Thu 3rd
23:02

Back in the office

I was back in the Lib Dem office in Consett this afternoon, for the first time since the general election. I was there to print a Focus. 1800 done in just over an hour. They are already in the hands of the team responsible for delivering them. I will be back to the office soon.......

Posted by jonathanwallace on Jonathan Wallace
Thu 3rd
22:57

Out of hospital

My friend Richard was discharged from the Queen Elizabeth Hospital on Tuesday. I went there for my last visit and to collect him at 2pm. We didn't get away until 5pm as medications needed to be sorted so in the meantime, we went to the hospital's Costa Coffee for our last cappuccino at this otherwise overpriced establishment. Over the past 4 weeks I made 40 visits to the Queen Elizabeth

Posted by jonathanwallace on Jonathan Wallace

Another day, another newspaper column from Vince Cable. This time it is for the New European on how the Liberal Democrats can successfully lead the fight for Britain's role in Europe.

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

We awoke to a rather gloomy picture, with temperatures below freezing and a stiff breeze from the north. However, we were passing the rarely seen ice shelf on the southern shore of Nordtauslandt, the second largest of Svalbard's islands. It's rarely seen because the pack ice seldom allows access, and even if you can get there, impenetrable fog often obscures the view. Mile upon mile of ice cliffs, facing south, represents an impassable barrier. It was time to turn south. We were heading for an area known as Kittiwake Canyon, where a crease in the hillside has created a perfect ...

Posted by Mark Valladares on A liberal amongst the country gentry...
Thu 3rd
14:33

Brazil: Temer Holds On

Last evening was quite surreal. I was at a local working men's health club in Fortaleza where, in one room, men were taking part in a karaoke competition, while in another, people were crowded round a TV screen, watching a live broadcast from Brazil's lower House of Congress in Brasilia. The shouting and catcalls from [...]

Posted by jonathanfryer on Jonathan Fryer
Thu 3rd
14:17

Meet Vince Cable

Embed from Getty Images The lovely digital team at HQ have interviewed Vince Cable. He spent his childhood immersed in chocolate, it seems. I grew up in York, which was then very much an industrial city. Its factories supplied the country's railway carriages and fed its appetite for sweets. I grew up breathing the all-pervasive smell of sugar, cocoa and vanilla. My first home was a small terraced house close to the Terry's chocolate factory. My father Len was a craftsman at Rowntree's chocolate factory whilst my mother Edith packed chocolates for rival firm Terry's. I arrived at the University ...

Posted by Mary Reid on Liberal Democrat Voice

Embed from Getty Images When I stood as a Conservative parliamentary candidate in 2015, I remember preparing notes on every conceivable subject for my first hustings. But when it came to the NHS, I couldn't bring myself to follow the party political line and just bash my opponents; no one has fixed it and no single party is to blame. What I said, instead, was that we should have an independent commission to decide the future of the NHS and put it above party politics. It was a line that went down very well with the audience; when politicians throw ...

Posted by Azi Ahmed on Liberal Democrat Voice

The family farm could disappear due to the government's failure to guarantee subsidy beyond 2022, the Liberal Democrats have warned. Liberal Democrat farming spokesperson Kate Parminter said: "No doubt ministers will also ignore the National Trust for being experts. "It is right that farming subsidy should be in return for promoting the public good, such as for producing high quality food and for improving the environment. "But the government's refusal to guarantee subsidies beyond 2022 makes it impossible for farmers to plan, threatens the very future of the family farm, and could have devastating effects on the much-loved British landscape." ...

Posted by LD Neath on Aberavon & Neath Liberal Democrats
Thu 3rd
11:00

My tweets

Wed, 12:56: Bulgaria pledges to champion Macedonia's EU and NATO dreams https://t.co/h3ZtDv3L84 Peace breaking out? Wed, 18:41: Asking a manager https://t.co/9zh94EoEAX #iamtestingnewposteditor Wed, 20:48: Answers that are needed now on Brexit https://t.co/2IgIQstLZ2 John Bruton asks three questions. Thu, 10:45: Brexit: can and should the UK remain in the EEA? https://t.co/mFUvDjtV0y Good questions, answered by @DavidAllanGreen.

 

Posted by AL Franklin on Maintain the Advance!
YouGov

There will inevitably be a huge number of answers to that question raising from the positively conspiratorial to the mundane. If Ministers and civil servants wish to rise above suspicion, paranoid or otherwise, then they need to buck lifelong instincts and open up their files. The Freedom of Information Act was designed to do precisely that of course, but the Blair Government lost its nerve and threw in so many exceptions and exclusions that the final product was a shadow what was originally intended, even of the US version. There is little wonder therefore, that we continue to get headlines ...

Posted by Peter Black on Peter Black

Inochi. A Japanese phrase which appears to have no exact equivalent in English. I only know about it at all thanks to a blog post by the poet Sue Holliday, who describes it as the "intrinsic value of all living things". It also means simply life. Sue Holliday defends the inochi as far as she can, and [...] The post Where has the empathy gone from the ruling classes? Answer: inochi appeared first on Radix.

Posted by David Boyle on Opinion - Radix

The temperature had dropped to zero, albeit that zero is rather mild for that latitude, and we were heading for The temperature had dropped to zero, albeit that zero is rather mild for that latitude, and we were heading for Nordauslandt (which, I'm told, is the size of Wales, as a surprisingly large number of places seem to be) in search of walrus, or walruses, or walri. Me, I was hoping for many walrus. Many, many walrus... The morning activity was a walk, starting at a camp on the shore, before heading up the various levels of former beaches before ...

Posted by Mark Valladares on A liberal amongst the country gentry...

I commented a few days ago about the bizarre dispute (and the context of it) between Maghull Town Council and Maghull Cricket Club whereby the Council seemed to be after the Clubs money by way of increased payments to the Council. A large paid for advert trying to sell the lease of the land appeared in the Aintree & Maghull Champion on 26th July in the Council's name but the following edition of the paper, dated 2nd August, said that a deal between the Club and Council was close. Bearing in mind that the paper, for editorial purposes, was probably ...

Posted by Cllr. Tony Robertson on Sefton Focus

If you want to win a parliamentary seat at the next General Election start thinking about the new parliamentary boundaries. Seasoned political campaigners understand the importance of the boundaries. Any area that is divided up into electoral districts has to have lines drawn somewhere. Moving a village between this or that constituency can make all the difference to who wins and who loses. Sometimes changes are so significant that new constituencies are radically different to their predecessors. In 2011, Parliament amended the Parliamentary Constituency Act 1986. There were two main changes: 650 MPs would be reduced to 600 and constituencies ...

Posted by Antony Hook on Liberal Democrat Voice

From the Curator of Museum Services at the University of Dundee : On Saturday 5th August at 2pm, I will be giving an illustrated talk and guided tour to accompany the exhibition Stewart Carmichael: Celtic Visions in the Lamb Gallery at the University of Dundee. The exhibition marks 150 years since the birth of one of Dundee's most significant artists, Stewart Carmichael (1867-1950). For six decades, he was one of the leading figures of Dundee's cultural scene, a constant champion for the role of art and culture in society. The talk will take place in the D'Arcy Thompson Lecture Theatre ...