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My New Blog
No comments on My New BlogProcess Guy is no more, but if you find yourself here, you may be interested to know that I have started another blog: Strange Thoughts Why not have a look? Source: This content was originally posted on my old Process Guy blog.
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The end of Process Guy
You may or may not have noticed that things have been rather quiet on this blog lately. Well, it hasn’t been because there hasn’t been anything to write about! I have been very busy and have found it difficult to find the time to update it, even when inspiration has struck, or more accurately when something has wound me up. However, more recently it has been because a few weeks ago I made the decision…
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International summit or jelly and ice cream?
There are media reports today that Gordon Brown has prepared some goodie bags for the world leaders attending the G20 summit. Apparently this is an attempt to “showcase British creativity”. Hang on a minute? Why on earth are world leaders getting goodie bags? Surely it can’t be some kind of inducement to ensure a high turn out? Do the presidents and prime ministers of the world make decisions on whether to attend based on the…
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Why does Moran cost Luton taxpayers ten times more than Hopkins?
I live in Luton and work in London. Like many thousands of others I do a regular commute each morning to get to the office and one each evening to get home. Because I have the benefit of living close to the rail station and the relatively good service provided by the Thameslink line I can be at most central London locations within an hour or hour and a half of leaving my home. This…
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Looking up from the bottom of the sea
I’ve a number of things that I’ve been wanting to write about here for the last few days, and some for the last few weeks, but I’m finding it difficult to fit it in. Usual story. But I have got time to say a very well deserved congratulations to Alix Mortimer for being shortlisted for the Orwell Prize. She says she is “dumbfounded, and a bit shuffly” about it. There really is no need. As…
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Mental health issues need to be a priority
The lead story in the Luton News this morning is reactions to the welcome life sentence given to the murderer of PC Jon Henry who was stabbed to death in Luton town centre while on duty in June 2007. The murderer, Tennyson Obih, is a paranoid schizoprhenic. It is a reminder that so often at the centre of the most shocking and senseless of violent crimes is someone who suffers from a severe mental illness.…
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Can Labour win?
No. Oh. You want more? then go read this. Source: This content was originally posted on my old Process Guy blog.
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Ed Miliband stops funding for solar power
The Government have closed its grant programme for solar energy. Part of the Low Carbon Buildings Programme provides grants for solar photovoltaic projects on public buildings. This has been so successful that the allocated share of the £50m for these projects has been used up. So what does the government do? Invest more money into the programme so that they can build on its success? No. It closes the scheme to new applications. As the…
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Harrogate 09: The last word
Well I’ve got to Thursday and I am still writing up the weekend’s events at Conference. Time to knock it on the head. I broadly agree with what James Graham has written over at Comment is Free about the political impact. No need to say much more. I was impressed with the Leader’s speech. Not only with the content itself but with the implications it has for the message and strategy of the Party. My…
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The Leader’s speech: Clegg does an Obama
I thought Nick Clegg’s speech to the Liberal Democrat spring conference on Saturday was one of the best leader’s speeches I have heard for many years. I thought it was a speech of gravity, of great political intelligence, one that has altered my view of Nick and his leadership, and has strengthened my optimism for the future. My companion (as they say in restaurant reviews) was less impressed. He, the cynical bastard that he is,…
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The Spring Conference education debates: A tale of two rows
The row we never had For me theme of the weekend turned out to be the impact of Obama and the lessons to be learnt from the US election campaign. For many conference representatives however it would have been the policy moves we were making on education. If I felt these debates seemed overshadowed by other issues that is probably because of ‘the row we never had’. Until the Federal Policy Committee, very sensibly, decided…
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Howard Dean at the Liberal Democrat conference
Howard Dean got a standing ovation from the Liberal Democrat conference on Saturday morning. Yet it seemed to me that it was President Obama that the audience were in large part applauding. The ‘Obama Effect’ was a major theme of the 2009 Spring Conference and the sense of relief amongst Lib Dems that George Bush is no longer in the White House was most clearly felt during Dean’s speech. I was slightly disappointed by the…
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Not blogging conference
This blogging during conference thing doesn’t seem to work. I got halfway through my Howard Dean post when the battery gave up. I couldn’t find a power socket. Then I got swept up in the conference whirlwind. Ho hum. But I am now home and will write up the happenings of Harrogate over the next few days. Source: This content was originally posted on my old Process Guy blog.
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In Harrogate for Spring Conference
I’ve had a hectic few weeks – busy with one thing or another – so haven’t been able to follow up on some of my recent posts – building on my arguments – as I had planned. But here I am in Harrogate for the Liberal Democrat spring conference with a whole weekend to concentrate on things liberal. Harrogate is one of my favourite conference venues. I love its poshness and gentility. Its yorkshire friendliness.…
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On that Liberator editorial
There has been a lot of reaction to the “Blues Under the Bed” editorial in the latest issue of Liberator Magazine. Part of Liberator’s mission is to stir things up from time to time and it seems they have certainly succeeded in some quarters with this. Scarred as they undoubtedly are by the internal party battles of the 1990’s, I often think the Liberator collective display a degree of paranoia about dark forces at work…
