Author Archives: the founding editor

More here and here.

Well done BBC!

This year’s Party elections counts will be the last for two years and probably the last to be held in Cambridge.

We have to copy the details of the votes on all the ballot papers to computers so they can be counted. No experience and very limited typing skills necessary. This year we again have the large extra job of counting the election for the Interim Peers List, with 48 candidates for 30 places.

• Saturday 4th November
• from 9 am or as early as you can make it
• Cambridge (Hills Road Sixth Form College)

Please contact Colin Rosenstiel if you can come or know others in your …

Look, we’ve told you before love, you’re not coming in here. Source: Sky News

Now for some wild speculation. Short is resigning early on in a Parliament. It was only last year she won her seat standing on a Labour ticket. There will be intense pressure on her to resign and cause a by-election. We were in second place in Ladywood at the last election…

A war of words has broken out in Wakefield over a topless photo. Former Tory council candidate Nathan Garbutt has resigned from the party after local activists tried to stop him posing for gay magazine Attitude .

Members of the Conservative Group on Wakefield council have dismissed his allegations, and told Wakefield Today that Mr Garbutt, 21, left the party over a disagreement about policy.

Garbutt, who is openly gay, was approached by Attitude to take part in an article about gay activists in political parties. The magazine wanted him to pose topless.

More

Wakefield Conservatives will soon be advertising …

“Should the rumour mill be moved to the members area?” is the question being posed in the private area of Lib Dem voice – members can vote in the poll there.

https://www.libdemvoice.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=146

Prince Charles has been urged to cancel a visit to Pakistan which will coincide with the scheduled execution of a Leeds man on death row.

Mirza Tahir Hussain, 36, is due to be executed on 1 November for murdering a taxi driver in 1998.

Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall are due to visit the country from 29 October to 3 November.

Leeds MP Greg Mulholland said it would be “monstrous” for Mr Hussain to be hanged during the Prince’s visit. More here.

Greg has been fighting hard to save his constituent. See:

• Pakistani President must accept his responsibility

…

What do you think? Vote in the poll on the right hand side.

UPDATE: Somewhat predictably, there was some immediate poll rigging. The results for the first hour were very balanced, and then there was a pronounced search in favour of the third option. I’m not going to pull the poll, else the likes of Mr Fawkes will make that in to a story, too. 🙂

UPDATE 2: Or maybe I will. After all, there’s no value in a rigged poll. Anyway, before the poll rigging took off, it was about 40% in favour of waiting for the electoral

…

You may recall Baroness Jenny Tonge landed herself in hot water at the Lib Dem party conference this year for saying at a fringe meeting “The pro-Israeli lobby has got its grips on the western world, its financial grips. I think they have probably got a certain grip on our party.”

The Liberal Democrat Friends of Israel leapt on the remarks. Yesterday, Ming Campbell wrote what is apparently a stern letter of rebuke to Jenny. He said later (in a comment that I’m reading straight from a Board of Deputies press release, not from a …

Ow… just… ow… Sion Simon MP, when you wrote for the Guardian you were funny, but you’re now officially a tit.

Watch, and if you’re a fan of ‘car crash’ TV fast forward to 1 minute and 30 seconds in.

Below we publish an official list, received (with thanks) from the Returning Officer, of the candidates standing in federal elections, and to the peers panel, this year.

We have had to disable the ability to comment on this blog post, due to the election rule that “Candidates or their supporters must not use e-mail, e-groups, cix conferencing or websites during these elections to promote their candidacy”. At a later stage we will question the effectiveness of this rule, but for now we must accept that the rule is binding for this election.

The Liberal Democrats have criticised Jack Straw for being “insensitive” by asking Muslim women not to wear veils when they attend his constituency surgery. Mr Straw has today gone further and said he would prefer Muslim women not to wear veils at all.

You can hear the Lib Dem view below, and Jack Straw’s defence of his position here.

Prominent Lib Dems were split on a not entirely dissimilar issue recently – the French government’s decision to ban religious symbols in schools, including the hijab. As an example, Evan Harris was apparently in favour of that ban, while Sarah Ludford was against. I’ve searched the party website in vain for an “official line” on that issue.

Where do you stand on this issue? Are we right to disagree with Jack Straw?

Note: Audio problem fixed with the aid of Martin Tod, thanks Martin!

David Cameron has just introduced himself, as it were, via archive video clip.

“He is an analogue politician in a digital age. Mr. Deputy Speaker, he is the past!” – and in walks David Cameron.

Surreal.

Later: Poor Samatha Cameron (I’m not taking the p**s here) appears to be not at all comfortable with the typical “leader’s wife” role. She stayed in the auditorium unsmiling throughout her husband’s first speech on Sunday, and just now the microphones picked up David Cameron asking her “are you alright?” as she joined him on the stage. She didn’t look at all comfortable. So if she doesn’t want …

Almost a century ago, the poet Hilaire Belloc warned children against lying, eating bits of string and leaving nurses in a crowd. Landale’s Cautionary Tales – comic verse for the 21st century (Canongate, £7.99, published Oct 19) brings Belloc up to date, offering fresh poetic advice to address the sins of the modern child, namely drinking, smoking, swearing, taking drugs, watching too much television and so on.

The author, James Landale, is chief political correspondent for BBC News 24. The book will, he assures Lib Dem Voice, make a great stocking filler.

Gloria …

There is a Lib Dem MP who I keep passing come out of stores in Victoria Street, just up the road from Parliament.

Two things.

1. You’re in your first term. Your majority isn’t huge. During recess, you should not be spending so much time in Westminster. It’ll still be there when you get back (V for Vendetta permitting) from opening shows and kissing babies and, you know, actually doing some casework.
2. What are you buying in Boots that needs you to go in apparently daily in the early evening? The Shapers food is all stale by then.