How do we solve the problem of the suburbs? Urbanist Jeff Speck shows how we can free ourselves from dependence on the car - which he calls "a gas-belching, time-wasting, life-threatening prosthetic device" - by making our cities more walkable and more pleasant for more people.
Thu 1st
21:02
Shropshire Council brings in New Year by pocketing cash intended for town and parish councils
How can you trust a public body Shropshire Council when it diverts cash meant for town and parish councils into its own coffers? That's what it did before Christmas when the cabinet approved a damaging proposal to retain government funds it was told to pass on to local councils. Ludlow Town Council, which is facing [...]
View image | gettyimages.com Writing in The Spectator, Toby Young says: This time last year, I wrote an article saying my main project in 2014 would be to unite the right. That is, I would start a political movement that would bring together Conservative and Ukip activists in a tactical voting alliance. We would select a few dozen battleground constituencies and campaign for whichever candidate was best placed to win in each seat, whether Ukip or Tory. The name for this movement was to be 'Country Before Party'... Both [Tory and Ukip] camps told me that they would do very ...
Read part 1, part 2 and part 3. October The month began with Liberal England being voted Liberal Democrat Blog of the Year. So powerful is the accompanying curse that I had to spend 13 hours at my mother's house the following day looking after her. She hurt her back in the summer, spent some time in hospital and has needed a lot of help ever since. But I managed to defy the curse and keep Liberal England going - though maybe with a bit less politics and more quirky videos and links to other people's articles. And certainly with ...
Best wishes to all those who take the time to read this blog, who interact and leave comments, who have and continue to be (whether intentionally or otherwise) an encouragement and ongoing support. Best wishes to those who take the time to understand rather than criticise. Best wishes to all who, whatever their political creed and philosophy, commit themselves to striving towards a better tomorrow. Best wishes to all who persevere - people who, when the pressure is on, are unafraid to stand and be counted. Best wishes to those who, whatever journey they are on, take the path less ...
Dear friend, Few pundits are prepared to call the outcome of the General Election, but another hung parliament is expected. While it looks likely that the current coalition government will limp on until May, Liberal Democrat campaigners should continue to hit the campaign trail in our nearest target seats, to emphasise our progressive achievements, and once finalised by the Federal Policy Committee, the social liberal parts of our manifesto. Norman Lamb's radical work on mental health policy deserves special mention. For Liberal Democrats, the General Election will undoubtedly be difficult. Over the past four and a half years, the Social ...
It is interesting to watch as the Westminster village turns its thoughts to what would happen in the event of an inconclusive result on May 7th. There is talk of a second election, of possible coalitions involving the Liberal Democrats, UKIP, the Scottish Nationalists and the Democratic Unionists - sorry Greens and Plaid Cymru, but there just aren't going to be enough of you to be decisive, I fear. I have, to some extent, written off the first election as leading to a hung Parliament. So, what might happen?Conservative/UKIP coalition - unlikely to get enough seats to form an administration, ...
Like a lot of people, I usually make a few resolutions at the beginning of the year, break them sooner rather than later, and then feel badly about it. And so, this year, no specific resolutions, no "I'll improve X by Y", just a general "try and be a little less useless this year". And it's not as if I'm particularly useless. I am, I think, reasonably competent at the things I do - I don't tend to attempt things that don't suit my skill set. But I could be better, a little more focussed, a little more disciplined, a ...
Campaign for 2015 General Election has begun and I will be campaigning to get Andrew George, LibDem, re-elected in the St Ives constituency. I think he has been a great constituency M.P and really does understand and stand up for local people. Those who follow the news will know this is a target seat for the Greens and the Conservatives. It is a straight race between Andrew and the Tory candidate and take it from me, the Tories will throw everything at this seat as getting it back to a Conservative one would make it more likely that they can ...
[IMG: Manual typewriter] I give you July 2013: In the wake of the US surveillance scandal revealed by the US whistleblower Edward Snowden, Russia is planning to adopt a foolproof means of avoiding global electronic snooping: by reverting to paper. The Federal Guard Service (FSO), a powerful body tasked with protecting Russia's highest-ranking officials, has recently put in an order for 20 Triumph Adler typewriters, the Izvestiya newspaper reported. Each typewriter creates a unique "handwriting", allowing its source to be traced, the report said. Followed by July 2014: German politicians are considering a return to using manual typewriters for sensitive ...
Thanks to ITV News, we have 2015's first Headline of the Day.
Last year was not only more of the same rubbish; it also contained more awfulness than usual. Yes, the ongoing rise of the puritans continues. Just in the last week we get the example of the vile Katie Hopkins tweeting something vile yet instead of everyone doing the British thing and shaking their heads disapprovingly, we have the police investigating her! Feminists, conservatives and "progressives" have continued their march against the advances made by sensible folk by supporting things like the recent BBFC changes. Freedom isn't just under threat, it is now on its last legs. The Coalition has failed ...
George Watson and The Unservile State deserve to be more than a footnote in history, argues Peter Sloman. Did The Times make Oswald Mosley its Man of the Year in 1934? No, explains Mark Pack. "It feels like Twitter is rather like Wikipedia as of a few years ago. Often a source of useful information but its information has to be treated with care before being trusted." Andy Boddington on his year as a rookie Shropshire councillor: "Ludlow will thrive if we accept we have to do more for ourselves. We must rely less on the unreliable administration in Shirehall. ...
HT: Ninja EconomicsFiled under: Uncategorized Tagged: Alcohol, Google, New Years day
Throughout the 12 days of Christmas, we're bringing you the 12 most-read posts on this site of 2014. Here's today's offering... Politics is losing people, especially young people - what do we do about it? – Andy Boddington | Tue 10th September 2013 This is not just a question of one generation being more interested in politics than those that came after it. A detailed look at the data shows three effects. Firstly, people across all age groups have become less politically aligned - again in the sense of "I'm a Tory" - and less interested in politics in recent ...
Nigel Farage: The Media's Self-Fulfilling Prophecy – Alex Andreou on how the media are now congratulating themselves for creating the rise of Farage and UKIP. Tied hand and foot: the sad and sorry saga of the rise of Britain's giant 'pubcos' – Interesting background on how the old system of tied pubs became the modern pubcos. The Uberfication of knowledge – What will the life of a writer be, when the whole world's a potential content farm? On nerd entitlement – Laurie Penny on why white male nerds really shouldn't claim that they don't benefit from privilege. Hell Yes, I'm ...
Thu 1st
12:55
Did The Times make Oswald Mosley Man of the Year in 1934? No, so who started the hoax? UPDATED
View image | gettyimages.com Following the news that The Times named Nigel Farage its man of the year 2014 for his impact on the news a myth went round on social media that 80 years earlier The Times had picked Oswald Mosley. Not only did The Times not do this (they didn't do such namings back then and a search of their archive for all mentions of Mosley in 1934 finds no story even remotely similar) nor was Mosley the Time magazine selection for that year which could perhaps have been a cause of confusion. It basically looks a claim ...
As someone who travels a huge amount, researching, lecturing and writing, I never lose the thrill of encountering new places and new peoples. But I've always been a bit mystified by travellers for whom the journey and the mode of transport themselves provide the adrenalin: round-the-world yachtsmen, balloonists and so on. But occasionally one such [...]
When did the first bar chart, encouraging tactical voting, appear on a political leaflet in the UK? Aside from the inherent interest in knowing this historical curiosity, it's an interesting question to ask because of what it says about how narrow the methodological approach is of the contemporary British political science community. Huge numbers of academic papers and other writings about tactical voting have come out from it, often heavily reliant on opinion poll research and deploying statistical techniques to tease insights out of the polling and election results. Those doing this are certainly aware of bar charts, and – ...
View image | gettyimages.com Here is Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader Willie Rennie's New Year Message in full: It's hard to imagine that this year could match last year. I suspect on the sporting front it will certainly be difficult. In politics, experts often underestimate the strong minds of voters to do what they want, rather than what those experts predict. After his two week long retirement, our former First Minister has posed the big test for the year ahead. Alex Salmond wants to use May's General Election to rerun the referendum he just lost. And he wants to secure independence ...
Here are the five posts on this blog that recorded the most hits between October and December 2014: Social housing transformations (27th Oct) The Universal Credit fiasco (30th Nov) Uncertain terrain: Issues and challenges facing housing associations (11th May 2013) Why is Owen Jones so annoying? (4th July 2013) Defining the challenge of UK housing policy (30th Oct) So during this quarter a couple of hardy perennials featured prominently again. The two posts published in 2013 featured in the top five for every quarter of 2014. As I noted the other day, it turns out that these two posts, perhaps ...
I only returned to proper regular blogging in July of this year, when I started my series of Conrad Russell and liberalism posts, but it's been a good year of blogging overall. I've got some attention since I've come back – I'm apparently the 7th most influential 'other' blog in the UK, though still not a political one according to Teads – and also picked up a nomination for Liberal Democrat Blog of the Year (which went to the much more deserving Jonathan Calder). Thanks to everyone who visited, read, commented, linked or otherwise interacted with the blog during 2014, ...
[IMG: rsz_the_gap_that_needs_filling] As 2015 dawns a simple request, let us please find a way to stop this nonsense at Ormskirk Station whereby the Liverpool – Ormskirk trains and Ormskirk – Preston trains meet buffer to buffer. 50 years after Beeching have we learned nothing? Preston and Liverpool are the obvious end Cities for this line, not the lovely market town of Ormskirk in the middle. The photo is amongst those on my Flickr site at:- www.flickr.com/photos/86659476@N07/
One of the most disgraceful votes in recent history at a LibDem conference was that in 2014 which voted against the construction of a second runway at Gatwick. From the most basic point of view the Gatwick runway is a London/SouthEast issue and frankly no conference delegate from branches beyond 70 miles form London should have been allowed a vote on this. It is all too easy for a delegate from York, Manchester or the Highlands to get on their high horse and vote against a desperately needed new runway at Gatwick on the basis that airports should be more ...
According to yesterday's Western Mail, Plaid Cymru's latest red herring is that because the UK Government has up to another nine years to recoup its costs on the Severn crossings after they return to public ownership, then that is what they intend to do. The Plaid Cymru Westminster Transport spokesman has told us that although the crossings are likely to revert to public ownership by 2018, the UK Government still have the right to recoup its costs up until 2027. He says that the UK Government is deliberately keeping its intentions hidden and needs to come clean on its plans ...
These are things I hope will happen in the coming year. They are arranged in no particular order - the numbers are arbitrary. It's all good. You will note a certain degree of optimism, at least from my perspective, in all of these predictions. It's why I'll add this caveat here: these aren't so much predictions as little wishes. How many of them come true will probably be the measure of what I think of 2015 in retrospect, when the time comes. 1. Nigel Farage not winning South Thanet in May It will be interesting to see what this does ...
How many of these 2014 picture stories can you identify from Local Focus for Sodbury, Yate and Dodington?
[IMG: Cllr_Joe_Anderson,_Leader,_Liverpool_City_Council.jpeg] The Liverpool Echo has the story – see link above. You can look at this both ways i.e. it yet again highlights the dysfunctional nature of Labour Party politics on Merseyside (fighting like ferrets in a sack), which is clearly the case, or that on this occasion the inability of our local leaders to get along with each other has this time worked to the advantage of the rest of us. Both perspective are probably correct. Of course as a Liberal I want as much power exercised as close to the people as possible but no way ...
And so we reach the mid-point of the year. Already bruised, battered, fraught and fretful and along comes a Tory-UKIP bunfight in the form of a by-election in Newark to cheer us up. Not. Stephen Tall pored over the results: It was another dire night, to cap a dire fortnight. We didn't just lose our deposit, we came sixth. Our vote collapsed. Four years ago, 10,246 Newark voters marked a 'X' beside the Lib Dem box. Yesterday, just 1,004 did so. In contrast to the Tories, not a single Lib Dem MP turned up to campaign. To be fair, they're ...
According to Google Analytics, these were the five posts offered in tribute that got the most readers for the last three months of 2014: 5) Lib Dem Voice got the presidential race badly wrong, and it raises questions about their surveys – And yet they still continue to headline their surveys with 'Lib Dem members think' 4) There's been at least one former Prime Minister in Parliament since 1756, but could that end next year? – If David Cameron stays as PM, and none of Brown, Major or Blair join the Lords, a 259 year-old tradition will end. 3) The ...
Idris Elba would make the perfect 007; anyone who thinks otherwise clearly hasn't watched any Bond films (tags: ) On Leelah Alcorn (tags: ) Jane Fae writes a very measured piece on Leelah Alcorn (tags: ) [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
I was elected as a Shropshire councillor on 13 March 2014. As the vote was counted, I was at the point of exhaustion. I needed sleep. I also needed to write a comment to be published in the Shropshire Star the next morning. It had been a very long election campaign. We started in January [...]
Following today's increase of the Severn Bridge tolls to £6.50, the Welsh Liberal Democrat MP for Cardiff Central, Jenny Willott MP, has reiterated her party's call for the tolls to be scrapped. From today (1 January), cars will have to pay £6.50 – up from the current £6.40 – while small goods vehicles and small buses face a 30p rise to £13.10, and heavy goods vehicles and buses will have to pay £19.60, up from £19.20. The Severn Crossings are currently managed by a private concessionaire. The concession will end when a revenue target collected from tolls is reached. Current ...
I am not sure how long it will stay there, but watch Brond while you can. It has its own Youtube channel. The extract here shows the most outrageous wink in television history.
View image | gettyimages.com 2015. It's here. Because of us, we've known exactly when the General Election would be since the Autumn of 2010. Taking away the ability of the Prime Minister to slot in an election at a politically expedient time is a good thing. Anyway, this year is going to bring its challenges, its tears, its tribulations and, we hope, its joys. And they will just start with the General Election in May. So, fellow Liberal Democrats take a breath, a few swigs of bubbly and enjoy today – for tomorrow and every other day until May 7th, ...
Wishing all my readers a happy new year.
