Lord Harborough's Curve and Oscar Wilde's first biographerLord Harborough's Curve: photo by John Sutton Many railway enthusiasts will know the story of the Battle of Saxby and Lord Harborough's Curve, told here by the Leicestershire Museum Collections site:In mid-November 1844, railway surveyors were making their way slowly through the Leicestershire countryside. George Stephenson had sketched out his preferred route for the Syston & Peterborough Railway and now they were taking the levels. Four miles east of Melton, near the village of Saxby, they reached the estate of Lord Harborough, whose ancestral home of Stapleford Hall stood nearby. His Lordship hated the very idea of railways and had ... (more) |
His father knew Lloyd GeorgeOn the 9th April 1917, Easter Monday, the poet Edward Thomas was killed in the Battle of Arras. His family were Welsh, and his father Philip was an active Liberal and attendee of the National Eisteddfod in 1906. He was a friend of David Lloyd George long before Lloyd George became President of the Board of Trade. In 1936 David Lloyd George, prime minister Stanley Baldwin, and poet laureate John Masefield signed an appeal to create a memorial to Thomas, and on 2nd October 1937 it was unveiled on the Shoulder of Mutton hill in Hampshire. 'Adlestrop' is probably Edward ... (more) |
It is time for a new social democratic chapter in Lib Dem thinkingThe Liberal Democrats have a habit of arguing through books. The Orange Book, the Little Yellow Book, the Green Book; each tried to say something important about the future of our party. But taken together, they still leave one tradition unnamed: liberal social democracy. These books aren't just publications, but attempts to define what kind of party we are. The Orange Book laid out a deliberate statement of intent in 2004. It was a serious effort to restate one kind of liberalism and carve out a path that distinguished us from the Conservative and Labour Parties at the time. The ... (more) |
Improving our food resilience is essential to managing food price volatilityFood prices have become one of the biggest pressures on family budgets in Britain. Yet behind the rising cost of the weekly shop lies a deeper problem: a food system that is failing households, farmers and the economy alike. In the past decade, we have experienced the highest food price inflation in 40 years. UK production of some of our most nourishing foods, such as beans, fruit and vegetables, is stalling as they no longer offer a viable livelihood for farmers. Domestic fruit and vegetable production has dropped by 16% since 2015, and we see the largest trade deficits for ... (more) |
The Joy of Six 1501Samira Shackle meets victims of successive governments that have sought to reduce immigration while insisting universities recruit more overseas students: "Each year, about 400,000 international students are granted study visas to the UK. A significant proportion do so with the help of education agents: middlemen paid by universities to find foreign students. In 2023, UK universities spent a total of £500m on education agents - but there is very little oversight of how these agents operate." "In places like Kootenai County, where white Christian Republicans hold a supermajority, local politics is mutating into something undeniably extreme. North Idaho offers a ... (more) |
Cheaper fuel isn't a liberal transport policyLast week, the party announced an emergency transport package: 10p off fuel duty, £1 bus fares, a 10% rail cut, lower VAT on public EV charging. And the reaction from members has been... pretty muted. I think that tells us something. There's a shared instinct here that the package doesn't quite land, and it's worth working out why. It's not that responding to a crisis is wrong. People are paying more to get around because of a war they didn't start, and a responsible opposition should have something to say about that. The question is whether what we're saying is ... (more) |
Missing ObservationsMy computer has been malfunctioning for the past two weeks: hence a dearth of comments on the several dire problems facing the world The Space flight. There has been a rather pathetic attempt by the BBC to generate excitement about this project. I know it is very clever but it was successfully done fifty years ago, when technology was much less advanced, and flights to and from the International Space Station have become routine since. So why be thrilled with this one, even if it is a little bit further and we get new pictures of the other side of ... (more) |
Another leading Reform politician quits partyNation Cymru reports that a prominent Reform Wales figure has announced she will leave the party citing "serious concerns" over parachuted Senedd election candidates and allegations of racism. The news site says that former UKIP Assembly Member for South Wales West Caroline Jones told followers on Facebook on Tuesday (April 7) that she had quit Reform UK 24 hours ago but had not received any acknowledgment from senior party officials: In a statement to Facebook she wrote: "It has been over 24 hours since I have formally submitted my resignation from the Reform UK party. "After more than 13 years ... (more) |
8 April 2026 - today's press releasesCole-Hamilton takes on judo champ and pledges to restore Highland services Cole-Hamilton: Time to beg UK Government and European operators for vessels for Dunkirk-style effort to tackle ferry crisis Greene: Scottish Tory economy plans show they are the 'nasty party' again Cole-Hamilton takes on judo champ and pledges to restore Highland services Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has today tried his hand at judo alongside former Commonwealth medallist, British champion and Highland councillor Connie Ramsay, as he set out his party's pledge to restore services to Highland communities. In September 2025, Connie Ramsay won a Highland Council by-election for ... (more) |
An Edward VIII postbox on Ryhall Road, StamfordToday I bagged another Edward VII postbox. Having stalked and photographed the three examples in Leicestershire (on the Saffron Lane Estate and in Earl Shilton and Hugglescote) a couple of years ago, I was looking for more worlds to conquer. Then I read online that there was a box in Stamford. And here it is. You'll find it on Ryhall Road, not far from Greyfriars Gatehouse. (more) |