Posted by: Blackburn Labour in Untagged on
Oct 11, 2009
Longer version: things have been a bit quiet on the website as the team at Blackburn Labour are busy converting the site from
Joomla and
MyBlog to
Wordpress. The rationale (boring detail) behind this is as follows:
- The site will be easier for our councillors to update. The admins are tiring of receiving contributions via email!
- Using Wordpress for everything is simpler and more functional than MyBlog for the blog and Joomla for everything else.
- Wordpress has better support - and a larger community of users.
- Wordpress is just better.
- Erm... that's it.
This will be a headache in the short term, it should put us on a much better footing for the coming general election campaign.
Normal (better) service will resume soon!
This is a guest post by our friends at Left Foot Forward, whose new group blog launched this morning.
Left Foot Forward is a new political blog for progressives. We provide evidence-based analysis on British politics, news and policy developments.
We are a non-partisan blog. Because we are progressive and because of the aims we're committed to, we often find ourselves in agreement with left of centre policies and politicians. But we are focused purely on the quality of policies and furthering progressive goals, rather than on promoting individual politicians and parties.
We have been inspired by our U.S. sister site, Think Progress, and have therefore adopted their approach to blogging by setting out our beliefs and categorising our stories accordingly.
We are fighting for:
1. A proactive and sustainable economic policy that creates jobs, pulls Britain out of recession and towards a low-carbon and more equitable future.
2. Public services that work for, and are accountable to, local people and leave no one behind.
3. Safe communities where poverty and inequality are tackled, and the victims of crime are put first.
4. A multilateral foreign policy to tackle climate change, poverty, nuclear proliferation, genocide, terrorism, and disease.
We are fighting against:
1. Public greed and attempts by politicians and public servants to line their own pockets.
2. Administrative incompetence whether it takes place at the national, regional, or local level.
3. Media manipulation and bias to support a hidden agenda.
4. The threat of racism and extremism.
Posted by: Blackburn Labour in Untagged on
Sep 2, 2009
You know things have gone a bit weird when Burnley are in the Premier league
Things are a bit weird this year:
In keeping with this strangeness, Total Politics' Top 100 Left of Centre Blogs has been released today and we're number 18!
It's great to see West Lancashire blogger Paul Cotterill, Alex Smiths' LabourList (which is less than a year old) and our Twitter friend Kerry McCarthy up there. And of course, the honourable member for Glasgow South reigns supreme!
Our mixture between community campaigning, Jack's posts (amusingly described by a detractor as "The Thoughts of Chairman Straw") and occasionally taking the mickey out of the Tories seems to be oddly popular.
Thanks to everyone that voted for us and apologies if blogging has been a bit light during the recess.
Time to get our special blogging shoes on again!
Posted by: Blackburn Labour in iain dale on
Jul 27, 2009
If he's told you once he's told you a thousand times. Iain Dale said quite clearly: "DO NOT list ten blogs you think your readers should vote for" in the Best Blogs Poll.
In a fit of anarchic rule-breaking, however, the political blogosphere have completely ignored this and are posting up top tens willy nilly.
One of our editors nearly spilt coffee over himself this morning after he was informed Blackburn Labour had topped Tom Harris' illicit list.
In solidarity with our naughty classmates, here's what the Blackburn Labour editors reckon:
10: Benedict Brogan
9: Tory Bear [okay no more Tories, we promise]
8: Grace Fletcher-Hackwood
7: Cllr Tim Blog [check out his brilliantTwitter feed]
6: Alastair Campbell
5: Kerry McCarthy
4: Chris Paul's Labour of Love
3: LabourList [with massive kudos to Alex Smith for stabilising things post-Draper]
3: Tom Harris MP
1: Political Betting
A special mention should also go to our East Lancastrian counterpart Irfan Ahmed, whose special ways with spelling and grammar have kept numerous people extremely amused:
"Clearly this is a case of media hyperlitious [sic]!"
So if you haven't already, get over there and vote!
Posted by: Blackburn Labour in blogging on
Jul 17, 2009
Total Politics magazine, under the editorship of Tory blogger Iain Dale, are conducting their annual poll of the best political blogs.
This list has traditionally been dominated by right wing blogs, in part because the poll was started by a blogger whose readership are 80% Conservative. Promotion by LabourList and LibDem Voice may well give the results more of a cross-party flavour.
LabourList have an overview of the contest and have very kindly listed Blackburn Labour as one of the strongest left-wing blogs which have emerged in the past year.
For any new/irregular readers, here are some of our 'traffic spike' posts in order of the pageviews:
- Our revelation that the procedures for torn postal ballots were advantageous to the BNP in the European elections.
- The notorious Tory Logo Maker which was wide open to tomfoolery by Labour activists.
- Kerry McCarthy MP helpfully pointed a bunch of trolls in the direction of Jack Straw's post on civil liberties.
- Our blogger Asif Sange called for Derek Draper to resign in his characteristically strident manner (more from Asif soon).
- Back in April we totted up the top 50 Labour tweeters.
So mosey along here to cast your votes!
This site uses some technical malarkey to track how many people are visiting the site. Among other things, it shows us which search terms people are using to get here. This month's results are very interesting:
It emerges that Blackburn Mela - cancelled by the Tory/Liberal council - is the third highest search term entered by members of the public. Arts in the Park, which has also been dumped, is not far behind.
Labour leader Kate Hollern is quoted in the Lancashire Telegraph today in an article which reveals just £90,000 has been set aside for the poorly-attended 'Celebrate Blackburn' events.
When will Tory culture boss Cllr Michael Law-Riding realise that Blackburn residents want their festivals back?
Labour bloggers, tweeters, Facebook addicts and other online campaigners will be meeting in central Manchester at 4:30pm this Saturday 11 June.
This informal gathering will discuss the online campaign efforts in the North West, feedback our ideas to Labour HQ bods and hopefully put a few faces to their respective political blogs and Twitter accounts!
The attitude is very much 'the more the merrier' - you don't need to be a massive techie, just interested in this sort of campaigning! Please email blogmeet AT blackburnlabour DOT org for further details.
Posted by: Blackburn Labour in Hope Not Hate, BNP on
Jun 23, 2009
Hope Not Hate, who ran the campaign against the BNP for the European elections, are canvassing for views on how the movement they have built can be developed.
Nick Griffin and former National Front leader Andrew Brons may have been elected, but the fight against their abhorrent politics continues apace. Air your opinion on the forthcoming campaign by clicking on the image below:
Well, their survey. But they didn't do a graphic for that!
The 2009 Labour Party Conference will take place in Brighton from 27 September to 1 October. In a real show of strength for the local party, we're thrilled that a record-breaking twelve members will be making the 566-mile round trip to the Sussex seaside.
The team will be led by our voting delegate Shaukat Hussain. Perhaps the excitement of conference will lead him to get his bottom wet in the finest traditions of the Labour Party?
Jack Straw outside the Houses of Parliament as Blackburn's new MP in 1979
Margaret Thatcher had been Prime Minister for 40 days when Jack Straw made his maiden speech in the House of Commons on 13 June 1979 - thirty years ago last Saturday.
Paying tribute to his predecessor as Blackburn MP, he described Barbara Castle as "a fighter, as unquestionably the most successful woman politician of her generation, as somebody with immense personal and political courage and as somebody who, at her best, was in the company of only three or four others in her capacity to inspire people and to replace sloth by zeal."
The speech also paid tribute to Barbara Castle for her work on bringing about a better pension scheme, one which Jack observed "the Conservative government are now seeking to dismantle", benefits for the disabled and child benefits.
A section on the effects of the inter-war recession has taken on a remarkable poignancy with recent events: "What was the reaction of the town? Was it simply to accept its fate, to accept that the invisible hand of free market forces had been amputated in that area, or was it to decide that things had gone too far and that local government and State intervention was likely to be the only way through?"
Here's the full thing (click pages to enlarge them):
Conservative Sir William Henry Hornby represented Blackburn in the House of Commons for 23 years without making his maiden speech.
Apparently he was too shy. This could never be said of our Jack!
To play us out, here's the delectable Debbie Harry and Blondie with Sunday Girl. When Jack rose from that green bench this was apparently top of the "hit parade", whatever that is!
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