I have just come back from a wonderful evening at Midsomer Norton Library; a performance of mining songs and stories from the North Somerset mining communities put together by Dave Byrne and The Guss And Crook Band. The success of the evening was down to the mixture of entertainment and education mixed in with some [...]

Posted by werahobhouse on Wera's Blog

There's been an almighty row in the Coalition over which Private Members Bills should be given government support. The Liberal Democrats had offered the Tories a deal which would have given both Bob Neill's Bill on an EU referendum and Andrew George's on the Bedroom Tax a fair chance of becoming law. In return, the Tories offered the Liberal Democrats a deal under which only the EU Bill would have stood a chance. We'd have been daft to have let them away with it. Deputy Leader Sir Malcolm Bruce said: There is a completely reasonable deal on the table here ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice

[IMG: twenty-is-plenty-pic] Much of Warley ward is now covered by a large 20mph zone. Speaking to residents the 20mph zone gets a mixed response. Some people think it has reduced average speeds, and others think 20mph is too slow over such a large area. Personally as a father of a young boy I think the increased safety slower traffic creates is worth going a bit more slowly for. One thing everyone seems to agree on is that the Police are not enforcing the speed limit. This is despite assurance given by Labour's Police and Crime Commissioner Mark Burns-Williamson giving assurances ...

Posted by jamesbaker on Cllr James BakerCllr James Baker

The Lib Dems and Tories have come to blows after the removal of Colonel Bob Neill's EU Bill. It's all got a bit tense in the Coalition. Colonel Bob Neill's EU Bill was removed from the agenda for debate, and now both sides of the government are blaming each other very publicly. A full blown [...]

Posted by Charlotte Henry on Charlotte Henry

[IMG: MentalHealth] For too long there has been a stigma attached to mental health conditions. The lack of support, and help available to people suffering means that many people suffer and miss out on opportunities. The stigma attached to mental health means that many people take too long before they try and seek help and support from others, and then when they do so often there simply aren't enough services in place. At our conference this year we announced that we want to guarantee equal care and waiting times for mental health as for physical health, by increasing spending on ...

Posted by jamesbaker on Cllr James BakerCllr James Baker

Market Harborough's Old Grammar School has emerged from its wrappings with a different colour scheme to the black-and-white one we are used to. The new colours grow on me a little more every time I see them and I have worked out which building the Old Grammar School now reminds me of. I have worked it out. It is the gatehouse at Stokesay Castle in Shropshire.

Posted by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England

[IMG: poppy_selling] This week I joined volunteers helping the Royal British Legion with a stall at ASDA. The store has been fantastic giving us the space in the foyer, and stalls to sell poppies, pin badges, car stickers etc. You can donate to the British Legion online if you are able to help support them in the work they do. There are a number of services on remembrance Sunday across Calderdale. Two in the vicinity of Warley ward residents are Warley Town - Starting at 10.30am the service will start in the village before processing down to St John the ...

Posted by jamesbaker on Cllr James BakerCllr James Baker

[IMG: UKIP logo] Today in the House of Lords, Baroness Joan Walmsley and the Lib Dems secured an agreement from the Government on the Serious Crime Bill, for a major consultation on introducing rules on mandatory reporting of child abuse. At our recent Federal Conference in Glasgow, Liberal Democrats passed new Party policy in support of requiring those who work with children and vulnerable adults to be required by law to report to the authorities if they have any suspicion that abuse is taking place. However, despite debates on this and other amendments concerning child abuse being debates, Ukip members ...

Posted by Sal Brinton on Liberal Democrat Voice

[IMG: Police helmet] There's a by-election taking place this Thursday. The good news is the Lib Dems won't lose our deposit. The reason is the party's not standing a candidate in the Police and Crime Commissioner by-election triggered by the resignation of former PCC Shaun Wright over the Rotherham child sex abuse scandal. Here's how Nick Clegg explained the decision to the BBC earlier this month: "Having looked at the experiment of police and crime commissioners, I've come to the conclusion it just doesn't work. Look what happened in South Yorkshire and across the whole of the north of England; ...

Posted by Stephen Tall on Liberal Democrat Voice

[IMG: Climbing beans production in Rwanda - Photo by CIAT] The BBC reports on this year's Gender Gap report published by the World Economic Forum which shows a narrowing of the gender gap worldwide. 105 companies have seen improvements and Rwanda becomes African's newest entry, right in at number 7, reflective of its high female participation in the workforce. It's worth having a look at the full report and individual country profiles. Rwanda finds itself a whole 19 places above the UK. While we do ok on health and education, our gender pay gap is not good, and neither is ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice
YouGov

From today's letters page in The Independent: [IMG: Mark Pack's letter in The Independent] Ed Balls and Andrew Adonis complain that "Only a quarter of projects in the Government's infrastructure pipeline are in the North-east, North-west or Yorkshire and the Humber". However, what they don't mention is that these areas also contain around a quarter of the country's population. So if Labour thinks those parts of the country should get a larger share of infrastructure than their share of the population, perhaps they could also tell us which areas they want to see getting a disproportionately lower share? Yours, Mark ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

East Dulwich bus services are to get a further boost from this Saturday 1 November, as Transport for London (TfL) increases the frequency of the 185. Hooray. Route 185 is operated by Go-Ahead for TfL between Lewisham and Victoria Station via East Dulwich. It will see its frequency increased from a bus every 10 minutes to one every eight minutes Monday to Saturday. This follows feedback from local residents and councillors.This is great news. What other bus routes need changing? The 185 buses are also knackered so hopefully TfL will also listen to that feedback from Cllr Rosie Shimell and ...

Posted by James Barber on James BarberJames Barber

[IMG: Sarah Teather] Sarah Teather has been writing for the Guardian about the problems created by so-called revenge eviction and how her Private Members' Bill will tackle it. First she gave an example of what had happened to her constituent: Last month, a constituent came to my office in Brent for help after his landlord served him with an eviction notice. His property suffered from severe cold and a cockroach infestation, and following an environmental health inspection the council served notice on the landlord to fix the property. The landlord decided to evict my constituent and re-let the flat instead. ...

Posted by NewsHound on Liberal Democrat Voice

To most decent people the very idea that anyone would have to explain why it is unacceptable to say Africans "don't know what a toilet is" appears farcical. But in the world of Liberal Democrats [...]

Posted by Lester Holloway on

Somewhat optimistic number of seats for Ukip's public meeting in Sheffield to hear deputy leader Paul Nuttall speak pic.twitter.com/G8QEOjWMCz — Helen Pidd (@helenpidd) October 23, 2014

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

So it appears that Marvel have (finally) found their Dr Strange: Benedict Cumberbatch. Here are my thoughts: 1. Marvel and Cumberbatch seem like a good fit He's a good enough actor to do most things but he does some to like somewhat fantastical and over the top roles. And while I haven't read any of the [...]

Posted by Mark Mills on Matter Of Facts

[IMG: 387 004 blog] Hertfordshire Liberal Democrat Leader, Cllr Stephen Giles-Medhurst (Central Watford and Oxhey), has challenged Conservative run Herts County Council over their proposed bus cuts to 58 routes, to cancel their plans after almost no one supported them. Just 30 residents out of 4548 that responded to the official council consultation entitled "Have your say on a more efficient bus service for Hertfordshire" supported the idea.In addition several thousands of petition signatures have already been presented to the county council opposing the cuts. It is estimated some 10,000 residents have now signed petitions across the county being collected ...

Posted by Nick Hollinghurst on Nick Hollinghurst

Russell Brand and our political culture – Chris Dillow argues that Brand gets publicity because our political culture as a whole is anti-intellectual. Stuffing envelopes and getting stuffed – An alternative take on Liberal Democrat campaigning by Alex Harrowell. The Laborers Who Keep Dick Pics and Beheadings Out of Your Facebook Feed – the realities of social media content monitoring. The world will change around 2020 – According to David Boyle, that's what the trends are pointing to. Profs Bumble Into Big Legal Trouble After Election Experiment Goes Way Wrong – This is why conducting political science research is hard. ...

Posted by Nick on What You Can Get Away With

Votes vs Values: Did we get it right in 2010? Where to strike the balance in 2015? These were the questions asked at an excellent fringe organised by the SLF and Liberator at party conference. It was a crowded panel, but to my mind one speaker stood out: Neal Lawson. Neal comes from a Labour background, though the organisation he leads, Compass, has recently opened up to welcome others from different parties. Neal spoke about how he wished Labour had engaged more in coalition negotiations in 2010, how he hoped Labour would get this right in 2015, and how, given ...

Posted by AVSL on A Very Social Liberal

[IMG: rally kirsty williams 1] Welsh Liberal Democrat leader Kirsty Williams emailed Welsh members yesterday about the current war of words over the Welsh NHS. Here's what she said: You will have probably seen the stream of articles about the Welsh NHS in the Daily Mail last week. I wanted to write to you to put a few things straight. There is no stronger critic of Labour's catastrophic failings on health in Wales than me. Their appalling record speaks for itself: A&E targets that have never been met, the worst ambulance response times in the UK, the scandal of children ...

Posted by The Voice on Liberal Democrat Voice
eUKhost

Vivacity is an independent, not-for-profit organisation with charitable status. They basically manage the most popular culture and leisure facilities, that a few years ago Peterborough City Council did. Given that the Tory controlled City Council are now looking to make extra savings, we thought that it would be worth asking Kevin Tighe, CEO of Vivacity [...]

Posted by Cllr Darren Fower on Cllr Darren Fower

"Begin at the beginning," the King said, very gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then stop." ― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland This is the third in the series about Alice and her experience of 'the system' and covers her life as a young adult. The first article, introducing the series, can be found here and the second, on her adoption and early life, here. It's taken me longer to write this article than I thought it would. Things have been difficult for Alice over the past few months; she has recently come off her meds ...

Posted by Anonymous Liberal Democrat on Liberal Democrat Voice

Here's a rather nice graph showing how the many Indo-European and Uralic languages link to each other: The main revelation for me is that Pashto and Kurdish are related to Farsi rather than (respectively) Arabic or Indian languages.Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: Language, language families

Posted by Mark Mills on Matter Of Facts

[IMG: HS2 Distortion 200] The government's support for HS2, despite the critics, has shown a real commitment to providing adequate transport links to sustain the UK and give the North a fairer deal as we head into the mid 21st century. We Lib Dems can be proud to be some of the program's most enthusiastic and enduring supporters. The announcement yesterday of the creation of Transport for the North and the government's support for HS3 means the North may finally start to enjoy the benefits of transport investment equivalent to the £17bn Crossrail and £6bn Thameslink that benefit London.This is ...

Posted by Mike Green on Liberal Democrat Voice

Last week I went to the combined North and South Wokingham SDL Forum, and heard about the recently submitted outline planning application for 760 (-ish) houses at Matthews Green Farm. Having looked in great detail at it today, I have sent a long (well, very long actually) email to the planning officer asking some questions about the interrelationship between the proposed development and the proposed northern distributor road. I don't usually blog about the details of what I have asked planning officers, but in this case I am going to, because I know the line of the distributor road and ...

Posted by Prue Bray on Prue Bray

[IMG: Saltaire] Johann Lamont, the Scottish Labour leader, quit her post over the weekend. Glasgow Central MP Anas Sarwar has taken over temporarily as interim leader, while Labour rolls out a quick timetable for her permanent replacement - the new leader will be announced on December 13th. Only problem with the tight table is that nominations for the post close this Friday - and thus far, no one seems to want the job. Many have ruled themselves out already, most of them being the people who would have been considered the leading lights for the leadership position. Kezia Dugdale, the ...

Posted by Nick on nicktyrone.com

On 16th October, Andrew Waller clinched an empthatic victory in the Westfield by-election to regain his seat on York council. Andrew's campaign agent Steve Galloway, has written the following review of their impressive win and how they went about gaining the seat from Labour. Background Thursday 5th May 2011 was as bad an election [...]

#182597274 / gettyimages.com Once again, that boring little thing called evidence undermines the standard political rhetoric which infuses housing policy. Yes, house prices are going up. But rents? They're continuing to fall in real terms as last week's latest figures show: Private rental prices paid by tenants in Great Britain rose by 1.0% in the 12 months to September 2014. And what was inflation in the year to September? The Consumer Prices Index - which measures changes in the prices of goods and services purchased by households, has increased by 1.2% in the year to September 2014. This is not ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

[IMG: Liberal democrats] The Liberal Democrat pre-manifesto contains a lot of good policy, but what it is lacking is the narrative to pull all those disparate threads into a single powerful statement of who we are and what we stand for. In this short article I will try to provide just that. In 2010 we knew that our country was headed for a major recession and that the first priority of the Liberal Democrats in government must be to protect the poorest whilst setting in place the infrastructure necessary in order to re-grow our economy, close the deficit and start ...

Posted by Iain Donaldson on Liberal Democrat Voice

The Witchfinder General has written about the case of Re D. I do think the case is important as it highlights the fact that one jurisdiction believes that a child should be cared for by its mother and the other jurisdiction believes that a child should be adopted or at least subject to a special guardianship. The mother is the same, the children are about a year or so apart. The underlying

Posted by John Hemming on John Hemming's Web Log

[IMG: Libby - Some rghts reserved by David Spender] If you are a party member, you might want to head to this thread on our Members' Forum to see the lists of people standing for the Party Committees. The ballot will be conducted predominantly online with links to the ballot being provided to those Conference Representatives for whom the party has an email address. Those emails will be being despatched imminently. Ballots will be sent by post to those for whom there is no email address. The postie will be struggling up the path with the weight of the mailing ...

Posted by The Voice on Liberal Democrat Voice

[IMG: Featured on Liberal Democrat Voice]

Posted on birkdale focus

The Lib Dem £100 million investment in repairing our roads and pavements started in Gatley with Styal Road – a busy local road in very poor condition. The road is mostly in Stockport but a small section passes through Manchester and at first Manchester Council said they would not pay to have their part repaired. They then relented, allowing us to get the whole length of road repaired. The repairs are now completed and the lines have been repainted. The section from Church Road to South Drive has been fully resurfaced, then down to Yew Tree Drive the sections needing ...

G4S and Serco pay out £100,000 in youth restraint claims Actually felt sick after reading that (tags: ) New study strengthens link between Arctic sea-ice loss and extreme winters (tags: ) Heart attack victim was told he must attend work scheme... as he lay in hospital (tags: ) On Friday, Anita Sarkeesian called out "toxic masculinity" on Twitter. Here's what happened next. (tags: ) Why is David Cameron afraid to call himself a feminist? Possibly he's more bothered about giving publicity to a labour think tank. IMHO it's a shame the Fawcett Soc don't work more broadly across the political ...

[IMG: AlistairCarmichael] Yesterday, Alistair Carmichael spoke at a Green investment conference in Edinburgh, which is, of course, home to the Green Investment Bank. It was a strong pitch to persuade those attending that the Liberal Democrats are delivering in Government on policies that are both green and pro-businesss. Here are some of the highlights. Being Scotland, there had to be a bit on the constitution, though, and the Smith Commission: Last week Lord Smith convened the first cross-party talks to reach agreement on the proposals for further devolution to Scotland. His terms of reference make clear that the recommendations will ...

Posted by The Voice on Liberal Democrat Voice

#455638600 / gettyimages.com The set of final polls from each pollster published in three recent UK referendum campaigns (Welsh devolution 2011, electoral reform 2011 and Scottish independence 2014) consistently under-estimated the actual vote for the 'status quo' option. Taking the data from the excellent Elections in Wales site, we get: Welsh devolution referendum 2011: poll average 31% no, actual 37% no. Electoral reform (AV) 2011: poll average 64% no, actual 68% no. Scottish independence 2014: 53% no, actual 55% no. So far, this pattern has not embarrassed pollsters are they've got the winner right and in some cases the final ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack
Tue 28th
08:30

Friends of Balgay AGM

The 2014 Annual General Meeting of the Friends of Balgay will take place on Saturday 1st November at 2pm at the Mills Observatory. Guest speaker is Jim Crumley, who will give a talk on eagles - both golden and sea - and the evolving relationship between them. Refreshments will be provided and all are welcome!

Tue 28th
07:54

Maghull Signal Box

Have a look at this Flickr posting – see link above – from an Ex British Railways Signalman. There is some useful historical detail about the box with the photo. It bit the dust in 1994 during my year as Mayor of Maghull. I am sad to say that the campaign to save it, which I backed, failed but I was presented with the last track plan used in the box (see photo below) and it presently rests in a storeroom of Maghull Town Hall. [IMG: 8179430928_6f89e16131_z] And below is a sad shot of the box being demolished from ...

Posted by Cllr. Tony Robertson on Sefton FocusSefton Focus

Tim Farron MP writes [IMG: Lib Dem MP Tim Farron ] Lib Dem MP Tim Farron Faced with an upcoming vote on whether to support the European Arrest Warrant or oppose it to flirt with UKIP, their party has split down the middle. I support the European Arrest Warrant because to me the decision is clear: The European Arrest Warrant: Deports suspected murderers – Yes Deports suspected fraudsters – Yes Deports suspected thieves – Yes Deports suspected rapists – Yes Appeases UKIP – NO If the Tories are confused about a decision like this then it shows they can't be ...

Posted by Cllr. Tony Robertson on Sefton FocusSefton Focus

Nurseries, childminders and other early years providers in Southwark and Lambeth are respectively set for a £354,088 and £483,977 cash injection to help three and four-year-olds from disadvantaged families. Children from low income families have often fallen behind more well off classmates before they even start school.​ But from April 2015, the Early Years Pupil Premium - which has been backed by groups like Barnados, 4Children and the Child Poverty Action Group - ​will mean extra money to make sure every child gets a fair start. I am delighted by this investment in our part of south London to help ...

Posted by James Barber on James BarberJames Barber

Something is happening out there. A fascinating article in Der Spiegel (thanks, Joe) puts the issue pretty succinctly: the global economy is no longer working as it should - the banks are not lending, and the huge sums to be distributed by them simply shore up their balance sheets, the middle classes struggle increasingly to make ends meet - and the poor just struggle. While the handful of those at the top - less than one per cent actually - extract more and more. It is the Piketty thesis and it is accepted increasingly in every area of modern life, ...

Posted by David Boyle on The Real Blog

For once the Home Secretary, Theresa May makes a valid point when she warns her cabinet colleagues and Tory backbenchers that we need to stay signed up to the European Arrest warrant if we are to retain Britain's right to keep foreigners accused of terrorism, murder, rape and paedophilia behind bars. The Times reports that the home secretary has warned that a failure to back Britain's membership of the European arrest warrant (EAW) system raises a risk that the country would have to release more than 500 people from jail and the prospect that EU partners such as Ireland would ...

Posted by Peter Black on Peter Black