Archive for jonathan calder
Tim Farron: good speech, but wrong message
Sometimes the toughest speaking gigs for MPs is when they are talking to a friendly audience – but something interesting is happening behind them. So it was a few months ago with Julian Huppert talking to Putney Liberal Democrats. Very thoughtful speech, well received by the members and supporters present – but Julian had to [...]
I want to hear a speech from Tim Farron that I disagree with
Over on his blog Jonathan Calder makes a good point about the speech-making abilities of Liberal Democrat President Tim Farron: My impression of Tim is that he is very good at saying things people agree with. So in Cumbria he is against second homes and in favour of farming subsidies and Kendal mint cake… Now [...]
Total Politics: top blogs and bloggers
Following its list of top Liberal Democrat blogs and bloggers, Total Politics has now also published its overall list of top blogs and bloggers – two lists in which many Liberal Democrats feature. In the top 50 of the blogs list, Lib Dem Voice is in at number 12 (up from 27 last year), Caron [...]
Congratulations Caron, Jonathan and Stephen
The Total Politics Top 100 Liberal Democrat blogs table is out, with the top five being: 1 Lib Dem Voice 2 Caron’s Musings 3 Liberal England 4 Andrew Reeves’ Running Blog 5 Stephen’s Liberal Journal This blog then slips in at #6. It’s fitting to see Andrew’s contribution to Liberal Democrat blogging, both as a blogger and an [...]
How Great Ormond Street’s Jane Collins escaped investigation last year
Jane Collins, the Chief Executive of Great Ormond Street Hospital, is facing calls to resign after it was revealed that critical details about the hospital’s role in the death of Baby Peter were withheld from one inquiry into the tragedy and, despite the hospital’s subsequent claims, were also not supplied to the second inquiry. However, [...]
Learning the lessons from last week #5: You can’t be distinctive with someone else’s vocabulary
A favourite pastime of cynical journalists with space to fill is to take select phrases from the speeches of different party leaders, remove the names of the authors, jumble up the order and then ask the reader to guess which leader said which. Even with the wondrous variety of the English language, it’s no surprise [...]
In other news… speed cameras and does online campaigning work?
Jonathan Calder reports how Cornish councillor Jeremy Rowe is finding Twitter useful as a way to communicate with residents in his area who are hard to reach through traditional politics. Cllr Rowe’s local experience compliments the message that Google search data gives about people wanting to find politicians on Twitter. (If you are a councillor [...]
In other news… Son of mansion tax, Tory councillor switches to Lib Dems and more
Nick Clegg has been telling the Financial Times how he would like to see taxes introduced for the most expensive properties as part of any removal of the temporary 50p top rate of income tax. Son of Mansion Tax here we come… Jonathan Calder reports on the latest goings on in the lively world of [...]
Meet the Lib Dem bloggers: Jonathan Calder
Welcome to the latest in our series giving the human face behind some of the blogs you can find on the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator. Today it is Jonathan Calder, who blogs at Liberal England. 1. What’s your formative political memory? I can remember JFK being assassinated and being taught to say that Alec Douglas Home [...]
Posts of the week: what happens when you don't vote Labour and when you do a deal with the Tories
Welcome to my weekly round-up of two blogging highlights from the past week: the post that I found most interesting or enjoyable to write and the post from someone else that I found most interesting or entertaining. It’s a pair of videos this time, which stretches the idea of writing just a little, but hey… [...]
