Wednesday, December 31, 2014

Review of 2014

You just never know what opportunities life is going to throw in your way. That was my biggest take from a year of massive highs and lows.

The sad stuff first. We lost Hazel. Too soon and too painful, but forever loved. And Geoff Unsworth and Teresa Hawksworth, both so kind and warm and a cruel loss. Ian Hawksworth's eulogy to his wife, and the mother of his children, was as powerful and loving as anything I've ever heard.

Our debate forum Discuss has had a storming year - we're really thrilled with the progress we made - doing podcasts and putting on first rate debates - the real high points were our religion ding dong with Polly Toynbee and Bishop David Walker and the fracking fracas with Kevin Anderson and Bez.

My involvement in Discuss has really energised my involvement in popular debate and politics. I've seen some fantastic debates - Juergen Maier on Europe was outstanding, Tom Cannon on Football was pure poetry, but it was also contributions from people with a strong personal viewpoint who weren't academics or professional politician - guys like Steven Lindsay, Graeme Hawley and Tracey Smith, and then there was Bez, the longest ten minutes of my life from the moment I said: Ladies and gentleman, here's our first speaker... To be fair, he was on the winning side!

Saw some inspiring and thought provoking talks - the Blue Labour conference in Nottingham was probably the event with the deepest and widest range of provocations my friend Michael Merrick on education and Greenpeace's Ruth Davis on Nature, Science and the Common Good.

The best speech I wasn't at, but listened to on the RSA podcast, was Jon Cruddas's lecture on Radical Hope.

I long ago gave up on the main hall at Labour conference providing any of that, but the fringe had some real highlights - Liz Kendall on the personalisation of public services and Maurice Glasman on community organising - "the time it takes an activist to interrupt someone who is talking about something important to them - 8 seconds. The time that a stubborn interruption could be useful - 30 seconds." Personally, I think you can read some situations where even longer works. Listening always works.

Writing - got into the final of Pulp Idol - a first time writers competition. Making good progress on my debut novel getting published in 2015.

Work wise - I've really enjoyed being part of the Manchester conversation with Downtown - sitting at the table for some of the vital policy conversations that are contributing to the growth of Britain's best city, just as devolution rises up the agenda, providing a positive and progressive contacts and a context for the best business network in the North.

The work for Seneca, Liberty and the Tomorrow's Practice project for the ICAEW has been a real privilege, working alongside fantastically clever people creating businesses that are thinking hard and evolving in a challenging world.

Finally, I was selected to be Labour's parliamentary candidate for Hazel Grove for 2015. As described in the Stockport Express, Prolific North and the Business Desk, it is a big new step. But more than anything this represents a privilege and an honour, it is an opportunity to build a new covenant and a new way of doing community politics in this constituency.

Tuesday, December 23, 2014

Lunch at Pellicci on Bethnal Green Road

I love London cafes. They're a disappearing facet of a city that is changing before our very eyes. Some of our old favourites from when I lived down there seem to have gone, like Alfredo's on Essex Road. Today my bessie mate John Dixon took me on a stroll to one I'd not been to before - E Pellicci in Bethnal Green Road, just around the corner from where the Kray twins stalked their manor from their home on Vallance Road.

Yes, my escalope was tasty. John's egg and chips were spot on too, but it wasn't just about the food. What made it so special was a slice of London life - it was rammed, so you just pile in and share a table, pairing up with a smart metropolitan couple and then we were joined by an 88 year old Eastender and her daughter. We talked about food, change, life and salt levels in white bread.

The staff worked the place hard, they kept checking you were alright, it was busy and noisy and full of love. They got everyone singing happy birthday for a regular punter, it was warm, funny and cosy. John got given a cake as it was his birthday too.

In a moment of drama I dropped my glasses down the side of our table, then realised I didn't have my phone either (I'd left it at John's office, it turned out). The staff turned the place upside down looking for it, offering to locate it, even as the place was filling up to the brim. So no selfie, no picture, so I'm trying hard to throw as much of the colour of the place as I can - wood panel walls, a tiled bar, chrome exteriors. But its character and colour was a mood, a feeling and a wonderful authenticity.

Queuing up as we were leaving was the Young Soul Rebel himself, Kevin Rowland, just thought I'd mention it.

Next time I'm in visiting my friends at Intuit UK in Victoria I think a trip to the Regency Cafe is in order.

Saturday, December 20, 2014

Three generations of first born Taylors at the Rovers

We had a lovely day at the football today in a place that holds so many memories. That the opponents were Charlton Athletic had a certain resonance. Me and my Dad saw Rovers beat them at Wembley in 1986 on a day I'll always cherish.

My Dad also told me a story of how he saw his first ever first division match between Blackpool and  Charlton with his Grandfather in the late 1950s.

Me and Joe remembered the 2007 end of season game which relegated Charlton thanks to some flukey goals. A day when all of the fans united in a minute's applause for Alan Ball who had died earlier that week. It was the first time it had ever been done and felt right.

The game today was a good three points, some good chasing in midfield - a couple of goals from Jordan Rhodes, who proved why it's going to be hard to hold on to him in the transfer window, especially with the financial fair play rules meaning Rovers are banned from transferring players in.

But all these football issues are just a backdrop to the real meaning of these days. Time, doing things we enjoy, with the people we love. Here's to many more happy days and family memories.

Wednesday, December 03, 2014

Proud to be selected as Labour's parliamentary candidate in Hazel Grove

Tonight I am extremely proud to have been selected as the Labour candidate to fight the Hazel Grove parliamentary seat at the next General Election.

We have 5 months to persuade voters to break their habit of voting Liberal Democrat and thinking it will somehow get them anything other than a Tory government.

With typical brass neck the Lib Dems will be campaigning against their own record in Government. They will peddle that line that annoys me so much – that “Labour can’t win here”.

Those mathematically inaccurate graphs aimed at voter suppression. Urging our people to stay at home. How patronizing. How anti-democratic.

The Conservatives today have shown as a sham their record on economic competence – the deficit is still there and the national debt is rising. As I said on the BBC ONE O CLOCK NEWS today the Labour leadership in Northern cities like Manchester have led the way in developing the momentum the Tories are claiming credit for.

George Osborne kicked the can along the road today on business rates. Offering a review instead of reform, something that will do nothing for our hollowed out district centres that are kept alive by enterprise and ingenuity, but deserve the fair rating system that Labour propose.

Yet, they will tell the large numbers of self-employed and small business owners in this constituency that they’re on their side. I run my own business. My Dad is self-employed. Until recently he even had a white van. All the good companies I’m involved in now share the ethos of fairness, courage and supporting their staff. And as a business journalist for 20 years, I know what GOOD business is all about: inclusive, hard working and enterprising. They are my values and they are Labour values.

Ours is a vision for everyone having a fair chance, a good start in life and a country built on the efforts and endeavours of working people having a stake in its success.

Proud of our achievements in government – humble in our determination in opposition to fight for our people to re-earn their trust so they will turn out for us so our party can govern again with the message of radical hope we offered in 1945, 1964 and 1997.

 I’m going to be an energetic candidate on the doorsteps, in hustings, at events, public meetings, debates, on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. Wherever the people are.

 But my biggest asset will be the wonderful people of this community who I will work hard to campaign for and with.

Saturday, November 29, 2014

The scandal of Bredbury Hall and the bad banks

I wish I had a pound for every time I've been asked if I miss being a frontline business journalist. I don't, but I recalled the best of times this week when I watched BBC Panorama on Monday night about how Lloyds Bank treated Bredbury Hall Hotel (left). There was also a terrific investigative story on The Business Desk by James Graham.

On Panorama the BBC's Andy Verity and James have dug into what Lloyds inflicted on Bredbury Hall, once one of their former prized clients, featured in a promotional video. First the owners had the squeeze put on them, then their debt was packaged and sold off to a distressed fund.

One of my clients now is Seneca, a business that works hard to unravel the problems of the past in order to help businesses seize the opportunities of the future. That means helping companies who have been sold complex products by banks - often called 'swaps' - and acting for them on redress and assisting them to get back to health. Tim Murphy of Seneca has argued in front of a Treasury Select Committee that this behaviour by banks requires a completely new approach to redress for how the vast bulk of Britain's business can tackle such abuse by their banks.

"Businesses need an ombudsman with teeth, at present only microbusinesses (less than 10 employees and with sales under Euro 2 million) can apply to the Financial Ombudsman Service. Apart from the courts and the banks’ own internal complaints departments there is nowhere for other businesses to go," Tim says in a paper we're releasing next week.

For all his rhetoric Liberal Democrat Business Secretary Vince Cable has been weak on the banks. It's been left to the media and a few campaigning lawyers I've worked with like Alison Loveday at Berg and business organisations like Downtown. Some politicians have acted vigorously on behalf of the constituents - Jack Straw being one - but it's been driven home this week that the media has a positive and important role to play.

Yes, it reminds me of the importance of the media in campaigning. But I wonder if Bredbury Hall could have been better served by their local politicians too.

Sunday, November 23, 2014

The beating of Leeds, reconnecting club and fans again

When Blackburn Rovers fans of a certain age are gathered together, nostalgia bursts to the fore. So it was when I did an event at Ewood Park with Graham Jones, the MP for Haslingden and Hyndburn (pictured above with a Jack Walker portrait).

Even though our early memories are of Second and Third Division football, the high watermark for football, entertainment, emotion and atmosphere was in the mid-1990s. Foremost amongst those memories was a 1-1 draw with Leeds in the title winning season. It had incidents aplenty and was a powerful statement of intent that this was a team ready to fight even when down to 10 men. I think it was the best performance I ever saw from Alan Shearer and there were plenty to choose from.

So there we were on Saturday with a full away end and Rovers riding high. I don't think I have ever enjoyed an undeserved win as much in years. It felt like it should do at Ewood Park. The players responded to a plea for a fightback, something that's been lacking. It felt like there was a connection between players and supporters again.

That's what has been missing. Football is such an important part of everyday life and the clubs are a centre of the community. But as I've banged on about before, there's a danger it's disappearing up its own greedy orifice.

Fair play to Graham Jones then for the tremendous work he's done in seeking the truth about the ownership issues at Rovers and for supporting the Labour policy on football involvement in clubs.

A summary, from Graham:
The plan, which has been drawn up in consultation with 95 football supporters’ organisations, and which are fully in accordance with European competition and procurement law, would require supporters to come together to form a single accredited trust in return for the right to:
appoint and remove up to a quarter and not less than two of a football club’s board of directors; purchase up to 10 per cent of the shares when a club changes ownership, if they so wish.  
Supporters made clear during the consultation that this is the only way to ensure those running clubs share information, power and responsibility with them. Labour's proposals mean fans could hold the owners of their club to account on all issues on and off the field including ticket prices, shirt sponsorship, ground naming rights, and changing the colour of the strip or the name. I am sure Newcastle United and Cardiff City fans will be very interested in these aspects of the proposal.
At Ewood I have detected a desire on the part of the management to rebuild what has been destroyed over the last few years. The future of the club will only be meaningful and successful if a new covenant with the fans is created.

Saturday, November 08, 2014

Rose Hill Station - a great place to walk from too

I was delighted to be asked to get involved in the Friends of Rose Hill Station, our local station. David Sumner (pictured left), who chairs the group, has worked wonders with the other volunteers in creating a delightful ambience around our small and perfectly formed terminus. 

At the end of October we launched a guide to walks around the Marple area that are all accessible from Rose Hill. The idea is to work with Northern Rail to increase passenger numbers and usage of the station, but at the same time campaign for a weekend service and a far better frequency of trains in the evenings.

We were delighted with the launch and thrilled with the support we received from the Marple Ramblers. It's certainly one of the aspects of living around here that many people enjoy.

The leaflet is now available in the station at the booking office and in the library at the waiting room, as well as around Piccadilly Station and local tourist information centres around Manchester and the wider area.

There is a serious campaigning edge to the work of the Friends too and we've had some extremely productive and frank discussions with Northern Rail. Most recently, a squad of volunteers have been monitoring passenger numbers.

Anyway, do visit the station and get in touch if you'd like a guide.

Sunday, October 26, 2014

Running the line at the Brabynabau - Marple Ath v Rose Hill Rovers

It was the Young Firm clash today, the SK6 Classico, Marple Athletic v Rose Hill Rovers at Brabyns Park. A gorgeous autumn morning for the two local Under 16 sides to play each other in front of a crowd of over 50 assorted mates, parents and grandparents. 

It was a cracking game too. It ended 2-2 and all four goals were belters.

Fair result? I'd say so. But given the injuries Marple were carrying (including to the regular keeper), the return fixture (also at Brabyns in February) will be another shot at local bragging rights.

As linesman I didn't have any tough calls to make, but I will say this as diplomatically as I can - I wouldn't fancy stepping to being a referee any time soon.

Jeanette Winterson's Foundation Lecture at the University of Manchester: From Gradgrind to Graphene



I am amazed that writer Jeanette Winterson's Foundation Day Lecture at the University of Manchester hasn't been more widely reported. It was a powerful tour of the University's radical progressive traditions - from Gradgrind to Graphene - and at times an angry call to arms to resist austerity and the forces of conservatism.

It was also a eulogy to the intellectual traditions of the city that didn't mention football or any of that music that so many pretended to like in the 90s. Maybe that's why it merited so little coverage.

As soon as there's a link to a transcript, or a more detailed report, I'll add it. In the meantime above is a delightful video which introduced her lecture. Featuring a range of voices from Brian Cox to Michael Wood and Shami Chakrabarti and touches on some of the ideas and ambitions of this fine institution.

It was another reminder of how fortunate I was to have had the opportunity to attend the University in the 1980s when I got a grant to do so. It was a transformative period of my life and it's why I am so proud to give a little back by serving as a member of the Alumni Board and sitting on the General Assembly.

Sunday, October 19, 2014

My mate #21 - Tom Bloxham

It's been a while since I updated the "my mate" series. It's not because I've run out of mates or anything, but more a symptom of slower blog activity to be honest. Last Wednesday I was at the University of Manchester Alumni Dinner at the Town Hall, where the guest speaker was Tom Bloxham, the Chancellor of the University and the chairman and founder of property company Urban Splash. 

We had a chat afterwards, as we often do on such occasions, and he reminded me of the times we've shared together over the years - the acquisition of my favourite hotel - The Midland in Morecambe - by Urban Splash, his innovative property business and how he used some of my articles about it in the exhibition before the launch;  how consistently supportive he was in my time as editor of Insider, speaking at events - always superbly; but socially too we've had some enjoyable times together - his wife Jo's joyful 40th at their house in Worsley and a terrific Christmas lunch with some of our other mutual friends like Ian Currie. Tom also invited me to join him at Old Trafford for United's annual drubbing of Blackburn Rovers, I declined, that being the time we won against the odds of course.

We're from the same neck of the woods politically - the pro-entrepreneur arm of Labour - and he's most recently been a contributor to the Labour Party's review of housing under Michael Lyons.

But I also recall a University General Assembly meeting during my lengthy and painful 12-month notice period as I was exiting Insider. I asked a question about what the University was doing to leverage its academic base to connect better with the intellectually curious in the city. A good answer would have been to list a number of public lectures and open days. Tom's answer was brilliant, he leant forward and asked me, "what have you got in mind, Michael?"

That encouragement was the first step on the road to developing what is now DISCUSS and I've never forgotten his support. Indeed, our motivation is part of the same civic pride to make our adopted city better than we found it, in line with his own well-used anecdote about the Ephebic oath of the ancient Athenians.

I always enjoy Tom's company and seeing him at the dinner last week reminded me of the friendship we've developed and how fond I am of him. I'll say this as well, he'll be a hard act to follow as Chancellor.

Saturday, October 11, 2014

Whatever happened to the aspirant northern Tories?

The rise of UKIP and the dent they have made in the Labour vote in Heywood and Middleton seems to have shocked a lot of Labour people. Not me.

I grew up in the north, but it was in a Tory area and not even a posh one. For me Tory was normal and “common sense”. This wasn’t the North of Ken Loach and David Peace, where you wore your yellow Cole Not Dole sticker with pride. Where the Labour votes were weighed rather than counted. This was the City of Lancaster, where our MPs were Elaine Kellett-Bowman and Mark Lennox-Boyd.

I wasn’t born into Labourism or a Trade Union tradition. My Dad was a self-employed milkman and my Mum a nurse. Political debate around our dinner table was about what an idiot Arthur Scargill was and why surrendering nuclear weapons would be akin to inviting the Red Army to invade our shores.

It was where standing for socialism in 1983 made you out to be a bit of a nutter, frankly. I used to work with my Dad on his milk round, knocking on doors every Friday night to collect the money. The reaction to my political badges then told me everything I needed to know about how out of touch Labour had become.

I remember stumbling upon a disco in the church hall in the city centre one Friday evening. In there were all the sporty lads from our school, the rugby team and the quiet lads who did well in their exams. Their equivalents from the Girls Grammar School were there too. Attractive girls with a bit about them, who you’d never see at the punk gigs we went to, or the CND meetings at the Trades and Labour club. No, this was the Lancaster Young Conservatives. One of my mates did some childish graffiti in the toilets, we insulted a few people and left. But what bothered me more than anything was that this lot weren’t meant to be having a good time, Tories were anti-fun.

Even when I took to knocking around with the lads I knew through football few of them had much positive to say about the divisive issues that faced the working class. They were for patriotism, working hard, getting off your backside and wishing they could get a £20,000 pay off from a job down a pit like Scargill and his mob.

I mention all of this because there seems to have been a selective memory loss about what the North was like during the 80s. It wasn’t a sea of rebellion and insurrection against Thatcher. Many people quite liked her. Many people started their own businesses – often in the teeth of a workplace culture of sloth, petty theft and entitlement. I remember one lad I knew describing one of his mates thus – “a typical Labourite – you know, going off sick and always bloody complaining.”

When I went to University it was the aspirant working class kids from the Home Counties that were politically apathetic around University but were sufficiently attracted to the surge in Thatcherite capitalism that they ended up working for Goldman Sachs, Deutsche Bank and Merrill Lynch, or became feisty entrepreneurs.

They may have also been imbued with a loathing of racism, a sense of fairness, but they were the people who quietly voted Tory in 1992. But where has that layer in society gone now?

I keep a close eye on what Ged Mirfin has to say on this and many other matters. A northern Tory and a councillor in Lancashire who has some keen observations to make on all of this: “Political affiliation has become less about aspirant lifestyles, and more about the maintenance of living standards.”

It's why I don't quite buy the line that Mondeo Man is voting UKIP, as Rod Liddle has, it's more nuanced than that. 

As John McTernan says here, in Heywood and Middleton. Labour seem to have fought the campaign on the single issue of the NHS. This is at a time when people all over the North want to hear something new and someone addressing their concerns over living standards and immigration in the way that Simon Danzcuk seems to do in Rochdale. 

The demography of Britain is changing. The last couple of years has seen record levels of new company formations and new businesses. According to Start-Up Britain 500,000 new businesses were started in 2013. That enormous figure may mask a multitude of different stories – it includes one-man bands, sole traders, kitchen table eBay traders, white van men, shell companies as well as a fully fledged companies with dreams of world domination. Lumping them all together as “entrepreneurs” is dangerous, but they do have that shared hope that screams to be supported, not held back.

George Osborne is hoping these people will also become Tories. But Labour have as much a claim to this as the Conservative Party. Small Business Saturday,  imported from the US, was modestly successful and was well championed by Chuka Umunna.

Aspiration is one of those words that gets too easily reduced to a slogan. But it used to be what people associated with Conservatism. I see much to be optimistic about in the North, I meet energetic and creative people everyday. Politics doesn’t often come into it, but what we have seen in less than a generation is the collapse of the Conservative Party as any kind of organising force in the urban North and the complete disconnect from any claim to be the party of Northern aspiration.


Saturday, September 20, 2014

Scotland the brave

I've done two blogs on the Scottish referendum result and the aftermath. One is more normal Downtown Friday blog, which is here. A flavour:
There has been an awful lot of hyperbole amongst think tankers and pundits about the triumphs of the Manchester experiment. But it would be wholly wrong to equate this with any kind of awakening of a civic mood for independence.
 But if we think the Tartan Spring is on its way to Manchester we have a lot of waking up to do. There are wards in Greater Manchester with voter turnout at miniscule levels. So small as to actually undermine the democratic mandate.
 There is an argument that because local government has become about bin collections and cuts to services that there is nothing to vote for. The aspiration has to be to correct that through real power, proper engagement and meaningful change.
Then I was guest commentator on Prolific North, the media news website. Where I picked up on the theme about political engagement and the role the media can play. A taster:

And the media has a role to play. What kind of North do we want? Do we have respect for the institutions of power, those that seek election and those that make the hard decisions, are do we turn over and yawn. Will all of the efforts to create a new constitutional settlement for how our cities can be run better be reduced to a newspaper poll about whether Marco Pierre White could be Mayor of Leeds or Shaun Ryder in Manchester.
Scotland has had a generational opportunity and is hopefully now working out how it can work effectively as part of the United Kingdom. That conversation has started here too. It mustn't get obsessed with structures, but it still desperately needs something to connect to people about what the new politics will be like.

And as if by magic, our next DISCUSS debate on the 8th of October will be on the race to give power to the cities. 

Eventbrite - English devolution. More power to the cities.

Saturday, August 30, 2014

Mental strength and football

Quick one. Went to Manchester City v Stoke City today and was reminded of why I so fondly remember Mark Hughes' time as Rovers manager. They mugged a 1-0 win with a goal from Diouf which he scored too few of for us, but the resolute defending took me back to the Samba, Nelsen pairing at their "never say Dai" best under the Welsh management team of Hughes, Bowen and Niedweski.
Stoke parked the bus, for sure, but they had more clear shots on goal over the game than Man City who tried to play it through the middle via Toure and Silva when that clearly wasn't working.
I also noticed that Gary Bowyer today has said Rovers need to toughen up defensively. Go and watch how Stoke set up and have a plan Gary. Surely there's a Sparky manual left around in the dressing room somewhere.

Douglas Carswell and the end of politics


I was shocked and taken aback by the defection of Douglas Carswell MP to UKIP. This isn’t some swivel-eyed loon from the back benches trying to shore up his declining local popularity. 

I have watched him with interest and he is a serious thinker about how to modernise politics and how technology is forging an entirely new relationship between the individual and the state. Though he was never a mainstream Tory, his departure into the UKIP fold is a massive shock to the Conservative central nervous system and, I hate to say it, a huge lift for the credibility of UKIP.

I think the major parties need outriders and mavericks. Good constituency MPs who don’t toe the party line, energise local campaigning and reflect the broad coalitions of position and philosophy that makes up our otherwise dreary party system.

It's a bigger jolt to the Tories than it is to Labour, obviously. It exposes the position on the referendum  for what it is, a patronising sop to the Eurosceptics, thinking it will shut them up just kicking the can along the road.

But for Labour it helps because it paints the emergent threat as a Tory problem. Suddenly the second most prominent UKIP member is a libertarian thinker who wants to reduce the state. Not sure how that will play down in target seats like Rotherham, where Labour is rightly vulnerable for the unforgivable sins of the past and in other parts of the North where "they're all the same" is a frequent complaint.

His book The End of Politics and the birth of iDemocracy is a terrific handbook for anyone who wants to understand how society and politics are changing. It now gives UKIP something I've never really thought they had - ideas.

Netwalking, not working and a fantastic day

I have a sore knee, aching feet and a warm glow. Yesterday was the culmination of an idea I first had two years ago. To take a party of people into the Peaks for a day out. Anyone who knows me well will understand that the logistics and delivery of something like this is beyond me, but the core idea - the simplicity of netwalking - was something that got me excited.

Enter stage left then my good pal Michael Di Paola, a branding genius, a bundle of energy, with a personal magnetism and a following gained from his status as Man of the Year. Michael made sure we had the full turn out we needed - and a good mix of people who made the day so special.

As with all good plans, they adapt and we were blessed to have Thom Hetherington, the one man Glossop tourist board, who offered to guide us on a route described as Bleaklow from Old Glossop.

It was a physical challenge - at my age walking 9 miles to anywhere will be - but the initial steady 2 mile climb was gruelling and a shock to the system. The wind on the next leg was bracing and invigorating and a relief it wasn't colder. The yomp across the peat moors to the summit, and then to the site of a crashed American WW2 plane was a test of your balance. But mostly it was just a matter of keeping your footing and spending time with the rest of the party. That's what these days are about - not passing out business cards and schmoozing, but getting to know people a little better, seeing ways you can help one another, working people out and being amazed by what they do and what they know.

The rain started five minutes after we landed at the Wheatsheaf pub in Old Glossop. A sure blessing, but a fine piece of luck on a day when a plan really came together.

There are more pics on my Facebook, Chris Marsh took some crackers and on the Twitter hashtag #netwalking.

The business club with altitude.

Sunday, August 24, 2014

I accept the Ice Bucket Challenge



Accepting the ice bucket challenge and will be donating to Macmillan Nurses in memory of our much loved friend Martin McDermott.

I nominated Gareth Burton, Father Edmund Montgomery and Graham Jones MP.