Birmingham University Labour Students

Congratulations to all newly-elected Birmingham City Councillors.  I happened to be browsing through the Birmingham Conservatives website, and found a page containing lovely pictures of all Conservative Birmingham City Councillors, sorted by ward.  I would encourage everyone to go and take a look - it appears not to have been updated with the new councillors [...]

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Conservative Party, Race | 5 Comments »

Albert Bore’s response to the 6 losses last night has been reported on The Stirrer.
“Labour leader Sir Albert Bore scoffed at suggestions that local voters were swayed by local issues.
He laid responsibility for his party’s performance at the government’s door.
“It’s not about cleaner streets or even the Council Tax, which only raises £6 million [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics | 6 Comments »

Check out the results for Birmingham City Council elections here.
Without doubt PragueTory will be on this blog within minutes claiming he knew all along Labour were going to get hammered. I’ll say this to Dom now, there’s no real surprises there. Over the last few weeks this blogs hasn’t exactly been a laugh a minute [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Labour Party | 3 Comments »

Now three Birmingham MPs, Sion Simon, Gisela Stewart and Lynne Jones, have declared the 20p starting rate on income tax a step too far… that’s a fair cross section of MPs, from regular rebel to usual loyalist.
While the theory goes that this will be offset by tax breaks, it is claimed the poorest will be [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary, Economy | 3 Comments »

Rod Dungate our candidate in Edgbaston for this May’s local elections has started his own blog which I thought I’d share with you.
Edgbaston Ward is held by the Conservatives but I really think we can give them a run for their money this May and we wish Rod the best of luck.  Happy reading!

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Labour Party | No Comments »

Flicking through the Birmingham Post today, I came across some colourful quotes from one of BULS’s more blogged-about councillors, John Lines.
 Of asylum seekers, he remarked:
“Some scallywag, some scumbag can jump on the back of a lorry, come over under the tunnel and never expect to do a day’s work in his (expletive deleted) life. And [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary, Far right, Immigration | Tagged: John Lines, asylum seekers | No Comments »

Sir Dick Knowles, former Labour leader of Birmingham City Council, died yesterday at the age of 90.
 
Dick was leader of the Labour Group from 1984 to 1993, and brought in many of the changes which saw Birmingham get back on its feet and feel the sense of pride in itself that many regarded as lacking [...]

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Labour Party, Local news | Tagged: Dick Knowles | 2 Comments »

Mr Lines, the esteemed Birmingham Cabinet member for housing, made some interesting remarks recently.

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Immigration | 2 Comments »

In all the commotion over Hain and Watson, we forgot to mention on the blog local MP Liam Byrne, who this weekend received his third ministerial portfolio. As well as a constituency MP, Minister for immigration and the West Midlands, he will now be a Minister of the Treasury too.
The Tories were already upset about him [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary | Tagged: Liam Byrne | No Comments »

One of the essential parts of BULS is campaigning throughout Birmingham.  We’ve got some very important local elections coming up this May so what better time to start grinding the campaign gears than at the start of the New Year.  Today, comrades travelled to Kings Heath to help Labour candidates Nathan Matthew and David Williams [...]

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Campaigns | 2 Comments »

The Birmingham Post reported today that a Birmingham Lib Dem council candidate has admitted to changing his name so as to appear above a Labour candidate on the ballot paper.
Saeed Aehmed was Saeed Ahmed, until he changed used deed poll to insert an extra “e” into his surname, pushing him alphabetically above Councillor Muhamed Afzal on the [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary | Tagged: Birmingham City Council | 1 Comment »

The Birmingham Post has carried two headlines this week that prompted me to shell out 70p for it. The first, on Monday, was in the fall out of the Enoch Powell Tory row… like the Post correspondant, I had already googled the speech, only to be led straight to the National Front website which carried [...]

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary, Women | Tagged: Birmingham, Birmingham Post, Enoch Powell, Gender pay gap, Nigle Hastilow | 1 Comment »

Mike Leddy was returned to Birmingham City Council for Brandwood in a shocker by-election victory for Labour.
Winning with a majority of 335 Labour had been on the attack from the start. In the local elections in Brandwood last May the Conservatives had won with a 400 majority. With leaflets going out every weekend and door [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics | 7 Comments »

… Because there’s a by-election going on in Brandwood! Brandwood is a ward in the South of Birmingham, which is facing a council election this Thursday following the sad death of Cllr Ken Hardeman. Labour’s Mike Leddy has been doing some fantastic work in the area and BULS will be out campaigning for his election [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary, Campaigns | 1 Comment »

In case people didn’t know there is a by-election in the Brandwood ward of the Selly Oak consitutuency. Ken Hardeman, the Tory councillor, recently passed away and the election is set to take place in mid September. Brandwood run from Kings Heath out to Druids Heath and towards Kings Norton so really ought to be [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics | 1 Comment »

On May 3rd, John Lines was re-elected to his Bartley Green seat on Birmingham Council. This made me rather angry.
Why do I pick out this particular Tory? Is it because I spent months of phone canvassing and weeks of leafleting for John Ritchie, his Labour challenger (culminating in an insane 5am-10pm stint of campaigning on [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Brigid Jones's Diary | 6 Comments »

Last week’s dismal weather meant many people took Thursday as a welcome day off work. The returning officer in the Bede ward of Nuneaton and Bedworth Borough Council was not quite so generous to her staff, however, and I spent most of the afternoon and evening with a few other BULS diehards campaigning in the [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics | No Comments »

if the war has cost £5bn and Birmingham City Council cannot spend more than 8½ minutes discussing it, that values the time of our good councillors at £588 million a minute… it’s no wonder Brummies don’t think they’re getting value for money out of the council.

Filed under: Birmingham politics, International Politics, National Politics | 3 Comments »

Someone once said “there are three kinds of lie – lies, damned lies, and statistics,” and I considered this theme at some length in my last blog, highlighting the Tories selective use (or even simple complete creation) of crime figures. Now, although I don’t intend to use all of my articles on this blog to [...]

Filed under: Birmingham politics, Tories' Porkies | 2 Comments »