Just been away for the weekend to visit my parents in the Lakes and I've returned to a mountain of casework. A couple of planning issues as well as the normal housing and anti-social behaviour related things. Just need to try and find some time to do it this week as I've got a lot on with both council stuff and work.

This afternoon I've got a meeting of the 'Members IT Group'. This looks at how we can improve the way councillors use IT and what the council needs to provide to help us perform our roles as councillors better.

Somewhat belatedly for a self-pronounced master of spin Paul Richards has started a political blog which I've added to my favourite blogs list. Like me Paul is a freelance PR consultant and the author of Be Your Own Spin Doctor.

Saturday's Yorkshire Evening Post carried a leaked story about the draft ALMO inspection report for three of the Leeds ALMOs. On the face of it the leaked report seems like bad news, but I've read the whole report and while I can't comment on specifics while it is still a draft (and officially the property of the Audit Commission) there is another story to tell.

Watch this space.

I've just discovered that Billy Hayes, the General Secretary of the CWU, is now posting a regular blog. It's impressive that such a senior figure is making the time to do it. This week's posts should be particularly interesting as it is the TUC conference. I'm planning to blog daily from the Labour Party conference when I go down at the end of the month.

Billy Hayes is one of the so-called new breed of left-wing union chiefs. I'm reserving my judgement on him for now until I see how well he handles the current dispute with the Royal Mail. My instinct is that his leftist stance will result in a strike that will seriously hurt the members he claims to represent.