ER4EM

Just submitted my nomination for East Midlands Regional Chair for the Liberal Youth elections. There are several things I'd want to do in the job and it's these things that motivated me to run.

1. My local party isn't fantastic, Leicester has had a lot of problems with internal factions over the last decade and has gone from successful to having only one councillor (even he is a defector from the Conservatives), so I went looking for my regional chair for some advice when setting up a branch at University only to discover that The East Midlands hasn't had a chair for almost six months, the last one defected to the Green Party. I really hope to be able to stand up as someone people can come to if they have issues or need help and support with something

2. I myself wasn't a member of Liberal Youth before I turned 18, simply because I didn't know you could be. I was out campaigning for my local Lib Dem PPC for months before officially becoming a member because at no point did anyone tell me Liberal Youth existed. I think it's vital that we reach out to our younger members and especially make sure that local parties encourage young people to join and participate.

3. A related point is that we need to make sure we represent all young people, not just students. We're not Labour Students, we're Liberal Youth, and we need to make sure our focus isn't just on those in further and higher education. We need to reach out and include graduates, young workers, interns and the youth unemployed.

The manifesto doesn't allow me to go into the detail I'd like and there are almost certainly other issues that I am passionate about but if you have any questions feel free to tweet me @RebelRevell or comment on here and feel free to like my Facebook page which will be updated periodically :)

Interviewing Tim Farron

Spring Conference seems like such a long time ago now all those weeks ago I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to interview Party President Tim Farron. Here is my report of the interview which was originally posted at the Libertine, there you can also find the other three bloggers' interviews :)

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When I saw that Liberal Youth wanted bloggers to interview Tim Farron I was more than a little bit up for it, I got an ‘opportunity’ to interview David Miliband through my university magazine and he turned up quite late so in the end I didn’t get to ask a question at all. I love following Tim on Twitter and it’s fantastic that he takes the time to respond to people on an individual basis so I was definitely interested. ‘Blogger’ isn’t maybe the word for me though, my blog is a site a shout at once a month when some issue has gotten me angry then I forget about it for another three weeks. Luckily I was asked if I’d do it anyway so I couldn’t really say no!

Four folks all asking questions when you only have half an hour – Tim’s a busy guy at the best of times, never mind at Spring Conference with the country’s media watching – doesn’t give you a lot of time to ask your questions but I got to asked two; one that had political significance and related to an article Tim had written in previous day in the Guardian and one that was more about Tim as a person.

Tim’s article said that the Liberal Democrats need to stop apologising so following on from that I asked on where Lib Dems should be looking forward or back, I can safety say that Tim’s answer was the fully expected ‘bit of both’. "This is an opportunity to do things, and to change things in a very positive sense…I look at our flag ship policy [raising the income tax threshold] that I’m pretty sure going to get delivered and quicker…My great fear in all of this is that even that news gets swamped."

I think Tim taps into the feeling that a lot of people in the party have is that whilst we are in government doing brilliant things for people it gets overshadowed by some of the not so popular things that the government does or things that are beyond government control, Liberal Democrats seem to get the blame but not the credit.

We have to be mindful that Labour have a narrative to try and pitch us as being weak and keeling over in front of the Tories which isn’t true. And this is something I’ve encountered on several occasions, people are quick to criticise us for being the Tories’ whipping boys but when you explain to them our policies in government, both what we’ve done so far and our plans for the future, they are quite often receptive to them.

My second question to Tim asked what his proudest achievement as Party President had been so far. I expected him to name a policy he supported but was quite surprised that his first choices were the new HQ and the appointment of a new Chief Executive. These are, in his own words, “geeky” choices but they are clearly things he is proud of and he went on to say the bit of the job he enjoys most is “just getting out there, and knocking on doors and lifting spirits”. He told a story of going out campaigning with councillors and MSPs who lost their jobs in 2011 but who are still hard at work campaigning for the Liberal Democrats and it was obvious how proud he is of the grassroots campaigners who made the party what it is and who, by and large, are very supportive of him.

One of the great things about Tim as a Party President is that he is so approachable and willing to take time out of his undoubtedly busy schedule to talk to four Liberal Youth bloggers around a cramped table under the stairs at the back of a conference centre. We can only hope he remains as approachable and eager to reach out to all wings of the party in the future.

Democracy Rebooted

It's quite rare that I write more than a blog post a month recently, never mind two on consecutive days but there we go. I had the rather joyful experience of receiving an email from the President of the Politics Society telling his members that "It has come to my attention that although none of the committee positions were contested, we are still able to hold an election though the 'Re-open Nominations' (RON) system." Though I am more than a little bit concerned that the President of the Politics Society was not aware of the possibility of running against RON, I am glad that an election is being run. However it seems to be that the President and current committee had no intention of letting the candidates display or justify their manifestos to us and just expected that we would vote for them regardless. Luckily the guy running for Academic Officer seems to be keen on getting stuff organised, hustings and the like, with an admirable commitment to democracy not usually found in a member of Labour Students.

Another issue I have is that the election isn't going to be conducted anonymously, we have to email our votes to the Politics Society. The anonymity of an election booth wasn't something I'd given much thought to before now, some votes that are conducted by secret ballot at Union Parliament don't really require the secrecy in my opinion, but I'm really put off by the idea that someone will see my votes and it will be blatantly obvious that it's me. I'd consider voting RON for some of the categories but I don't really want to do that knowing that someone will see it and probably imagine I am being unduly petty in doing so.

Whilst today may have improved my view of societies I can't say it has been a fantastic day for democracy either!

Ladies First...?

I wasn't originally going to write a post about the Chris Huhne resignation for a few reasons, one being that it triggers in me an excess of anger towards an ex-wife who is clearly only interesting on inflicting pain on a man who left her (however justified that pain may be), another being yet more anger at certain newspapers' reporting of the incident which always seems to make reference to Huhne's new partners' sexuality as if it were a contributing factor to their infidelity. As it happens Carina Trimingham has decided to sue the publisher responsible and I fully congratulate her in doing so (the spelling mistake in that article's headline isn't The Independent's greatest moment!). The third reason is that the press and social media chatter, both before and after Kier Starmer's announcement that charges were to be brought, seemed to focus on what would happen if he was guilty whilst ignoring the fact that Huhne is innocent until proven guilty. I didn't think that the gender of his replacement would be the thing that made me change my mind about writing a post.


Well it isn't so much the fact that Ed Davey is male but the fact that this seems to anger some people. I must admit I have very little knowledge of Ed's work but as far as I can tell he has done a great job in his previous role and I can only hope he does the same in his new one but the criticisms of Nick Clegg for his "failure" to promote a woman to the Cabinet, such as those from Stonewall Chief Executive Ben Summerskill, are ridiculous. Worryingly some of the most vocal criticisms come from party supporters, liberalism is equal opportunity for all regardless of arbitrary distinction therefore jobs should be awarded on merit. If a deficit develops it is due to a lack of education and opportunity for that group or discrimination against it and these things need to be tackled at the root, not glossed over when it's too late. That is not to say that Jo Swinson and Lynne Featherstone, the women most mooted for the job, are not fantastic MPs and fantastic ministers because of course they are, Lynne is pretty much single-handedly pushing for gay marriage as I can't imagine Theresa May is a fan (but the less said about her opinions on Page 3 the better), but I don't believe they should be promoted just because they're women.


I have never believed in positive discrimination: it's an oxymoron for a start, putting the word 'positive' in front of a negative concept does not automatically make it a good thing, and also because in the 60 years of affirmative action in America there has been no fundamental change in ethnic minority representation at the highest levels (the reasons Barack Obama doesn't count are too numerous to list here). Anyway, surely all discrimination is positive? If one group is being discriminated against, surely that means there is discrimination in favour of another? I'm a white woman who grew up in a middle class family but whose parents are now divorced: I don't want to live in a country which values my gender above my ability but counts my skin colour against me. Are my childhood holidays in Africa counted against me because they clearly indicate a financially-stable family even though I get bursaries from my university because my dad left and took with him a large chunk of the family income? I'm a politics student who doesn't want to become an MP but if I did, I would want to fight to be selected by the party and elected by the people on the basis of my ability and my beliefs not existence of two X chromosomes and a comprehensive school education. The use of all-women shortlists by Labour implies that women are unable to be selected on merit and have to be given a helping hand and this implication spreads to all women, even those who weren't selected in this way.


There is no denying that there is a problem of representation for women, BME people, non-heterosexual people etc in places such as the House of Commons but artificially boosting their representation does not help tackle the fundamental social circumstances which create this deficit. Incidentally I'm not entirely sure that the House of Commons needs to be a direct microcosm of society, without sounding flippant I don't feel that my MP being male makes him unable to represent me (his position as a Labour Whip on the other hand does). Interestingly, men are under-represented in teaching at lower levels, by lower I mean nursery and junior schools, but no-one is advocating giving male applicants these jobs over women simply because they're men, the effort focuses on making young men more aware that teaching is an option available to them and encouraging them to train and apply. Why doesn't this same thinking apply to under-represented groups in politics or business? Why is positive discrimination called for?


The Liberal Democrat leadership programme is well intended, of our 57 MPs only four are openly gay, only 7 are women and probably most shamingly none are BME, but it is fundamentally pointless. We should be tackling the problem at the root, pushing for change to an education system which nudges boys into 'hard sciences' but girls towards English and away from engineering, in order to ensure change which not only creates a more equal society for the next generation but for all the generations that follow, not aiming to provide change which is purely cosmetic.


Change is needed but condemning and repressing straight, white men is not the way to do it. 

Total Recall?

Rep. Gabrielle Giffords finally stepped down today, triggering a special election to decide who will serve out the rest of her term. Since she was shot along with nineteen others, six of whom were killed, on January 8th 2011 she has only made one public appearance at a memorial service marking a year since the attack. Now I'm in no way saying I'm not sympathetic to this woman, I can only imagine the hell her and her family have been through over the last year, but I do truly believe she should have resigned a long time ago. As an elected official, her job is to represent her constituents and unfortunately she has been unable to do that, this basically means her constituents have been without adequate representation for over a year. While I'm sure no-one wanted to push her from her job and there was no law mandating she should step down I do think it would have been best for her constituents, and probably for her, if she had stepped down sooner. Given that her reasoning for the resignation was that she has more work to do on her recovery I don't see any justification for leaving it a year before doing so.

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I understand the annoyance of having an absent elected official for over a year. Whilst Mrs Giffords had every reason for being unable to perform her duties over the last year, my ex-MP had no such excuse. During the 2009 expenses scandal it was discovered that Elliott Morley MP (Labour - Scunthorpe) had continued to claim his mortgage payments back from the taxpayer even though the mortgage had already been paid off, eventually he was found guilty of false accounting and being sentenced to 16 months in prison but not before claiming over £30,000 of taxpayers money. Instead of doing the decent thing and stepping down immediately he hung on for 12 months, stepping down at the 2010 election and thus retaining his full parliamentary pension, but kept away from the constituency as much as possible. For over a year our entire constituency had no effective representation because our MP was afraid, rightly so, of the reaction if he appeared in public. 

This is why I strongly support the Liberal Democrat policy of giving constituents the ability to recall their MPs. I wouldn't have advocated this route with Giffords, it would have been better if someone had persuaded her to step down off her own back, but with my MP I really wish our constituency could have forced a new election and I'm certain it would have fallen into the Lib Dem definition of who this would apply to.

"We would introduce a recall system so that constituents could force a by-election for any MP found guilty of serious wrongdoing."

The recall idea was debated in parliament this week with issues over the wording of the bill and possible unintended consequences being raised, Zac Goldsmith MP even argued that "the worst MP in the world" could escape the recall process. Its no great surprise that this bill is contentious and that debates are being had over the wording but it is an idea I truly believe in because I can't stand the idea that my MP was able to sit at home for a whole year, fighting off criminal charges, and leave us effectively unrepresented.

I mean recall elections in the United States led to Arnold Schwarzenegger becoming Governor of California. What could possibly go wrong?

I'm back (again)

Okay okay I fail at the whole 'update more than once in a blue moon' thing but I'm having another go. Mainly because I'm fed up and like having a moan.

I'm a lib dem. I'm a member of a economic liberal group on facebook but I'm also a kind-of member of the Social Liberal Forum. It's been implied that I can't be both but I don't see why not! Why are the ideas social and economic liberalism so contradictory? I believe in the free market and less regulation for business but also that the poorest in society should be given a helping hand by being taken out of tax and schools given extra money to help for its most disadvantaged students? I always thought the Liberal Democrats were the only party without ridiculously tribal elements but it turns out this is complete crap. I'd really fed up of an economic liberal friend bitching about the Social Liberal Forum as if being vaguely left wing was some kind of hippy movement to be discarded as having no worth. And the SLF seem to think the economic liberals are Tories in disguise, sent to infiltrate the party and turn us all over to the other side.

The people I follow on Twitter seem to be torn between identifying as Tory Liberals or Labour Liberals and keep trying to debate where we should align ourselves in the run up to 2015. I don't see why we have to do either, we're our own party with our own sets of values and ideas and I know we're not going to win a majority at the next election - god knows we'll be lucky to keep the seats we have - but we shouldn't align ourselves with anyone. I think we're a party well placed to work with elements of either of the other two parties and Nick was right in what he said in the run up to the last election: in the event of a hung parliament we should talk to both parties but ultimately the electoral math decides.

We're not the Conservatives. We stand up for all members of the public regardless of wealth, class, gender etc which is more than can be said for them. We aren't torn apart by internal divisions (much as it seems as above) over Europe or religion and we should not be ashamed to stand up and say when we disagree with our Coalition partners.

We're not the Labour Party. Their internal divisions are the worse of any party and will never be a cohesive group. Some of the things they accomplished in their 13 years in office were admirable, it was pointed out on Twitter than their record on gay rights was fantastic, but they are a new party with a new leader and harping on about past victories whilst languishing on the Opposition Benches without a single idea and a 'blank page' approach to their policies. 

We're the fucking Liberal Democrats and I'm fed up of people trying to tell me otherwise!

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One policy that's got my attention and that's the Tories favourite policy of tax breaks for married people. I'm fantastically proud of Nick's response to it because it shows how out of date some Conservatives are. I can't think of any justification for giving money to married couples that makes any sense! If 77% of people think a single parent can form a family and 59% think a same-sex couple can be a family then why do the Conservatives cling to this rose-tinted vision of an ideal past that never existed where father went out to work and mother stayed at home to raise the children? It's utter crap and I'm glad the Coalition Agreement does not bind our MPs into supporting this ridiculous policy.

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One last thing, Aidan Burley's firing. This stag party is made to sound like a Max Mosely-style Nazi orgy (by the Daily Mail, obviously) but from the video footage I've seen it appears to be some men sat around a table with one of them wearing a military hat. If Mr Burley has been to a Nazi-themed stag do I can only conclude he was drunk (not exactly a fireable offence, especially given it was a stag do) or that his friends are idiots and I very much doubt this is something unique to him!

Before this I didn't know who this man was and my opinion now is that the man is harmless, if a little prone to mistakes under the influence of alcohol and the company of his friends. In my opinion this isn't a firing offence and if Cameron would have had any balls he'd have said that.

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With any luck I'll remember to post again some time before Easter!!

Just sayin'

I suppose this is technically my first blog post as an elected official. I got elected to Union Parliament which is obviously marvellous but I did find out today the turnout was just under 1200 from a student body of around 20,000 and I managed to get elected with only 24 first choice votes! That's made it clear the increasing awareness of the parliament's activities and encouraging more general student involvement are things I absolutely have to do. The chair of the uni's Labour Society got elected too but the two mates who were running with us didn't, hopefully we can get them in through the re-open nominations next week. I have the training session tomorrow afternoon so hopefully it's not as dull as it sounds though I fear it may be lol.

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The reason I'm writing this post now and not last night is that after Russian my housemates and I decided we wanted to go watch The Lion King 3D at the cinema. Somehow I'd managed to convince myself that watching the film as an adult and knowing the traumas that were about to come would mean I wouldn't cry at them, this was an utter falsehood! I didn't cry quite as much as some I could mention but there were definitely tears in my eyes! For some reason we decided to walk home in the minus twenty weather but we had a laugh by getting tangled up - quite literally - in the rock climbing society's social which seems to involve groups of ten people tied together, wandering drunkenly round town and trying to avoid getting tied around lamp-posts.

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I wrote all that ^ over an hour ago but then got distracted by Question Time. It's not bad this week, I've seen better but it's not a passionate as usual, I've only shouted madly at the TV twice which for an hour long political programme is unusual.

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Having seen tomorrows front pages for The Sun and the Daily Mail I am disgusted. I was always disgusted by those two particular newspapers anyway given their tendencies towards homophobia, bigotry, racism, sexism and so on but the way they have glorified Col. Gaddafi's death is horrendous. No man, no matter what war crimes he may have committed, deserves to die. He should have been put on trial by the International Criminal Court and sentenced for what he could be held accountable for not killed. A trial would have allowed Libyans to put the past behind them whilst showing the world that they were prepared to embrace the norms of modern liberal democracies and yet all they have done is reinforced my belief that Western governments will live to regret the recognition of the NTC.

Fuck it I'm sleepy

I'm utterly exhausted. All I want is a day where I can sit and do nothing but I'm not going to get one until at least Wednesday and even then I've got Russian in the evenings. Tomorrow I need to head into town and find something to wear for Monday's polsoc bar crawl, I need to make my screen page for the union elections and double check my manifesto is okay. I also need to copy up all my lecture notes and read for my UK politics module. I'm actually so fucking tired that I can't write anything...

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One thing I can remember through the haze of tiredness is that Liam Fox finally bit the dust. I'm not happy about his replacement at all but that's an entirely different story! Fox was clearly in the wrong and he should have stepped down quickly in order to work on clearing his name and retaining any respectability he could. It has become increasingly apparent that his name isn't likely to be cleared though; Werrity shouldn't have been given access to the people Fox could give him and it's probably that he was being funded by less then legitimate means. I'm too fucking tired for in depth political analysis atm, might write another post when I'm watching the F1 tomorrow morning.

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I will leave you with this brilliant column by Chris Bryant in today's Indy about the media and 'carry on' politics.

We have no time to stand and stare

Well I've done so much today I've practically forgotten I even had a lecture! Got dragged to the Union Parliament by a friend who wanted to see what it was like and ended up getting nominated to stand for election to the bloody thing. I have no idea why I've done it but there we go, I'll send a message round the UoL groups on Facebook and hope lol. It would help if I know enough people to get elected! I also had to go to the Labour society meeting which led to the awkward moment when they tried to sign me up for the party. The Conservative society is open to people with an interest with politics, regardless of party, but the Labour one seems to require party membership. Might email a exec member tomorrow and see if this is definite or if I'd got the wrong end of the stick but trying to get out the room without filling the form in, signing away my soul and possibly breaking some law (I'm not sure if its legal to join more than one political party lol) was ridiculously difficult!

LUSH was a ridiculously chaotic meeting; I would much rather do some campaigns or scheduling work but Roisin persuaded me to join up and she really wants to do a radio show so I can't really say 'yeah erm go off and do it on your own...' can I?! The model UN meeting was actually brilliant, I persuaded Jason and Joe to come with me and they've both signed up too. There's a informal debate thing next week to get us into it, I never actually thought to ask if we pick our own country or pick them out of a hat or what. And do we keep the same country for every MUN or does it change? I really should email on of the exec guys and find out, probably the distractingly hot guy who happens to be on my course and friends with a girl I know :)

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Contrary to the impressing this blog post may have given so far I did actually attend some lectures today and yesterday. Mondays are now my least favourite day of the week as I have two lectures and a seminar with a lecturer who has a hideously dull and irritating voice :( The European Union lecture today though was really good, the lecturer seems nice and unlike 90% of students I know I don't find the European Union dull as hell or a pointless waste of time. It was amusing though to see that the most recognisable 'important EU figure' (as decided by our lecturer) was Cathy Ashdown even though there was one guy who for some reason recognised not only her and Van Rumpoy (as did I, before someone thinks I'm think) but also Jose Manuel Barroso and Jean-Claude Trichet. Clearly someone how either reads for seminars way way in advance or someone who actually gives more than a passing glance at EU news!

Anyways I have a killer headache and am panicking slightly about my new-found need to campaign for a week for the Union Parliament so I'm off! Night folks x

Busy Busy (not)

Managed to do a shit load of nothing today: I got out of bed, watched an entire Dara O'Brien gig on YouTube and cooked a sausage pie. I actually can't wait until I get back into lectures tomorrow so I have something more than 'watched tv' to say on this bloody blog! Double 'Governance and Politics in the UK' tomorrow, two hours apart in the lecture theatre next door which is utterly ridiculous but the makers of my timetable seem to be hell-bent on ruining my week so I suppose I shall have to deal with it :/

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Now the first week of Freshers is over I've started getting emails about the societies I signed up to about their first meetings. This does mean that on Tuesday I have a meeting at 5pm in Attenborough One about working for the uni radio station, 6pm in Attenborough Two for the Labour Party Society and 7pm in Attenborough One for Leicester Model UN. I may as well just sit in the corridor outside the Attenborough lecture theatres and get them to leave the doors open and speak loudly! I'm not going to the Politics bar crawl though, a mate from my course has suggested an alernative bar crawl at our own pace and 'round some better bars since the organised ones are fast as hell and downing two drinks quickly and moving on to the next club isn't her idea of fun, or mine!

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Lib Dems on Twitter have been floating the idea of Paddy Ashdown as new Defence Secretary given that Liam Fox appears to have got himself into a shit load of trouble. This would be absolutely fantastic as Paddy is brilliant and he is probably one of the best foreign policy minds the Coalition has, certainly better than William Hague! But he's a former leader on the junior coalition partner, a member of the Lords with a vast experience in politics and a man almost universally adored by all Liberal Democrats so I feel David Cameron is highly unlikely to want to be head of the Cabinet that contains a man so unlikely to tow the line.

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Another political story, Chris Huhne has apologised to Theresa May for briefing against her. Lets be honest if a conference address by an opposition party member turns out to be utter bullshit and a dramatic misrepresentation of the facts, attracting attention across the media spectrum, and then it turns out that this story was lifted directly from a far right party speech who wouldn't casually point it out to a newspaper! May has shown her incompetence through 'Catgate' and Huhne is not a member of her party and has not reason to back her over this idiotic mistake. Any reshuffle should leave him well alone!

Moonpig.com

I couldn't manage more than 24 hours in the house before I cleaned up. I filled a bin bag with magazines, letters, general paper, bottles and other crap the housemates had left all over the living room floor, tidied the eight - 8!! - pairs of shoes that were hanging around and did the week's worth of washing up that had been piling up in the kitchen. I refused to clean the kitchen worktops or the cooker which are covered in bread, cheese and grease respectively but no doubt they won't disappear before the next time I snap and clean up after everyone.

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We've finally met our neighbours, well three of them, and they seem quite nice. I must admit we were hoping for some attractive men who could be called upon to open jars or kill spiders from time to time but they seem like nice girls. We've been invited round for drinks tonight but we're too poor to go out out so pre-drinks then going straight back to ours while everyone else goes out seemed a bit miserable!

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My evening thus far has been spent Goolging pictures of topless men in the hunt for pictures for my mate's birthday card. The miracles of Moonpig mean he is now going to received a card detailing his past relationships with Russell Tovey (naked photo), Danny Miller (strategically positioned towel), Colin Morgan and Bradley James (clothed, unfortunately) before showing a current picture of him clinging to a lovely Gaydar Angel wearing only some time silver pants at Manchester Pride a few weeks back. Along with the US Queer as Folk box set I've bought him as a gift, I feel I have probably bought the best present I could conceivably have come up with :D

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I feel like I should chuck the odd bit of politics in today after a slight lapse post-LibDemConf. Apparently 57% of people don't see Ed Miliband as a credible Prime Minister and I must say I also fall into that category. While he appears to be one of the more reasonable members of the Labour Party, his inability to control the tribalism of his shadow cabinet - see Ed Balls - or the members of his party in general doesn't fill me with confidence for his political future.

It could be suggested that Labour's reforms with regards to the shadow cabinet, the move from appointment by the Leader rather than internal elections, will help give Ed control but I don't think it it bodes well that a political party has decided elections are an undesired event. They have also suggested that non-members should be allowed to play a part in the party's leadership elections which I can only assume were suggested by David Miliband and adopted by Ed under the influence of alcohol. There is no way Ed would be in the position he is now if non-members had more of an influence over the leadership!

This conference will once again have an undertone of sibling rivalry. David has said he doesn't want to detract attention from his brother, merely to help the party, but by popping in and out of the spotlight he draws more attention to himself and the failed leadership bid than he would have if he had simply entered the shadow cabinet alongside his brother. One finds it difficult to believe David thinks his leadership hopes are over and it's hard to shake the sense he would happily step in, should his brother fail.

Anyways more politics tomorrow! Mili-E steps up to the podium to make his keynote speech and I shall be listening intently (and trying not to fall asleep)

I've run out of quote/song-lyric/poetry inspired titles...

Completely forgot to post yesterday! Mainly due to the excitement of watching the final episode of Torchwood with an over-excited housemate who forced me to watch the 5 episodes I was behind in one afternoon so that I would be ready to watch the final episode at 9pm. It was totally worth it though; John Barrowman got his kit off, Rex survived and I managed to ignore Gwen's shrill voice so all was well :) This was followed by what can only be described as THE most boring Question Time I have ever watched; monotone voices and boring questions combined to make it very difficult to watch/stay awake throughout!

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Today however I was up bright and early (having panic packed yesterday), showered and took delivery of some drawers the housemate and I had orders to compensate for the lack of storage space in our uni house. Booked taxi to the train station and apart from my bag strap breaking as I was on my way out the door I managed to get to my Liberal Democrat Conference accommodation (my mate's sofa) without too much trouble. I've planned all the ICC and Fringe events I want to go to so now all I have to do is read the policy documents for the debates I'm going to and contact my home party and see when they're about so I don't feel so ridiculously alone!

Makes it sound so simple ay?

Will be reporting back tomorrow on opening speeches, Lords reform plans, a speech by Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone and the Conference First Timers welcome drinks :)



Every sinner has a future

I seem to have found myself thinking about my future all summer; not in a deeply philosophical way, just in a 'what do I want to do with my life?' kind of way which I'll admit is pretty important nevertheless. Pretty early on after I picked my degree subject I realised that being a politics student meant every single person I meet with automatically ask 'So you want to be an MP?'
No.
No I don't.
Not even close.

I don't want to build my adult life on such a fluid job; the idea that I would probably have to move my political beliefs to a more electable centre ground to get anywhere coupled with the chance that five years down the line I could be unemployed hardly makes for attractive job prospects does it? On the other hand, the idea of working behind the scenes in some kind of capacity is very enticing to me. So far I've come up with

1. Lobbyist
2. Charity Work
3. F&C Office / DfID / Diplomatic Service
4. Party Work

The first two kind of go together: I'd like to lobby for issues I care about and recently I've found myself being drawn to gay rights charities like Stonewall or Kaleidoscope which launched today. I'm also passionate about working in other countries, I aim to learn Russian this year, so working for Kaleidoscope or any of the #3 departments would be amazing for me. Since the election last year I've paid close attention to DfID's work; I admire the way Andrew Mitchell has set about his job with determination and planning and I realised that although British politics can be incredibly disillusioning, the idea of spreading democracy and basic human rights around the world has a strong appeal. My final option is some party work: I would love to be able to work towards strengthening and increasing party support plus I have a love of speech writing that I've always wanted to develop so working for an MP or Lord in some kind of research assistant capacity sounds like something I'd enjoy.

All of this needs to be decided fairly soon which terrifies me slightly. I'm almost certain now that I want to continue education beyond the end of this degree though, probably working towards a Masters at a different University if possible. Leicester is all well and good but it's not the place I see myself spending the rest of my life!

.........

Positive news!! My Lib Dem conference pass has arrived!! Now all I have to worry about is getting lost, missing something I really want to go to, looking like a lonely nutter because I'm going on my own and the guy I'm staying with trying something on with me because he's been trying for years and now he's giving up his bed for me for 5 nights.

Oh and I've lost my passport. That was yesterday's panic that hasn't quite subsided yet.

So not much panic then!!