Six of the Best 205

"On Saturday morning the English Council will debate their budget for the year ahead which, for the first time in at least ten years, will not include a rebate for Liberal Youth membership." On Liberal Democrat Voice LY Chair Tom Wood explains why he thinks this is a bad idea.

Redbrick, the University of Birmingham student newspaper, reports a visit by Lembit Opik.

"We are not out of the woods yet, but this could turn out to be an example of good old-fashioned Lib Dem compromise, saving the Coalition from its more ideological instincts." Writing on the Spectator website, Martin Bright welcomes today's announcement of the Youth Contract.

IanVisits ventures underground to photograph Aldwych tube station, which has been closed to passengers since 1994.

2012 will see the bicentenary of a certain novelist's birth. Londonist starts the celebrations early with a Charles Dickens pub crawl.

"… in the 13th century there is evidence of growing tension between the governing class and the poorer citizens, whose only means of civic expression were the folkmoots – mass gatherings which took place in St Paul’s Churchyard. When the churchyard was enclosed in the early years of the 14th century the folkmoot ceased to meet." Philobiblon has found a quote from 1928 with a remarkable contemporary resonance.