Category : Dave Rowntree

The Arts, Disability and Change

I really enjoyed chairing a panel this morning at Breaking Down the Barriers at The Garage in Norwich. My co panellists were a particularly impressive bunch, practically fizzing with energy and enthusiasm. They included Actor, director and campaigne...

Five Easy Ways to Campaign From Home

Local Elections are on May 4th closely followed by a General Election on June 8th. You’re registered to vote, but you’re snowed under! Maybe juggling work and family commitments, but convinced you have to do something to help get rid of t...

Rags to Rags

A friend mentioned something the other day I hadn’t heard in a while – the idea of ‘Rags to Rags in Three Generations’. The story happens more often than you might think. The ‘first generation’ of a family starts with nothing, but through hard work a...

No need for Labour MPs to struggle with TV interview questions about shadow cabinet appointments

No need for Labour MPs to struggle on TV with questions about shadow cabinet appointments – the answers are incredibly simple: Q. Was it right for Jeremy Corbyn to appoint xxx to the shadow cabinet? A. It’s one of Jeremy’s main jobs to appoint...

Star Boot Sale – Raising Money for Refugees

I’ve helped organise an eBay auction of celebrity memorabilia and bric-a-brac. In an attempt to be funny, I’ve called it a Star Boot Sale, but don’t let that put you off… Tim Burgess, Alex Turner, Paul McCartney, David Arnold...

I think I may have had a brilliant idea!

My favourite Pizza Express pizza is a classic base Margherita with extra Hot Green Peppers. It costs £10.10 – £8.45 for the pizza and £1.65 for the extra topping. But it’s also possible to buy it another way. You could order an American Hot wit...

A career in film!!! (all I have to do is make a video in my underpants…)

This is a genuine email I received this morning: — from: pq <pjq71@sbcglobal.net> reply-to: pq <pjq71@sbcglobal.net> date: Wed, Aug 26, 2015 at 3:15 AM subject: Hi, David. This is Paul from Model Mayhem with th...

Make sure you can vote on May 7th

It’s the most important election in decades – but are you sure you’re going to be able to take part? To be able to vote, you need to be on the Electoral Register. Are you? In the old days, one person from each household would manage...

Justice for the rich, McJustice for the poor.

This is the speech I made to the #Just4Justice Legal Aid protest on 7 March 2014. As you probably know, we’re going to be hearing a lot over the next year about the Magna Carta, because in 2015 it will be 800 years old. It’s going to be a big deal &#...

Human Rights, Human Wrongs

It is 20 years ago today that the first Human Rights Day celebrated the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948. A huge amount has been achieved since then in many countries around the world, but not everything has changed for t...

Karen Buck MP – Superhero

It is great to see that Education Secretary Michael Gove has been forced to scrap plans to create a two-tier education system, which would have split children into winners and losers at 16, and abolished lessons in the arts completely. My favourite q...

Why you can never trust the Tories

Remember David Cameron’s promised “bare knuckle fight” with Gordon Brown to save Accident and Emergency departments? Of the 29 he said he’d fight a blind man to save, 12 have either been closed or downgraded. You can never tr...

What Everyone Should Know About George Osborne

With the Bank of England now predicting that there will be no growth at all in the UK economy this year, many people are starting to ask themselves whether George Osborne actually knows what he’s doing. So here is a short list of things everyon...