Finally, it’s a blog.

OK, I admit it. Some days, a microblog just isn’t enough.

After about six months of running the new and improved website and tweeting like there’s no tomorrow, I’m giving in and adding a blog. I was only ever going to be able to hold out so long, and today’s events have finally broken my will.

Yes, school’s back at Westminster and the kids have all had an extra reason to worry – the report cards have been issued on day one. I’d guess that most people will feel both angry and dismayed that the expenses issue is still topping the news agenda – that goes for indignant MPs who would rather just bury the thing, and furious voters who would only feel a sense of justice if they’d seen a few convictions handed down by the courts already.

But what I find most frustrating is that this is a period of crucial importance to other political issues which ought to be at the top of the agenda. One group of activists went to great lengths to remind the Honourable Members that our very future is threatened by the Government’s inaction on climate change, and by its support for new runways, and new coal-fired power stations.

Sadly even if it weren’t for the ongoing expenses furore, some MPs just don’t get it. Just as others have previously expressed their outrage at public protest across the road from Westminster, some seem to think that the location of today’s peaceful direct action is more important than the cause.

Radical change in politics has rarely happened without direct action – something which we can all celebrate after the fact but which small-c conservatives will always hit out against at the time. But the likely successes in the climate change debate currently coming one after another are evidence that activism can have more impact than the political process alone.

In fact it remains to be seen whether the political process will achieve much at all on the world stage, and anyone who makes an effort to focus minds (those minds which remain open anyway) on this issue are to be commended. This matters more than moats and duck islands.

So yes, thanks Greenpeace, and keep up the good work.

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