Despite the parliamentary watchdog IPSA finding "overwhelming evidence" that Rochdale MP Simon Danzcuk claimed expenses for two children that were not living with him, the Labour MP has been simply been ordered to pay back the £11,000 in false claims, with no further sanctions against him. The false claims amounted to more than six months wages for an average worker in Rochdale, who he claims to represent.
SpArC: The Conservative Administration of Shropshire Council have made it clear that they want to cut funding to all leisure centres, including SpArC by 2017-18. Whilst this is bad news for all our leisure centres, this is particularly bad for SpArC as this is the only major leisure facility for miles incorporating a pool, fitness suite and theatre. It also plays a key role for local schools'providing swimming lessons etc.
In response to growing fears about the Government's plan to turn schools into academies and the impact they will have on our area, three Shropshire Councillors have invited Pank Patel*, the Government's Schools Champion, to visit a number of schools in the rural west of the County.
Liberal Democrats in Hinckley and Bosworth have condemned plans, announced in the recent Budget by the Chancellor of the Exchequer, to force all schools currently under Local Education Authority (LEA) control to become Academies.
Nobody viewing the tragic scenes in Brussels on Tuesday can fail to be moved to tears by what has unfolded. No matter how many times bombings and shootings take place on our TV screens, the uncompromising images of violence, terror and confusion shock us all to the core. When confronted with such horrors in person, human beings have two default responses: fight or flight. The same is true for Britain as a nation. Do we work together with our allies to confront terror, or cut ourselves off and vainly try to ignore the world around us?
The EU Leave campaigners are engaging in 'truthiness': if they don't like a fact they just make up another one A few years ago the American comedian Stephen Colbert, imitating a Right-wing shock jock, coined the phrase 'truthiness' to describe the art of asserting one's beliefs as if they are facts. "Anybody who knows me knows that I'm no fan of dictionaries or reference books. They're elitist." he declared. "Who's Britannica to tell me the Panama Canal was finished in 1914? If I wanna say it happened in 1941, that's my right.