1. She was christened 'Patsy Sloots'. 2. She is the grandmother of the formee England rugby international Toby Flood. I was not sure of this second fact when I blogged about Flood's theatrical grandfathers, because Albert Lieven married four times. But it is indeed the case. Shaw was a popular actress for some years after World War II and had a prominent role in one of the best films of the era: Ealing's drama It Always Rains on Sunday. But hers was a sad life. After Lieven she married the American actor Bonar Colleano and was hit hard by his ...
This morning I voted for the Liberal Democrats' London Assembly list candidates electronically, a process that took less than five minutes in toto. That's partly because I know all but one of the candidates personally and had given the matter some consideration once I knew who was on the shortlist. But the main reason it [...]
I hope it does not go ahead.I wrote that in September 2013 when news broke that Tesco was planning a large out-of-town store in Market Harborough. Today came news that the supermarket chain has abandoned those plans. For the reasons outlined in that earlier post, I am glad. Market Harborough is still growing. Ignore all those plaints about Nimbys: the council and residents can do little about it. So there may come a time soon when the town's population is too big to be served by its centre. I get the impression that has happened in both Northampton and Cambridge, ...
After ten years away, we are back to the world of The Curse of Chalion, Paladin of Souls and The Hallowed Hunt, with a novella about a young lordling who, much to his dismay, is possessed by a demon with several mature female personalities. It retreads some ground from the earlier books, but is basically a good read from one of my favourite writers, and will probably get one of my Best Novella nominations for next year's Hugos.
William Wallace (Are you sure about this? Ed.) Laura McInerney overhears someone learning to be homeless. "We need to pitch our appeal for a liberal left distinct from whatever package Labour develops, and rebuild local bases which we can capture on another anti-Conservative swing. And we should not kid ourselves that many within the current Labour Party will welcome our efforts." William Wallace anticipates another phase of the 'future of the left' debate, whether or not Jeremy Corbyn emerges as Labour's next leader. Talking of which, Nick Cohen says: "Like many from the Left's dark corners, Corbyn ... is concerned ...
Fri 28th
18:19
URGENT: Deadline for notifying LDHQ of Conference reps extended till Monday 7th September at midday
There was great disappointment amongst Liberal Youth members earlier this month as they were told that they were too late to notify LDHQ of their voting reps for Federal Conference. The organisation has a number of voting places allocated to it as young people often find it difficult to get elected to the role by a local party as they are more likely to move home or to be away studying half the year. They had not been aware of the original deadline and over the past few days have made their case to LDHQ and the Federal Conference Committee. ...
On my Spotify I am enjoying the Major General's Song from Pirates of Penzance – it still amazes me that anyone can sing all those words in such a short space of time. Tom Lehrer took Gilbert and Sullivan's tune from that song and turned it into the "The Elements", which Daniel Radcliffe uses as his amazing party piece. So here's the Major General, Tom Lehrer and Daniel Radcliffe in that order:
A couple of my friends are in Blackpool at the moment – and having a fantastic time, by the sounds of it. However, they had a bit of an unpleasant experience at the Mecca bingo hall there last night. Here's ... Continue reading →
The Blyth Quayside Family Fun Day ( aka Lifeboat Open Day ) will be on Saturday 5th September from 11am until (about ) 4:30pm If you are on Facebook, please follow Blyth RNLI on :- https://www.facebook.com/blythlifeboat
[IMG: reading railway station by paul walter] There's been a lot of discussion about train safety for women over the last week or so after the publication of statistics showing a rise in the number of sexual assaults on trains and the subsequent controversy over Jeremy Corbyn's comments on women-only carriages. However, we haven't heard much from some very influential organisations about this, surprisingly so. The train companies themselves have been pretty silent. Liberal Democrats Kelly-Marie Blundell and Daisy Cooper took to Twitter to question them. The voice missing in debate on #womenonlycarriages is the rail companies – what are ...
Fri 28th
15:56A chance to help shape Liberal Democrat policy on social security, privacy and sex work
The party's Federal Policy Committee is looking for party members to take part in policy working groups to develop policy in three particular areas: Social security Security and privacy Sex work From an email sent to party members today: The Federal Policy Committee is setting up a number of policy working groups designed to develop our Party's policies for the 2015-2020 Parliament. The Committee would like to invite any member to apply for the following groups: Social security - The group will look at what effects changes to the welfare state announced by the Conservative Government are likely to have, ...
[IMG: CK Memorial] On Monday, a memorial service for Charles Kennedy was held in Dingwall, a town just north of Inverness which he had represented for the whole of his 32 years as an MP. His constituency office was there and over 300 people turned out to remember their former MP. Music was provided by the Kiltearn Fiddlers, who played a piece of music written by Charles' father when he was elected to Parliament in 1983. The Dingwall Gaelic Choir also sang. It was quite an emotional occasion, but also full of laughter as memories of Charles were shared. Scottish ...
Last night, with old chum Keith, I went to an event at the former Neptune Theatre in Liverpool which has been renamed the Epstein. The event was organised as part of the Liverpool International Music Festival around that great American songwriter/producer Lamont Dozier who was one third of the Holland – Dozier – Holland team which wrote so many Motown hits. [IMG: lamont_inside] It took the form of a live edition of the Radio 2 programme The Record Producers with Steve Levine , Richard Allinson. The unique event consisted of an in depth analysis and discussion of rare archive and ...
As the line up for BBC's Strictly Come Dancing is complete and we all start to look forward to the launch show, 'The Library in the Gardens' (Botanic Gardens) is putting on our own 'Strictly Taster' in a FREE session on Saturday, 5th September in Churchtown. Come on down - you know you want to!
Fri 28th
13:24Tim Farron MP writes...Liberal Democrats will work with anyone to reform the House of Lords
Yesterday, the news was released about the latest tranche of appointments to the House of Lords. The Liberal Democrat peers will be, as they always have been, constructive and conscientious. Where we agree with the government we shall support them and where we don't we shall work to amend and if needs be oppose.But the principle matters, Liberal Democrat peers were appointed on the pledge 'to abolish themselves'. The Lords has two functions. To revise and to hold the Executive to account. The first it does quite well, the second it does not at all - how can it when, ...
Much of the media when listing Knights and Dames puts all the Knights first, even though D comes before K in the alphabet. Putting more senior posts first is the norm of course, but unless you think men are more important than women, why break with the alphabet for Dames and Knights?
The ever-energetic and helpful Dr Mark Pack, formerly of this parish, has published a very informative update this morning on the subject of the election of our Greater London Authority candidates: Emails with online voting links have been landing in London Lib Dem members' inboxes over the last day. The emails are from onlinevoting@electoralreform.co.uk with the subject line The Liberal Democrats - London Mayoral Candidate and London List Candidates Selection Ballots 2015. If you think you should have received one but haven't, it's worth checking for emails matching this description in your spam folder. The deadline for voting online is ...
[IMG: London panorama featuring City Hall. Image courtesy of FreeImages.] Emails with online voting links have been landing in London Lib Dem members' inboxes over the last day. The emails are from onlinevoting@electoralreform.co.uk with the subject line The Liberal Democrats – London Mayoral Candidate and London List Candidates Selection Ballots 2015. If you think you should have received one but haven't, it's worth checking for emails matching this description in your spam folder. Members for whom the party doesn't have a working email address are receiving voting information through the post and all London members, regardless of how long they ...
The Cheadle Muslim Association wish to extend a warm invitation to you for their forthcoming "Funday Extravaganza and Open Day" to be held on Saturday 5th September 2015. The mosque is situated at 377 Wilmslow Rd, Heald Green, Cheadle SK8 3NP. The event now in its eleventh year is an opportunity for local communities to come together, to develop bonds of community cohesion and mutual understanding, to find out more about us and what the CMA do, to raise money for a worthy local charity and most importantly for everyone to have a great time! The event will take place ...
The post Steal Like An Artist appeared first on James Taylor.
Fri 28th
09:42Conference Countdown 2015: Human Rights motion - we need to be careful not to throw the baby out wit...
As many will know, there is an excellent motion on Human Rights to be debated at the Bournemouth conference. I have set out the motion below this post. I have one query which readers may be to help me with. It pertains to this section of the motion: Conference resolves to: ...C. Retain the Human Rights Act unless it is replaced with a Bill of Rights which incorporates and builds on those rights set out in the ECHR and oppose any attempts by Conservatives to introduce a British Bill of Rights which does not achieve this. Where it says "Retain ...
You can read all the articles that have caught my attention this week here: https://delicious.com/stephentall Below are a selection... How will Labour top losing the election? By losing its own leadership contest | Frankie Boyle | Comment is free | The Guardian The "commentary" in Frankie Boyle's Labour piece is risible. Jokes are good, tho. Which is what you'd kinda expect... http://bit.ly/1VgwVfg Jeremy Corbyn is a stranger to responsibility and will loathe leadership – Comment – Voices – The Independent Andy McSmith on Corbyn as leader: "That nice life, hanging out in the company of people who agree with him, ...
The Western Mail reports on new analysis which concludes that electrifying the Great Western main line is costing four times more per mile than Britain's last major electrification project. They say that Network Rail's original estimate of £625m for electrifying the Great Western line from London to Cardiff, Oxford and Newbury was in line with the cost of the East Coast main line electrification in the late 1980s. However, the Great Western cost has now increased to £1.7bn and there are suggestions it could rise even further. Writing in the latest issue of the magazine, Roger Ford, technical editor of ...
[IMG: Lib Dem peers on Twitter] Freshly updated following the latest batch of ennoblements, here's a Twitter list of all the Liberal Democrat peers who have taken to the social network which has over 15 million active users* in the UK: https://twitter.com/markpack/lists/libdem-peers As ever, do let me know if you spot any additions or corrections – thank you. * Twitter = 15m active users. Lib Dem general election votes = 2.4m. Worth remembering if you wonder if "real people" use Twitter.
I blogged a few weeks ago that the Liberal Democrats should boycott the peerage meery-go-round and refuse to nominate any more members of the bloated House of Lords. I was disappointed, but not surprised therefore to read yesterday that my advice had been ignored and that Nick Clegg had decided to add eleven more Liberal Democrats to our group there. I have no problem with any of those individuals, however I do feel that as a party it is difficult to defend a position whereby we are nominating more new peers than we have MPs and where we are advocating ...
Yesterday, the government announced the dissolution list. This told us all the people who are becoming peers, getting knighthoods or other royal honours as a result of the general election coming and going. This is a ritual that accompanies every general election post-mortem. As a result of the list being published, another great British ritual took place yesterday: articles from across the political spectrum denouncing the House of Lords as a horrible institution. From the Right, we had Leo McKinstry's "The House of Lords is full of sycophants, failed MPs, and political donors. Sack them all". From the Left, we ...
The City Council has again this year planted various prominent sites - including the Dudhope roundabout (below) - with wildflower - and this provides for lovely splashes of colour across the city :
The bankruptcy filings of a Virginia coal firm have shone a rare light on a murky web of corporate attacks on climate science. Have you heard about the group that has abused open records laws to harass climate scientists across the United States? The organization behind North Carolina's ban on using sea level science to inform coastal planning? The institution attacking renewable energy targets? These are all activities of the innocuous-sounding Energy and Environment Legal Institute (E&E Legal). Now, thanks to a scoop by Lee Fang at The Intercept, we now know where some of their money comes from. Continue ...
Boris Johnson is one of the "eight million foreigners living in the UK" the Torygraph is shrieking about today There's a growing movement calling for Yorkshire to unify and go it alone Why I don't share 'Missing' people posts on twitter The LAB leadership election results WILL be broken down by how the different categories have voted Voters won't trust Labour to run the country after 'chaotic' leadership contest, admits MP Personally, having seen how they run both my local council and the country, I wouldn't trust them to run a whelk stall, but I realise others disagree, or nobody ...
Time flies. It has been eight years since I last blogged about reforming the second chamber. On that time-scale I am a mere Johnny-come-lately. Reform of the Lords has been going on for over the past century, or rather talk over it. In real terms, very little has been achieved. The main problem with the issue is that those at the top of politics really enjoy wielding the power of patronage. As David Cameron has made clear by today's announcement of the appointment of forty five new peers, mainly Conservatives, the main purpose of the Lords is rewarding those loyal ...
Fri 28th
07:27
Carol Vorderman reveals she is 'covered in burns' after she fell off her treadmill while running nak...
Headline of the Day goes to the Independent.
