A row has broken out following Scotland’s first council by-election since the introduction of STV after the Returning Officer decided four votes was not a small enough margin to warrant a recount.

The Aberdeen City Council seat was won by the SNP, but at one stage there were only four votes separating the Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives and analysis of the ballot papers shows that had the Liberal Democrats overtaken the Conservatives (rather than being eliminated) they would have gone on to win the seat.

“The Liberal Democrats were four votes away from a sensational by-election gain. We will be raising …

Dominic Asquith, the British Ambassador to Iraq, has increased the pressure on the Government to grant asylum to people who have worked for the British armed forces in Iraq by stating that Britain has a “duty of care” to them.

He made his comments, which are reported in The Times, as he prepares to leave his job in Baghdad.

The Liberal Democrat campaign website on this issue is at ourcampaign.org.uk/interpreters and there’s a good round up of people who are supporting the petition on the Number 10 website over on Tim Ireland’s blog.

Labour councillor Rofique Ahmed recently faced this decision at a meeting. What did he decide? To sit there saying nothing. Only one slight problem. It was a key planning meeting which had to decide whether or not to grant outline planning permission for the Olympics. And he was the only councillor from Tower Hamlets sitting on the body.

Actually, I exaggerate slightly. He did talk once – to be excused to go to the toilet.

The East London Advertiser has more.

Two new surveys on student debt levels point towards top-up fees increasing student debts:

Another survey of 2,000 for Push.co.uk predicts those who began courses last year will owe nearly £17,500 by the time they graduate, up 24% on 2006.

It says this year’s freshers will owe up to £21,500 when they graduate, with some of them struggling financially.

Editor of the Push.co.uk survey Johnny Rich said: “This is the first time we have had genuine figures about what top-up fees have meant.”

He claimed the figures meant the government’s financial support for students paying variable fees was not working.

“This increase is not just

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From a Philip Webster story on The Times website:

It has also emerged that Mr Brown has spent £39 billion in his first seven weeks at No 10.

Sadly, this sentence was hit by a printing error and some text was lost from it. But I can reveal now what The Times really meant to publish was:

The Guardian has done the research and showed that Mr Brown has spent £39 billion in his first even weeks at No 10 but, you know, we just can’t bring outselves to mention that the story was put together by another newspaper or give any credit to that

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Vince Cable gives the Liberal Democrat repsonse over on Comment is Free.

Here’s the relevant text: 

Regular readers of this newsletter will know that your local MP, Theresa Villiers, and two local Conservative Councillors, Wendy Prentice and Bridget Perry have always been against moving Foulds into the site of the Barnet Countryside Centre at the end of Byng Road.

Conservatives In Touch with High Barnet ward newsletter, number 39, June 2007, London Borough of Barnet

Sounds a reasonable expression of local concern perhaps?

But remember that phrase “have always been against” and now read this:

“One of Barnet’s oldest schools, Foulds School in Byng Road, is to be re-built … the northern end of Byng Road,

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A recent edition of Channel 4’s Dispatches programme looked at Britain’s housing shortage and revived questions over donations made to the Labour Party in Manchester. I’ve just got hold of a transcript, so if you missed the show, here’s the story:

Manchester Central Constituency Labour Party has received more donations from property developers than any other in the country – tens of thousands of pounds. They’ve even solicited cash.

On 1st June 2004, the party held a fundraising breakfast here at the Manchester City Art Gallery. Among the donations was £5,000 from a company called “Ask Property Developments”.

The Labour Party did well in the subsequent election and was returned to power. And this is when things take an interesting turn.

You may have noticed there’s been a bit of a fuss over whether the Conservative Party has done a bit of a u-turn over its logo.

Their tree logo seemed to undergo a change of colour, dropping the use of green for a more traditional Conservative blue and adding in a splash of clouds.

But today the BBC reported this:

A Conservative Party spokeswoman … told the BBC: “We are not changing it at all. When we launched the tree last year there were various colours on it.

“You can change the backdrop on it. You can change the colour of the tree to

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