Londonist explains: This lovely short film shows what life was like in Wimbledon in 1951. Made by Wimbledon Cine Club, it has recently been digitised by London's Screen Archives (LSA). Over 12 or so minutes it covers what happens when you put out the bins and where your waste water goes as well as the provision of more bucolic amenities such as Wimbledon Common and Cannizaro Park ("a close rival to Kew Gardens" — but is it actually pictured in the film? LSA aren't sure). Local sports facilities get a look in too, with tennis courts (outside of those in ...
Hooray! Just 2 weeks to go and its all over bar the counting and shouting. Here in Gateshead the postal votes arrived today so we did a local election knock up this evening of supporters, soft Cons, soft Labour and Ukippers. Those who had indicated some kind of UKIP leaning in the past were quite interesting. They now seem to be plumping for us locally and UKIP nationally. Just as interesting was
@nick_clegg @LibDems on @TheLastLeg #TheLastLeg has won my vote, sorry @natalieben @TheGreenParty you just mess up too many times. — Mark (@MCW_1988) April 23, 2015 Of course what Nick Clegg should have done is his special dance:
The Psychiatry SHO has been through the different parties' manifesto commitments on mental health and comes to this conclusion: It doesn't take a PhD in politics to work out that the Lib Dem manifesto is head and shoulders above the Conservatives and Labour in terms of engagement with the issue and promises made. They have ticked pretty much every one of the Mental Health Policy Group's boxes for suggested improvements. Again, there is an infatuation with wellbeing, but the groundwork done by Norman Lamb with his Crisis Care Concordat has gone some way to engendering trust in the party when ...
I have been horrified to find that Labour controlled Durham County Council has left empty a 5,250 square foot unit which it is leasing at a rental of £62,760 a year until 2019. The building was vacated by the Youth Offending Team in February 2014 and has since lain idle, with the meter still running for the unsuspecting council-tax payer. The simple fact is that if a concerned resident had not contacted me about this, neither I nor anyone else outside the council would have had any inkling of it. The worry is that this particular example of waste is ...
I only had a look at the nominated candidates for my ward yesterday. Last time there were two Liberal Democrats elected. This time there are three candidates for two seats. One is an ex Liberal Democrat, who is now standing as an independent. She is also my neighbour and I won't have any hesitation in [...]
From the Harborough Mail: Residents are being invited to a public meeting next month to hear more about the £500,000 renovation of the River Welland in Market Harborough. The stretch of the river through Harborough has been greatly improved over the past two years through a £500,000 project headed by the Welland Rivers Trust. The trust is holding its final community open evening at The Angel Hotel in High Street, from 7pm to 9pm on Wednesday, May 6. The trust wants to hear people's opinions about the project and its design team will present some brief displays on wildlife and ...
Unfortunately, the parliamentary hustings organised by the Forest Hill Society and the Sydenham Society organised for Friday 24th April has been cancelled. The reasons for cancellation are given here. Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate for Lewisham West & Penge, Alex Feakes, said: "I am disappointed that the hustings has been cancelled, as I think it is [...]
The Office for National Statistics reports: Latest figures from the Crime Survey for England and Wales (CSEW) showed that, for the offences it covers, there were an estimated 6.9 million incidents of crime against households and resident adults (aged 16 and over) in England and Wales. This is a 7% decrease compared with the previous year's survey, and the lowest estimate since the CSEW began in 1981. The CSEW covers a broad range of victim based crimes and includes crimes which do not come to the attention of the police. The important point to note about the Crime Survey data ...
Lib Dems Believe Wordle 35 Freedom - the environment
People tell us. Daily. They say to us. You're all the same. You don't tell the truth. There's no point to politics. It doesn't change anything. We can't trust any of you. Well we have to change all that. Reconnect. Or politics will have no future. And we start by restoring a sense of idealism to politics. Saying why we, Liberal Democrats, are different. Explaining that our principles are different. And that those principles matter. At the heart of our philosophy is liberty. A wholehearted commitment to freedom. These are my values. Your values too. Liberty, freedom of the individual. ...
BBC News reports: An east London mayor has been removed from office and a poll declared void after he was found guilty of electoral fraud. An Election Commissioner concluded Tower Hamlets mayor Lutfur Rahman breached election rules and must vacate his post immediately.You can read Richard Mawrey's full judgment on Trial by Jeory. In 2010 Rahman was chosen to be the Labour candidate for mayor of Tower Hamlets, but was deselected shortly afterwards amid concerns about the selection process and his alleged links with extremist groups. In November 2010 he stood against the official Labour candidate as an independent and ...
Two weeks to go until the election, and possibly the most interesting news in British politics today isn't about the general election, but instead the position of Mayor of Tower Hamlets. If you haven't heard, Lutfur Rahman has had his election in 2014 declared null and void because of his use of corrupt and illegal practices, which means there'll be a new election to fill the now-vacant post on June 11th in which he's banned from standing as a candidate. There were all sorts of odd things happening in Tower Hamlets during last year's elections, and it seems that shining ...
Welcome to another of the unsung heroes of the 2015 general election; this time it's Sylvia Emmott. [IMG: Tim Farron and Sylvia Emmott] As Tim Farron says of Sylvia: Sylvia Emmott is one of those people that every local party has. A person who is civic minded, community spirited and dedicated, Sylvia is a party stalwart. She is someone who doesn't want headlines, but works in the background rolling up her sleeves and getting stuck in. She is to me, the best of Kendal. She is a former maths teacher and deputy head at Queen Katherine School and she has ...
Support for remaining in the EU ahead by 10% three months in a row (highest ever) – http://t.co/4KmZK0VSgs pic.twitter.com/6vUrt9bW0J — YouGov (@YouGov) April 22, 2015 In fact, the best circumstances for winning a referendum are when: There's a public lead for an 'in' vote, even without an 'if there is a renegotiation' caveat (which always leads to a big swing in favour of 'in'). The Conservative Party has a leader who will campaign for an 'in' vote. The economy is growing (as support for 'in' and prosperity are linked). When the referendum is called with the support of, rather than ...
Here's the new film from the Liberal Democrats:
The Mayor of Tower Hamlets has been found guilty of corrupt electoral practices and removed from office. There is a 200 page judgement which outlines in detail the allegations against him which range from personation to the old offence of "undue spiritual influence." There is a section on that latter offence which goes through the history of it being used in Ireland against the undue spiritual influence of the Catholic church in the 19th century. The judgement also goes through the history of toxic Labour factionalism in the borough which is an eye-opening read to say the least. The judgement ...
Thu 23rd
15:29
I ranked every film and TV series in the Marvel Cinematic Universe because I'm that cool
As my way of celebrating the impending release of Avengers: Age of Ultron, here's my personal ranking of the ten films and three TV series that form the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) so far. 13. Iron Man 2 (2010) Pros: The first film to move beyond hinting at a broader universe and start fleshing it [...]
The uncertainties of fighting an election in a period of austerity were brought home to roost today when the Institute of Fiscal Studies published its assessment of the manifestos for each party. The problem is of course is how do politicians offer enticements to voters to cast their ballot the 'right way' whilst at the same time facing up to the reality of more years of cuts and fiscal retrenchment? According to the BBC the IFS have concluded that four of the major parties have not provided "anything like full details" on plans to cut the deficit. However, they added ...
Pugh Warns Tory Regional Pay Plot Will Hit North West Teachers and Nurses John Pugh, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Southport, warns teachers and nurses in the North West will be paid nearly £1,200-a-year less under Conservatives plans to introduce local public sector pay rates if governing alone. John Pugh led the Lib Dems in blocking Conservative attempts to smash uniform national pay rates for state workers - and would do it again. Dozens of Conservative MPs and candidates want salaries of public sectors workers in the North West cut in a bid to make them fall in line with ...
Willie Rennie's campaign theme today was all about the support Lib Dems offer families. Note the impressive absence of the awful phrase "hard-working families" from any of his utterances. He also had his son, 11 year old Stephen, with him as he and Alan Reid visited a nursery in Argyll and Bute as part of a Take your child to work day. Here are the pair setting off from home: It's a family affair on the #GE15 campaign trail this morning! Stephen looking forward to helping Alan Reid in A&B. pic.twitter.com/5etY45gzn2 — Willie Rennie (@willie_rennie) April 23, 2015 And once ...
In its analysis of the parties spending plans, the Institute for Fiscal Studies reported that the Liberal Democrats are the most transparent. It also said that the Conservatives give a "misleading impression" while Labour give "disappointingly little" information on borrowing and do not provide enough funding for the NHS. The report states that the Liberal Democrats have been more transparent than the other parties about their overall fiscal plans for the next parliament, in particular setting these out in some detail up to 2017-18. It also highlights how we would cut borrowing more quickly than Labour and keep our economy ...
After posting this on Facebook, the best caption suggestion came from Simon Oliver: "No no no, I said diverse! I wanted a diverse group of supporters in the background!" [IMG: Nick Clegg with a diver in the background]
All party leaders (apart from Nigel Farage) were invited to submit a short video to NUS for their recent conference. Given the Greens supposed popularity among students, it was, shall we say, surprising that they didn't put one in. Nick Clegg's did not shy away from the issue of tuition fees, but he did point out how much less people would be paying per month than under the old system, giving them more money at the time when they needed it most, when they were starting out on their working lives. He went on to talk about 3 issues which ...
I'm not a parent and I haven't seen the inside of a school in over a decade. However I have long held views on our education system and believe that it needs a completely different approach. I wrote about it last year in a piece entitled, It is time for the Lib Dems to be truly radical on education and back in 2010, one of my very first articles on this here blog was on education – My rambles on education. The long and short of it is I believe education is too rigid and too much a 'one size ...
In a post last June I made a ten point summary of Christian Wolmar's arguments against HS2, the proposed High Speed Rail Link between London and the North. Interestingly this is the third most looked at post on Keynesian Liberal, after "Scottish Independence Referendum " (I suspect the astonishing number of "hits" was a freak) and "An Airy Fairy Measure" (I suspect the title is misunderstood: it's actually about David Cameron's inadequate proposals for assessing our level of happiness) Last month the House of Lords issued a report which was also highly critical of the HS2 proposal. You can see ...
There are a few things that bind students, stay at home parents, the unemployed and those who work from home. One of those is that at 10AM on BBC1, more often than not you'll see two excitable faces shows us around three homes that have been sold at auction. Homes Under The Hammer has been steered through the choppy waters on daytime TV successfully by just two on-screen presenters since 2003 (although for one series there was an alternative set of presenters, Jasmine Birtles and Marc Woodward) but apart from that one season, it has been the job of Lucy ...
Today (Thursday 23rd), our friends at Lib Dem HQ announced a "Carer's Bonus" proposal to recognise the massive contribution that unpaid carers make to the care and welfare of individuals across the country. It is accompanied by a template press release that local campaigners can use to publicise the policy in local media. The press [...]
Disability manifesto / King's FundStronger Economy. Fairer Society. Opportunity for EveryoneDisability manifestoA £150m package for Britain's 6.5 million carers is being announced by the Liberal Democrats today as part of our Disability Manifesto.The package will help carers across Britain who support their loved ones who are older, disabled or seriously ill.Around one in every eight adults provide unpaid care for family and friends. Under the Liberal Democrats these carers will receive a £250 grant to ease the cost of looking after family members who require support for 35 hours or more each week over a 12 month period.In addition, the ...
David Cameron has today promised public money to fund a Stadium for Cornwall. Speaking to Tamsin Melville on BBC Radio Cornwall, he said: "If it takes some extra money, I'd make that money available" On the one hand this is a pretty blatant election bribe. Neither Mr Cameron nor anyone else in the Conservative Party has said anything like this before. Yet he happens to be able to come up with this very specific commitment during a visit to West Cornwall. Hmm. On the other hand, where does this leave North Cornwall Conservative candidate Scott Mann? Scott famously resigned 'on ...
Thu 23rd
11:55
Liberal Democrat Newswire #62 is out: 5 things you may have missed about the Lib Dem manifesto
[IMG: Liberal Democrat Newswire logo] Liberal Democrat Newswire #62 came out on Monday. You can also read it below, but if you'd like the convenience of getting it direct by email in future, just sign up here. It's free! Since it came out, three of the stories have moved on a little: Welcome to the 62nd edition of Liberal Democrat Newswire, rounding up some of the Lib Dem-related election news you may have missed in the last week. Statistic of the week: 73.4% – that is the new record high level for the employment rate, reached in the latest figures ...
If you want a chance to quiz the candidates standing in North Cornwall in the general election, there will be a hustings event at Central Methodist Church in Launceston next Tuesday- 28th April at 7pm Tweet
The anger surrounding the appointment of 'Skeptical Environmentalist' Bjorn Lomborg to a university post in Australia gives us a great opportunity to discuss academic intolerance Alice Dreger's new book, Galileo's Middle Finger: Heretics, Activists, and the Search for Justice in Science, tells the stories of various academics whose work is perceived to be politically threatening to one group or another and then as a consequence experience vicious personal and professional attacks. In each of the cases, when Dreger explored the controversy, she found that the claims made to impeach the researchers - such as that their research was fabricated or ...
S [IMG: Caron and Shirley] hirley Williams has written to the Times (£) to highlight that the SNP has not been as successful in government as it would like people to believe. She highlights failures on student debt, class sizes, the NHS and, importantly for anyone of a liberal mindset, its many failings on civil liberties.Here's her letter: The election campaign in the United Kingdom has been seriously impoverished by the absence of any detailed analysis south of the border of the SNP's record in government. Today the Scottish NHS is in crisis, with targets for cancer treatments not being ...
With the postal votes arriving this week, we've been out delivering letters and leaflets to those whose voting papers are now dropping through letter boxes. For the past 4 days, I've built up quite a sun tan in Ryton, Whickham, Sunniside and Dunston. In the picture above are letters and Focuses for my constituents in Whickham South and Sunniside. Apart from one patch on Fellside Park which I
A major Policy announcement from our Manifesto is the Carer's Bonus, to help those who care for family members who are older, disabled or seriously ill. The annual payment would be a boost to an army of unsung heroes who work tirelessly to care for their friends and relatives. This policy is part of a £150m package to help make the lives of Britain's 6.5 million carers that bit easier. It forms part of our Disability Manifesto published today. [IMG: carers] The measures include: A new Carer's Passport to allow unpaid carers certain privileges, that could include free hospital parking, ...
[IMG: Manifesto for Disabled People] Nick Clegg launches the party's Manifesto for Disabled People today. In the foreword, he writes: Liberal Democrats believe that no matter who you are, where you come from and what your circumstances, you should not be denied the opportunity to fulfil your potential. It is essential to break down the unfair divisions in our society, yet disabled people in Britain today still face significant barriers to getting on and living happy, independent lives. Providing opportunity for everyone is the test of a liberal society. In Coalition Government, I am proud of the important progress Liberal ...
Today is April 23, a date of some significance. It is St George's Day. It is Shakespeare's birthday and deathday. It is a number of other people's birthdays too (many happy returns, Andrew!). It is also the day that Rupert Brooke died, exactly a century ago, in 1915. We could argue about his significance now, and I have done in my short ebook about his death, Rupert Brooke: England's last Patriot. There will certainly be people who dismiss him as twee, mixed up or naive, or all three. But he was, in a small way, a pioneer. He articulated a ...
High-wire act for Lib Dem candidate - go @KellyMarieLD! (tags: ) David Cameron goes on Radio 1, gets mauled by a group of young people (tags: ) Right to privacy 'could be meaningless in 10 years under Tory and Labour plans' (tags: ) Please select a dark Lord (tags: ) [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
I despair. My ambition was to do a weekly survey of important political issues relevant to this election. But after the economy and the NHS there seems to be little actual argument over policies. Housing and immigration do feature prominently in local hustings. But education, the EU, political reform: nobody seems interested. Instead the election news is dominated by Scotland. So that's what I'll cover this week. The proximate cause of the fuss is the rise of the SNP. This surge was first evident in 2011 when they secured a majority in the Scottish Parliament, in spite of its proportional ...
[IMG: Nick Clegg on the Last Leg 8] After the triumph of his first appearance on The Last Leg in January, Nick Clegg returns to the sofa tonight. It's a risk, for sure. Can he repeat the success of the last time when Twitter was full of praise for his sense of fun and natural manner? Remember when he persuaded Alex Brooker to vote by comparing it to a visit to Nando's? As I wrote at the time: Well, people liked him because he was natural and funny and entirely himself. No other political leader in Britain could have come ...
Nick Clegg made this pledge a couple of days ago:- It was followed by this from PCS trade union leader Mark Serwotka:- As a public sector worker I think Mark Serwotka has his tactics wrong here. Instead of attacking Clegg he should have used the welcome opportunity that Clegg has provided, by bringing public sector pay into the election campaign, to challenge the other party leaders to match or better Clegg's pledge. To go Clegg bashing may appeal to a socialist audience but gaining a pay rise for public sector workers who have had their pay held down ...
John Pugh, having helped scupper Tory plans to introduce lower pay in the NW, backs a plan to ensure public sector pay rises. 'This is the minimum that is acceptable' Pugh told Southport electors. Workers across the public sector have made enough sacrifices. You have done your bit to help get the country back on track. That's why the Liberal Democrats believe it is time to end the era of pay restraint. Under our plans, we will give all public sector workers - from teachers and nurses to social workers and police officers - pay rises that at least keep ...
Yesterday, the story of the moment was an allegation that Grant Shapps has been doctoring various Wikipedia pages; those of other Tory MPs he's not all that find of, i.e. most of them, apparently. Shapps vigorously denies any involvement and says he's the victim of a smear campaign. But on the story goes. Mostly because, hey, what the hell else are the political media going to talk about for the next couple of weeks? Labour announced some policies a little while back and even made mugs to commemorate them. One of pledges was a very Yvette Cooper-esque one to get ...
To go with the Lib Dem 2015 general election manifesto, here is the party's manifesto for the local council elections happening on the same day: Download this document
[IMG: nusconference] It's NUS Conference week, which in my time as a student meant it was the time of year when thousands of students (accompanied by the contestants in the Britain's Most Obscure Trotskyite Sect competition) descended on Blackpool for a week of increasingly bitter political debate, badly organised elections, heavy drinking, the making and breaking of friendships, and the cultivation of a ridiculously over-inflated sense of self-importance. Nowadays it's all different, as it takes place in Liverpool (even NUS doesn't rate Blackpool as a conference destination any more). To mark Conference, NUS tweeted out an infographic with a bunch ...
I love local radio and love Radio Shropshire. It's my station of choice. It's more than that - it's a friend. And it has the highest local audience of all local BBC stations. TV and national radio get successful by creating celebrities. The sort of people you'd take a selfie with. Local radio is different. [...]
[IMG: JS61471186] The Liverpool Echo has the story – see link above.
The Liberal Democrats have announced a 'Five Point Plan' for teachers and parents The front page of the Lib Dem manifesto states our commitment on education, to protect education funding from nursery to 19. The Liberal Democrats are the only party to guarantee the protection of per pupil funding in real terms over the next five years. The Liberal Democrat five point commitment for teachers and parents will: - Provide an additional £2.5bn of funding for 2-19yr-olds by 2020; protecting per pupil education spending in real terms over the next parliament and increasing the education budget as a whole. - ...
Conservative Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt should apologise for his inflammatory comments on cross-border healthcare last year, Welsh Lib Dem candidate Jane Dodds has said. During a row over the NHS in October 2014, Welsh Liberal Democrat Leader Kirsty Williams wrote to Mr Hunt over comments regarding the number of people from Wales using health facilities in England, which she said had made many people in mid Wales feel unwelcome at English hospitals. Mr Hunt did not bother to respond to the letter. The Health Secretary yesterday visited Newtown to discuss the issue of cross-border healthcare with local campaigners. Jane Dodds, ...
On Monday, the first of the East Renfrewshire hustings took place at St. Ninian's High School, organised by Eastwood Ecumenical Peace & Justice Forum. One of the issues that was raised was the question of the renewal or non-renewal of the UK's Vanguard submarines, the vessels that carry Britain's Trident nuclear warheads and which are based on the Firth of Clyde. A lot of people have strong views on nuclear weapons. Some think it is inherently immoral to possess, let alone use them, while others think they are vital to our national security. This creates an unhelpful impasse, where there ...
A bit of light relief from the election campaign. Politicians are viewed by some as having snouts in troughs. Pinkie, one of my goats, yesterday demonstrated this with a bucket. She was of course stealing the other goats' food. Or so she thought. Sadly for her, the bucket was empty.
