Southport Model Railway Exhibition 2015

This is always a good show that is well worth a visit. This year it was held over the weekend of the 7th/8th November at Greenbank High School.

I ran into my old friend Geoff Payne who was running the West Lancashire Light Railway stand. Geoff is an Aintree Village Parish Councillor of long standing. It was nice to catch up with him especially as I not previously realised that he was a fellow railway enthusiast.

I also spied my old chum Roger Bell running the OPSTA stall. Roger is a also a Labour member of West Lancs Borough Council and was deep in conversation with someone (Roger is a big talker!). I thought I would have a chin wag with him later, trouble is he must have seen me as I could not find him on my second circuit! Only kidding Roger.

Here are 3 photos I took at the exhibition:-

A typical American steam era scene in HO scale.

A typical American steam era scene in HO scale.

A beautiful Darjeeling live steam loco on 32mm track.

A beautiful Darjeeling live steam loco on 32mm track.

In steam - a delightful representation of a British narrow gauge train also on 32mm track.

In steam – a delightful representation of a British narrow gauge train also on 32mm track.

Media bias – You have to fight it or live with it as a Liberal

Media bias against Liberals has gone on for generations especially in the press; national certainly and locally too at times. The days of newspapers holding a Liberal line are long gone and it probably comes down to fact that journalists bringing their own political prejudices to the table as well as having to carry those of the paper’s owner. By the way I am not wishing to see a paper biased towards Liberal views as that would be replacing one prejudice with another; what I want to see is balanced reporting.

But then there’s the BBC, yes the BBC, because it seems to be at it too. On Friday 16th January Radio 4’s Any Questions is being broadcast from Greenbank High School in Southport and I have discovered that the programme has TWO well-known Tories and NO Lib Dem appearing.

My colleague and Southport Cllr. Tony Dawson says “This would be bad enough anywhere but in a town where 50 per cent voted Lib Dem at general election and 16 out of 21 councillors are Lib Dem it’s pathetic.”

For the record the advertised Tories are Anna Soubrey, Defence Minister and “Liverpool based textiles businessman Tony Caldeira.” who just happens to have been the Tory candidate in the Liverpool Mayor election.

You can bet that the BBC is getting complaints about this carry on!