Ed Davey on Kuennsberg to talk about "Trump's idiotic war" and need to act on food securityEd Davey was interviewed by Victoria Derbyshire who was sitting in for Laura Kuennsberg this morning. He wanted to talk about our plan to ensure food security by giving a billion to England's farmers and introduce a Good Food Bill in next month's King's Speech. Unsurprisingly, though, the first question was about whether we supported the UK sending military help to keep the Strait of Hormuz open. Ed said: I think we should work with our international partners, particularly at the UN if possible but certainly with our allies in NATO and elsewhere and in the Gulf Region in particular ... (more) |
Bill Oddie: On Ilkla Moor Baht'atGraeme Garden was singing the praises of Bill Oddie's music for I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again and The Goodies on the Through the Square Window podcast the other day. And this is a good example of how funny and accomplished it was. The Dandelion Records label, says Dandies in the Underworld, was a labour of love run by John Peel and record company Clive Selworthy. The latter explains how the record came about:One of the label's most collectable singles is Bill Oddie's On Ilkley Moor Baht'at. I think I was behind that. It was another one of our jokes ... (more) |
Tom Arms' World ReviewUK and Russia UK-Russian tensions have been ratcheted up several notches this week. It started when Vladimir Putin sent a Russian frigate to escort two shadow fleet oil tankers through the English Channel. The move was a response to Sir Keir Starmer's threat to board and impound any of the sanctioned tankers moving through British waters. Result: stand- off. The tankers issue was followed by a press conference at which Defence Secretary John Healey announced that British forces—in cooperation with Norway—had foiled a Russian attempt to cut a key undersea cable north of the UK. Not revealed at the press ... (more) |
Latest PollBase is out, with all the British voting intention polls since the 1930sWith the end of another, rather interesting, quarter, another update to PollBase, my database of British voting intention opinion polls since the 1930s is now up. It includes the first PM approval ratings from 1938 and first national voting intention scores from 1939. Download the new version here. As well as another three months of data, changes this time include: Correction to information about Techne polls, which are of the UK rather than GB. Additional Gallup data from the 1951, 1955, 1964, 1966 and both 1974 Parliaments. Some of this information has come from the Bodleian Library's set of Gallup/BIPO ... (more) |
Police review Reform UK energy prize drawNation Cymru reports that police are reviewing a complaint about Reform UK's offer to pay the energy bills of an entire street for a year as part of a prize draw. However, Nigel Farage has said he is "not in the least bit worried" electoral rules may have been broken by holding the competition after footage online showed him and Treasury spokesman Robert Jenrick visiting the winners: In a video posted on X, the pair could be seen handing a bunch of flowers and a large cheque for £1,758 to a couple, said to be Reform UK supporters, in Wigan ... (more) |
Ken Loach was Kenneth Williams' understudy in a West End revueIn 1961 Sheila Hancock was appearing in the West End revue One Over the Eight. In her memoir The Two of Us: My Life with John Thaw she writes: The chief joy of One Over the Eight for me was meeting and becoming friends with the writer of the show, Peter Cook, and Kenneth [Williams], the maverick star. But she didn't feel London was really swinging yet and neither did Kenneth Williams: One night after the show, when I gave him a lift back to his chaste flat on the back of my Lambretta, he waved his furled umbrella at ... (more) |
The Joy of Six 1502"As need has grown and reform and resources have stalled, 1.9 million people in England alone provided a 'full-time' (defined as 35 hours or more) week of care in 2023-24 - that's 70 per cent more than 20 years ago. Others have to fit caring responsibilities around their jobs: dropping off the kids at school, going to the office and then helping their elderly parents bathe and eat."Frances Ryan asks who will care for the carers. Ari Berman names the far-right conspiracists who are urging Trump to take control of the mid-term elections. Tao Wang says a study of the ... (more) |
Observations of an Expat: Two-State SolutionTWO-STATE SOLUTION. That is the only answer to the Palestinian conundrum; the Arab-Israeli problem and now, the Iran War. Neither the US nor Israel can bomb the Palestinian issue out of existence. It only creates recruiting sergeants for future generations. Hitler tried it with his Final Solution. Even though six million Jews died in horrific circumstances he failed. The Jewish state rose from the ashes of the Holocaust with a determination that they will never again face extermination and that the land of Israel is theirs by right of God's promise to Abraham. Problem was that the Biblical land was ... (more) |
Basque refugees in SwanseaI think it is commonly known that a large number of people left the UK, and South Wales in particular, to fight the fascists in the Spanish civil war. In fact, the South Wales Miners Musuem, now relocated to Y Storfa in Swansea City Centre, has a huge amount of material about those prepared to fight and die for the cause. It is not so well known that Swansea hosted refugees who had undertaken the reverse journey. Swansea University's history website reports that in May 1937, nearly 4,000 children arrived in Southampton aboard the Habana, fleeing the horrors of the ... (more) |