The Whickham Remembrance Day parade and service went ahead today. This video covers parade, the readings by local children and the laying of wreaths by over 40 organisations.
This evening Sheila and I took 95 year old Charles (Uncle Albert) Walker out for a meal at the Stanley Arms in Aughton. [IMG: Charles looking back on Gibraltar (in the distance) from the cruise ship Victoria a couple of years ago. Charles was based in Gib' (RAF) during part of the WW2.] Charles looking back on Gibraltar (in the distance) from the cruise ship Victoria a couple of years ago. Charles was based in Gib' (RAF) during part of the WW2. Charles was an RAF electrician from 1942 during WW2 and prior to that he was a youngster in ...
Graeme Cowie was not impressed by the arguments used by the Scottish Liberal Democrat establishment to win a debate at the party's conference yesterday. That is putting it mildly. The 'bedroom tax' is contributing to significant hardship among low-income families, and this is having a negative impact on the education and wellbeing of children, argues Laura Winter. "We'll likely never know how many people were kept from the polls by restrictions like voter-ID laws, cuts to early voting, and barriers to voter registration. But at the very least this should have been a question that many more people were looking ...
As part of the package of party reforms agreed at the Liberal Democrat conference in Brighton, the Federal Executive (FE) is being replaced by the new Federal Board. On paper, it has a very wide remit – which makes having a clear sense of priorities all the more important if the reforms are to result in more than just a change of acronyms. I'm running for election to the Federal Board myself, so I have a particular interest in what members think its priorities should be. But whatever the outcome of that internal election, I hope this survey will help ...
A local winner as the Leicester Mercury carries off our Headline of the Day Award.
On Saturday, the Scottish Liberal Democrats confirmed themselves as unconditional Unionists. This is not liberal. The Parliamentary Party turned on a motion that was itself an attempt to heal the divide between members of the party for whom the result of the EU referendum will likely compel the choice between two unpalatables. They showed a total unwillingness to listen, to acknowledge that the Unionism of far too many, especially many in the Scottish Tories, is unthinking, tribal and contrary to the interests of either people in Scotland or other parts of that Union. They falsely accused the movers of the ...
A German couple sits on a couch in front of the telly. He, with his eyes glued to the box, says "How stupid are the Yanks to vote for Trump?" while she looks out of the window to the hordes of neo-Nazis and AfD supporters waving "Foreigners out!" and similar banners.
[IMG: Individual poppies] Liberal Democrats from across the UK have been marking Remembrance Sunday. Remembering today those like my uncle Maurice who died aged 19 fighting evil so we can raise our families in freedom & peace. Never forget. — Tim Farron (@timfarron) November 13, 2016 We must never forget those who laid down their lives for our freedoms. It was a honour to lay wreaths at Cupar and St. Andrews. pic.twitter.com/4szr1p5b6B — Willie Rennie (@willie_rennie) November 13, 2016 Wonderful to see wreaths laid by local children from @Prima1Brudenell Primary School at the War Memorial in #Headingley #Leeds. https://t.co/cfbHkC386k — ...
Getting legally married when people have religious marriage isn't compulsory. Big deal I hear you ask. But if you then become religiously unmarried you have no legal rights to alimony, splitting ownership of a home, who looks after the children, access rights to children. An obvious example is where a marriage is annulled by a Sharia Court. I get why people might hold a court based on their religious text to decide cases only involving people of that religion where they agree to this – and communities can put a lot of pressure for people to religiously conform. But what ...
Councillor Josh Mason Leader of the Lib Dem Group on Redcar and Cleveland Council lays a reef at the Remembrance Day Service at Redcar. Councillor Karen King also lays a reef on behalf of the Humanists. Add caption
This morning I had the honour of laying a wreath on behalf of Blyth Town Council at Cowpen War Memorial. Usually the Deputy Mayor attends this service to lay the wreath, but he wasn't feeling well, and as I usually attend this service I was asked. It has always been a smaller service than the Blyth one, but it was reasonably well attended. Nice touch that the referee officiating a Sunday League match on the nearby football pitch stopped the game for two minutes at 11 o'clock to observe the silence. Lest we forget.
I attended the Remembrance Day service and parade in Whickham this morning and laid a wreath on behalf of my constituents. You can see photos of the event on the photo link above.
Today, Remembrance Sunday, the BBC screened an interview with France's far right leader, Marine Le Pen. Doubtless Andrew Marr and his producer are feeling proud of themselves with this journalistic "coup" that has caused such a storm on twitter, but they should be ashamed of themselves. Not only did this choice of interviewee dishonour the [...]
I used to be ashamed that Wizzard had been my favourite band in 1973. But the more I have learnt about music history, the less ashamed I have begun. Alex Petridis wrote about Roy Wood, the band's founder, this week: His influence has occasionally seeped into subsequent pop in some peculiar ways - not least the fact that Glen Matlock claimed the opening guitar riff of God Save the Queen by the Sex Pistols was based on the Duane Eddy-inspired twang of Fire Brigade - but you never hear Wood's name dropped as an inspiration by a hip new band. ...
Sun 13th
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WATCH: Willie Rennie's speech to Scottish Liberal Democrat conference "Liberals are not quitters"
Yesterday, Scottish Liberal Democrats had their Autumn Conference in Dunfermline. Here is Willie Rennie's leaders' speech. The text is below. You can imagine that this was not the speech I was expecting or hoping to deliver today. The grief this week has been palpable. Not just the fear of what a President Trump could bring but the sense of loss of what could have been. The first woman president, committed to expanding healthcare, internationalism, equal rights, tolerance. A president full of hope and opportunity - looking for the best in people, not the worst. It was the same sense of ...
What's up then? According to the latest snippet from Westminster, the next step for the Paston Reserve/Manor Drive development in Gunthorpe, will take place in the new year. What's been said then? According to Caroline Spelman, the Government's Second Church Estates Commissioner: They claim to be in regular communication with Peterborough City Council and statutory consultees [...]
Note: I wrote this post three years ago and for some reason never published it at the time. So having remembered it and re-read it this felt like a good day to put that right. My family is fortunate. In all of the family history research that I've done and in the vast extended family tree [...]
Maybe it's just my own predisposition, but I seem to be seeing the phrase 'more candidates' all the time in Lib Dem literature. Mark Pack's excellent pamphlet 'How to Rebuild the Liberal Democrats' talks about 'more candiates', Tim Farron has used the phrase, and my regional chair has just asked me to contribute to a by-election fund so we can stand 'more candidates'. All of which is good stuff, especially if more candidates lead to better quality candidates and increased diversity of candidates because more candidates are applying to fly the Lib Dem flag. But I'd also like to encourage ...
OSKAR stands for Online Skills and Resources and is a goldmine of online training and information for Liberal Democrat members.
Many people have already drawn comparisons between the victory of Donald Trump in the USA and the vote to leave the EU here. Common themes include an alienated and disillusioned middle class voting against the establishment and a strong desire for change. Trump's victory was achieved on the back of a racist and misogynist narrative. In the former case that also has parallels with Brexit. And just as the number of incidents of racial abuse increased after our referendum, so they appear to have also multiplied in the USA. The Independent reports that more than 200 incidents of harassment have ...
Instagram When Martin Luther nailed his protest to the church door in 1517, little did he know that 500... Did Clinton fail to turn out registered Democrats? RT @justamusicprof: Clinton received more votes than any other candidate in US history except Obama. brimful of asha · I've been thinking a lot about the meeting between... RT @stevesilberman: Scathing post. As close as we'll get to knowing why Trump looked so glum on his tour of the White House. Election Week Cold Open - SNL - YouTube RT @stackee: Kate McKinnon, as Hillary Clinton, singing 'Hallelujah' on SNL is the thing ...
At 11 a.m. this morning I will be standing with fellow councillors and other representatives from the Yeovil area in remembrance... At this time I also reflect on attending the remembrance parade at Old Steine in Brighton whilst growing up, carrying the flag on behalf of my Scout Troup. Looking back on what it meant [...]
James Lillis, the Campaign Manager in Richmond Park, must have woken up with a sense of dread yesterday morning – it was raining, heavily. His challenge to the party was to get 1000 people along to the biggest Action Weekend ever. But Liberal Democrats arrived, and kept on arriving. [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-7] Dogs and babies joined in. [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-5] There were ponchos (modelled by our wonderful candidate, Sarah Olney, and Chris Lovell) ... [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-6] ... and cake. [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-2] They put up stakeboards. [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-3] They delivered leaflets and canvassed. [IMG: richmond-park-by-election-4] By the end of Saturday James was on ...
DUNDEE CITY COUNCIL - WEEKLY ROAD REPORT REPORT FOR WEST END WARD WEEK COMMENCING MONDAY 14 NOVEMBER 2016 Perth Road (Glamis Road to West Park Road) - temporary traffic lights for one week for gas main renewal. * Brook Street, Dundee - off-peak temporary traffic lights on Thursday 17 November for Scottish Water manhole repair. * With regard to Perth Road (from West Park Road to Glamis Road), I sought clarification of this as the road is now fully open. The City Council advises : "The road was indeed opened up last Monday but there were still some service connections ...
Now we all want more jobs to be created in Sefton (except senior Civil Service leaders who are withdrawing them in large numbers from the Borough) and indeed across Merseyside but when those jobs come at a price of potentially compromising our environment the issue clearly needs more thought. How can these massive cranes and a Country Park be linked? [IMG: Peel's cranes at Liverpool 2's deep water river berth for colossal sized container ships, Seaforth.] Peel's cranes at Liverpool 2's deep water river berth for colossal sized container ships, Seaforth. [IMG: The bottom tip of Rimrose Valley Country Park ...
Commonwealth citizens have rights to join the electoral register in the UK, which makes in part the electorate dependent on international diplomacy. The oddest quirk of that probably comes from when Mozambique – despite never having been part of the British Empire – was allowed to join the Commonwealth for reasons of international diplomacy. As a result its citizens in the UK gained the right to vote. Likewise, when countries leave the Commonwealth their citizens living here lose the right to vote here. Or, more precisely, when the relevant piece of legislation (Schedule 3 of the British Nationality Act 1981) ...
Clinton's Popular-Vote Lead Will Grow, and Grow, and Grow But the result will be the same. (tags: uspolitics ) 'I feel truly ashamed.' Sheffield VC on Theresa May's trade mission to India Ow. (tags: india ukpolitics migration )
