Very happy to see the campaign for a Robin Hood Tax is gaining momentum! With a tax of 0.05% on Banker's transactions, this would raise hundreds of billions of pounds a year. This would easily be enough to stop cuts to our public services and help tackle poverty. This is a simple and excellent idea, which has already drawn the support of politicians, economists and business experts, and which I wholeheartedly support. You can find out more about it here

Was also pleased to see that, despite vocal opposition from the Conservatives (I wonder why...) and some skirmishing amongst Labour, the vote to hold a referendum on whether or not to replace our archaic first-past-the-post voting system was passed 365 to 187. How Brown can present Labour as the "party of reform" when it's taken them 13 years to do this however, I'm not sure - and let's not forget that Tony Blair promised a full referendum on the voting system back in 1997!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2010/feb/09/electoralreform-firstpastthepost

This is a small step in the right direction, though it's still far from proportional. The proposed AV system is still slanted in favour of the bigger parties, and tends to exaggerate large swings. If we had a truly proportional and democratic voting system in place, Greens would already have at least six MPs, and be set to have a lot more!

Less pleased, however, to have received a letter from Labour MP and Minister responsible for trains Chris Mole, saying that FCC was not going to have its franchise removed, and that it could take over 6 months of striking for the Government to end it. As someone who travels on FCC services a lot, I'm fed up of waiting for delayed services which end up overcrowded. I have written again to the Department of Transport, and hopefully will get some more answers - will keep you posted!