Author Archives: Cambridge Town Owl

So when I saw the headline about further cuts to school budgets, I was reminded of the song. For those of you who need a reminder about the state of the present UK Government, here’s a Not-Safe-For-Work (NSFW) reminder from Juice Media. This was on the back of the markets punishing the UK economy overContinue reading ““If you tolerate this, then your children will be next” sang the Manic Street Preachers in 1998″

…and a missed opportunity to live-stream the speeches by the young green party leaders TL/DR: Watch the joint speech by the Greens’ co-leaders here, and with future events ensure Ever since I left the civil service in 2011 I started going to lots of local and London-based public policy events like the proverbial celebrity whoContinue reading “The Green Party Conference 2022 – the co-leaders’ speeches”

It made a change from big names interviewing “The Minister for The Today Programme on BBC Radio 4”. Browse through this thread for highlights. Or alternatively listen to all of them all of the way through. It was that excruciating. The lack of public statements in recent days as the financial markets punished the UKContinue reading “Prime Minister Liz Truss vs BBC Local Radio presenters. And a comment from Emily Maitlis”

Slightly loaded question given the huge opposition to it – and that is in the face of the Stagecoach shambles. Also, the County Council publishes its cycling and walking infrastructure plan (See item 8 here – and compare it with Oslo here) Above – the Cambridge Independent leading with the opposition to bus cuts –Continue reading “Consultation on a Cambridge Congestion Charge, and a new walking & cycling plan”

On the new Cambridge Innovate Charter You can read it at https://www.innovatecambridge.com/resources/ <<– click, scroll to the foot of the page, click. “I thought we already had a charter!?!?” We have a few – from various monarchs past. The last one which made Cambridge a city was from King George VI in 1951. Before then,Continue reading “Cambridge University must be open and honest with town and villages about its ambitions”

Is this Black Wednesday for 2022?* (*Past performance is no guarantee of future returns) I’m reminded of this spoof NSFW advert by Juice Media. …and things just got worse. Much worse. It’s just over 30 years to the day that the £ crashed out of the Exchange Rate Mechanism <<– This take being from aContinue reading “Have the Tories handed the next general election to Labour?”

How should we pay for local government? And could the revenue help fund some services that are under-funded by central government? I’ve been picking up a number of very old books about all things local democracy from times gone by because the last time we had a major overhaul of local government – boundaries, funding,Continue reading “A local income tax or a land value tax?”

Many of you will have seen the front pages on paper or online. For those of you not affected directly, What’s the one small action or one small one off behaviour change you could take in response to a crisis that will affect many people on low incomes who live outside of our city? ItContinue reading “What will *you* do in response to the Stagecoach Cambs Bus Crisis?”

That’s not to say “I want them to fail and have the proponents of them to fall flat on their faces covered in mud and have to make grovelling public apologies for being wrong before we all get to throw rotten tomatoes at them”(I’m part of CABU!), but rather to ask what contingency plans areContinue reading “What are the contingency plans if the busways fail and the proposed bus service improvements don’t materialise?”

I’ve written lots about adult education and lifelong learning – mainly because I think we could do so much better on it. TL:DR This arrived earlier in the week – by Derby WEA. I’ve picked up a number of books in recent times on the subject too. Note any new institution needs ministerial approval beforeContinue reading “An ideal adult education college – An example from Derby 1968”