Ed’s inbox – May 16th

By Mark Ferguson / @markfergusonuk

If Ed Miliband could only read five blogposts each day, he’d read these ones…

The new Northern Irish health minister is “opponent” of evolution – Political Scrapbook
By Political Scrapbook

Believing in science is pretty much an essential for anyone with significant influence over health policy, which is a shame for new Northern Irish health minister Edwin Poots. As an adherent of a fundamentalist version of creationism, the MLA for Lagan Valley does not believe in evolution.

So much so, in fact, that he attests to this in his official biography:

“Edwin is a young earth creationist and an opponent of the theory of evolution.” – Read more.

Toby Young preferred free lunch to TPA rally – Liberal Conspiracy
By Sunny Hundal

“All those who care about Britain’s future should attend the Rally Against Debt” – declared the fearless Toby Young on 13th May.

Taxpayers are sponging off the state and destroying the lives of our children dontcha know? These public subsidies must stop!

Of course we already know Young opted instead to attend a Pirate’s Exhibition at Museum of London Docklands rather than the TPA rally. Now that’s commitment!

But it gets better – Read more.

Where does the Huhne story go from here? – Political Betting
By Mike Smithson

And Cameron backs his energy secretary

The Lib Dem energy secretary, Chris Huhne, has done a BBC interview in which he states categorically that the allegations he asked someone else to take his penalty points for a 2003 speeding offence are “simply incorrect”.

No doubt there’ll be a lot of reading between the lines of his statement but it’s hard to see where the story goes from here without any evidence.

Ladbrokes report that the money this morning has been going on Huhne still being in the cabinet at the start of June and the price against him going earlier has moved out from 5/4 to 6/4. – Read more.

The Localism Bill: gloves off for Report and 3rd Reading – ProgLoc
By Anna Turley

It’s Report and Third Reading of the Localism Bill tomorrow (Tuesday) and Wednesday. This will be crunch time for both government and opposition amendments to be debated and voted on before the Bill goes to the Lords.

Labour will be attacking the government claiming its localism is a ‘sham’ and that the Bill is actually centralising (giving the Secretary of State 126 new powers). Expect strong attacks from the opposition on the cuts leading to vital services being put at risk. – Read more.

Bigots vow to bring Ugandan anti-gay bill back – we must continue to fight them – Left Foot Forward
By Paul Canning

Uganda came within a cat’s whisker of launching a witch-hunt of gays and lesbians with a hangman’s noose attached last week. The infamous Anti-Homosexuality Bill (AHB) ran out of time at the end of the current Parliament and didn’t come to a vote – which it would definitely have passed.

The anti-gay forces who’d proposed it had made it quite clear what they intended – a witch-hunt, with not just individuals but NGOs and even one government (the Norwegians) in their sights for ‘promoting homosexuality’. – Read more.

Our suggestions for Ed’s inbox are limited by what we read – so if you’ve seen a blogpost that should be in Ed’s inbox, let us know.