More4 News Blog

Britain's Parking Fines on Google Earth

We've been messing around with Google Earth, trying to make our latest scoop about parking tickets look a bit more visually exciting.

Local authorities are raising huge sums of money from parking fines - some have generated more than £1m of fines from a single street. Extraordinary. Outrageous. But not much to look at.

Google Earth is a great way to make this kind of geographical info more attractive to surf through. It's already used quite a lot on telly - a quick swoop above Iraq on Google Earth is much cheaper than hiring a helicopter and heading out to the Middle East.

But it's also an easy way to make an interactive map. We produce a little file with all the co-ordinates in it, and anyone with Google Earth an upload it.

So we've produced a Google Earth 'layer' with all the parking ticket hotspot on it, shown as little red cars. Have a look here to download the instructions on how to do view it.

Or if you're already a Google Earth expert, download the .kmz file from here.

Tory tax plans: the bloggers' view

Tory tax plans have got the blogosphere in a lather. But not all Tory bloggers are after cuts...

"CONSERVATIVES "SAY SOMETHING SENSIBLE" SHOCK SENSATION! ******ALERT ALERT ALERT****** Rejoice. The Conservative Party has FINALLY said something quite sensible."

That was the verdict on the right-wing A Tangled Web blog. But for many bloggers of a Conservative persuasion, tax cuts are anything from electoral good sense to religious obligation.

No sweat

Well, thanks a bunch, Le Iene. The Hyenas. Ha bloody ha (writes Mick Hodgkin)

That's the Italian TV programme that carried out a cunning sting operation on 50 MPs. A camera crew pitched up outside parliament, and under cover of pretending to solicit their views on the budget, the producer wiped the sweat from their brows for the camera. Said perspiration was then taken away and tested for drugs, and - surprise surprise - 12 of them had smoked cannabis in the last 36 hours and four had taken coke.

Italian regulators have pulled the show - but spare a thought for TV producers the world over. For us, the damage has been done. Studio lights are hot, guests get sweaty and it doesn't look very attractive. But what MP's going to let us mop his or her forehead now?

Cameron on Toynbee

David Cameron today at his party's conference quoted an article he had read, giving the example of the ludicrous way the NHS is managed in his eyes.  Hard to say for sure, but the most likely contender for the article he had read ran as follows: a "public health director for the south-west region (who) has held the same job since 1994, but has had to reapply for it seven times since then, due to reorganisations".

The author was that old liberal die-hard Polly Toynbee.  Wonder how she feels about being paraphrased by the Tories.

A 'Perfect Day' for Cameron?

David Cameron takes to the stage today for the second time, to tell us about the shape of Tomorrow's Party. The rumour is that he may even Take a Walk on the Wild Side unveil some policies.

If there are any facts in this speech, we'll be checking them out on our FactCheck website. In the meantime, while we're Waiting for our Man to speak, why not have a look at some more satirical photoshopping from the man behind this Lou Reed pastiche, Beau Bo D'Or?

That Thatcher soundbite

When George Osbourne evoked the words of Margaret Thatcher during his party conference speech yesterday, it was full marks to his researchers.

While it would have been much easier to find a Thatcher soundbite extolling the virtues of 'rolling back the frontiers of the state', Osbourne quoted the former Conservative prime minister in much more cautious mood. "I am not prepared ever to go on with tax reductions if it meant unsound finance," the shadow chancellor quoted her as saying.

But where does the quote come from? And in what context? Click here to find out.

The Church of the Latter Day Tories

Up on a hill above Bournemouth, there's an old church full full of eager young workers taking a few hours out of the Tory Party conference to turn it into a leisure centre.

A train of shadow cabinet ministers has been making its way up the hill to watch them sawing, beavering and drilling away - and a widescreen TV is helpfully placed there to help them keep up with the 24-hour news cycle.

Of course, the plan is to show how caring and sharing the erstwhile 'nasty party' now is; and to illustrate the right-wing idea that volunteering and charity can do a better job of looking after the needy than the welfare/nanny state. But there are layers upon layers of symbolism up there.

A deconsacrated church suggests how far the party's high command has changed since the days when Margaret Thatcher used to quote St Francis of Assisi. Would she ever have been seen actively dismantling a church?

And ironically, St. Mary's fell out of use ten years ago... more or less the time when a certain party fell out of government.

Welcome to Conservatives 2.0

Silly title aside, the Tories' new 'Webcameron' website is a clever step forward in the world of video webcampaigning.

It's fully compliant with all the latest fashions in internet design - known to the dot-cognoscenti as 'Web 2.0'. There are easy-to-play videos, just like YouTube. There are shortcuts to the trendy social bookmark service del.icio.us. (We have them too - see the column on the right). There's even a MySpace-style 'friends' section, called the Guest Blog, though there's only one friend so far - US senator John McCain.

But though the site is a slick professional bit of work, the videos are amateurish efforts, apparently shot on wobbly handheld cameras in two minutes flat.

And that's the beauty of them. As one of the Lib Dems behind the Ming Campbell conference vidcasts explained, one of the best things about video podcasts is that they only take five minutes of the candidate's time to do. The aide points a camera, the candidate talks for a couple of minutes, then gets back to work - or in the case of the first episode of Webcameron, the washing up.

It's even quicker than a blog to do (though the minions still have to spend hours posting them). And they give a quick, unmediated glimpse into what the candidate is like as a person, without a reporter shoving a microphone up his nose.

They aren't, perhaps, the ideal forum for exploring the minutiae of fiscal policy. But they could be just the way to present the candidate as a honest, decent, dishwashing sort of chap. You know, the kind of guy you could vote for.

Such is the theory - but will the public buy it? Will those elusive swing voters and non-voters tune in for these neatly presented slices of backstage political life? Who out there really wants to watch videos of the Conservative leader up to his arms in ecological soap suds?

If they don't, here's one sure way to get the YouTube generation to tune in - film politicians mixing mentos and diet pepsi. The results would be explosive.

The power of political blogs

Are political blogs one way to connect with a disenfranchised electorate? Somehow, having spent two days in Manchester with the brains behind two Labour-slanted blogs, I have my doubts, Andrew Thomas writes.

Apart from their independence and individuality, the USP of blogs is that they are more accessible than traditional media and don't get the life pulled out of them by over-zealous editors. Posters can write exactly what they want - can report gossip without the fear of upsetting political contacts. Blog readers, meanwhile, can follow conference news and gossip from their desktop.

Twenty political blogs you should read

If you haven't check it out already here's our guide to the political blogs you really must read.

Are you in it?