I don’t normally use my blog to ‘advertise’ other company’s products – for one, my blog is independent of commercial interest. If I did introduce advertising or worse blogged about products in a way destined to influence my readers (perhaps for some sort of commission), people would quite rightly stop reading it. I wouldn’t blame them!

After picking myself up off the floor on receipt of my renewal from my current insurer (£700 or £800 if I pay monthly) I used all of the car insurance comparison sites: comparethemarket.com, confused.com, moneysupermarket.com etc and ended up with a very competitive £450 via Compare the Market. Having see the TV advert (all very funny) I knew that I would be entitled to a “free toy” once I had completed my purchase – and there is a seperate claims mechanism in place via www.meerkovo.com to claim the toy.

The fun doesn’t end there: once you’ve successfully claimed your free toy, the residents of Meerkovo celebrate a day in your honour (by way of further thank you).

Compare the Market have proved that once a company has taken your money, they don’t have to think of you as just another customer. I wish more companies would feel the same once they have relieved us of our hard earned money.

Well done Compare the Market!

Yesterday Nick Clegg and Paul Burstow unveiled a new mental health strategy in which more focus will be placed on dealing with mental health problems at an early stage.

The new mental health strategy for England promises an extra £400m for therapies, such as counselling, to increase access to them by 60% by 2015. It also stresses the need for early intervention, to nip in the bud mental health problems in children.

Mental health represents 23% of burden of disease (30% of people that walk through a GP’s door, for example) but only 11% of expenditure. One of the first speeches Nick Clegg made on becoming Liberal Democrat leader was to highlight the state of mental health provision and accuse politicians of “shamefully” turning a blind eye to the scale of mental health problems.

Under Labour the top-down approach has ultimately denied many service users the personalised support they need.

Under measures announced today we will be investing around £400 million in talking therapies over the next four years:

·         an extra 1.2m people able to get treatment for depression and anxiety
·         0.5m more people will recover, many more showing measurable improvement
·         75,000 more people will be able to work, or take part in education, training or volunteering
·         and more than £700m in savings, in healthcare, tax and welfare gains.

Speaking yesterday morning on Daybreak, Nick Clegg said: “Today we are announcing that we are repealing an old-fashioned outdated law which means that MPs at the moment are disqualified from being MPs if they have a mental health problem which goes on for more than six months.

“We are scrapping that – it is a relatively symbolic thing because it has never been used – but it nonetheless shows that we are determined to root out that stigma.”

“Many people think that soldiers coming back from conflicts in Iraq or Afghanistan, they have been so brave and so courageous, I think people think ‘Well, surely they are not susceptible to mental health problems’.

“But often, actually, the toughest battle for them is when they have actually come back from the battlefield in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Paul Burstow youtube video can be seen here with more info available on the Lib Dem website here

Alastair Campbell blog: More Power to Clegg on Mental Health Agenda
Guardian: Children to be offered talking therapies
Sun: Sun wins £7m for Our Boys

Read More

What do North West Labour and Conservative controlled councils have in common? They think it’s OK to charge their constituents to shop locally.

Salford Council has charged for it’s car parks for a good few years now. So even if you just want to pop to Salford Shopping City for a few minutes, perhaps to post a letter, it’ll cost you a couple of quid.

My Bury Lib Dem colleague Vic D’Albert has blogged today that the Conservative-controlled Bury Council are now introducing car parking charges at the Prestwich Town Centre Fairfax Road car park. I know this car park well, as I lived in Prestwich for a number of years – and I used to regularly shop at the Longfield Centre, since even then I believed it was better to shop locally.

What a pity Bury Tories are as short-sighted as Salford’s Labour. As Vic points out, the policy is being brought in for purely financial reasons. The car park charging proposal was introduced into the Council budget by the Conservative group earlier this year to balance the budget.

Have they not thought about the impact this will have on the struggling small businesses in the Longfield Suite? I assume they gave the Longfield the same consideration that Salford Labour gave Salford Shopping City when they increased parking charges there.

Listen up Conservatives and Labourites across the North West. It should be free to shop local.

Six inches of snow outside and, brrrr, it’s bloody cold. For most of us that means staying indoors all week, working from home if possible, and turning the heating up another degree. But for a few households, that extra 1 degree can significantly increase your gas/electricity bill – which in the current (financial) climate, adds a strain to already thin wages.

An uninsulated house loses 33% of all heat generated through your walls, 25% through the roof and (if not double glazed or poorly fitted) 20% through the windows. Fortunately, there is something you can do about that – and it might not cost you a penny*

Although it’s quite hidden on the Salford Council website, there is help for some households which means you can get cavity wall and loft insulation free of charge.

*If you live anywhere in Salford, it does not matter if you are a homeowner or renting from either a private landlord or Salix Homes/City West – if you are over 70 years of age OR earning less than £15,592 and receiving a benefit (perhaps Working Tax Credit or Child Tax Credit) you WILL qualify for FREE CAVITY WALL and LOFT INSULATION.

Simply telephone Salford Council’s Affordable Warmth Team on 0161-922 8732 or email: keepingwarm@salford.gov.uk
There is also an on-line form you can fill in to submit your request for FREE INSULATION here at: http://www.salford.gov.uk/lowcostinsulation.htm

In April 2007, Salford Council conducted an aerial thermal image scan of every household in Salford, you can check your own home’s results here: http://www.salford.gov.uk/aerial-thermal-images.htm

Type in your postcode and the Council’s database will automatically check the level of heat loss from your home (levels correct as at 5th April 2007).

Don’t forget, the governments boiler scrappage scheme also started today – but you’re unlikely to benefit unless your boiler is 15 years old, or older. If you still have a G-rated boiler (pilot light permanently lit), then you could get £400 off the cost of a new one.

Late last night (about 1am), I was made aware of a completely ridiculous and baseless accusation from Richard Carvath that I and/or Norman Owen have been involved in a blog-comment discussion over on the Swinton South Liberal Democrat site.

Apparently this claim has been made to Richard Carvath by an “anonymous electronic communication”.

I would like to state here, for the public record, I am not the mysterious Roger Berry. I do not write anything using the name Roger Berry nor do I know who Roger Berry is. He may or may not be a real person, it may be a pseudo-name; I do not know.

To Richard Carvath: I would expect more for someone who wishes to represent Salford in Parliament, fortunately with this display of childish and potentially illegal behaviour it’s increasingly unlikely to happen. Salford can breathe a sigh of relief that such a naive, irrational and comical character will not be a source of embarrassment.

I require a complete retraction on your own website (deleting the offending blog article will suffice). And on the Swinton South Liberal Democrat blog I require nothing less than a full ap0logy for accusing me of writing under the name of Roger Berry. Further, I demand to know who the “anonymous electronic communication” is from – I understand that Richard may not wish to make this individual’s identity public but I have a right to face my accuser(s), if indeed there are any other than Richard himself.

Clearly Richard’s posting on his own website and comment replies on the Swinton South Liberal Democrat blog were designed to harm Councillor Norman Owen’s public perception and my own. The accusations are baseless, defamatory and potentially libelous. If the accusations are not withdrawn in full, I will take legal advice and dependent upon that advice may issue proceedings against Mr Carvath.

It is simply not good enough to repeat groundless accusations and then state “I was only repeating what I had been told” – if you publish it on your own website, you are responsible for the content, regardless of the source.

I hereby give Richard Carvath 48 hours to delete the offending item from his website and publish an immediate retraction on the Swinton South Liberal Democrat website.

Finally, I suggest a suitable mark of regret would be a donation of £15 to Christie’s Hospital.

For some reason I’ve been hit by hundreds of comment spam this evening, so apologies if you post comments and they don’t come through straight away – I’ll work on fixing it all tomorrow.

Off to bed now.

This was supposed to be a humorous blog post about the fact that Twitter is currently offline and I was wondering how it will be possible for all those iPhone and Blackberry users to tell their followers what they are doing in 140 characters or less.

It was then that I was reminded that Twitter is currently being used in Iran to document the ongoing situation following their Presidential Election.

With heavy reporting restrictions in place and because of the rules banning unauthorised gatherings, Twitter is playing an important role in Iran, encouraging open discussion and enabling the process of arranging political meetings.

All of this, is of course, banned in Iran.

So next time you read a Tweet about something trivial, remember that hundreds or maybe thousands of miles away, Twitter could be saving a life or bringing about political change.

Who would have thought that a free social networking website could change the world?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfQu9OBfQVI

I’m not sure what is more surprising about this video, the fact that Susan Boyle’s voice is just amazing, or that I was informed about this by my favourite American author (Peter David). I’ve heard that even Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher are big fans. And no, I don’t watch Britain’s Got Talent (do they broadcast it in the US?)

Back in January, I wrote about a bar in Oldham that had introduced a new promotion, All you can drink, £5.99
I condemned this promotion at the time and am glad to see that the Liberal Democrat controlled Oldham Council has decided to review the licences of all the pubs and bars in and around Yorkshire Street, which is where the majority of the town’s bars are located. 

This strong action has been taken by Oldham Council’s Trading Standards under the Licensing Act 2003, which will see all 22 bars have their licences reviewed following a spate of incidents involving town centre disorder.

Trading Standards suggestion includes introducing post office-style queuing systems and the limit of two drinks per person, in the hopes that promotions run by bars do not promote alcohol mis-use and anti-social behaviour.

You can read the full story here, on BBC New’s website.

I praise the Liberal Democrat-controlled Oldham Council and will be watching the results of the licence review, to see if it is something we could introduce here in Salford.

I recently had cause to write to my local MP, Hazel Blears, with reference to the shocking decision by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme to deny Christies Hospital a refund of £6.5m of donated money that was lost when two Icelandic banks collapsed.

Whilst I did expect a standard reply, penned by one of Ms. Blears’ minions – I did not expect to open the reply and see her picture greeting me whilst I tried to down my ready brek this morning.

Is Hazel Blears really so vain she needs to include a photograph of herself on all official correspondence from her parliamentary office?

It was the last thing I needed to see this morning whilst I tried to digest my breakfast!

In an effort to forget the woes of the recent by-election in Pendlebury, I elected (no pun intended!) to take the other half for a meal and film at our local cinema. Regrettably, I selected ‘Watchmen’ despite the wife warning me the feature had not received particularly good reviews. I generally do read cinema reviews before choosing which film to go and see, but I recall having seen a trailer for Watchmen at a previous cinema outing. The trailer seemed to offer something different – a dark tale, where superheroes are a little less ‘super’ and rather more ‘damaged.’

For the uninitiated, Watchmen is based on a 1980s comic book, set in an alternate 1985 reality where masked/costumed vigilantes fight crime in America and President Nixon has served three terms as President. I would attempt to summarise the plot, but there is no plot. At just over 2 and three quarter hours Director Zack Snyder (of ’300′ fame) attempted to copy the style of the excellent ‘Sin City’ with more than a small nod towards ‘The Dark Night’ and even a complete rip-off of an entire scene from ‘Dr Strangelove’.

The film begins with the murder of one of the vigilante superheroes (The Comedian) but there is no reason for the viewer to invest in the superhero characters, as they have no redeeming features whatsoever; further, the characters are simply boring. At one point, which may have been after I had re-opened my eyes after a short rest, I was actually hoping more superheroes would be killed – but then I realised I didn’t care either way.

We are then offered some kind of ridiculous love triangle; but since there is no reason to care about any of the characters involved, the whole love-triangle-arc is meaningless and ultimately futile. After a couple of awkward sex scenes, which offer little to the viewer (did the writer just use a free downloadable template to write the screenplay? You can just imagine where the template had the words “INSERT GENERIC SEX SCENE HERE”)

Finally, after many extended scenes of ‘Dr Manhatten’ parading around naked (yes, the full frontal kind), I re-opened my eyes for the second time to witness the conclusion to this awful movie. Despite my sincere hope  that the USSR would get the chance to obliterate the alternate-reality east coast USA, I was not rewarded by my 3 hour wait.

While I was not expecting a thought provoking and deeply engaging experience from ‘Watchmen’, I was hoping for a touch of escapism and perhaps even a captivating storyline. In fact, I would have settled for a a superficially visual spectacle, that would have at least allowed me to forget my aching bones for a couple of hours.

Who watch the Watchmen? Only those that haven’t had time to catch a review – everyone else: AVOID!

For the second time this week I’ve woken up feeling ever so slightly queasy – probably something I ate. So it was appropriate that I would read, whilst browsing The Times Online, a letter written to the editor.

Sir, “Quantitative easing” is far too cumbersome a phrase. I suggest that we truncate the phrase into a more manageable term: “Queasing”. Much easier to pronounce and carries with it the slightly queasy feeling that one naturally feels when trying to save the economy from imminent collapse.

Carl Maxim

Southsea, Hants

Somehow that seems appropriate, considering how crappy I am feeling today.

About 2 years ago I sued my bank, Barclays Bank plc, in the Salford County Court for thousands of pounds worth of ridiculous bank charges (and accrued interest over time) that they had debited from my account over a 6 year period. They callously removed funds from my account on a regular basis for going over my overdraft limit, something they allowed to happen, which questions what purpose my “agreed overdraft limit” served at the time, if they were happy to let me go over it, then charge ridiculous sums for it.

In some cases, Barclays refused to pay direct debits of just a few pounds, but then charged me a fee of around £30, to bounce a direct debit of less than £10.

After picking up the story on the Penalty Charges Forum and The Consumer Action Group I decided to begin action in the small claims court and submitted my claim. As my case came to be heard, I prepared my court bundle and sat waiting to put my case across to the judge.

Barclays didn’t bother to show on the day, but the judge had already made his mind up long before I walked into his chambers and put a “stay” on my case until such time as the High Court made a ruling.

Last week, the High Court ruled that the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) could indeed determine if the charges are fair and we are but the last step from some form of redress (and hopefully refund) from the banks.

I urge anyone who has ever been charged for bounced direct debits, standing orders or cheques or “unathorised” overdraft fees to lodge a complaint with your local county court against your bank and begin the process of claiming back these unfair charges.

Useful links:
Penalty Charges Forum and The Consumer Action Group

What a sight that would be if it actually happens? I for one would pay real money to see Starbug land in the middle of the street!

I was reading that the new Red Dwarf series started filming (to be shown on the Dave channel over Easter) at Granada Studios in Manchester, including on the Coronation Street set. BBC News reports that Simon Gregson (who plays Steve McDonald in the soap) also made an appearance.

Now I don’t watch Coronation Street, but for years worked many times at Granada Studios and have fond memories of walking down the street and even having a beer in the (fake) Rovers Return. Coupled with one of my fave sci-fi shows (that and Blakes 7) – I for one, can’t wait until Easter.

Now all we need to do is to work out how to get Space 1999 in Eastenders (an eagle landing in the square?) and Blakes 7 on Emmerdale (must be somewhere to land the Liberator in Yorkshire!).

While I’m not one to be out every night drinking my brain cells away, I do like the occasional tipple, but I was quite astonished that The Tokyo Club in Oldham has stooped to a new low. All you can drink for less than £6. I can’t get lunch for less than that these days – but apparently now it’s possible to drink solidly for four hours for just about the national minimum wage.

It’s a sad reflection on our culture that bar owners see this as a solution for their businesses to survive the economic slump. 

The Tokyo Bar is promoting and condoning binge-drinking, which is one of the major causes of accident and emergency admissions (over 1 million A & E admissions last year were alcohol-related).

Didn’t we introduce longer licencing laws to try and combat the very problem of drinking large amounts of alcohol in a short space of time?

All you can drink for £5.99 can’t be the answer.

Welcome to my new blog. 

As I was creating this I was reminded of the time a researcher called me from Sky News to see if I was interested in appearing on The Martin Stanford show. This was a short lived experiment by Sky, a kind of “call-in show with webcams”. I had previously appeared on The Martin Stanford show a couple of times, so I was obviously on some kind of ‘desperate’ call back list (I assume they needed someone to come on quickly).

So, telephone rings, “Hi, this is XXX from Sky News, we were wondering if you would like to appear on Martin Stanford’s show this evening, according to our records you have an opinion on most things”

At that point I think I said I wasn’t interested/was busy and hung up.
They haven’t called back for a good while now

Anyway, they were right, I do have an opinion on most things – this seems the perfect place to vent!!!