UKIP is due to launch its Scottish manifesto today, the BBC reports.
This blog has been privileged to have had a shot of the manifesto’s cover smuggled south of Gretna Green for the benefit of readers.
Enjoy! 🙂
Walking down Stapleton Road this morning, I stopped to take the picture below in readiness for reporting the fly-tipping to Bristol City Council.
The gentleman passing on the right of the picture and half caught by the camera saw what I was doing, thanked me effusively and shook my hand when I told him I was reporting it to the council.
We then had a brief conversation about how such anti-social behaviour detracted from the pleasantness of Bristol, which he described as a “beautiful city”, the health implications of fly-tipping and the way they encouraged the spread of vermin such as rats (posts passim).
As we parted with waves, he asked me whether I was a member of the Green Party. Unfortunately I have no affiliation, but that’s no barrier to being an active and caring citizen.
Banksy, probably Bristol’s most visible artist since the days when noted portraitist Sir Thomas Lawrence (13th April 1769 – 7th January 1830) became President of the Royal Academy of Arts, has now given allegedly given his opinion on Mr Farage’s party of right-wing xenophobes; and I don’t think Nigel will be enamoured with it.
This image will now be forever in my mind whenever the words ‘United Kingdom Independence Party‘ appear before me on a ballot paper.
On Friday 24th April 2015, the Open Rights Group is supporting the Wild Wild Bristol West Hustings, a chance for local voters to quiz the candidates for the Bristol West constituency – rated by commentators as either a 2-way or 3-way marginal constituency.
The event will be from 7.00 p.m. to 10.00 p.m. and its venue is Bristol University’s Wills Memorial Building, Park Street, Bristol BS8 1RJ (map).
In alphabetical order, the candidates attending as this post goes to press include:
More information about the prospective Bristol West MPs is available at http//meetyournextmp.com/event/646-wild-wild-bristol-west-your-future.
The event is free, but in order to allocate spaces fairly, you’ll have to register via EventBrite.
The event is being supported by ORG Bristol as part of the organisers, the Greater Bristol Alliance, a coalition of local campaign groups.
With some free time on my hands this morning, I spent a leisurely hour going through the main UK party manifestos (excluding regional parties such as Plaid Cymru, the SNP and the Northern Ireland parties) for the forthcoming general election looking for instances of “hard work“. The results for each manifesto are shown below.
1st: Labour 5
2nd: Conservatives 3
3rd: Liberal Democrats & UKIP 1 each
5th Green Party 0
Both my parents were unskilled manual workers who left school at the age of 14 and worked all their lives. Indeed my father once told me that on his last day of schooling, he went to school in the morning, left at midday and went straight to work for a local farmer as an agricultural labourer in the afternoon.
I remember the physical effect that hard work had on their bodies. Both were prematurely aged long before the official retirement age. My father died at the relatively young age of 67, whilst my mother, who although she lived to be nearly 82, was disabled from her mid-50s onwards by a debilitating stroke. I therefore do not regard hard work as such as the same great virtue as the closeted and cosseted inhabitants of the Westminster Village, who’ve probably never done a hard day’s physical graft in their lives.
One transport project which is moving closer to realisation in the Bristol area – and is popular with locals too – is the reopening to passenger traffic of the railway line to Portishead (which is currently only used by freight trains to and from Portbury Dock. Ed.).
The project will entail building a new station at Portishead and reopening Pill station.
However, there’s also a petition to rally support for the building of a new station at Ashton Gate to replace the now-vanished original Ashton Gate station.
The petition reads as follows.
We are local residents and organisations (big and small) in BS3 campaigning for a new railway station in Ashton Gate on the Portishead branch line.
We want a new station opening in 2019 with two trains an hour in both directions – towards Portishead and Temple Meads.
In 2019 the Portishead rail line will be upgraded for new passenger services linking Bristol, Bath, Avonmouth and Portishead. New stations are being built at Pill and Portishead. Four trains an hour will pass through Ashton Gate.
A station linked into the local bus network would encourage visits to the area and promote the local economy. We believe trains must stop at Ashton Gate to allow residents, workers and visitors to come and go easily and comfortably whilst decreasing the strain on the heavily-used local road network.
A new station would bring substantial, long-term benefits to South West Bristol. Local people are increasingly turning to public transport and more rail services help to promote the city as a European Green Capital.
Lampeter Town Council could have translation at its council meetings to allow more Welsh to be spoken after the mayor said she felt “guilty” that the council doesn’t use enough Welsh, according to a report in Cambrian News Online.
Mayor Cllr. Elsie Dafis is reported as saying that her term in that office had brought home to her the fact that the council could do more to promote the Welsh language and stated that the town council must do more, starting by enabling more Welsh to be spoken at council meetings.
Nevertheless, Cllr. Ellis’ idea did not find favour with a colleague – Cllr. Kistiah Ramaya. The latter had concerns that the move could divide the council and was concerned that having translation could sideline councillors who didn’t speak Welsh and might even dissuade non-Welsh speakers from joining the council.
Cllr. Ellis informed her colleagues that council could have a translator and equipment at their meetings for under £1,000 a year. However, Cllr. Ramaya said that while he supported the Welsh language, he felt that discussions could move on before non-Welsh speakers had received the translation of comments made.
Lampeter is the smallest university town in the UK, with a population including the university of some 4,000 people.
According to Wikipedia, Welsh is no longer taught at undergraduate level at the University of Wales in Lampeter.
Hat tip: Yelena McCafferty.
The weather is warming up, summer migrant birds are returning to the UK to breed in the trees, shrubs and other traditional nesting sites; and as regular as clockwork, Bristol City Council sends workmen out to destroy those same traditional nesting sites, as witnessed this morning at the junction of Lawrence Hill and Croydon Street.
During the few minutes it took me to buy a tin of coffee up the road, the two trunks seen standing in the photo had been felled, joining a previously felled companion. All three felled were – as far as I could see – healthy specimens.
As regards protecting breeding birds and mitigating harm during the breeding season, Natural England’s advice (PDF, p. 4) is as follows:
The main mitigation route to reduce the likelihood of harm to breeding birds is to undertake clearance or destruction of any vegetation or structure which may be used as a breeding site outside the bird breeding season when breeding birds are unlikely to be present (based upon habitat features) or where survey work has confirmed their absence. Avoidance of such features is best achieved through timing of work (see below) but may also be possible by temporarily preventing birds from using these features, before they start doing so. Examples include physical exclusion (preventing access to potential nest sites) or use of visual or audible deterrents. Such measures should only be undertaken following the advice of a suitably experienced ecologist, taking account of relevant legislation and welfare considerations.
The bird breeding season will be dependent upon weather conditions and will vary from year to year, but in general is the period between early March and late August.
Natural England acts as an adviser to central government on the natural environment, providing practical science-based advice on how best to safeguard England’s natural wealth for the benefit of all.
By carrying out such works at this time of year, Bristol City Council is not only disregarding the advice given by Natural England, but also its own advice which it gives to community groups (PDF) carrying out conservation works involving trees. Page 2 of this document clearly states in relation to coppicing that this should be carried out between October and February. In the exact words of the guidance (page 2), this
Should be done during the dormant season and outside the bird nesting season.
In another city council document (PDF) entitled Tree Management Standards, page 4 clearly states:
Nesting birds are protected under the Wildlife and Countryside Act (and other related wildlife law).
All this is happening in the year when Bristol is allegedly European Green Capital. However, the city council seems more interested in press stunts than in sound environmental practice that protects the environment and wildlife.
Readers with long-term memories may remember that scrub clearance took place last year nearby at Lawrence Hill roundabout (posts passim).
Although it may not be hitting the headlines in the way it was a couple of years ago, Capita Translation & Interpreting’s cack-handed execution of its interpreting contract for courts and tribunals with the Ministry of Justice continues to waste public money, as well as delay and deny justice (contrary to one of the few clauses of Magna Carta still in effect. Ed.), as evidenced by this cutting from the latest edition of Private Eye.
Hat tip: Sarrf London.
In what appears to be a last-ditch swipe against foreigners, motorists who don’t speak either English or Welsh and want to use DVLA’s translation service will pick up the costs under changes announced on 25th March 2015 (the day before Parliament was prorogued. Ed.) by Transport Minister Baroness Kramer.
Transport Minister Baroness Kramer said: “The vast majority of calls to DVLA are either free or charged at local rate. However, it is only right that the cost of using translation services is paid for by those who use them. The change will help encourage individuals who don’t speak English very well to learn the language and also help when accessing government services.”
Under the changes, those who need a translation service will need to call the premium rate numbers, which will be publicised by DVLA closer to the implementation date of 29th April.
The numbers will be available from 8am to 7pm Monday to Friday and from 8am to 2pm on Saturday. Calling these telephone numbers will cost £1.03 per minute from a landline and may cost considerably more from a mobile.
All other public calls to DVLA contact centre are either free or charged at local rate.
Hat tip: Yelena McCafferty.