"Well written, funny and wistful" - Paul Linford; "He is indeed the Lib Dem blogfather" - Stephen Tall "Jonathan Calder holds his end up well in the competitive world of the blogosphere" - New Statesman "A prominent Liberal Democrat blogger" - BBC Radio 4 Today; "One of my favourite blogs" - Stumbling and Mumbling; "Charming and younger than I expected" - Wartime Housewife
"It’s a well-worn tactic: Say something obviously offensive and watch as the media debates whether you were right, actually. The result is that the state of general discourse moves further to the right, the ratchet effect in action." Don't fall into the Nick Timothy trap, warns Mic Wright.
Helen Maguire exposes planners' failure to consider women's safety: "Simple issues like lighting dictate who feels able to use public space after dark. Many women plan their routes based on lighting, avoiding dark shortcuts or taking longer paths home simply to stay on well-lit streets. Some pay for taxis to avoid walking along unlit roads altogether, a luxury that not everyone can afford."
"Quietly, our country is moving, state by state and executive order by executive order, towards policies that all but dismantle the rights of those deemed mentally ill. In the US, both Republican and Democratic legislators have applauded the trend toward seemingly humane policies that lower the threshold for involuntary psychiatric commitment and assertive, non-consensual treatment in the community." Nancy Burke on mental health and the assault on autonomy in Trump's America.
Georgina Brewis and Sam Blaxland consider the long history of student finance: "It is hard to see successive campaigns against repayable loans or fee increases as anything other than a series of failures. But it is also clear that many of the support systems students today take for granted arose out of such activism, from student discounts to subsidised canteens to union shops and hardship funds."
Emily Temple tells how J.R.R. Tolkien stopped W.H. Auden writing a book about him.
A run of Japanese films released around the millennium, and bracketed together as 'J-Horror', gave new life to the ghost story. In 2026, says Ray Newman, they’re still exciting.
Helen Maguire is backing a campaign to restore a derelict cemetery in her Epsom constituency.
Horton Cemetery contains the graves of 9,000 people who died at one of the five mental health hospitals that made up the Epsom Cluster between 1899 and 1955. Today, it’s neglected and not accessible to the public.
Interviewed by the Lost Souls project, Helen Maguire said:
“I would really welcome the opportunity to have a conversation with the landowner to see if we can find ways to return this graveyard to a public location so relatives can access it.
“It's about heritage, education and people being able to learn about what Epsom used to be. This isn't just in Epsom, it's in other places as well, other locations where graveyards have even built over. This is the start of a conversation that raises the awareness of mental health.
“I think a memorial is a great idea. These individuals have been forgotten, and in many situations it’s not like Horton, where we might have the possibility of making it public one day.”
In 1896 the London County Council purchased the Horton Estate in Surrey with the intention of building a cluster of mental hospitals and other institutions there. A railway system, linked with the main line, was built to carry materials for the construction of the hospitals and then carry the coal and other goods they required for day-to-day operation. The cluster, naturally, had its own power station.
In the 1920s the volume of coal and coke delivered to the power station, and to glasshouses at one of the hospitals, reached a peak of 15,000 tonnes per year.
This railway system was little used during the second world war, when some of the hospitals were given over to wounded and recuperating soldiers, and it was scrapped not long after hostilities ceased. But before it closed, enthusiasts in sports jackets and flannels came to photograph the operations for railway magazines. It is said you can still find traces of the lines among the housing estates, private roads and golf courses that now occupy the Horton Estate.
And, as the horrific story about the home at Tuam in County Galway reminds us, it’s not only asylum inmates who lie in unmarked graves.
I write often here of Dennis O’Neill, who in death was the most famous child in the country during the opening months of 1945. His death from abuse and neglect while in foster care shocked the nation, even as the Allied forces closed on Berlin.
Yet when Dennis's brother Terry, who had been with him when he died, later went with his girlfriend to look for Dennis’s grave, this is what they found:
Pat and I had to walk up and down the row several times before we found the correct grave, because there was no headstone or marking on it, only a metal plate with a number. Long grass grew up around it and some kind of prickly bramble had twisted its way across, sinking in deep roots. I saw a cemetery attendant and ran over to confirm that this was, indeed, Dennis’s grave.
I just stared at the spot, as if somehow I would be able to see through the soil to where he lay. Pat got down on her knees and started tearing up the bramble.
“We should come back with some shears to trim the grass, and bring some flowers next time,” Pat said.
It Newport Borough Council felt any guilt over sending Dennis away to his death, it was not deep enough to lead them to buy him a headstone.
The Putin regime has banned 15 British MPs from entering Russia, accusing them of making "hostile statements and unfounded accusations". And eight of those 15 are Liberal Democrats.
Our congratulations go to: Alistair Carmichael, Chris Coghlan, Will Forster, James MacCleary, Helen Maguire, Mike Martin, Manuella Perteghella and Cameron Thomas.
Helen Maguire, the party's defence spokesperson, told Politics Home:
"I will wear this retaliatory sanction as a badge of honour - as will my Liberal Democrat colleagues also placed on Moscow’s blacklist."
Six peers have also been sanctioned by Moscow, among them the Lib Dems Jeremy Purvis and Julie Smith.
You know what? I bet Josh Reynolds has never heard someone make a joke about his name and the great painter before. He's going to be so amused!
In his maiden speech Josh admitted he couldn't paint to save his life, but went on to point out that Stanley Spencer's Cookham is in his constituency. Lord Bonkers once asked Spencer to paint one of his barns, but it turned out to be an unfortunate misunderstanding.
Friday
One advantage that my political experience brings is the ability to spot talent, so I have been running my eye over our many new MPs. Epsom and Ewell’s Helen Maguire, to take one example, is a former captain in the Royal Military Police and thus a chief whip in the making if ever I saw one.
Roz Savage from the South Cotswolds is the first woman to row single-handedly across three oceans: the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian. She did so in order to raise awareness of environmental issues, and I shall certainly invite her to cross Rutland Water with the same aim in mind, though not while Ruttie is in her current mood.
As a former archaeologist, Charlotte Cane from Ely and East Cambridgeshire is bound to take an interest in someone as ancient as me, though I have my doubts about Joshua Reynolds, who took Theresa May’s Maidenhead. These artist fellows can be A Bit Of A Handful – the tales I could tell you about my old friend Augustus John!
At least I shall now have a reliable source among our team in the Commons in the shape of Steve Darling’s delightful guide dog Jennie.
Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West, 1906-10.
