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20 Most Recent News Stories
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Fri 16th Jul 2010
Congratulations to Derry on winning UK City of Culture 2013. The city has a vibrant heart and becoming better known by more people will benefit Britain and Ireland as well as Derry itself. It is good luck on my part that I was in Derry and able to sign up there to support the bid very much as a latecomer just four days before they were successful. As my father was schooled in Derry, my grandmother from there and I've spent many happy occasions visiting family and visiting with friends I was pleased to support the city's bid.
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Thu 15th Jul 2010
Reducing the size of the State and encouraging private enterprise is a good thing. The dominance of public sector spending on the UK economy, on particular sectors and in particular towns and cities shows far too much dependence on the State and taxation and not enough enterprise and jobs generated by people, businesses, and communities themselves. If this is to be done it should be as a deliberate thought out principled policy approach not as a part of an emergency budget to correct the deluded spending plans of a bankrupt Labour Government and curtail an unsustainable deficit.
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Wed 23rd Jun 2010
Luciana Berger 1.
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Wed 23rd Jun 2010
The Budget by the coalition is a responsible Budget, protecting the poorest workers, taking many of them out of income tax altogether, reversing some of Labour's unfair tax hikes and putting up capital gains tax for the well off. Stopping an increase in National Insurance - Labour's tax on jobs instead of simply taxing income more for the rich - is good but the capital gains tax and inheritance tax could have gone up more for the rich to claim back for society more unearned wealth. That would have been better than the increase in VAT across the board. I'm pleased the excessive taxes on alcohol (a tax imposed by well off professionals and Labour politicians as part of their social control) have been stopped for now.
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Mon 10th May 2010
Is Luciana Berger [the new Labour MP for Liverpool Wavertree] a vacuous bimbo?
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Fri 7th May 2010
Bill le Breton who helped the Lib Dems gain the MP in Burnley makes the point to me that a "Government of all the talents" is the best way forward. Given that no party has a monopoly on the best policies and wisdom, given the tribal us v them Labour v Tory attitudes, given David Cameron's opposition to coalitions, the best bet may be a war time style Government of all the best people to deal with the major challenges that our country has.
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Fri 7th May 2010
Labour voters in Liverpool have got the MP they deserve! Labour voters in Liverpool have elected a vacuous, right wing, inexperienced, bimbo MP, Luciana Berger, with no experience of Liverpool, no personal experience except as a careerist new Labour politician, no record of achievement and no background to work on behalf of local people.
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Fri 7th May 2010
A hung Parliament is good for Britain if the parties work together in the best interests of the country. This is normal, it happens in many other countries. It is what the Liberal Democrats always have argued should happen. Parties should work together to improve the country. In Scotland and in Wales in hung Parliaments the Liberal Democrats worked together with the larger party to make the countries better. Scotland and Wales have had great success in the last 10 years following coalition government.
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Sun 18th Apr 2010
As I expected after the debate, tabloids are using the Lib Dem surge to try & scare voters back to the tribal parties. The Mail on Sunday's historic front page "Historic MoS poll puts Liberals in General Election lead for first time in 104 years" is followed by rabid jingoistic attack on Nick Clegg inside: "His wife is Spanish, his mother Dutch, his father half-Russian and his spin doctor German. Is there ANYTHING British about Lib Dem leader?" p. 8. That's it for intelligent political debate then.
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Thu 15th Apr 2010
The Leader's debate between the party leader's has been very impressive. I was in two minds whether to leave the Cambridge pub to watch it but it is an improvement for British election campaigns and I am glad that I did. Nick Clegg was passionate and positive and had simple policy ideas to make improvements. The others were not as optimistic or as honest.
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Sat 10th Apr 2010
Commiserations to the family and friends of all the victims of the air crash at Smolensk, including Polish President Lech Kaczynski. It is terrible that so many people are killed on the way to an event for the purpose of encouraging reconciliation. Respect and calm must prevail at this time. Nothing can take away the ill will from they Katyn massacre but today should be remembered for the important reconciliation between two historic countries of Europe that was aimed at.
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Mon 29th Mar 2010
The first ever TV debate between the three candidates to be the next Chancellor has seen Lib Dem Vince Cable win a clear victory. In a Channel 4 on-line poll carried out immediately after the debate, Vince out-polled both Alistair Darling and George Osborne.
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![Vince Cable [Photo: LDD Pics]](/images/sites/217.160.173.25-3e54d75166df56.63810547/thumbs/316.jpeg "Vince Cable [Photo: LDD Pics]")
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Sun 28th Mar 2010
At 8pm on Monday 29th March, Channel 4 will stage a live debate between the would-be Chancellors, Liberal Democrat Vince Cable, Labour's Alistair Darling and Conservative George Osborne. Krishnan Guru-Murthy will be asking the questions.
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Sat 20th Mar 2010
This website is to promote political debate and dialogue, hopefully tolerance and individual and collective improvement, as well as my own views and myself ;-). Therefore though I am a British Liberal Democrat I steer clear of promoting simple party politics and have not linked to friends or directly partly political websites as they tend to promote a, often simplistic, party line and not necessarily promote intelligent political debate! The rhetoric and language of 'we are right and you are wrong' or 'we are better than you even though our policies are no different' I reject.
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Sat 20th Mar 2010
These two articles in leading progressive British newspapers:
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Sat 13th Mar 2010
The help given to Haiti demonstrates the best of mankind. It is impossible not to be impressed by the immense outpouring of support, compassion and generosity from people world wide - of every race, creed, colour and ideology - of individuals and organisations, of Governments (whether the US, Cuba, China) or bodies like the UN and EU, of NGOs and charities, and of corporations (yes corporations have done a lot to help under no obligation to do so and with no profit motive, presumably because individuals decided they should), of IT providers and web campaigners, trade unionists and the media. Yes the media have done a lot of harm but they have also done a great deal more good in highlighting the problem, what is being done badly and what well. Whether the US army or the inefficiency of the UN the genuine motivation is commendable. It is also impressive, but sadly reflects the scale of the tragey, that the earthquake relief story is still in the news (here in UK) two months afterwards when the media would normally have moved on to a more topical story.
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Sat 13th Mar 2010
The decade from 1995 to 2005 should be seen as the golden renaissance of life in the British cities. The excellent competition for the European Capital of Culture title for 2008 convinced me of this, showcasing as it did the very best of many of the UK's biggest cities plus a few smaller but still enthusiastic challengers. Newcastle, Liverpool, Birmingham, Belfast were exceptional. The competition in 2002 - 2003 showed how the post-industrial towns and cities were contributing with renewed confidence to the vitality of the country. The magnanimous poem from Birmingham's Poet Laureate at the time, Julie Boden, summed up a confidence shared in the industrial cities outside the South East:
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Thu 14th Jan 2010
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8458000/8458611.stm This interview by John Humphrys of the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, is one of the most impressive demolitions of 'God' that I have heard. John Humphrys does not take any stance or put forward a view, he simply asks questions as a journalist. Radio 4 Today programme, 14 January 2010 8.31am. 'Where is God in Haiti?'. The difficulty the Archbishop has in dealing with the distress of the earthquake is obvious.
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Mon 14th Dec 2009
BBC NEWS | UK | British adults 'fear youngsters'
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Mon 14th Dec 2009
This was the front page headline of Liberal Democrat News (the only UK major party weekly political newspaper) on 26 November 2004. It referred to a speech by party leader, Charles Kennedy MP, before the Labour Government's Queen's Speech announcing its legislative programme for the year in Parliament. Kennedy spoke out in favour of action on the environment, crime prevention and preventing re-offending and against a using a climate of fear to force through repressive measures. The issues resonate just as much five years on.
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