It's a while since we had some Iain Sinclair. So here he is with John Rogers, whose videos about lost London rivers I have been posting lately, answering questions on their film London Overground.
Peter Geoghegan and Jenna Corderoy reveal how dark money is winning the Brexit influencing game. "According to anthropologist David Vine: 'British agents, with the help of Navy Seabees, quickly rounded up the islanders' pet dogs, gassing and burning them in sealed cargo sheds. They ordered ... the remaining Chagossians onto overcrowded cargo ships.'" Simon Allison supplies the background to the court victory by the Chagos Islanders. Alexandre Afonso says the academic job market is structured like a drug gang, with an expanding mass of outsiders and a shrinking core of insiders. Andrew McCloy asks if England's network of long-distance footpaths ...
Wed 27th
18:35
Sal Brinton writes: A chance to change the face of our politics by engaging with supporters
At Spring Conference at York we will be debating the role of supporters of the party. This follows the extensive consultation we had in the Autumn. You will remember that we had two consultation sessions at Brighton (you can find the consultation document here , after which the Federal Board arranged for a series of further consultation sessions around the country, as well as member webinars and an online survey. Many thanks to the thousands of you who asked questions and also responded to the survey. At these sessions we promised that members would have the final say on the ...
I have real difficulty understanding what goes through the mind of some people in the Labour Party when they approach the subject of anti-Semitism. To me it's incredibly simple. Anti-Semitism is racism. Let me try another Country. If I started ... Continue reading →
We want to help the Party achieve a bumper set of results in this May's local elections – the biggest of this parliament. To entice you to join us and to ensure your team has the best chance of success, until Sunday 10 March, new joiners will get 50% discount from their first six months. Join us online at www.aldc.org/join Enter SPRING2019 in the discount code slot when prompted. You'll pay just £3.41 a month for your first six months. Please help us spread the word and let your fellow team members who may be interested know. How we can ...
Like many Lib Dems, I was underwhelmed by the formation of The Independent Group (TIG) of 11 defectors last week from both the Labour and Conservative parties. It had been a long time coming, and its members are undistinguished, except for the Conservative Sarah Wollaston and perhaps Labour's Chuka Umunna. But now I am less ... Continue reading The Independent Group shows how all three main parties are narrowing their appeal
First, what the (at time of writing) Labour MP Chris Williamson has said about his earlier comments regarding anti-Semitism, doesn't really count an apology. That is because: It only takes four sentences for Chris Williamson to get from saying it was never his intention to minimise the nature of anti-Semitism for him to get on to doing just that. — Mark Pack (@markpack) February 27, 2019 Second, this latest ugly incident is a reminder to people in all parties about how important it is to have effective complaints and disciplinary processes. That's particularly relevant to the Liberal Democrats, as we're ...
Theresa May has finally backed down to allow the extension of Brexit leaving date if her deal is, again, rejected by the Commons. This is against the backdrop of MPs leaving the Tory party and some ministers threatening to resign to ensure there isn't an exit with no deal. May has never read the Art of the deal (co-written by Trump but confirmed by his co-author and the publisher he had no real input in writing the book). Over the last few months, she has cut a forlorn figure traipsing back and forth from Brussels with no new proposals other ...
Tue, 12:16: RT @mvanhulten: Not enough pallets. https://t.co/mbODmqVlb1 Tue, 22:26: Tuesday reading https://t.co/De4v6jvVTy Wed, 07:54: RT @littlebrown: A revised statement from Little, Brown and Company. https://t.co/zSQp1Q132C Wed, 08:58: RT @timd_IFG: Carolyn Fairbairn telling it like it is on @BBCRadio4 - 'no business would go into a negotiation saying if you don't give me...
Perhaps, at this time of opportunity to work, in some form, with a new Parliamentary grouping, it is appropriate for us to review our policies, in their several forms? This would enable us to make more sure that our words, actions and ways of communicating are what we want and to be reasonably sure that the degree of match and consonance between the TIGs and ourselves is appropriate for some form of working more closely. We might even find that we do not have policies in areas where it might be desirable to have them! Although the TIGs may not ...
It has been a lovely week so far, with temperatures far higher than usual for February. In fact the UK is experiencing the highest winter temperatures since records began over a hundred years ago. A temperature of 21.2C was recorded at Kew Gardens in London on Tuesday, beating the 20.6C measured at Trawsgoed, near Aberystwyth the day before. As the Independent reports, the soaring temperatures have been described as "an extreme weather event" by the Met Office and come at the end of a particularly mild winter. The previous record was 19.7 and that has stood since 1998. The paper ...
I read a book not so long ago about Samuel Plimsoll (he of the Plimsoll Line on ships) called 'The Plimsoll Sensation' by Nicolette Jones. Within that book, which I heartily recommend, you read of the very worst aspects of insurance in that ship owners insured ships that were unfit to leave port knowing that they would be paid out if and more likely when their overloaded coffin ships were lost at sea. The lives of seafarers were not of importance but the insurance of the cargo carried by the overloaded ships was. That it took so long to put ...
Rarely in the history of the United States of America and the White House has a foreign policy been so meticulously geared to one goal: the re-election of the president. A pragmatic man, Donald Trump does not bother with big ideas on thirty-six subjects. After the mixed results of the mid-term legislative elections, the president [...] The post Trump's diplomacy is all about his own re-election appeared first on Radix.
On the 14th of February, the Dutch Foreign minister was driven to distraction by a big blue Brexit muppet on his desk, impeding him to get anything done ). Only him being bold already, saved him from pulling out his hair. Today, Monday 25th, Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte was all over British news media, desperately pleading with the British government to get a Brexit deal through parliament, and thereby avoiding a No Deal Brexit. A no deal Brexit will not only disrupt, nay destroy the British economy, its international traffic of people, medicines and foodstuffs, but will also ...
