Welcome Back!

Hello everybody. We all hope that you had a great Easter holiday, and now that we're all back it's now time to (finally) update you with some news. It's been rather busy lately, with dissertations due we really let the blog fall a bit out of date. Here's a news summary, and pictures will follow shortly!

Mark Wallace and Ranil Jayawardena

A big thanks must go to our guest speakers last term, Mark Wallace (campaign manager for the Freedom Association) and Ranil Jayawardena (Chairman of the Blue Sky Foundation). We are very grateful to them for taking the time out to come and talk to us up here in Newcastle-upon-Tyne and look forward to seeing them again!

Alan Duncan Visit - April 25th

Thank you to all those who turned up to greet Alan Duncan and help campaign around Newcastle City Centre. A few photos should hopefully be up soon.

The Newcastle Union Society Awards 2007

It gives us great pride to announce that Newcastle CF received an award for "Most Improved Society" at the Union Society's awards ceremony. We'd like to thank all of those who have helped us out with socials and campaigns this year and we hope to continue our success next year!

Inter-mural Debating Competition - 14th March 2007

On Wednesday 14th March Newcastle Conservative Future entered a team into the Inter-mural Debating Competition and were Runners Up, losing out in the final debate. Congratulations go to David Codling and Keir Gravil - more information and pictures shall be posted tomorrow (Monday).

Green Action Day - 10th March 2007

Today NUCF met up with Durham University CF and helped Tynemouth Conservatives with their Green Action Day event. We went along to Briar Dene in Whitley Bay to help out with a local project that they have going there. We helped landscaping the area with the local Friends of Briar Dene association, as it is their quest to make improvements and add to the variety of plants and wildlife in the area, not a task to be taken lightly.

It was a good day and fun was had by all - it's amazing what a bit of hard work can do to team spirits, even if it was an early morning. A lot of work was done removing some overgrowing bramble patches and helping to plant new trees in the area.

NUCF on Question Time in Newcastle upon Tyne

It was good to see some NUCF members in the audience last night on Question Time. The video can be viewed here.

NUCF on University Challenge

Congratulations must go to Neil Archibald (Campaigns) and David Codling (Treasurer) for getting selected to represent Newcastle University on University Challenge. Well done guys!

Thatcher! The Musical

Newcastle CF went to see Thatcher! The Musical on Thursday 1st March at Newcastle's Northern Stage. It was a thoroughly entertaining night and the musical was brilliant - even if we didn't always agree with how things were being portrayed. One thing that struck us was how well all of the women playing Margaret Thatcher pulled off her voice - it was very convincing.

The musical begins with Margaret Thatcher appearing in a giant handbag - Narrator Maggie as she is known in the programme - and guides us through her life from birth until the present day. There are nine different Maggies dressed in attire that resembles the point in her life that was being focused upon: for example during the Falklands War scene (Military Maggie) she was dressed in a camouflage dress.

At one point one even comes around to play the audience - Gordon, one of our members fell victim but was looked upon kindly as Britannia Maggie said he had a "soft voice". Unfortunately Naima didn't get off so lightly and was told she was "dressed like she was French". It was all light-hearted fun however - and the quips about Tony Blair were good too.

The play provoked mixed reactions upon us all - Keir stating that he thought it was "pretty well balanced" and that "a lot of people wouldn't pay money to see a play that was too pro-Thatcher for various reasons. Considering it had to appeal to as wide an audience as was possible it was fairly flattering towards her." Others remain more sceptical, Barney was particularly disappointed at the portrayal of her character, of which he thought it was pretty much against her.
Hopefully we'll have a few more opinions from members up here soon, but in the mean time a few songs can be downloaded from the website:
http://www.thatcherthemusical.co.uk/audio.html

The Nuclear Debate

Newcastle Conservative Future and Newcastle Liberal Democrats Society have organised an evening of debating, including the main motion:

"This house believes in the Nuclear Weapons Disarmament of the UK".

This is booked for Wednesday 7th March in the Function Room of the Students' Union at 7:30pm. The Function Room is located on the 2nd floor of the Students' Union, at the opposite end to the MLK Cafe.

If you would like to take part in the debate itself please email our Deputy Chairman (Political) on:
b.e.g.baber@ncl.ac.uk

It's all light-hearted fun and anybody is welcome to join in, if you don't fancy debating then there will be a large audience there so feel free to come and watch (the more the better). There will be the opportunity to ask questions to those taking part too.