The Democratic Dashboard gives information about your local constituency, including previous general, regional and local election results and the results of local polling (if available, presumably). It's a project based at the LSE, though not necessarily an LSE project ( Read more... )

Last weekend, I went on another anti-SDL (aka EDL) march. Edinburgh Council decided that it was fine to let the EDL march through the city in the middle of the biggest cultural event in Europe - the Fringe as well as the Edinburgh International Festival - which host performers and visitors from all over the world. In case you are not aware, the EDL ( Read more... )

It has been a week for a 1970s revival. On Wednesday, I went to a performance of Tubular Bells; in Friday, I saw the "Space Ritual" played to celebrate its fortieth anniversary; and yesterday I went on an anti-racism demo outside the Scottish Parliament, protesting at the presence of a "Scottish Defence League" rally attacking Muslims following the ( Read more... )

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I went on a march today protesting at the "bedroom tax". I nearly didn't go, feeling that little good will come of the protest and feeling somewhat ignorant of the "bedroom tax" itself. (That's my fault; a lot has been written about it; but it does make for somewhat boring reading ( Read more... )

Over on my other blog I posted about where I stand on Scottish independence.

I did lots of different things during the Edinburgh International Festival - I experienced new music, radical theatre, new artists. Much of it was excellent, a little was dreadful ( Read more... )

I went to listen to Nick Clegg yesterday. He was answering questions from London members of the Liberal Democrats and, having opportunity to hear the deputy Prime Minister speak, I wanted to hear what he had to say.

I thought the discussion might have been dominated by questions of the recent disturbances in England and Wales, but it wasn’t - ( Read more... )

You may have noticed that last week there was an election throughout the UK. I have been politically interested for the last thirty five years or so, but this election saw me become politically active, as well ( Read more... )

This week - maybe last week, now - is or was international blog about racism week. I was thinking what I could write, but nothing came to life.

Then in yesterday's Independent, I read this article about the black boxer and the first black heavy-weight wordl champion, Jack JohnsonIt is a chilling story of racism in the first half of the last ( Read more... )