BBC News - Clegg defiant despite Lib Dems' slump in Barnsley poll

Your going to fall out of bed in a minute Nick Clegg.

Nick Clegg has said people should not "write off" the Lib Dems despite the party slumping to sixth place in the Barnsley Central by-election.
The party finished behind UKIP, the BNP and an independent as its share of the vote dropped to just over 4%.
Labour, which won the poll on a 36% turnout, said voters had sent a "very clear message" to Mr Clegg about their dislike of his role in the coalition.

Think about it for a moment. This by-election was triggered because the Labour incumbent was convicted of expenses fraud. Yet the Liberals couldn’t do better than the Nazis (BNP) and someone who was practically a passer-by (an independent candidate did better). Meanwhile, the Labour Party, despite being under a cloud over the corruption charges, increased their majority.
People have already written you off Nick. I am no expert but maybe its the lies and broken promises. Or maybe it was that puppy dog look on your face as you followed David Cameron into Downing Street on a promise.  Wake up Nick! They’ve stamped “MUG on your forehead while you weren’t looking; and you made it so easy for them.
BBC News - Clegg defiant despite Lib Dems' slump in Barnsley poll

BBC News - Ministers accused of free book funding 'partial U-turn'

Happy Christmas kids. Don’t worry,  we’ll get you later.

Love

Dave and Nick

“The government has been accused of performing a partial U-turn over funding for a charity that gives free books to children.

Booktrust had been told it would lose all £13m funding for its bookgifting programmes in England, but ministers now say funding will continue.”

BBC News - Ministers accused of free book funding 'partial U-turn'

BBC News - Cameron hails 'revolutionary' Whitehall data website

Following plans to make the unemployed work at menial tasks for £1 an hour the government is now planning to hand over the auditing of the civil service to – well, you and me. Ironically, it is the unemployed who might be best placed for time to do this job.

Funny, but when I put my cross next to my candidate of choice at the last election I was convinced I was helping to build a government that would do the job. It seems that while they are dead keen that all the people they are planning to put out of work should find a job, even if it is for £1 an hour, they themselves seem curiously workshy.

David Cameron announced a new age of transparency, when ordinary people will be able to check on whether the government is keeping to the pledges it has made. Maybe he should look closer to home. He is already in government with Nick Clegg and the LibDems who have broken almost every pledge they made before the election.

BBC News - Cameron hails 'revolutionary' Whitehall data website

BBC News - David Cameron launches Tories' 'big society' plan

 

Speaking to the BBC before the speech, Mr Cameron rejected suggestions that the plans [for a big society]were "cover" for substantial cuts in public services in many areas as the government tries to cut the deficit.

"It is not a cover for anything," he told BBC One's Breakfast. "This would be a great agenda whether we were having to cut public spending or whether we were increasing public spending.

"This is not about trying to save money, it is about trying to have a bigger, better society."

Margaret Thatcher told us that there is no such thing as society, meaning of course that there is no autonomous entity called society to catch you if you fall and we all have to take responsibility. Now David Cameron tells us that there is little else but society, meaning – well the same thing really.  They are two sides of the same coin.

It was worrying to hear him tell Phil Redmond that he got his “Big Society” idea from watching Grange Hill. What I want to know is, if we are all going to take more responsibility for things and government is going to do less, will we pay less in taxes, moving the resources as well as the task to the big society, or will we pay the same or more in taxes leaving the weak to go to the wall – Social Darwinism which has always been a key Tory philosophy?

BBC News - David Cameron launches Tories' 'big society' plan

Exclusive: The Breathless Celts

With the new Condem alliance threatening cuts of between 25% and 40% across the board and in all departments this column can exclusively reveal how the regions, and especially the peripheral, Celtic nations of the UK will carry the brunt of those cuts.

A  leaked document today reveals that the North of England will be closed from Friday to Monday, while the Midlands will close early on Tuesdays and Fridays. Regions further south will remain open, but will see a ban on every mode of transport except walking and piggy backs. Residents across the UK are encouraged to go to bed early, especially as the days get shorter, to save on electricity. The Home Counties are under review, although there are no plans for any such radical money-saving measures because that’s where David Cameron lives.

But in a move that some commentators say makes Margaret Thatcher look like a socialist citizens of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are being asked to hold their breath when there is an ‘R’ in the month. The leaked document reveals the government’s concern that there isn’t enough air to go around after MPs have debated the issue. Other ideas for making such savings include restricting women to only breathing out, an idea that was rejected when someone pointed out that most women can talk breathing in, a feat of multitasking considered vital to the nation.

A member of the Welsh Assembly, when asked to comment, said that policies were still under consideration and everyone was holding their breath in anticipation of official announcements. “After all”, she observed, “we might need the practice.”