#blackpool council

[petnews2day]

American Bulldog seized by cops after terrorising neighbourhood's cats, dogs & owners

New Post has been published on https://petn.ws/794DF

American Bulldog seized by cops after terrorising neighbourhood's cats, dogs & owners

Watch more of our videos on Shots! and live on Freeview channel 276 Visit Shots! now Margaret Blanchard, 78, has been left ‘devastated’ after her only companion was brutally killed by a dog that was known to be aggressive around other animals. Beloved companion killed by ‘roaming’ bulldog The Whitley Avenue resident had spotted two school-aged […]

See full article at https://petn.ws/794DF #CatsNews #American, #Animals, #BlackpoolCouncil, #Cctv, #Neighbour8217S, #ParkinsonSDisease, #Police, #TheGazette, #XlBully

[tomorrowusa]

Labour picked up yet another seat from the Conservative Party in a by-election in the constituency of Blackpool South.

Labour has taken Blackpool South from the Conservatives as voters deserted the Tories in a resounding Westminster by-election victory. Chris Webb secured a 26.3% swing in the marginal Lancashire seat, easily wiping out the Tories' 2019 general election majority of 3,690 to win by 7,607. Conservative David Jones only beat Reform UK's Mark Butcher into second place by 117 votes. The by-election was triggered by former Tory MP Scott Benton's resignation.

By itself, flipping one seat doesn't put Labour in the driver's seat in London; but it's significant because of the margin and because it's part of a series of repeated recent Conservative by-election losses to Labour and to the Liberal Democrats.

But wait, there's more!

There were various local elections around England and a few in Wales which coincided with the by-election in Blackpool South.

107 local councils in England held elections and there were also contests for mayor and public safety officials in a number of localities.

Here are the areas which held council elections. Some councils held elections for all council members while others had elections for half or some other fraction of the councils. This map shows party control prior to the election.

While not nationwide, the council elections were spread over much of England.

In any case, the Conservatives lost control of 10 of the 16 councils they had controlled. Labour picked up 8 and the Lib Dems gained 2. The number of councils with no overall party control or control by minor local parties remained the same.

But council control stats don't tell the whole story.

The overall number of elected councilors showed the Conservatives falling into third place behind Labour and the Lib Dems. It also shows the Green Party making inroads even though they did not gain control of any councils.

A number of localities held elections for mayor.

In London, Labour's Sadiq Khan was elected to a third term.

In Manchester, Labour Mayor Andy Burnham was easily re-elected. His nickname among supporters up there is the King in the North. ⚔️

Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson provided some unintentional amusement on election day. He's responsible for enacting UK voter ID laws. He was not allowed to vote when he first showed up at the polling station because he had forgotten to bring his ID.

Boris Johnson barred from voting under his own voter ID rules

In summary from the BBC...

A general election must be held no later than late January. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak may look at the terrible results and decide that an early June election would not go well for his Conservatives. And because elections between mid June and the end of August tend to be unpleasant surprises for the governing party (Conservatives 1945) (Labour 1970), the UK would probably not see an election for parliament until at least mid-September. I'd bet a double espresso on October.

Even if Rishi waits until the very last possible day, things are unlikely to get any better for the Conservative Party. Electoral Calculus shows only two possible outcomes of a parliamentary election: 98% chance of a Labour majority and a 2% chance of a Labour plurality. Nobody is seriously talking about Conservatives being in charge after an election – regardless of timing.

BTW: Blame Salford for the delay in this post. They didn't announce their results until well into Sunday. Just couldn't post until all 107 councils had been decided.

[streetsofdublin]

BULL AND DROVER BY KEVIN HOLLAND

The Bull and Drover is a bronze sculpture by Kevin Holland, located on the gable end of Madden's Buildings in Blackpool, Cork, Ireland. The sculpture depicts a bull being led by a drover, and is a reminder of the cattle market that once operated on this s

AT MADDEN’S BUILDINGS ON WATERCOURSE ROAD IN CORK Madden’s Buildings consists of a number of single-storey redbrick buildings arranged in terraces, with each terrace having a gable end facing Watercourse Road at one end and or Great William O’Brien street at the other end. The Bull and Drover sculpture is located on the gable end of one of one of the terraces. The Bull and Drover is a bronze…

[totallyhussein-blog]

All out for the RNLI in Manchester on May 13th

It was great to take part in the recent AGM of the RNLI City of Manchester branch. The Royal National Lifeboat Institute are the charity which saves lives at sea and in 2022, the RNLI's lifeboats were launched 9,312 times, their crews saved 389 lives and RNLI lifeguards saved 117 people.

Here in Manchester, we have some exciting plans lined up to support these efforts and on May 13th, a city wide collection will be taking place. On this day, RNLI supporters will be on the streets of Manchester City Centre where you can donate or ask questions about the RNLI's lifesaving work across the UK.

I've been involved with the RNLI since 2016 and in this time, I've always loved taking part in these events. It's great to hear the experiences of RNLI crew members and it's also great to speak with members of the public and listen to their experiences with the RNLI. Everybody is welcome and if you'd like more information then please visit us at RNLI.org.

[ingek73]

…

About 150 people carrying St George’s Cross flags, shouting “you’re not English any more” and “paedo Muslims off our street”, were greatly outnumbered in Leeds by hundreds of counter-protesters shouting “Nazi scum off our streets”. Skirmishes broke out between demonstrators and punks – in town for a festival – in Blackpool, with bottles and chairs thrown.

In Bristol, police kept protesters and counter protesters apart before a group headed to a hotel used to house asylum seekers.

The need for urgent political intervention was stressed by the government’s independent adviser on political violence and disruption, Lord Walney, who told the Observer that new emergency powers may be needed. “The system isn’t set up to deal with this rolling rabble-rousing being fuelled by far-right actors,” he said.

“I think home office ministers may want to look urgently at a new emergency framework – perhaps temporary in nature – that enables police to use the full powers of arrest to prevent people gathering where there is clear intent to fuel violent disorder.”

Keir Starmer held a meeting of senior ministers on Saturday in which he said police had been given full support to tackle extremists who were attempting “to sow hate by intimidating communities”. He made clear that the right to freedom of expression and the violent scenes over recent days were “two very different things”.

Last week’s riots followed the killing of three young girls at a Taylor Swift-themed dance class in Southport on Monday. Axel Rudakubana, 17, from Lancashire, is accused of the attack, but false claims were spread online that the suspect was an asylum seeker who had arrived in the UK by boat. In the wake of these messages, far-right protesters – guided by social media – gathered in cities across the country.

A key factor in this spread of online disinformation involved Elon Musk’s decision to allow rightwing activists such as Tommy Robinson back onto his social media platform X, said Joe Mulhall, director of research at Hope not Hate, the anti-fascism organisation. “The initial disinformation and anger was being perpetrated by individuals on Twitter, for example, that have been previously deplatformed,” he said. “And now they’ve been replatformed.”

Robinson was permanently banned from the platform (then called Twitter) in March 2018, then reinstated in November last year, after Musk bought it. “We hadn’t seen any significant numbers at any demonstrations since 2018,” Mulhall added.

An example of the danger posed by the misuse of social media was revealed in Stoke-on-Trent, where police were forced to deny there had been a stabbing, countering claims made on social media. “There is growing speculation that a stabbing has taken place as a result of the disorder today. We can confirm this information is false and no stabbings have been reported to police or emergency responders, despite videos fuelling speculation on social media,” police said.

The danger of such intervention was stressed by Ben-Julian “BJ” Harrington, the National Police Chiefs Council lead for public order, who condemned social media disinformation as a cause of last week’s disorder.

He said: “We had reports today that two people had been stabbed by Muslims in Stoke – it’s just not true. There’s people out there, not even in this country, circulating and stoking up hatred, division and concerns in communities that they don’t care about, don’t know and don’t understand.”

[sourcreammachine]

ELECTION NIGHT ENGLAND 2024

composition of all councils circa 2023:

🌹Labour: 5609

🌳Tory: 5395

🕊️Liberal: 2804

🌻Green: 757

💩Reform: 10

🔥Liberal (1989): 5

🦋Transform: 4

💩SDP (1990): 2

Regionalists, RAs and Others: 1663

these numbers do not include changes over the past year or so – including a number of labour councillors who’ve left the party due to the centralist agenda and the leadership’s support for the genocide

TONIGHT’S ELECTIONS:

every mayor bar cambridgeshire and the “West of England”

every police commissioner

multiple district councils

london assembly

blackpool south byelection

borough mayor of salford

SEATS UP TONIGHT:

🌳Tory: 989

🌹Labour: 973

🕊️Liberal: 418

🌻Green: 107

Regionalists, RAs and Others: 172

ALLOUT ELECTIONS (all seats are to be elected, whole council can flip): Basildon, Brentwood, Bristol, Cannock Chase, Castle Point, Cheltenham, Dorset, Dudley, Epping Forest, Fareham, Gloucester, Harlow, Havant, North Herts, Maidstone, Nuneaton, Reddit, Rossendale, Rotherham, Stevenage, Stroud, Tandridge, Tunbridge Wells, North Tyne, Warrington, Wokingham, Worcester

PARTIAL / ROTATING ELECTIONS where enough seats are being contested to potentially flip the council, ignoring labour majority defences (bold/italic councils could only be changed to no overall control): Adur, Basingstoke, Bolton, Burnley, Cherwell, Colchester, Elmbridge, Hastings, Hart, Hyndburn, Norwich, Sheffield, Solihull, Stockport, Walsall, Hartlepool, Hull, Milton Keynes, Oxford, West Oxon, Pendle, Peterborough, Portsmouth, Rochford, Rugby, Southend, Tamworth, Thurrock, Welwyn Hatfield

[skeptiquewrites]

Microfic: Swings

for this @drarrymicrofic prompt

There's funfair in Blackpool and all the other parents are going. Harry hasn't shaken the feeling he's just pretending to be one of them, and that Teddy will turn around one day and recognize Harry is a poor substitute for Remus or Tonks or Andromeda.

He didn't expect Draco or Scorpius to join. He didn't expect the fast friendship between Teddy and Scorpius.

"Can we go on the ride alone?" Harry looks to Draco, and Draco nods once, leaving them standing together.

"I haven't seen you at the Parents Council before."

"Astoria was the one who..." Draco trails off awkwardly.

[scotianostra]

On December 1st 2010 an "unprecedented" snowfall and freeze brought Scotland to a standstill.

Across the country temperatures plunged the lowest being -16 in the Highlands and the Forth Road Bridge was closed to traffic for the first time in it's history. Several councils closed all their schools meaning a welcome day off for over 250,000 pupils across the country. The lowest minimum temperature was -21.3C at Altnaharra on December 2nd!

Glasgow and Dundee were among the areas to introduce blanket school closures as well as all state schools in Midlothian, West Lothian and East Lothian. East Coast train services were severely affected with no services going to or from Inverness or Aberdeen from Edinburgh, a reduced service between Glasgow and Edinburgh and services cancelled on the Larkhall-Hamilton to Glasgow line.

BP announced it was causing delays on deliveries from the Grangemouth terminal to its petrol stations across Scotland.

It wasn't all doom and gloom though, Cairngorm, Glenshee and the Lecht said they had lots of fresh snow, while the Nevis Range was due to open with its earlier start to a season for 13 years. Some people took advatage of Lochs freezing over including Lochwinnoch in Renfrewshire, and Lake of Menteith in the Trossachs.

A further heavy snowfall on December 6th added to the chaos, South Lanarkshire Council put up about 200 people on the Monday night in their banqueting hall, including a party of pensioners from Blackpool who had been travelling to Arrochar, two Yorkshire businessmen and an OAP in a hypothermic state who had walked from Coatbridge and had been found in Almada Street in Hamilton.

The period from 9 to 15 December saw milder and quieter conditions with a gradual thaw of lying snow. However, a second spell of severe weather began on Thursday 16 December as very cold Arctic air pushed down through the country and it remained bitterly cold until Boxing Day, with day time temperatures again failing to rise above freezing and very severe frosts. While there was little further snowfall, lying snow remained until 26 to 27 December.

Overall, the prolonged freezing conditions resulted in an exceptionally cold December resulting in: the coldest December in the last 100 years

By the New Year a thaw had begun, and there was no recurrence of the extreme conditions for the remainder of the winter. There was some snowfall in early January, and there was an anticyclonic spell at the end of the month that brought some cold, frosty days. February was above average in temperature and ended on a mild note, although the snow returned in much of Scotland during March.

[grandmaster-anne]

30 January 2023 HRH The Earl of Wessex visited Blackpool today meeting with local young people who are making a difference through The Duke of Edinburgh's Award (DofE). The Earl spent time with DofE participants from South Shore Academy who are volunteering at Thames Primary School, helping younger pupils with arts and crafts activities. He also visited The Oracle, where he met young people doing their DofE through voluntary and community groups supported by the council. The Earl also spoke with young people from Park Community Academy where the DofE is an integral part of school life. It’s fantastic to see so many young people in Blackpool developing their skills, resilience and self-belief through the DofE. A big thanks to the staff and DofE volunteers for supporting them with their amazing commitment and passion 👏 📸: Blackpool Council

[mikeo56]

I’ll go through the results party by party.

Conservatives

The Tories got smashed all over England. They lost control of 10 of the 16 councils they’d controlled before, dropped over 470 council seats, and lost 11 out of the 12 mayoral elections.

The one mayoral election they did win was quite incredible. Ben Houchen retained his position as mayor of Tees Valley despite his involvement in the incredibly dodgy Teesworks scandal. It’s hard to know what people there were thinking.

The Tories also kept 17 of their Police Commissioner positions across England, losing 10 to Labour.

The Tory results were awful, but not quite as bad as the predicted slaughter, and not bad enough for Tory MPs to depose Rishi Sunak and replace him with an emergency replacement leader for the looming General Election, which is actually the best possible result for people who despise the Tory party.

They’ve taken an electoral kicking, yet they’re sticking with their ludicrously out of touch and widely disliked lame duck leader who doesn’t stand a chance of winning the next general election.

Labour

The Labour Party capitalised on the Tory collapse, winning 185 extra council seats across England, taking control of 8 more councils, holding all of their mayoral positions, winning the three new mayoralties (North East, East Midlands, York + N. Yorks), and flipping the West Midlands mayoralty from Tory to Labour.

Labour also took Blackpool South from the Tories in a parliamentary by-election increasing their share of the vote by 20% while the Tory vote collapsed by 32%.

It would be misleading to paint these results as a poor show for Labour, but there are warning signs.

Keir Starmer told people on the left to "leave if you don’t like it" and that’s exactly what a lot of people have done. For every vote the Labour Party has picked up from the Tory implosion, they seem to have lost almost as many to the Green Party, independents, and minor parties.

Then there’s the brutal reality that Keir Starmer and Rachel Reeves are dead set on continuing Tory austerity ruination, meaning they’re implacably opposed to restoring local government funding.

Labour’s inexplicable austerity obsession renders the local election results fairly meaningless, because even though Labour have eight more councils under their control, all that really means is that the people imposing ruinous local cuts, overseeing declining services, and flogging off public assets to balance the books are changing the colour of their ties from blue to red.

[usearki]

35 councils in and it's not going well for the Tories.

GOOD.

ETA:

There was also a by-election in Blackpool South.

OOPS LOL.

[petnews2day]

cricket veteran, cat-lover and council leaders amongst Lancashire folk given a gong

New Post has been published on https://petn.ws/yXqId

cricket veteran, cat-lover and council leaders amongst Lancashire folk given a gong

Watch more of our videos on Shots! and live on Freeview channel 276 Visit Shots! now A Fylde cricket club stalwart, a volunteer for a first aid group and a woman dedicated to the protection of cats join two Lancashire council leaders in gaining recognition in this year’s King’s Birthday Honours List. While Alistair Bradley, who […]

See full article at https://petn.ws/yXqId #CatsNews #Blackpool, #Burnley, #Chorley, #Council, #Fylde, #Heysham, #HumanInterest, #Kirkham, #Lancashire, #Lancaster, #Leyland, #Mbe, #Morecambe, #News, #Politics, #Preston, #RibbleValley, #SouthRibble, #Warton, #WyreAndGarstang

[uomminecraftsociety]

2024 UK Local Elections

So every set of elections we have in the UK, I kind of go crazy, pull an all nighter just following the election results by filling my own spreadsheet. But you know what... I'll shitpost election results here.

THESE ARE NOT RESULTS AS OF YET, THESE ARE AS OF YET UNANNOUNCED

Also, none of what I say really matters, I'm not an analyst or anything, just a guy who follows elections too excitedly.

Now granted, I don't know how late I will be able to follow the election results for, especially with how long it will take the election results will take to come in. I also can't follow all the elections so here are the ones I will be following:

Police and Crime Commissioners

Conservatives won 29 of the commissioner positions in 2021.

Labour won 7 of the commissioner positions in 2021, 3 of which were in Wales

Plaid Cymru won 1 of the commissioner positions in 2021

These elections generally cover rural areas, hence why it is so Conservative. These are areas which Labour would like too see gains in if they are to win the next general election, as many are predicting them to.

Council Elections

There are many council elections occurring, too many to properly follow but here are the ones I will be following:

Dudley - Currently Conservative but only just, a good indication of how much of a swing will occur.

Bristol - The results for the constituencies within Bristol for the upcoming general election could be quite an interesting one as many parties have shown promising results in recent council elections, this could be a good indicator for where the city could go.

Peterborough - Currently Conservative, with a mix of support for other parties, a good measure on how strong strong the swing to other parties are.

North Hertfordshire - No overall control, with very close results in 2021 between Labour, Conservative and Lib Dems, similar to Peterborough, would be a good indication of where new support lies.

Local elections which likely would likely lead to a conservative minority or even a mild conservative

Gloucester - Conservatives have 26 of a required 20 seats, with Lib Dems next largest 16 seats behind.

Havant - Conservatives have 28 of a required 19 seats, with 24 more seats than 2nd place Labour.

Greater Manchester Council elections will of course be followed as well:

Bolton - Labour minority, many parties in opposition with strong presence from Reform which could see an increase of support with the current swing.

Bury - Labour Majority, with Conservative minority and a similarly large local interest party.

City of Manchester - Strong Labour majority.

City of Salford - Strong Labour majority.

Oldham - Light Labour majority, Labour did poorly in recent neighbouring Rochdale by-election

Rochdale - Labour Majority, aforementioned by election results were poor.

Stockport - Liberal Democrats the largest party in minority with Labour close behind

Tameside - Strong Labour majority

Trafford - Labour Majority

Wigan - Strong Labour Majority

Mayoral Elections

All of the mayoral elections will be followed, though most noteworthy are:

Tees Valley - Strong support for the incumbent Tory candidate.

West Midlands - Less strong Conservative presence but often reported that their image in the area is independent of the party.

East Midlands - New mayoral position, probably would have gone conservative in 2021 if it were to run, but not strong support.

North East - New mayoral position, mostly Labour support and would probably stay that way.

York and North Yorkshire - Historically strong Conservative support, probably will stick that way. Region has Rishi Sunak's seat.

London Assembly and Mayoral Elections

What it says on the tin. All 3 polls will be followed.

Blackpool South By-Election

Probably will go Labour's way considering it recently flipped to the Conservatives, historically was Labour and the Conservative running there left on a scandal. Though as always, interesting to see the election swing.

[ceevee5]

“The charity said that its figures were likely to be an underestimate as not all local authorities had replied to FoI requests, including large councils such as Birmingham, Blackpool, Ealing and Hackney.”

[blackpoolhistory]

The changing face of Talbot Square, makes you wonder if our council actually have a clue what to do with our town!

The wasteland of what was Yates's Wine Lodge stood for almost an entire decade before work started on the Premier Inn building that eventually took its place.

Today, we have a confusing & dangerous mess of pedestrianised areas, tram lines and an obscure layout of junctions to confuse visitors - all so we can have 1 additional tram stop opposite the train station.

The town centre has been ravaged for over a decade to make this a reality, yet we are still without a bus station.

A truly shambolic display of complete incompetence, well done Blackpool Borough Council.

[visualpoett]

''However many years anyone may live, let them enjoy them all; yet let him remember the days of darkness; for they shall be many. All that cometh is obscure, and just illusion.'' —saith Qôheleth, Son of David, King in Jerusalem"

Psychic Palm Reading, Sideshow placard. Blackpool, Lancanshire ~ 2005 British Council. London