"When he became leader of the Opposition, Corbyn was an unknown, even to his own side. Really, he was not of the Labour Party at all. He's hardly followed the Labour whip, he disagreed with large amounts of what the party did when last in government, and he's spent most of his time surrounded by a small coterie of like-minded outsiders." Jay Elwes on the takeover of Labour by a strange tribe. Gordon Lishman writes writes about an economics motion the Social Liberal Forum will be submitting to the Liberal Democrat Conference. You will find a good podcast about Labour's ...
Embed from Getty Images Paddy Ashdown and Jo Cox, the Labour MP for Batley and Spen, have written a joint letter to David Cameron calling on him to involve the RAF in getting aid to the starving inhabitants of the of Madaya in Syria. The letter begins: The images and stories from besieged Madaya in Syria are truly shocking. According to reports, in the past month alone 31 civilians have died in Madaya as a result of starvation or attempted escape, while the UN estimates that 400,000 remain besieged across the country. We find it astonishing that so little has ...
[IMG: Tim Farron Social Liberal Forum conference Jul 19 2014 Photo by Paul Walter] Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron has said 'hope always wins out' after news that the Electoral Commission has removed the British National Party (BNP) from its register of political parties. The decent and fair minded British public have stood up against the BNP and all they stand for – intolerance, hatred and an organisation that worked to stoke fear wherever they could. Britain is a little better off today because of this news, but we should always be mindful that the just because the BNP have ...
Well that's 2015 done then! But what sort of year was it on the local political scene, were you entertained or disappointed? Here's some of the main things I spotted and took not of over the last 12 months: January 2015 The year did not start well for Peterborough City Council, with the news that they'd [...]
Today I went to Sintra for the first time for 40 years, taking the train from the Rossio station in Lisbon, itself totally transformed from how it looked in the 1970s. The journey itself was different, too, as modern apartment blocks have taken over much of the previous scrubland and only a few of the [...]
Current Watership Down, by Richard Adams Travelling Light, by Tove Jansson Relative Dementias, by Mark Michalowski Ms. Marvel Volume 2: Generation Why, by G. Willow Wilson Wylding Hall, by Elizabeth Hand Last books finished Saga vol 5, by Brian Vaughan and Fiona Staples Zodiac ed Jacqueline Rayner Jews vs Aliens, eds Lavie Tidhar and Rebecca Levene A Day In Deep Freeze, by Lisa Shapter Rupert Wong: Cannibal Chef, by Cassandra Khaw The Philosopher Kings, by Jo Walton Last week's audios The Yes Men, by Simon Guerrier The Forsaken, by Justin Richards The Black Hole, by Simon Guerrier Next books Dry ...
The Electoral Commission has today (8 January) removed the British National Party (BNP) from its register of political parties in Great Britain for failing to confirm their registration details with the Commission – a legal requirement that must be submitted annually... Now that the party has been removed from the register, BNP candidates cannot, at present, use the party's name, descriptions or emblems on the ballot paper at elections. The party can, however, submit an application to re-register at any time and their name, descriptions and emblems are protected under PPERA for two years to prevent other parties using them. ...
This was the first of 29 anthologies of stories featuring the first eight Doctors published by Big Finish between 2002 and 2009. This takes the dubious proposition that astrology as developed on Earth might somehow be relevant to Gallifrey, and asks twelve writers to write stories based on signs of the Zodiac. The results are variable; the one that particularly grabbed me was Ian Potter's Third Doctor / Brigadier / Liz Shaw story "Still Lives", though I did not really see its relevance to the sign of the Crab which it supposedly represents. Also noted for one of my other ...
Latest in the excellent and entertaining series by Vaughan and Staples, though I feel a bit less enthused than by some previous volumes - most of the fun characters have now been introduced, some have been removed from the scene, and there is a bit of shuffling the pieces around the story board to get them into the right place. It will probably get one of my Hugo nominations, but probably not my vote.
[IMG: laura kuenssberg] Following Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday and the on air resignation of Shadow Foreign Minister Stephen Doughty, renewed accusations are doing the rounds claiming BBC bias. One of the most shared blogs I've seen regarding this accusation uses a now deleted post by Andrew Alexander to illustrate how the Daily Politics was 'not reporting news, it's making it'. But this is once again people misunderstanding, and showing contempt for, the role political journalism has in a healthy democracy. The role of political journalism has been developing and changing for years and it's only a recent development that ...
[IMG: DSCF0032] Dear Tim Yesterday you were campaigning in Faraday, my old ward in inner city Southwark. Way back in the 90s I was councillor for Faraday for eight years. Councillors' expenses were meagre at that point and it took many thousands of pounds to win and keep that ward. My two ward colleagues and I dipped into our own pockets many a time. I can say without any shadow of a doubt that I could not have afforded to be a councillor had I had a family to provide for at that time. When I was selected as a ...
Liberal Democrat Health Spokesman Norman Lamb, has called for a Cabinet Office inquiry into reports that the Department of Health toughened up the language in a letter from Professor Sir Bruce Keogh to the BMA. According to the Independent: We now know that there was, indeed, collusion between Sir Bruce and the Department of Health during the drafting of the letter, from a series of emails obtained through a Freedom of Information request. In one, addressed to Sir Bruce, an unidentified civil servant wrote: "I have woven the points from my email earlier this morning into your letter." Norman said ...
[IMG: Cllr Richard Kemp has been selected as the Lib Dem Mayoral Candidate for Liverpool] Our friend and colleague (not to mention long-time ALDC member!) Cllr Richard Kemp has been selected as the Liberal Democrat candidate for Liverpool's 2016 Mayoral election. It's great to see him on the ballot and we will all be wishing him the best of luck and the greatest success. Here is the story from the [...]
In Liberal Democrat Newswire #74, I highlighted Edinburgh Western as a key seat for the Liberal Democrats in May's Scottish Parliament elections: Absent a rusty political tidal wave generator being found in the basement of party HQ, the way back for the Liberal Democrats is via well-organised and effective grassroots campaigning, building from the bottom up as during previous revivals. But can the party really rediscover its local campaigning edge and will that be enough? A great test of that is to be found in the Scottish Parliament constituency of Edinburgh Western (previously West). The Westminster seat of Edinburgh West ...
[IMG: st Andrews flag saltire scotland Some rights reserved by Fulla T] Welcome to our weekly roundup of what the Scottish Liberal Democrats, led by Willie Rennie, have been getting up to. This week, our MSPs have had a lot to say about flooding, policing, A & E waiting times "Thatcherite" testing, housing and fostering. Oh, and Alex Cole-Hamilton and Edinburgh West are back, bigger than ever. The week started with Willie Rennie's Bright, green, liberal vision: I will set out why four key liberal values should be at the heart of the next parliamentary session. They are that every ...
Over the past couple of years Ealing Council has made a number of decisions which have or will harm some of our most vulnerable residents. Although Ealing Council has been given less money by the government in the past few years it still has control over hundreds of millions of pounds. So, Ealing Council can still make choices to protect both our front line services and those that are used by the disabled, those who are ill, the elderly and others in need. Gary Malcolm being handed a Council Tax Support petition Initially there were closures of a number of ...
Fri 8th
13:24
Our Great Coalition Failure: The Ministry of Justice is More Liberal Under a Tory Majority Governmen...
We have always prided ourselves on being the protectors of liberty. The very first sentence of the preamble to the Lib Dem constitution refers to the 'fundamental' value of liberty. The MoJ should have been the department where we made the biggest impact. However, we failed to do so and because of that failure we [...]
[IMG: Birthday cake. CC0 Public Domain] Yesterday was Nick Clegg's birthday and he penned a piece for the Evening Standard on cake, and Europe: You can't have your cake and eat it (even on your birthday). Of course you can't. In normal life, no one expects you can have the full rights to a tennis club or a fitness gym without paying your dues and signing up to the rules. Only children believe it's reasonable to eat the cake and custard but insist that someone else eats their Brussels sprouts. Yet this is exactly what the anti-EU campaigners claim: that ...
This isn't the first time it has happened. Going to pick up somebody at Edinburgh airport, check their live arrivals webpage, see that the flight is marked "scheduled" and then, upon entering the International Arrivals area, check the board only to find the flight has been delayed by some time: certainly more than enough to bump up the car parking charges into the next tier or even two. These circumstances happened to me, again, last night and I've had enough. The last time I tweeted Edinburgh airport (@EDI_airport) but probably because I was rather impolite in my tone (I believe ...
Fake news stories, Sunnis and Shias, and cultural appropriation. 10 Ways to Spot a Fake News Story by Melanie Radzicki McManus (How Stuff Works) #1 the story makes you angry Ever read a story that really made you mad? Or that seemed to tap into your innermost insecurity or fear? Maybe it was about the government [...]
It's a real pity that the same tired old tactics are sometimes still being used to fight a class war. If you are inclined to accept without question the article Blue Foxes Red Green and Gold Star (Phil Aisthorpe, Liberal Democrat Voice 6th Jan) you would understandably have a very negative view of the Countryside Alliance and of hunting too. Look a little harder and a very different picture emerges. The Alliance is attacked for ignoring rural communities during the devastating flooding over the Christmas period. Leaving the hunting issue to one side for the moment, anyone looking at the ...
I got involved in some Facebook exchanges yesterday with folks who are concerned about the state of Maghull's Shopping Centre, at least that part of it to the north of Westway. [IMG: This is Maghull Square in the 1970's but the buildings are as was. It was built in the 1960's. Photographer unknown.] This is Maghull Square in the 1970's but the buildings are as was. It was built in the 1960's. Photographer unknown. It certainly is run down now despite the valiant efforts of the Maghull in Bloom volunteers whom Sheila and I have recently joined. I suppose there ...
[IMG: David Owen in 1981. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons] Way back in the 1980s, one day I was watching David Owen being interviewed on television, responding to probing questions about the then Alliance's opinion polls ratings by saying there was a seasonal pattern in third party support in the polls. Frustration with the lack of detail in his answers or knowledge in the interviewer's follow-up questions turned into a fruitless search for sources for answering the question afterwards. Which then led to the birth of my collection of opinion poll data, which with the kind help of many others ...
[IMG: table-21] Last year, I mentioned the new ESRC-funded project to research political party members and their beliefs. There's now some interesting data from it available on the LSE politics blog. This data is looking at how party members and strong supporters place themselves on a left-right scale, how they see their party and others, but also how their opinions show up on an objective analysis of the left-right positioning. There's lots of interesting information in there, including that the biggest mismatch in perceived views and actual views is from UKIP voters, who think they're much more right-wing than they ...
There is a part-time opportunity available to work with our friends at the Yorkshire and The Humber Liberal Democrats. The role is a regional communications and administration role. Full details and application process via W4MP: http://www.w4mpjobs.org/JobDetails.aspx?jobid=54129 The closing date is 26th January.
[IMG: Norman Lamb Liverpool Spring conference Spring 2015 Photo by Liberal Democrats] Liberal Democrat Health Spokesperson Norman Lamb has launched proposals for an unprecedented cross party commission into health and social care. Norman has received the backing from Conservative and Labour former Health Secretaries Stephen Dorrell and Alan Milburn and believes that only a full non-partisan commission will properly deal with the crisis in health and social care. They have been joined in this call by NHS survival – a group of 8,000 doctors, patients and and members of the public committed to ensuring the survival of the health service. ...
You can read all the articles that have caught my attention this week here: https://delicious.com/stephentall Below are a selection... Might Grayling end up leading the Conservative Leave campaign? | Conservative Home If so, great news for Remain > "Might Grayling end up leading the Conservative Leave campaign?" | ConHome http://bit.ly/1OLXLN1 An inquiry into the delayed publication or withholding of government research Edu researchers: @senseaboutsci is asking if u know abt any (inconvenient) publicly-funded research being held back: http://bit.ly/1S3rLV1 Stumbling and Mumbling: What's the point of Labour's right? Chris Dillow's 5 ideas for the centre-left are sensible. And all already Lib ...
Fri 8th
09:05
Edinburgh West Lib Dems re-open their office ahead of Alex Cole-Hamilton's bid to gain Holyrood seat
[IMG: Edinburgh West office] This is the site greeting commuters and pedestrians in one of Edinburgh's main roads. In June, sadly, the office which had been rented by Mike Crockart and the local party closed down. This week, it's re-opened, four months ahead of the Scottish Parliament elections in May where Alex Cole-Hamilton hopes to regain the seat. He also heads the Lothian list. Since May, newly elected MP Michelle Thomson, who is yet to open a constituency office, has had to resign the SNP whip after a police investigation started into her company's property deals. Edinburgh Western's sitting SNP ...
The A432 Badminton Road through Old Sodbury - a busy link for traffic from Yate and Chipping Sodbury to the M4 and the A46, will be closed for three days in January. The length of road from Catchpot Lane to the A46 at the Cross Hands, will be closed for roadworks to install a new drainage system. Please allow extra time to follow the signed diversions.There will be access to local businesses from the Chipping Sodbury direction, but there will be special signs telling HGVs to turn round much earlier.
Sensible words from Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron: The idea that this is an attack on British values is ridiculous and depressing. Rather than seeking to divide people by their faith, we should see this sensible move as an opportunity for inclusion and understanding. This is a simple rescheduling of some school exams, recognising that a number of students will be observing Ramadan. As a person of faith myself I think it is entirely reasonable and decent to consider such things when planning exam dates.
Fri 8th
08:10
If Labour take an anti-NATO position, it will be even worse for them electorally than an anti-Triden...
Post-reshuffle and post-Maria Eagle, Corbyn has no one involved in Labour's defence review that he doesn't see eye to eye with. The near-future of Labour defence policy now rests on the shoulders of Emily Thornberry and Ken Livingstone. If that didn't give you a little shudder, nothing will. The latter of those two illustrious figures appeared on the Daily Politics yesterday to declare that Labour's position on NATO was fair game: "My main view on this is it doesn't really matter whether you are in Nato or not terribly much because the cold war is over. If we are to ...
The Telegraph reports that the United Nations have warned that new UK Government snooping laws could result in "mass surveillance" and have a "chilling effect" in freedom of expression. They believe that a lack of appropriate oversight and transparency will "ultimately stifle fundamental freedoms". The paper says that the UN submission expressed concern that there was insufficient safeguards in the measures to protect journalistic sources or prevent inappropriate bulk collection of data or restrictions on encryption: It read: "We are especially concerned that, if adopted in its present form, the draft bill could result in surveillance, including mass surveillance that ...
It's not just Chris Gayle: sport media's Blokesworld mindset needs to change [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
Liberal Democrats today helped to persuade Redcar and Cleveland Council to adopt a policy of putting new housing on "brownfield" sites rather than on green fields.At today's meeting of the council, Lib Dem Councillor Chris Abbott seconded an opposition motion committing the Labour-led authority to prioritising future residential development on previously developed brownfield land.The motion, proposed by Cllr Philip Thomson (Con, Saltburn), was passed with support from all sides of the council.Councillor Abbott, who represents Newcomen Ward in Redcar, said:"If additional housing is needed in the borough, then the council's policy should be to build on brownfield sites, which have ...
Experience Nottinghamshire tells the story of the city's statue of Robin Hood: On 24th July 1952, the statue of Robin Hood was unveiled by the Duchess of Portland on the Robin Hood Lawn, beneath Nottingham Castle, in the remains of the moat on Castle Road. It was a warm sunny day when 500 schoolchildren sat attentively on the grass in the special VIP enclosure to watch the ceremony of the statue and its complementary plaques and sculptures being revealed to the public, accompanied by a fanfare from the band of the Royal Lincolnshire Regiment. Cast in eight pieces of half-inch ...
