http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/ For not upon these hills alone the doom of sport shall fall. O'er the broad face of England creeps the shadow on the wall. en-us 2006-05-19T10:58:56+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001600.html Just another post to say that The England Project had moved to a wordpress blog on this server. The new address is www.theenglandproject.net/wordpress/. I would be grateful if you could update your blogroll links to reflect this new address. Bloglines subscribers can re-subscribe by clicking on the following button: The general rss feed is here. Many thanks.... Admin John 2006-05-19T10:58:56+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001599.html The England Project is moving to a wordpress blog on this server. The new address is www.theenglandproject.net/wordpress/. I would be grateful if you could update your blogroll links to reflect this new address. Bloglines subscribers can re-subscribe by clicking on the following button: The general rss feed is here. Please do re-subscribe. I have made the move for a few reasons. Primarily because my hosting provider has started providing wordpress as an installable product which means they will provide upgrades and the like. I will be trying out comments on this new blog using a registration based system. If you want to join in then please do register. A few design elements will probably be changed over time on the new blog. I hope you like the initial design. At some point in the future I will install a redirection script from the original blog URL to the new blog. Links to existing blog pages will still work. I hope that this isn’t too inconvenient for readers.... Admin John 2006-05-15T13:35:03+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001598.html This situation comes as no great surprise:A majority of English voters think Scottish MPs should be barred from becoming the UK's prime minister, according to a BBC survey.This is an indication that unequal devolution has worsened people's perception of politics and democracy in general across Britain and especially across England. As the understanding of accountability and mandate by people in post devolution Britain grows we can expect to see this kind of situation get even worse. The sooner something effective is done about it the better.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-15T12:13:57+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001597.html We need to wait to see how this pans out but it is important to pre-emptively note that any attempt at teaching British values to our schoolchildren must be inclusive. That is to say it must include all British state schools regardless of what British nation they happen to be educated in. There is absolutely no equality based ethical argument that would exclude Scotland and Wales and Northern Ireland from these plans. Indeed, to do it any other way would be prejudicial. An England and Wales only scheme or an England only scheme cannot and should not be tolerated.... Education John 2006-05-15T11:12:28+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001596.html Haha. That’s what I have to say to New Labour. Haha. I mean talk about revealing yourselves at every turn. This time it’s Ruth Kelly who seems to delight in decrying the not in my backyarders but then turns out to be one herself:Ruth Kelly faced fresh embarrassment as she was branded a hypocrite for denouncing Nimbyism while opposing a series of housing developments in her constituency. Local planners said Ms Kelly, the new Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, was a regular campaigner against new housing in her Bolton West constituency, despite saying she wanted to "root out" the not-in-my-backyard attitude of householders.I’ve never been happy about the term NIMBYISM when it’s been thrown about by elected politicians. I mean, they are the worst offenders, what with all that ”working for the best interests of my constituents” and the ”listening to the demands of my local community” seemingly without a care in the world for the people in the next constituency. When New Labour lose a seat they say ”oh well, it was about local issues, we must do better” and in the next breath it’s all ”oh local issues, don’t be such a NIMBY”. What are they like eh? UPDATE There's an idea. The Little Red Book of New Labour Hypocrisy. Try and keep it under 600 pages.... Politics & politicians John 2006-05-11T13:16:42+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001595.html Visiting the online site of The Guardian I notice that the most popular stories visited by Guardian readers yesterday were: Not an opinion piece among them. All sport except the middle one which is about UFO's.... Media John 2006-05-10T15:16:16+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001594.html Updated ... see end of post. From the CEP, which I received via mail last night, and also from the EDPA public meeting is being held in the Rugby Club in Penrith, Cumberland, at 7.30 pm on Thursday 11th May 2006. Christine Constable, our Vice Chairman, will be there representing the English Democrats. Scilla Cullen, Secretary to the CEP, will also be there with a speech entitled An English Parliament? - Objections and Solutions. All welcome For further information please contact Steve Gash at spg.cep [AT] btinternet.com or Geoffrey Graham - gwgraham [AT] supanet.comIt's too late and too far away from me but this thing will be recorded by the BBC possibly for The Politics Show so the bigger the turnout the better. If you can make it at such short notice it would help. UPDATE Have your say over at the BBC.... Politics & politicians John 2006-05-10T13:54:20+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001593.html No. 10 backs Kelly on equalities. Oh, oh....she's finished.... Politics & politicians John 2006-05-10T13:38:05+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001592.html eGov Monitor reports on the confirmation of the line up and responsibilities at the Department for Constitutional Affairs. The MP responsible for Devolution and Regional Policy is Bridget Prentice MP (Lewisham East) who, when she's not failing to redress the devolution imbalance, enjoys stopping people from smoking, reducing parliamentary scrutiny, advocating the introduction of ID cards, charging English students fees that are not charged to other British students, imprisoning people without trial and banning fox hunting.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-10T10:25:02+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001591.html I have a new post up on Anthem4England.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-09T14:34:20+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001590.html Via Kev comes this bit of World Cup news:Irish low-cost airline Ryanair could offer free tickets for each goal scored in the World Cup against England, the company's outspoken chief executive Michael O'Leary has told a German newspaper. "That's something we can envision doing," O'Leary, an Irishman with a flair for publicity and known fondness for soccer and rugby, told weekly Welt am Sonntag.Interesting business proposition. Or is it? OR IS IT? Do please pass on this opportunity.... General John 2006-05-09T13:43:27+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001589.html From Iain Dale:I've just read in the Standard that John Reid described the Home Office recently as "the one Department which can't have a Scot in charge". For those of us living in the real world that out to be so, but in Mr Blair's parallel universe anything's possible. Next he'll be making Margaret Beckett Foreign Secretary.Quite. Anyone notice how quiet the BBC are being over this issue? Perhaps I missed a news story somewhere from them.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-08T18:41:01+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001588.html David Cameron recently made a speech at The Power Inquiry conference. Read the text here. He quite rightly puts the boot into New Labour's regional agenda but fails completely to mention anything about the unfinished devolution project and the democratic deficit that leaves in the British Union.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-08T13:58:52+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001587.html While England waits with growing impatience for it's share of the devolution cake the Scottish are already talking about devolution version 2.0:Somehow, Labour must come to terms with this new phase – “devolution version 2.0” – and develop policies accordingly. McConnell needs to address the deficiencies in the Scottish democracy, the sections of the Scotland Act designed as a unionist fail-safe against independence. The Scottish parliament must find its own revenue base and be seen to raise more of the money it spends.England's version of devolution isn't even in the alpha testing stage yet. Rumours have it that the programming team is full of idiots.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-08T12:46:28+00:00 http://www.theenglandproject.net/mt/archives/001586.html From The Times:Such is his aggressive manner that the much-aired West Lothian Question, which highlights the anomaly that lets Scottish MPs vote on English affairs while devolution prevents things happening the other way around, is again likely to come to the fore with Reid at the helm of the Home Office.It looks like the Home Office has become the Home Away From Home Office.... The other, more evil, England project John 2006-05-08T10:37:39+00:00