Ipswich remembers

This week the people of Ipswich remembered the fallen

From the service at Ipswich war Cemetery, involving Primary School children from  Ipswich to the showing of the play, The Wipers Times' at the New Wolsey to the Sunday service at the Ipswich Cenotaph - where we saw one of the biggest crowds in years.

Ipswich Remembered

Tour of Britain returns to Suffolk

Tuesday 18 August, Tour of Britain launch - media ride. Thetford

Suffolk is becoming a cycling hot spot and Ipswich is doing its best to not only be involved but also to help. Today saw the Tour of Britian media launch and I got the chance to ride alongside the cycling team that ex England cricketer Matt Prior helps fund - the One Pro team, it may have been a bit soggy but was great to cycle the 15 miles alongside some of Britain's pro cyclists.

So the Tour follows the Women's Tour to Ipswich, but that is not all the cycling we have - on Saturday we have the Crafted Classique Sportive, Sunday the Sky ride hits the streets of Ipswich and later in the year the local theatre, the New Wolsey gets in the act with the cycling based play - Beryl - Ipswich is really at home on two wheels.

Cycling also seems to put a smiles on peoples faces, great for health and if we can reduce the number of cars on the road that is also a bonus. Labour run Ipswich Borough Council should be proud of the part it has played in making Ipswich a real cycling boom town.

'The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists'

On Friday, I visited the New Wolsey in Ipswich to watch 'The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists', a strange theatre experience with over 100 members of Ipswich, Suffolk and Colchester Labour present to see what has become known as the first major novel of the British working classes and is now a socialist classic. Strange as it felt more like an East of England Labour AGM that a normal Friday night at the theatre.

I must admit I had heard of the book but knew little of the story. Written by Noonan an Irish sign writer who used the pseudonym of Robert Tressell (after the painters table). it tells the tale of the lives of painters and decorators in a fictional seaside town (based on Hastings)

I found the play both entertaining and also educational, I can see why the 'great money trick' from the play is used in schools to help explain capitalism.

I now have the promise of the book (from my wife for Fathers Day) and I can't wait to read it. But if you get the chance to ever see the play - go. It certainly makes you keener to get out and campaign after watching it.

Tressell believes that the workers are the real philanthropists rather than their bosses. Wonder what he would have thought this week after we hear for £250,000 you can meet the Prime Minister and help set policy - guess they would call that philanthropy!

Beating Berlusconi! back in Ipswich‏

I have seen some fantastic productions at the New Wolsey in Ipswich over the last two years but as a football fan as well as enjoying the theatre, the show that I have enjoyed the most has been 'Beating Berlusconi' and you don't have to be a Liverpool fan to appreciate the story.

Plus feel free to boo when Margaret Thatcher appears on the tv in the background during the play.





The show returns to Ipswich on the 2 and 3 February- go along, you will enjoy it.

Beating Berlusconi!

On Friday night I paid a visit to the New Wolsey Theatre in Ipswich to watch the one man show (Paul Duckworth) - 'Beating Berlusconi!' The title and part of the play is based on the true tale of one of the many Liverpool fans who went to the Champions League Final in Istanbul in 2005.

This part of the play is hilarious but the whole play is full of comical moments but also at some points the theatre is silent as we remember the tragic events of Heysel and Hillsborough.

The play is not just about football, it is a portrayal of a city that was ravaged by Thatcher and her cronies but still survived, in part due to their own Scouse humour.

I loved every moment of it, for many reasons - as a football fan who spent many away match being treated like an animal both before and after Hillsborough dark days but also a fan who can remember watching those early European Cup finals with Liverpool in, like Rome in 1977. As a soldier, my regiment had our fair share of Scouse's, so very used to their humour and the scally in all of them. But also as Labour supporter as the story spoke of Thatcher, Hesseltine, Hatton and Kinnock.

I came home thinking how fantastic this great game of football is, the only game that a play about another team would go down as well in any city in the world not just Liverpool, but I was also worried, like the film/play 'Billy Elliot' they are great reminders of the Thatcher years, but we must never go back there, and with Cameron and their 'Big (no) Society' I am worried, and watching the video of the great Hessltine idea to rescue Merseyside - The International Garden Show in Liverpool - very worried that we are moving back towards those dark days. Where we will be at the whim of stupid plans by people who have no understanding what it is like to be poor, unemployed and in some cases desperate. Where can we sign up for 'Big society' if libraries and other community hubs are being closed down? Wonder where they will build the International Garden Show this time?