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The Sir Oliver Dowden sketchy behaviour monitor, part three
A pay rise for MPs – and a really big one for Sir Oliver Dowden How much money is it appropriate for an MP to earn while he continues to sit in the House of Commons? How much of his time can he reasonably devote to outside work? Does it matter that this MP is…
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Hertfordshire County Council elections – the voting
What just happened? Well, having said in the previous post that there can’t possibly be anything more boring than a county council election we are ready to revise our position – just a little. In that post we said: “…a swing to Reform large enough to displace the Tories in Hertfordshire would be a real…
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Hertfordshire County Council elections – preview
Honestly, is there anything more boring? We’re struggling to think of anything. County Council elections have none of the obvious glamour of the national contest, the stakes are lower and – let’s face it – nobody knows what they do (quick, make a list of five things that your county council is responsible for! No…
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The Sir Oliver Dowden sketchy behaviour monitor, part two
In which we ask what happens to an MP’s priorities when three quarters of his income comes from his second (and third) jobs? UPDATE: 20 April 2025: Sir Oliver’s new favourite football team San Diego FC got absolutely clattered 3-0 at Charlotte, finishing with ten men after some VAR drama. And it was a very…
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DC01UK: data centre drama
It’s a few months since we learnt that Europe’s biggest data centre might be built here in Hertsmere – what could stop it from happening? In part three of our DC01UK deep dive we’ll look at the various obstacles that must be overcome before it goes live on the Internet in 2030 (some updated information…
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DC01UK: Hertsmere steps into history
Well, possibly. Data centres are the cotton mills and steel foundries of our day. Vast, industrial-scale facilities that are right at the heart of the fourth industrial revolution. And one might be built right here, next to the motorway in South Mimms. We’ll admit to a certain childish excitement about this. Mysterious developers want to…
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First mover
There might be a by-election in Hertsmere in the new year. Reform UK is the first to have noticed Boom. First out the gate. Reform UK is distributing leaflets in Hertsmere in anticipation of a by-election in the new year. Candidate Darren Selkus’s letter to electors says: If the rumours prove true and Oliver Dowden…
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The Sir Oliver Dowden sketchy behaviour monitor, part one
When we started blogging about Radlett, in the very distant past, Oliver Dowden wasn’t even a thing yet. He’d recently returned to the Tory Party HQ from a period at a vast, global PR company. And it wasn’t just any PR company. It was one of those vampiric outfits that would rather do the dirty,…
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Dowden election date betting scandal interview situation
We really should have put some money on this. As we said in our last post, the keeping-an-eye-on-Sir-Oliver-Dowden business has really fallen off a cliff since the election. We’re not complaining. It was bound to happen. And, to be honest, we weren’t expecting him to do anything worth keeping an eye on until after the…