"The Yorkshire Yellow Book 2019 is bursting with ideas about how a future Yorkshire should develop. Importantly, these ideas are evidence-based and embedded in sound Liberal principles." Nigel Lindsay praises this new publication. Ian Birrell explains how the birth of a profoundly handicapped daughter changed his politics. 'Impostor syndrome' is a pseudo-medical name for a class problem, argues Nathalie Olah. Did Anglo-Saxons establish a settlement in the Crimea after the Norman conquest? Remarkably, says Caitlin Green, the answer appears to be yes. "His novelistic ambitions didn't really take off and, although they left some interesting material behind, we can be ...
The White Horses was a Yugoslav children's television series that I swear the BBC showed in every school holiday throughout my childhood. The same was true of Robinson Crusoe and Belle and Sebastian. It's not a great song - this is mostly about personal nostalgia - but choosing it does allow me to introduce you to the remarkable career of its singer Jackie Lee. Your can read all about it on The World of Jackie Lee, where you will discover that she sang on Jimi Hendrix's recording of Hey Joe.
Sun 20th
18:18
Repeated delays to Brexit are down to the failure of Conservative leaders to persuade their own, and...
We get comments here on Liberal Democrat Voice of this type from Simon today: If you want to try to frustrate and cancel Brexit that's up to you, you won't succeed because eventually the majority will win. In the meantime you are just making people's lives a misery. All this stuff about workers rights and the environment is nonsense scaremongering, any government that tried to do it would get voted out, that's why we have votes albeit you don't respect them. This line of argument ignores reality. The people who stopped the May deal being approved three times were Conservative ...
Here are the Lib Dem contributions from our MPs in yesterday's "Super Saturday" debates. First up was Jo, basically telling the Prime Minister that he was too feart to put his deal to the people: The Prime Minister's deal removes protections on workers' rights. It puts a border down the Irish sea and, according to the Government's own analysis, will damage our economy on a scale greater than the financial crash. Today, hundreds of thousands of people will be outside demanding a final say in a people's vote. Is not it the truth that the reason why the Prime Minister ...
Sun 20th
15:25Labour MPs surely can't support the bonfire of workers' rights in Boris Johnson's deal
One of the many compelling reasons to stay in the EU (alongside peace and prosperity) is the protection that workers get from being in the single market. To create a level playing field, there are minimum standards on things like maternity leave, TUPE (protection if your job is outsourced), working hours and paid holidays. Certainly our current law goes beyond the minimum protections in many ways. However, if we leave the EU, all bets are off. We simply can't trust the most right wing government in living memory with workers' rights. If our rights were safe, surely they would at ...
Yesterday was an interesting day in Liverpool. Everyone will know about the vote in Parliament and the big rally but there are interesting details that have not been fully looked at. It is clear that unlike the Lib Dems the ... Continue reading →
Sun 20th
14:50
A plea to Ludlow bus passengers - please keep seated on the town buses until they stop
I have been on buses in other towns and cities a lot of late. One thing I have noted is that people sit in their seats until the bus has come to a halt at a stop. This doesn't happen much in Ludlow. Passengers in our town, many elderly, stand up well before the bus stop despite the "Stopping" sign having been illuminated. This is dangerous and completely unnecessary. Passengers should remain seated until the bus comes to a halt at the stop. It is time to ditch this dangerous habit. We don't want anyone injured. We want our bus ...
Laura Gordon is our ace Prospective Parliamentary Candidate in Sheffield Hallam. I'm delighted to be able to add that she's also backing me to Liberal Democrat Party President.
As previously discussed, this year's Worldcon administered (1, 2) and awarded 11 Retro Hugo Awards to honour the sf that fans might have honoured if there had been a Worldcon and Hugos in 1944. [IMG: 4EED472D-1FC6-459C-AF38-A41A108595ED.jpeg] We did our best to identify copyright holders during the nomination process, but it was not easy, and (as noted previously) only one author's estate authorised us to use their material for a Retro Hugo voter packet (I will reveal that it was Fritz Leiber), so we did not proceed with that. I'm glad to say that we did have a few designated acceptors ...
After the Parliamentary shenanigans yesterday, Jo Swinson spoke to the People's Vote rally in Parliament Square. She told not just the crowd but the country to have hope, that we can stop Brexit and have a brighter future. https://twitter.com/LibDems/status/1185591460009304066?s=20 The next few days are going to be critical in determining the sort of country we are going to be for generations. Talk to everyone you know and explain to them why it is so important to stop Brexit. * Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
Yesterday I was one in a million! The People's Vote campaign estimated that there were one million people on the streets yesterday asking for a final say on the Brexit deal. I hope that Ed Davey forgives me the internal flight down, but I felt that it was worth it, just this once, to show support for something that is so critical. I left home, where it was bucketing with rain, at 5am. The taxi driver who actually knocked on my door, even though he was fie minutes early, is not popular as my family had to deal with a ...
Another week and another failure of the Conservative Government to deliver Brexit. This sentence could have been written any time since 2018. On this occasion, it is the Letwin amendment, which simply stated that Parliament should see the Johnson deal set down and passed in legislation, before giving it a meaningful vote of support. The fear was not that Johnson deal would pass, but if it did not, then we would be leaving the Eu with no deal on the 31st of October. Predictably enough, there are again howls of complains from the rightwing press. Letwin, Corbyn (who has finally ...
Sat, 12:56: The Bad Faith Attacks on Archive of Our Own Have to End https://t.co/LfZpHN1NI5 I remember Strikethrough. Sat, 13:54: Excellent analysis. @pmdfoster thinks that Johnson never wanted a no-deal outcome, which is the key difference from... https://t.co/P2K2sknO3a Sat, 14:48: What Stanley Kubrick didn't say https://t.co/BSzY4Q5JvS An old article about the peculiar case of Adrian Rigelsford... https://t.co/UnjTUat67G Sat, 15:44: Lawrence of Arabia, and The Seven Pillars of Wisdom https://t.co/tUVWCKT4ZA Sat, 15:48: RT @Mij_Europe: Quick thoughts on drama playing out in Westminster, based on chats with all sides. EU is desperate to get Brexit over with.... Sat, 15:50: RT @peterjbirks: From ...
Sun 20th
10:47Linney House development runs into trouble from heritage, highways, ecology, and a potential threat ...
It is rare that an application for permission to build houses is straightforward. In Ludlow, it seems that is almost never the case. The application to build eight homes in a modern style in the grounds of Linney House is a case in point. This has been a much abused site over the years with permissions given that would not get through the tougher planning system in place today. Trees on the property have been felled without consent. This application, submitted to Shropshire Council last February, has now hit new stumbling blocks (19/00826/FUL). The scheme was already subject to an ...
Goodness knows what history will make of yesterday's so-called 'super-Saturday' - the extraordinary session of the House of Commons that was meant to resolve Brexit once-and-for-all, albeit with a humiliating, union-breaking U-turn on the part of the Brexit-liar-in-chief As is par for the course, MPs made the decision not to make a decision and booted the whole thing into the long grass again, with idea that they could perhaps force through a people's vote on Boris Johnson's s deal. My fear is that everybody is so fed up with the whole thing that given the chance to decide themselves they ...
I welcome guest posts on Liberal England. As you can see from this list of the 10 most recent, I am happy to consider a wide range of subjects. If you would like to write a guest post yourself, please drop me an email so we can discuss your idea. The importance of respectful relationships between teachers and pupils - Sean Warren and Stephen BiggerThe Lib Dems and Brexit: How a shot in the arm became a shot in the foot - Neville FarmerDrinking with Daniel Farson - James TarryAn ideological conflict is coming - time for Liberals to seize ...
Sun 20th
08:55Lord Martin Thomas writes: Building a justice system that offers rehabilitation and hope
No one will forget the pictures three weeks ago of the shaven headed prisoners clad in orange trousers, sardined together in an improvised prison cell in Northern Syria. Nothing to do except exist. They were captured ISIL fighters, at least a third of whom were foreigners, including British citizens, who had flocked to join the caliphate. My sympathy for them is non existent. Their captors, the Kurdish SDF, regard them as a time bomb and in the events of the last few days, can no longer guarantee to hold them. But it was their eyes that caught my attention. I ...
With the October school holidays now over, it is back to West End Ward surgeries this coming week. My Mitchell Street Centre and Harris Academy surgeries take place tomorrow. My full surgery details are below - although I can also be contacted via esurgery@frasermacpherson.org.uk or phone me at home on 459378 anytime :
