Writing for the Evening Standard, Nick Clegg says: Eight years ago, when I became leader of the Liberal Democrats, I used one of my first opportunities at Prime Minister's Questions to ask Gordon Brown about mental health services. The House of Commons chamber, usually a hostile wall of sound, became quiet. Afterwards, a number of MPs told me I was "brave" to raise the issue. We have come a long way in the few short years since then. It is no longer considered "brave" for a politician to talk about mental health. Indeed, there has been an unusual outbreak of ...
So, you're a political journalist trying to do your best to bring a flavour of First Minister's Questions to your adoring public. And then two of the participants get in on the act. Watch Colin Mackay try to keep Willie Rennie and Nicola Sturgeon under control. What happens when Nicola Sturgeon and Willie Rennie decide to hijack STV's Colin Mackay's Instant Take at Holyrood? https://t.co/Yy3JzyFTAy — STV News (@STVNews) March 3, 2016 Just a few minutes earlier, Willie and Nicola had had quite a testy exchange over the SNP's modest tinkering with the Council Tax. It didn't take them long ...
I want to play cricket on the green Ride my bike across the stream Cut myself and see my blood I want to come home all covered in mud The Who, I'm a Boy Schoolboy rugby appeals to this blog's prejudices, but the open letter from doctors and other health experts should not be dismissed: The majority of all injuries occur during contact or collision, such as the tackle and the scrum. These injuries which include fractures, ligamentous tears, dislocated shoulders, spinal injuries and head injuries can have short-term, life-long, and life-ending consequences for children."My impression is that rugby clubs ...
Mary Reid has been reading a report from the Manifesto Club on Public Space Protection Orders. It's not Bernie Sanders that Jerermy Corbyn resembles, but Donald Trump. Lance Parkin draws parallels between the woes of the Republicans and the Labour Party. "Our heritage, our history, our quirky collecting natures are being eroded and erased by the need to make financial savings, to economise, to pare down and re-shape." Tincture of Museum on the threat to our smaller museums. "All this promises well for Mile End, does it not? Think of all the comfortable and respectable suburbs of London, from Norwood ...
The new series of Stewart Lee's Comedy Vehicle starts at 10 this evening on BBC2. While we are waiting, here he is interviewing Alexei Sayle about Thatcher Stole My Trousers, the latter's second volume of memoirs . Something the two have in common is that, rather than flatter it like lesser left-wing comedians, they attack their audience's view of the world.
More educative entertainment from Tom Scott: In the Thames Estuary, near a town called Sheerness, a few dozen miles east of London, lies a World War 2 shipwreck that contains over 1,000 tonnes of unexploded bombs. Is it a risk to the area? Or is it just an interesting historical artifact? The trouble is, no-one's quite sure...
Embed from Getty Images I'm catching up on telly. Last night I watched the first episode of Simon Reeve's Greece series. It was a corker. You can see it on BBC iPlayer for a further 6 days. I'm quite a fan of Simon Reeve. He's evolved from being a sort of back-packing TV reporter into an intelligent and compassionate observer of the world. His programmes are part-light travelogue, part-incisive documentary. What made his first Greece show so good was his visit to Lesvos. We've all seen the news clips of refugees/asylum seekers/economic migrants coming ashore there. But Reeve's film was ...
Embed from Getty Images I'm catching up on telly. Last night I watched the first episode of Simon Reeve's Greece series. It was a corker. You can see it on BBC iPlayer for a further 6 days. I'm quite a fan of Simon Reeve. He's evolved from being a sort of back-packing TV reporter into an intelligent and compassionate observer of the world. His programmes are part-light travelogue, part-incisive documentary. What made his first Greece show so good was his visit to Lesvos. We've all seen the news clips of refugees/asylum seekers/economic migrants coming ashore there. But Reeve's film was ...
Thu 3rd
17:11
The Economist on the success of the Pupil Premium: "A pricey education policy looks like money well ...
Embed from Getty Images I've said before that I think the Pupil Premium – £2.5 billion of extra money given to schools to support children and young people from disadvantaged backgrounds — is one of the most progressive government policies of the last decade, an achievement of which the Lib Dems can be well proud. This week's Economist takes a look at it and gives the policy the thumbs-up: How to raise the attainment of children from poor backgrounds is now a focus for educators. Before the premium, 57% of school leaders said they aimed support at their most disadvantaged ...
In an earlier post I have applauded Scottish National Party leader Nicola Sturgeon for by far and away the most sensible and constructing economic policy in last year's General Election. Once again, amid the dreary claims and counter-claims of economic ruin or prosperity beyond compare bandied by the mainstream "outers" and "remainers" in England, M/s Sturgeon has hit the jackpot. In a speech on Monday she castigates David Cameron for running a "miserable , negative, fear-based" campaign in the referendum and pleads for a "positive and constructive case" for remaining in the EU, and in particular for the protection and ...
Nick Clegg has written about mental health in today's Evening Standard column. One story illustrates different attitudes to physical and mental health: A few years ago, I met a man called Robert at a mental health trust in Liverpool. He was in his sixties, well-dressed and with a neatly trimmed moustache that gave him something of the air of a Fifties provincial bank manager — not the image you normally associate with severe mental illness. He told me that a few years earlier he had been in hospital with a heart condition and, while he was there, he had been ...
An LGA report report released today shows that councils fear that the Conservative housing bill will see a sell off of homes that will not be replaced and a rocketing of homelessness in communities across Britain. The survey of local authorities, treated as a snapshot by the LGA laid out their concerns starkly. The key [...]
Yesterday in the House of Commons the Liberal Democrats demanded an urgent update on the military situation in Syria and the ability for MPs to hold the government to account. As part of the debate last year on military action in Syria, we said that we wanted to see regular updates to the House of Commons. The Prime Minister agreed to give quarterly statements. Three months on, it is time for David Cameron to stick to his promise. Parliamentary questions have uncovered the UK military airstrikes in Syria have totalled 43 targets in Syria in three months and 319 Daesh ...
You may have seen the road works going on in Rodford Way last week - these are the first stage of the road safety project that was consulted on recently. Most of the proposals put forward by your local Focus Team met with general agreement by local residents: 1. Abbotswood U-turn prohibition and splitter island (8 against, 47 in support) The island has now been installed. The proposed Traffic Regulation Order required for the prohibition signs will be advertised for potential implementation later in 2016. 2. Advisory 20mph speed limit for Abbotswood and Culverhill Schools (17 against, 36 in support) ...
Bang!: A History of Britain in the 1980s by Graham Stewart [IMG: bang] The '80s are suddenly back, at least for the Labour party which has regressed to them. I was two years old when they began, so I recall a fair amount, but through the inevitably unreliable and partial lens of a child. So I thought it was about time I revised what I had lived through. Graham Stewart's Bang!: A History of Britain in the 1980s is, overall*, an excellent guide. He's as comfortable writing about monetarism as he is about Madness, as informative about the SDP as ...
[IMG: Belinda BG at BBC] Dr Belinda Brooks-Gordon, who led on the development of our policy on sex work, was on the Today programme this morning debating whether managed zones for sex workers are effective. She cited huge amounts of evidence which suggests that they are. The retired police officer was pretty aggressive in the way he made his points and was really patronising to Belinda who has done so much academic research in this field. The police officer said that we should be looking to eliminate rather than enable sex work. Belinda cited how this makes life much more ...
Well after years of Labour supporters and hacks saying that the last Labour government had no responsibility for the financial crash it now seems that Labour's new Leader is fessing up to what his party did in government. For having the guts to say this is to Jeremy Corbyns's credit but you can see all his many right wing 'Red Tory' MP's spluttering away in disbelief! Of course, I am sure that Corbynomics would be a disaster in itself but at least he has made the Labour Party come out of its years denial and face up to its ...
When I first saw the Visiter headline I mistakenly thought it was associated with healthy eating. The reality is that it has nothing to do with healthy eating and sadly it is because of unacceptable behaviour from young people within the KFC shop in central Southport.
Back in December, the Local Tax Commission in Scotland published its report which looked at various ways of raising local taxes. Political parties were urged to bring forward their own proposals. Scottish Conference had a consultation on a well-researched and thorough document. An indicative vote at the end favoured a progressive, fair property and land based tax, which, if formally adopted, would replace our proposal for a local income tax. The basic principles that you would expect from a local tax is that it's fair, progressive and takes into account the ability to pay. I have to say I'm not ...
merseysidenorth.blogspot.co.uk/p/about-us.html The other day at a Maghull in Bloom meeting Ed, a local volunteer, told us about another Maghull volunteering project that he is involved with and a great project it is too. Ed's other volunteering group is called Merseyside North Volunteers who support the work of the environmental footpath/cycle path charity Sustrans. Sustrans, of course, are responsible for the Cheshire Lines Path which runs from Southport to Maghull and onwards into Liverpool as part of the Trans Pennine Trail. [IMG: This is the old Sefton & Maghull Station just prior to demolition in the early 1960's. A factory now ...
Interesting insight from Campaigns & Elections: For Trump, Twitter is a strategic weapon aimed straight at political reporters, commentators and talk show bookers. Every outrageous statement gives him a new round of media attention, and each wave of attention makes it even more imperative that reporters and pundits talk about him, lest they lose their own relevance. If President Obama mastered the connection between the web and organizing, Trump has exploited the connection between the Internet and mass media. Of course, if you are not a celebrity and not an American, the context for political use of Twitter is a ...
Why do planes still have ashtrays? Yes, I wondered about this too. (tags: travel ) Record fine for company behind 'staggering' 46 million nuisance calls Hooray! (tags: crime wankers ) Cameron's EU deal: the view from Brussels My friend Chris reflects. (tags: eu ukpolitics )
Adblocking is a 'modern-day protection racket', says culture secretary | Media | The Guardian Imagine if instead of ad-blocking he said "making a cup of tea while the ads are on" or "fast-forwarding the ads" The rise of American authoritarianism - Vox Long but interesting (& terrifying) article on the rise of Trump. Liberal England: Mirror alleges Tories exceeded spending limit in 9 Lib Dem seats Behold: the world's most patronising smartphone for women 'Orange is the New Black' Disney Princesses. Big Boo is fabulous :) Red from 'Orange is the New Black' meets her pint-sized twin OMG OMG OMG ...
Michael Fallon, the defence secretary, will today announce a £640 million investment in Scotland. It will be specifically around renewing Trident with an emphasis on how the Tories want to protect the thousands of jobs directly related to Trident and its renewal in Scotland – while Labour wants to scrap the deterrent altogether, a comparison Fallon is eager to make. "The GMB union understand that the Trident programme is going ahead. We are renewing these boats now, we're spending money on them and we're creating the skilled jobs in the Trident programme. "Now the only threat to that is Labour. ...
Hooray for Sir Simon Stevens, Head of NHS England, for putting into practice what I was proposing at last year's Party Conference! In my keynote speech I maintained that the NHS cannot tackle the country's current and future health problems by itself and we need a "whole government" approach. The Department of Health must be supported by policies from the Department of Communities and Local Government, the Department of Education, the Department of Transport, The Department of Culture, Media and Sport and, of course, local authorities, since it will not be able to tackle the increasing demand for healthcare by ...
It takes a peculiar form of arrogance to go on television and contradict your party leader and Prime Minister over an issue which he controls and you have little influence over, yet Welsh Conservative Leader Andrew R.T. Davies managed it last night. The BBC reports that Mr. Davies went onto The Wales Report and insisted that Wales will still get economic aid for its poorest areas even if Britain votes to leave the European Union. He gave this assurance despite the fact that David Cameron said he "can't be certain" the UK government would spend the same if we left ...
Last night, I attended the March meeting of Community Spirit - the community group for the "north" part of West End Ward, covering Tullideph, Pentland, Ancrum and the Cleghorn area. The meeting took place in the Mitchell Street Centre. There was a really informative and entertaining presentation by Anna Murray of Verdant Works about Verdant Works' High Mill project, the history of Dundee's jute trade and forthcoming events at Verdant Works. I updated residents about forthcoming roadworks in the area, external cyclical maintenance plans for sheltered housing in the area and parking issues and there was a good discussion about ...
Stagnant Power The Liberal Democrats is a party with a huge amount of internal democracy. However, that democracy is rarely held to account or challenged ,at all levels. Local parties stagnate, with the same small clique rotating the officer positions. One thing that's vital as part of the Lib Dem Fightback and our influx of new [...]
