Tag Archives: Parliament

Daily View 2×2: 15 January 2010

By Helen Duffett | Published 15th January 2010 - 12:25 pm

Welcome, Daily Viewers, to January 15th – and a public engagement special.

There's a plane in the Hudson. I'm on the ferry going to pick... on TwitpicA year ago today US Airways Flight 1549 made an emergency landing into New York’s Hudson River. Eyewitness Janis Krums took this famous photo of the plane (right) and immediately shared it with the internet via Twitter, thus proving the website could be used for so much more than telling the world what you had for breakfast. (The only twitpic photo that’s come close since then was of a fox on the London Underground, but I live in hope and carry a camera…)

And as Mark reminds us, today’s a very good day for having your say on MPs’ expenses.

2 Must-Read Blog Posts

What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here are two posts that have caught the eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:

  • A vote for ‘None of the above’ is a vote for pusillanimity

    • Adam Bell at Decline of the Logos: from fence-sitting to barricading the streets.

  • Enquiries and the state of Brown’s trousers – a historical note

    • MKNE political information looks at public protest, 1812-style.

Spotted any other great posts in the last day from blogs that aren’t on the aggregator? Do post up a comment sharing them with us all.

2 Engaging Stories

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Posted in Daily View | Also tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

So, why can’t you call yourself an MP?

By Mark Pack | Published 17th December 2009 - 10:26 am

The rules against people calling themselves an MP usually get a flurry of publicity in the run-up to a general election. Indeed, it’s part of the pre-election “Will it be an internet election this time?” tradition to have a story about how “MPs who use [insert currently fashionable internet tool] face disaster because they’ve called themselves an MP”.

This time round it’s been Twitter, with the story that MPs who have chosen a Twitter username containing “MP” will run into problems as they officially stop being MPs when Parliament is dissolved for a general election. So if they tweet during …

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Posted in Election law | Also tagged , | 5 Comments

LibLink … Nick Clegg: Don’t waste our time… bring forward real reform

By The Voice | Published 16th November 2009 - 10:30 am

In today’s Independent, Nick Clegg makes a bold pitch – that Parliament should use the few months it has left before the election to try and actually achieve something to solve the big political issue of the year: restoring the public’s trust in Parliament. Here’s an excerpt:

On Wednesday, all the pomp and ceremony that Parliament can muster will be rolled out for the Queen’s Speech, setting out the Government’s list of new laws for the coming year. But the glitz and glamour will be based on a complete fiction. Parliament will find it difficult to pass any of the

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Posted in LibLink | Also tagged , , | 14 Comments

Ros Scott writes… Party President’s report to members, October ‘09

By Baroness Ros Scott | Published 4th November 2009 - 5:15 pm

October was a month which began for me in India and ended in Cairo. I had been invited to India by the Indian High Commission along with a small delegation of Parliamentarians who are “Liberal Democrat Friends of India”. We were led by Lord John Alderdice through a week’s visit which was split between Delhi and Pune and included a number of meeting and visits to reflect India today, politically, socially and economically.

I was in Cairo for three days to attend the Congress of Liberal International, which is held every 18 months. The Lib Dem delegation is led by the Party President, but all the work is done by the Chair of the International Relations Committee, who is Robert Woodthorpe Brown. It’s a pretty humbling experience to hear from campaigners who risk their life and liberty for working to make democratic change in oppressive regimes, and certainly puts domestic politics into perspective.

In between the two, Parliament resumed after the summer recess, and I’ve been busy in the Lords with voting, select committee work and a few speeches. The expenses issue continues to rumble.

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Posted in Op-eds, Party Presidency | Also tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

NEW POLL: How should the Lib Dems increase their number of female MPs?

By Stephen Tall | Published 21st October 2009 - 7:40 pm

At the Speaker’s Conference yesterday, Nick Clegg delivered a frank assessment of the Lib Dem Parliamentary Party, calling it “woefully unrepresentative of modern Britain”. It’s not hard to see why. No ethnic minority MPs, and just nine female MPs among our 63 representatives. Woeful is the word.

The real question is: what to do about it? Nick has previously indicated – and repeated the point in his submission yesterday – that he would consider recommending all-women shortlists be adopted by the party after the next election if he’s unable to point to real progress in improving the Parliamentary party’s representativeness. …

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Posted in Voice polls | Also tagged , , | 60 Comments

Nick Clegg – “Parliament houses a shooting gallery but not a creche”

By The Voice | Published 20th October 2009 - 10:20 pm

Today witnessed the appearance of Nick Clegg (as well as Gordon Brown and David Cameron) in front of the Speaker’s Conference, chaired by the new Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow.

The issue this special committee has been asked to look at is: “Consider, and make recommendations for rectifying, the disparity between the representation of women, ethnic minorities and disabled people in the House of Commons and their representation in the UK population at large”.

You can watch Nick give his views and answer questions on the Parliament website here (his part begins about 48 …

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Posted in Parliament | Also tagged , , , | 6 Comments

Why does one Labour MP claim £80k more in expenses than another MP living on the same street?

By Mark Pack | Published 24th March 2009 - 8:55 am

The two Labour MPs for Luton, Kelvin Hopkins and Margaret Moran live on the same street in Luton. You could argue over whether or not they should be able to claim a second homes allowance. But what’s really rum is that whilst Kelvin Hopkins has claimed £8,894 from the second homes allowance in the last five years, which could be for reasonable occasional costs such as the odd night in a hotel after a very late night at work, his near-neighbour Margaret Moran has claimed nearly ten times as much: £87,206. Is that really right?

Hat tip – Duncan Borrowman.

Posted in Opposition watch | Also tagged , | 9 Comments