July 2008

The Archives

• Being Labour

  A real grass roots view

  07.29.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  Below are the verbatim views  (bar a few very small typos) sent to me, in my position as a Labour branch secretary, of a recently joined Labour party member unhappy with the recent behaviour of some Labour MPs.  It speaks for itself.  I quote it in full with the permission of the said new member.  ” I recently joined the Party firstly […]

• Bickerstaffe Thoughts

  Bickerstock 2008 this weekend

  07.29.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  I’m doing plenty of running about this week helping with preparations for Bickerstock 2008.  I’m treasurer ‘cos I understand adding up better than all this modern music stuff, but it sounded great last year, and this one promises to be even better. Don’t miss out on this great two day free festival, run on a shoestring but […]

• Being Labour, Cotterill on the Council

  Now this REALLY is unacceptable

  07.29.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  I’ve commented before that it’s unacceptable for West Lancashire District Council go around naming and shaming someone for a crime they have not actually committed, as part of the tough-guy PR image thing it’s got going on.  Now things just got worse.  I’ve looked at this videoblog by the Chief Executive of West Lancashire District Council, and […]

• Being Labour, The world beyond West Lancashire

  Does the Labour party need philosophers?

  07.28.08 | Permalink | 3 Comments

  There’s the start of an interesting debate over at Though Cowards Flinch (TCF), with somewhat  opposing views on the value of intellectualism/academia to the Labour party/movement, and what counts as good music, put forward by TCF author Dave Sample and Miller 2.0. As seems increasingly to be the case, I started with a brief comment but finished with something that is […]

• Being Labour, The world beyond West Lancashire

  Labour wins Norfolk from Tories in dramatic trend bucking election vote swingometer move

  07.27.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  A bloggery hat tip to our new NEC man Peter Kenyon for flagging up this Labour election victory against the Tories.   Alright,  it wasn’t the whole of Norfolk, more a Town Council seat in Thetford, but Terry’s victory does show, as Peter suggests, that good local work can keep on winning (note the press even […]

• Being Labour, Cotterill on the Council

  So the information is available after all…

  07.26.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  I had a very cordial meeting with officers yesterday to discuss the information I needed for my scrutiny review of Environmental Health services in West Lancashire, focused on equity of delivery. On 04 July I was told that it really wouldn’t be possible ‘within available resources’ to provide me with information broken down by postcode […]

• Being Labour, The world beyond West Lancashire

  The Labour party and ethical investment

  07.23.08 | Permalink | 1 Comment

  Here’s the resolution I’ll be putting to my Labour party branch tonight:  “That this branch notes the action taken by Liverpool City Council, in cross-party co-operation, in respect of the potential for adding an ethical dimension to the Statement of Investment Principles of the Merseyside Pension Fund.   Further, that the branch notes the potential for the […]

• The world beyond West Lancashire

  The smoking ban a year on

  07.20.08 | Permalink | 2 Comments

  There’s been a debate on the ‘members-only’ discussion forum about a petition now circulating calling for the introduction of a limited number of ‘smoking licences’, which would give “the owners of pubs and clubs freedom to allow people to smoke on their property………allowing business owners to decide how to run their businesses and customers to […]

• About me, Being Labour, The world beyond West Lancashire

  A bit of defending unions and critiquing postmodernism and stuff

  07.19.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  Myself and a couple of seemingly like-minded bloggers have been challenging the well-right of centre views of a blogger from the other side of the pond who’s accusing the UK unions and all who support their right to do what they were set up for of a ‘return to the 1970s’.  My view for what […]

• About me, Being Labour, The world beyond West Lancashire

  Discourse, and the material world

  07.17.08 | Permalink | Comment?

  A ‘hat tip’, as real bloggers say, to Dave Ostler for bringing this critique by Tom Hampson (of the Fabians) of the growing use of the terms ‘chav’ to my attention.  For starters, I left this as what started out as a brief comment on his blog, but then it kind of grew organically into a […]

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