Commenting following the first televised leaders debate of the Holyrood election campaign, Scottish Liberal Democrat campaign chair Lord Purvis said: "Liberal Democrats have gone into this election confident that we will grow and this performance from Willie Rennie demonstrates why. It was a strong start to the campaign from Willie. We want Scotland to be [...]
What with Facebook and Google and Uber, you might be forgiven for thinking we were living in a great entrepreneurial age. It is true that, in the UK, the number of startup companies rises every year - though the growth in London completely dwarfs everywhere else. But in the USA, the number of successful company launches has been in decline now for fifteen years, and - since the UK always seems to copy the least attractive economic trends in the USA sooner or later - I'm sure the same will happen to us. The academic researchers, and the Federal Reserve, ...
The former Great Central wagon repair works on Upperton Road, which I went to photograph in 2011 when they were threatened with demolition, have won an award from Leicester Civic Society. The Mercury quotes the society's chairman Stuart Bailey: "Despite being locally listed in 2011 the wagon works was subjected to severe criminal damage, clearly aimed at hastening its loss to allow redevelopment of a valuable site. "It was at this point that it was acquired by Jamie Lewis Residential Lettings and work commenced on rescue and reuse. "There are retail units, including a Starbucks at the lower level and ...
Watch the latest video from the Britain Stronger in Europe campaign: If you'd like to know more about the wider topic, see my other European referendum posts, and in particular Nick Clegg's demolition of the anti-EU case.
St Giles, Uley © David Purchase The identity of the man who travelled from Ealing Broadway to the moors above Saddleworth to die remains a mystery. When I wrote about the case at the end of January it was because police were pursuing the theory that he was one of the child survivors of an air crash that took place there in 1949. That turned out not to be the case: The boy survivors were Stephen Evans (5) and Michael Prestwich (2). Michael, the 2016 press agrees, died at the age of 12 in a railway accident. It sounds as ...
After the success of their Seniors Christmas Dinner our wonderful Wallington Arms Public House is now putting on a free Easter Lunch for senior Wallington residents. It takes place on Tuesday 5th April, 12 noon at the Wallington Arms. We are so pleased at the community spirit of one of our local businesses so please pass on the invitation to [...]
In news that will surprise nobody, Labour today moved the writ for the Ogmore and Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough by-elections. It is defending the two seats following the resignation of Huw Irranca-Davies to stand for the Welsh Assembly and the death of Harry Harpham. This news comes on the day a very welcome poll puts us at 10%, just 1% behind UKIP: Westminster voting intention: CON: 36% (-3) LAB: 34% (+1) UKIP: 11% (-1) LDEM: 10% (+4) GRN: 3% (-) (via Ipsos Mori / 19 – 22 Mar) — Britain Elects (@britainelects) March 24, 2016 One poll is nothing to ...
The deadline is coming up, and I still haven't finished Glorious Angels (which maybe says something in itself), but I have re-read all the short fiction on the BSFA list, and will vote as below. I'm expanding my second-paragraph-of-third-chapter-or-section approach to include the short stories not separately published, with a little difficulty in a couple of cases. 5) "No Rez", by Jeff Noon Second paragraph of third section: and now we move on away from the projectors' reach, far away into the areas beyond the city, where the endless blue fields touch the endless blue skies with no visible horizon ...
We have all been shocked and saddened by the appalling acts of terrorism and murder in Brussels, and we can do no better than print the response from the Manchester Council of Mosques, which has a combined congregation of over 80,000 Muslim worshippers. The reported devastating terrorist attacks in Brussels have shocked us all. Our prayers and thoughts are with the injured and the families who have lost loved ones. Indeed this is a day of tragedy with an appalling loss of lives in Brussels. It appears that all too often our daily news is filled with saddening events of ...
Second text frame of third chapter: I've found my fifth nominee for Best Graphic Story. In retrospect, I don't know why it took me so long to pick this up - I generally like Neil Gaiman's writing, even if I'm not as wowed by him as the hardcore fans are (I went to a book signing with him on the very day I started this livejournal); and a return to Sandman, which was the first extended work I wrote about when I started bookblogging. I guess I was worried that it could have been pretty awful. I'm glad to say ...
This report concerns the meeting of the FPC that took place on 23rd March 2016. This was not the best-attended meeting of the cycle but there were some very interesting discussions nonetheless. Consultation Session on Liberty and Security Working Group Paper Brian Paddick attended to offer the committee an opportunity to comment on the consultation paper that was taken to Spring Conference by his working group. The consultation session at Spring Conference was standing room only and there were a number of views expressed in that meeting. Brian explained that the Investigatory Powers Bill is starting its committee session in ...
Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie has responded to comments made by Nicola Sturgeon this morning, calling on her to stop her insults and focus on making Scotland the best again. Mr Rennie said: "Yesterday Nicola Sturgeon claimed she wanted a war of ideas rather than a war of words. That didn't last long did [...]
Thu 24th
14:56
LDVideo: "A new, more rational approach is desperately needed" - Norman Lamb introduces his cannabis...
Norman Lamb yesterday introduced his ten minute rule bill calling for the legalisation of and implementation of a regulated market for cannabis. You can view the bill and follow its progress here. It will move to second reading on 22 April. And here is Norman's Commons speech from yesterday: Which is also available on YouTube. You can read the Hansard transcript here. * Nick Thornsby is a day editor at Lib Dem Voice.
Keith and the Lib Dems have been pushing for trams for Cheadle and Gatley, with a train station at Cheadle as an interim measure. We were concerned a couple of weeks ago to hear that Travis Perkins planned to sell their site for sheltered housing – it's one of the locations where a Cheadle station might sensibly be built. We've now met with TfGM and the Council and have updates on these issues. TfGM are working on a case showing how trams would be brought to Cheadle which will be done in the next couple of weeks. The scheme likely ...
With Monday being the Easter bank holiday, the bin collections are put back a day. So, for example, your usual collection day is Tuesday , next week it'll be Wednesday.And do on ... I'm sure you get the idea. Next week is a green bin ( ie normal non-recycle waste ) week You can find the collection calendar at :-
[IMG: It was a lot easier when he stood.] It was a lot easier when he stood. A Facebook discussion I was in the other day ended up talking about the mechanics of Tory leadership elections, and it prompted a few thoughts. Just to be clear, these are all about electoral strategy for candidates in that putative election, not about their policies or personalities except in as much as they might influence their strategy. A leadership election is a two-stage process. In the first round, MPs nominate candidates and then a series of eliminative ballots are held. The candidate with ...
A few weeks ago now I started using a different name. First, I told my close friends and family about the change, then mentioned it in passing to acquaintances who asked how to address me, then I changed my Facebook, Twitter, email adress, all of my public facing profiles and simply began to expect people to use it as if it was the name I was baptised with. Yet curiously, even the most classically liberal of my classical liberal friends tolerated this action. Without consulting them, I made a decision about how they would use language, informed them of my ...
Nibley Lane is expected to close for cleaning from 9.30am until 2.30pm on Tuesday 29th March.
This is an issue I have covered many times before but the link above to an article in the Southport Visiter is well worth a read. Interesting to see a Tory MP getting involved (although it has to be said that she also voted for the cuts to disability allowances recently on the very very down side) in this issue. To date it has seemed to have fallen to John Pugh the Lib Dem MP for Southport to lead the fight with Rosie Cooper the Labour MP for West Lancashire helping him out, to push this transport issue forward. ...
Thu 24th
12:26Sal Brinton on the change of attitude needed so that disabled people can start to live their lives
Embed from Getty Images Sal Brinton was part of the House of Lords Committee which produced today's report which reviewed the impact of the Equality Act 2010 on disabled people. Its conclusions were pretty damning. It's worth setting out in full the five major themes that they identified: First, in planning services and buildings, despite the fact that for twenty years the law has required anticipatory reasonable adjustment, the needs of disabled people still tend to be an afterthought. It is time to reverse this. We are all living longer, and medical advances are keeping us alive where in earlier ...
Impressive:
Former languages teacher Janet Ellard has been unanimously selected by local Welsh Liberal Democrat members as their candidate in the upcoming Ogmore Parliamentary by-election. Janet spent over 20 years as a modern languages teacher and lecturer and an assistant examiner. She is currently a Volunteer Manager for a youth homeless charity, and until recently volunteered with the Asylum Justice project. Speaking following her selection, Janet Ellard said: "I'm delighted to have been chosen by the Welsh Liberal Democrats to contest this by-election and fight for the people of Ogmore. "I want to spend the campaign listening to people's concerns across ...
May 5th has been chosen as the date for the forthcoming by-elections in Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough and in Ogmore (near Bridgend in South Wales) after Labour moved the writ today. The date is the same day as the parliamentary elections in Scotland and Wales as well as the London mayoral election and a raft [...]
When people take a position in any argument, in principle they should base their views upon a platform of facts. Sometimes those facts might be interpreted in different ways, but as the old Guardian motto had it, "Comment is Free, but facts are sacred". This "Dialectic" has been the basis for rational argument for centuries. Not any more. We are seeing the rise of political comment and political practice that is not based on any kinds of facts at all. "Evidence based policy" is so rare that these days it has to be specially commented on. The fact is that, ...
[IMG: David Laws Coalition] David Laws's account of his and our party's time in government, Coalition, was published earlier this week by Biteback, having been serialised in the Mail on Sunday. Keep an eye out for a review here on LDV soon, but in the meantime here's a round-up of what others have been saying. The BBC have put together this film featuring former Lib Dem advisers Polly Mackenzie and Phil Reilly, and David was on The Andrew Marr Show on Sunday. As for the reviews, Robbie Millen in The Times (£) thought life was imitating art perhaps a little ...
RT @WeFixYourAdvert: Nice to see some honesty on the underground Genevieve Valentine - Dealing With It One of the best essays I have ever read about what it is like to be a girl and then a woman in this world. Content note for sexual assault. How women prepare for a first date vs how men prepare for a first date. And yes, this happened with all three of my current partners, and not just for the first date. Once you had the nasty shit, even when it is twenty-plus years in the past, you don't ever want it again. ...
Jack Coutts of the Liverpool Dement Alliance telling us about dementia and coping stratgies for it. "My wife describes this as the day I went out to work and never came home". This chilling sentence came from a talk given ... Continue reading →
The first leaders debate of the 2016 Holyrood election takes place tonight. It is a BBC debate from Glasgow and can be seen on BBC1 Scotland at 9pm. Your intrepid reporter was originally selected to be in the audience for the debate but a few hours after receiving the confirmation e-mail the BBC wrote again [...]
Reworking Oola's Intergalactic Tuneship Eerie blog here ~ http://oolasite.blogspot.co.uk #sciencefiction
Surprisingly, perhaps the most interesting policy proposal in the race for Mayor of London has come from George Galloway, the controversial Respect candidate. Galloway's economic guru, Max Keiser, has set out plans in a white paper and campaign video to place the entire mayoral budget on a blockchain. The policy has yet to attract much coverage but the idea could feasibly garner support from both the left and the libertarian right, and suggests an interesting direction for liberals at all levels of government. The technology behind the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, a blockchain is a decentralized record of transactions. Instead of a ...
[IMG: Twitter on a smartphone - CC0 Public Domain] Handy advice from Campaigns & Elections: Now, I'm only covering Facebook and Twitter. There's a plethora of social media tools out there. But if your campaign is just launching, focus on where the largest audiences are and do them well. Be careful not to overextend your campaign resources... Send an email to your list and ask people to follow you on social media. Note that a large chunk of your list won't be social media users, so if you have the ability to filter those out ... you should do so... ...
I have a confession to make: whenever I'm at Tory party conference (I attend all the party conferences every autumn), I try and clear time to see Boris' speech. There is no equivalent at any other conference – I have never thought "can't miss Emily Thornberry" while at Labour. To do this isn't as simple as simply showing up at the hall right before he speaks either. It is so oversubscribed every year that you have to sit through whatever boring thing precedes it in order to partake. In other words, I am willing to sit through some turgid session ...
The civil war within UKIP between leader Nigel Farage and his main rival for the job, Suzanne Evans has led once more to the latter's suspension from the party. However, the reason for the disciplinary action says more about the unsuitability of UKIP as a party to hold public office than it does about the target of that action. According to Huffington Post, former deputy chair Suzanne Evans was suspended after she signed a petition opposing the selection of a candidate who compared homosexuals to Nazis. The website says that Evans, who Nigel Farage appointed as temporary leader last year ...
As residents are aware, I long campaigned to get a permanent and full resolution to the stones problem on the Riverside pitches on the south side of Riverside Drive, following a number of injuries to footballers in the past. In June 2014, the City Council's Environment Committee agreed to the necessary works. I recently asked for an update on progress and the City Council's Environment Manager has advised as follows : "...the capital works in terms of the replacement top soil/seeding is complete although there is a minor issue with some drainage. Hence all going well they should all be ...
Today could have seen me writing this post in an independent country. However history will show that Scotland chose a different path at this time and so instead the focus has turned to the forthcoming Holyrood elections in May. Thursday 24 March 2016 is the day the SNP set for Scottish independence but Mr Rennie [...]
Speculation that the Tata steel board will not approve a rescue package for the Port Talbot plant has underlined the urgent need for the Welsh Government to build on the new Enterprise Zone by setting up an urban regeneration company for the area, the Welsh Liberal Democrat Assembly Member for South Wales West, Peter Black has said. Mr. Black called for such a company to be set up shortly after the announcement of 750 job losses at Tata in Port Talbot, however little progress appears to have been made by the Welsh Government on this. When the steel works closed ...
Brussels's Response to Attacks Under Scrutiny The estimable @ncjcampbell reflects. (tags: Belgium waronterror )
