“The liberal deviseth liberal things, and by liberal things shall he stand.”
It must be true – it’s in the bible. Isaiah chapter 32, verse 8 to be exact.
The New English Bible has a different translation from the original Hebrew – “The man of noble mind forms noble designs and stands firm in his nobility.”
I am [...]
Entries from February 28th, 2010
God and the Liberal Democrats
February 28th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
It’s a two pancake race here
February 16th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
Trying to explain to Julie from France and Markus from Germany the ancient tradition of pancake racing was quite amusing.
Given the soggy and bleak weather conditions, I could only admire the participants as they ran up and down in front of the Old Town Hall.
As well as a “Roman Catholic priest” in full soutane, there [...]
Tags:Alison Steer·old town hall·pancake race·Sandy Walkington·St Albans
How green are my Tories – not
February 16th, 2010 · 2 Comments · Sandy's blog
Why am I not surprised that the list published by the Tories today of ‘Ten reasons to vote Conservative’ did not include any reference to the environment or climate change?
So much for David Cameron’s claim that he has ‘sought to push the environment up to the top of the political agenda.’
It follows the recent revelation [...]
Tags:Conservative green policies·David Cameron·Sandy Walkington
London Colney by-election result
February 15th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
St Albans Labour Party has been trumpeting their narrow 32 vote margin in holding their London Colney parish council seat as the greatest news since the second coming. Of course their candidate Maria Aguado is to be congratulated on her victory. But the real news was the trouncing of the BNP and the barnstorming performance [...]
Tags:BNP·Dave Winstone·London Colney·London Colney by-election·Maria Aguado·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·Vibs Nazeri
A win-win for everyone
February 8th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
I want to say thank you to Tesco. The news that they are dropping their plans to build a superstore on the London Road site and instead move their St Peters Street store to larger premises in the former Woolworths is a shot in the arm for St Albans.
We can now get an appropriately mixed [...]
Tags:London Road·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·St Albans Market·Tesco
BBC Radio 4 “The World This Weekend” on the MP expenses scandal
February 7th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
Today’s “The World This Weekend” included a long item on the MP expense scandal and looked in particular at voter reaction in Stevenage (Barbara Follett) and St Albans. Both Anne Main and I were interviewed for the programme while we were at St Albans City Station on Friday evening. There were vox pops with local [...]
Tags:Anne Main·BBC·MP Expenses·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·The World This Weekend
Would our trains always run on time if radio, television and the FCC top brass came to St Albans station every evening?
February 5th, 2010 · 3 Comments · Sandy's blog
It’s just a thought.
The arrival and departure boards at St Albans City gleamed with on-time trains tonight. How different from recent months. And what a coincidence that the FCC top management were doing their Meet the Managers (or “Face the Music”) session, not to mention more radio and television crews as well as local media [...]
Bedmond Tin Rocket
February 4th, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
I can well remember my first time in Bedmond. It was circa 1985. With a friend, I had done a great circular cycle ride from St Albans reaching Sarratt. Coming back, we came up Toms Lane, and I well remember the weary push. All I wanted was the ridge and the then easy ride back [...]
Tags:Bedmond·Bedmond church·Joy Mann·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·Toms Lane
“FIRST – Transforming Travel”
February 2nd, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
I had not consciously logged First Group’s strapline until I was sitting this afternoon in a Palace of Westminster committee room seeing a set of slides produced by Mary Grant, chair of First Capital Connect and managing director of all First Group’s rail operations.
FCC certainly has “transformed” travel but not perhaps in the way that [...]
Tags:377 trains·delay repay·FCC·First Capital Connect·Lord Bradshaw·Mary Grant·Neal Lawson·Nigel Quinton·Norman Baker MP·Paul Burstow MP·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·Tom Brake MP
Crossing boundaries
February 2nd, 2010 · No Comments · Sandy's blog
A belated note about last Saturday’s St Albans Interfaith Group’s reception at the Civic Centre.
St Albans is special in so many ways, and the longstanding interfaith group (which predates 9/11) is evidence of that. The initiative came from the Rev Tony Hurle of St Paul’s Church, who wanted to create a regular dialogue between the [...]
Tags:Marlborough Road Methodist Church·Sandy Walkington·St Albans·St Albans Abbey·St Albans Bahai·St Albans Islamic Centre·St Albans Masorti Synagogue·St Albans Quakers·St Albans United Synagogue·St Pauls church St Albans