You can read the opening statement made on behalf of Leicestershire County Council to the Independent Inquiry on Child Sexual Abuse strand on Lord Janner on the IICSA website. That is remarkable in itself, as the great majority of the proceedings in this strand have taken place in private. If you do read it you will find that Alex Verdan QC listed this among the "key points" he asked the inquiry to note: there are no longer any LCC-run care homes in Leicestershire. The last home closed in April 2018. The small number of residential placements are sourced through external ...
Apsana Begum, 30, entered Parliament at last December's general election with a giant 28,904 majority in East London's Poplar and Limehouse. But she has been accused of three offences relating to how she was given her council flat. She is due before magistrates on December 10. If convicted, Ms Begum could face a jail sentence and lose her Commons seat. [The Sun] Sign up to get the latest news and analysis Email* Enter Email Confirm Email Name* First Last What would you like to receive?* Liberal Democrat Newswire: monthly newsletter Polling UnPacked (political opinion polling news): max 1 email per ...
'Whatever happened to Little Bowden Junction signal box?" I asked back in July. The box used to stand on the Midland main line in Market Harborough. It was taken down and then re-erected at the Coventry Steam Railway Centre, which later became the Electric Railway Museum, in 1987. That museum closed in 2017 and its site was redeveloped. I could fine no mention of what happened to the box. The good news, which comes from the chairman of the Suburban Electric Railway Association, is that the whole collection from the Coventry museum was preserved. Little Bowden Junction box was taken ...
Chris Dillow explains why the Tories have lost interest in economics: "Evidence for this is of course abundant. We see it in reports that Sunak is worried about government debt despite the fact that the Bank of England is buying it and gilt yields are negative; in the failure to address the fact that job creation has plummeted; in Johnson's "fuck business" remark; and in the reckless pursuit of Brexit." "Our experience of mental ill health is not equal - factors like race, economic class, gender identity and disability all affect our likelihood of struggling with mental illness. These factors ...
Wed 28th
17:58
Covid Watch: As Telford and Wrekin moves towards Tier 2, we must ask how decisions are being made
Media reports, including from BBC Radio Shropshire, today suggest that a decision on whether Telford and Wrekin will move up to Tier 2 will be made today or tomorrow. The main impact of Tier 2 will be that friends and family members who are not in the same household must not meet indoors. Be that meeting in a pub, restaurant or a cosy family home. While we await the decision on Telford and Wrekin, I have been asking how these decisions on Tiers are made. Is a change of tier a diktat from central government or is there a local ...
Wed 28th
17:37
Complexity: The Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos, by M. Mitchell Waldrop
Second paragraph of third chapter:It was about time. By that point Cowan and his colleagues had begun to hire a small cadre of staffers for the institute, thanks to operating funds that were beginning to trickle in from sources such as the MacArthur Foundation. And those staffers desperately needed a space to call their own. Furthermore, what with the economics meeting coming up and several other workshops being planned, the institute desperately needed a little office space where it could keep its academic visitors happy with desks and telephones. Cowan decided that the convent was small, but workable—and came at ...
I have had the point made to me reguarly by local residents, and made the point myself to Folkestone and Hythe Parking Services, that the RingGo system used for Resident Visitor Permits is *not* straightforward or easy to use. However, its not always easy to find an example of WHY that is. Today though, I've been able to, and to brighten the existence of the Parking Services Manager and two Cabinet colleagues by sending them an extensive email detailing it. I know they are grateful. I can sense it. And I thought I'd put my example here too, in case ...
Next Tuesday Americans will be taking part in probably the most important presidential election in a generation. Actually, more than 70 million voters have already cast their ballot, which is a pretty strong indication of how seriously they are taking it. Joe Biden and Donald Trump are as different as chalk and cheese (and neither [...]
We had a meeting of Lydiate Parish Council yesterday evening via Zoom* and after many frustrations it looks like some positive progress is being made with regard to changing facilities at our Sandy Lane Playing Field. I would add that the frustrations have not been within the parish council. What started the project was our concern that we could not accommodate women's football because the changing rooms were simply inadequate and needed both upgrading and expanding. Followers of this blog site will recall that I've posted about this project before although not for a while. Here's my most relevant previous ...
Just so I don't lose it, a note on the genealogy of the writer Frederic Whyte (1867-1941), who was both my first cousin thrice removed and my second cousin twice removed, both links via his father. It turns out that there's another link, and it's another two steps sideways and one up; Frederic was my fourth cousin once removed via his mother. She was born Mary Jane Comyn in Holywell, near Kilfenora in County Clare, in 1834 and lived to 1912. Her mother, Margaret Helena Skerritt (1806-1879) was the second cousin of her husband, Henry Frederick Whyte (1830-1883). Margaret Skerritt's ...
British politics will hit several crunch points in the next two weeks. If Trump loses the US presidential election, the hopes of the hard-line Brexiters of a fast US-UK trade agreement will be shattered. Moreover, we must reach a minimal trade agreement with the EU, which the government will have to defend against hostile attacks from the right, or we will be faced with a No-Deal departure, with the prospect of chaos and confusion at Channel Ports in the New Year. It's taken me a long time to appreciate how deeply the hard-line Brexiters believe in the reality of 'the ...
Tue, 12:41: RT @Tom_deWaal: 1 A month now since the new #Karabakh conflict started. It's still escalating. A human tragedy, a regional crisis and a war... Tue, 12:56: RT @Tom_deWaal: Thank you to @foreignaffairs for the chance to go deeper into the deeply intractable dynamics of the #Karabakh dispute. The... Tue, 14:35: A Time of Gifts / Between the Woods and the Water, by Patrick Leigh Fermor Two brilliant, brilliant books of travel writing, written respectively forty and fifty years after the events described. #nwbooks https://t.co/XjYAlwqxmG https://t.co/K0Rj9HkKRs https://t.co/HNAN5pkOJh https://t.co/PvdBCQXgjB Tue, 15:35: In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote I am as ...
As if it were not bad enough that Donald Trump is using the apparatus of the state to try to secure his re-election through voter suppression and lies, it transpires that this particular virus has now started to infect the British state as well. It all started innocently enough: it was Japanese week on the Great British Bake Off and the person in charge of the Department for International Trade's twitter account decided to use the opportunity to promote their new trade deal with the Japanese, which er...secures for the UK the same terms of trade as we already enjoy ...
The preamble to our constitution, to quote Adrian Sanders in Liberator 400 (April 2020), "starts with the eradication of poverty as the first action point". Though both leadership candidates stated they wanted to achieve this, our party is not campaigning on it. It's not just that children from families receiving benefits need free school meals in the holidays. It is that 100,000 more children were living in poverty in this country in 2018-19 than in the previous year (DWP figures) and that an estimated 4.3 million children are living in poverty today (Social Metrics Commission). Former homelessness adviser to the ...
Wed 28th
08:30Whoniversaries 28 October: Ian Marter, Matt Smith, Abomble Snowmen #5, Stones of Blood #1, Arachnids
i) births and deaths 28 October 1944, 28 October 1986: birth and death of Ian Marter, who played companion Harry Sullivan in 1974-5, and also wrote nine Target novelisations. 28 October 1982: birth of Matt Smith, an actor who I am told appeared in some new New Who episodes and one Sarah Jane Adventures story in the early 2010s. ii) broadcast anniversaries 28 October 1967: broadcast of fifth episode of The Abominable Snowmen. Victoria is hypnotised by Padmasambhava; the monks evacuate; and the Intelligence grows in physical manifestation. (Yeah, I posted this plot summary last week mistakenly for episode four. ...
[IMG: How to explain your child's illness to them] As parents, our instinct is to protect our children from anything negative, even if it is something that affects them directly. Somehow we think that... The post How to explain your child's illness to them appeared first on Ambitiousmamas.
Four nations summit needed to keep families safe at Christmas, liberals warn Liberal Democrats in Scotland, Wales and England have joined with the Alliance Party in calling for a "four nations summit" to consider a united approach to keeping family gatherings safe during the festive season. In a joint letter to the four governments of the UK, the Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey, Scottish Leader Willie Rennie, Welsh Leader Jane Dodds and Alliance Deputy Leader Stephen Farry MP warned the "interlinked nature of life in the United Kingdom means no one government can devise guidance for the festive season in ...
As residents are aware, I have been in touch with the Roads Maintenance Partnership on numerous occasions about the need to resurface the roadway of Glamis Drive as it is in poor condition. I am pleased to advise that I have been informed that the road will be resurfaced from 9th November, which is good news. It will be undertaken in two phases over up to ten days : Phase 1 : from Invergowrie Drive to Hillside Road Phase 2 : from Hillside Road to Glamis Road This way access is maintained to the area throughout.
