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Fireworks at the HIV Candlelight Vigil 2013, Manchester (video)

The HIV Candlelight Vigil ended with fireworks on Monday 26 August 2013. Filmed from a tall building to the south of the city centre.

 

New year fireworks - Manchester welcomes 2013 (video)

Fireworks around Manchester town hall as the city welcomes in 2013 on New Year's Eve

Fireworks erupt around Manchester Town Hall On New Year's Eve as the clock chimes midnight.

 

Police Commissioner Hustings 2012 (video)

Police Commissioner Hustings 2012, Manchester

Short speeches from four of the candidates in the election for Police Commissioner. The hustings event was held at Manchester University and was organised by the Evening News.

 

Fireworks at Manchester Pride 2012 (video)

My video of the fireworks display on the final night of Manchester Pride 2012. As usual it followed the HIV Vigil. This was filmed from the top of a tall building to the south of the city centre. Videos of the display in previous years are also available: 2011, 2010.

 

Olympic Torch Relay (video)

The Olympic Torch Relay arrived in Manchester. Seen here as it passed along Deansgate and Sackville Street. Fun but also a slightly bizarre spectacle I thought in terms of the speed with which it was over, the sponsorship circus and the media hanging from the back of a van. My brief video reflects the feeling.

 

Bells ring out at Manchester town hall (video)

The bells were rung at Manchester Town Hall on lunchtime on Tuesday June 5, 2012 as part of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

 

Riots and looting in Manchester city centre (video)

Riots and looting in Manchester city centre

An exclusive 10-minute video showing the disorder and looting of shops in the Piccadilly area on Tuesday 9 August 2011 and the police response.

 

Manchester Day Parade - 20 June 2010 (video)

The first Manchester Day Parade took place on a sunny Sunday afternoon in June 2010

A six-minute video showing some of the highlights from the first Manchester Day Parade. It happened on a hot and sunny Sunday afternoon in June 2010.

 

New Year's Eve fireworks, Manchester city centre (video)

New Year's Eve fireworks in Manchester city centre on 31st December 2009

There was a ten-minute firework display at midnight. I broadcast live on blogtv for about an hour from my kitchen which overlooks the city centre. You can watch the display sequence here.

 

Giant ID card is burnt in front of Manchester town hall by NO2ID campaigners (video)

NO2ID campaigners burn a giant ID card in front of Manchester town hall

The video includes an interview with the national co-ordinator of NO2ID.

 

Dramatic fire in Miles Platting (video)

A dramatic fire in Miles Platting.

Seventy firefighters attended the blaze. But none of the mainstream media could be bothered going along to get any video of it. Luckily the g7uk 'news bike' peddled over to take a look!

 

Hazel Must Go: exclusive interview with veteran BBC war reporter Martin Bell (video)

Exclusive interview with Martin Bell and his full speech at the 'Hazel Must Go' meeting.

Veteran BBC war reporter Martin Bell was the guest speaker at a 'Hazel Must Go' meeting held in Eccles on 16 September 2009.

Watch my exclusive interview in which Martin Bell reveals whether he will stand against local Member of Parliament Hazel Blears at the coming General Election (g7uk scooped the BBC and Granada on this by at least three hours!).

Campaigners want Blears to stand down before the election. They are angry about her abuse of the MPs' expenses system and her record on local issues.

Plus a video of Martin Bell's main speech is now available too.

 

Queer activists invade the Manchester Pride 2008 balloon launch (video)

Queer demonstrators invade the Manchester Pride 2008 launch - watch the video

The Lord Mayor, councillors, the city's tourist chief and business representatives, find themselves flanked with banners asking whether Pride is a 'corporate scam'. Nothing like this had ever happened in the 18-year history of Pride. It was a bombshell...

Another incendiary hit the target two weeks later when the Chair of the Gay Village Business Association resigned and issued a damning press statement. Watch the six minute video (super-widescreen format). It includes two minutes of exclusive archive footage of August Bank Holiday 1991. Read more...

 

Sackville Park Village Fete (video)

Video of a cake contest and Punch and Judy at the Sackville Park Village Fete in 2007.

 

Archive: Liberation '91 (video)

Come with us back to Manchester in 1991 when the Lesbian, Gay, Bi and Transgender community marched through the city centre to demand equal rights.

Quite a shock for the general public in those days before Queer As Folk and Manchester Pride.

Watch historic video footage of the Liberation 91 lesbian and gay rally in Manchester, 1991

News & Comment

This is the main stopping off point for new stuff. The blog, video-blog or whatever you want to call it. More...

 

Favourite software

Over the years I've got together a great set of programs that work well for me. More...

 

EVENTS

Police With Pride (audio)

My audio recording of the Police With Pride discussion event. It happened on Wednesday 21 August 2013 at Manchester Town Hall and the the subject was relations between police and the lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans communities.

 

Feast (2008) (video)

Video from Manchester's annual picnic by the lake, in Platt Fields Park, Rusholme.

 

LOCAL HISTORY

Fire on Oldham Street, Dobbin's drapers and general outfitters

Another small part of Manchester's heritage went up in flames on 11th April 2013 when a former department store caught fire on Oldham Street. And a timelapse video shows the smoke from a further fire on the same street three months later.

 

The end of the Oxford Road Show

Back in 1956 when the BBC decided to build new studios in Manchester, the famous Oxford Road site wasn't the Corporation's first choice. And it would be another 19 years before New Broadcasting House opened. This includes photographs of the demolition of the Oxford Road building in September 2012.

 

Robert Stephenson — buried in a churchyard in Eccles

Civil Engineer and a native of Northumberland. Brother of George.

 

Why the University of Manchester at Whitworth Street may be haunted

Halloween special: it's 1909 and nothing stands in the way of Manchester's universities and their expansion. Not even a graveyard that has only been there for 89 years...

 

Bank robbery in Didsbury

In 1889 the Union Bank in Didsbury was robbed at gunpoint by a man who seized handfuls of gold and ran off. But he didn't get away with it.

 

Putting swine flu into perspective

3,000 people died in Manchester in the flu epidemics of 1918/1919. At the time, the population of the city was more than 425,000 and it was heavily polluted with poor living conditions.

 

Manchester then and now: Sackville Street, St. Luke's Church & Chorlton On Medlock

This fascinating area was at the heart of the industrial revolution.

 

Most Haunted

TV show Most Haunted claims that a Granada TV studio is built on the site of an old graveyard. But is it really?

 

MANCHESTER

Manchester's luxury apartments

The 'regeneration game' conveyor belt screeches to a halt leaving property owners in the lurch. But owners from a previous boom aren't too happy either.

 

COOKIES AND PRIVACY

This site uses cookies to improve your experience as you browse our pages. Some statistics are gathered and we display third-party ads. See our policy on cookies & privacy page to find out more.

 

GAY LIFE

Crime in and around Manchester's Gay Village

A list of crime incidents since 2011. Including the Ancoats canal area. Please tell us of any we've missed.

 

Freedom of Information request reveals scale of police call outs to Manchester's gay village venues (video)

Greater Manchester Police supplied a list of 4,079 pubs, bars and clubs they had been called out to in 2011-2012.

 

Canal Street - August Bank Holiday Monday 1990

Canal Street jumble sale, August Bank Holiday 1990Canal Street jumble sale, August Bank Holiday 1990

My black and white photographs of the jumble sale on Canal Street in August 1990. This is how the Manchester Pride that we either love or loathe started off.

Few other images exist of this event.

 

The original Manchester Pride investigation

For many years I've been researching, writing about and challenging our over-commercial Manchester Pride event.

Raising awareness about the spin and inequality that lies behind it, the profiteering by businesses and the small amount that goes to charity (just 12% of the total Pride income in 2007).

My main Pride investigation page includes links to many other pages on my site and elsewhere online and many original facts, figures and quotes.

Don't believe it when people say there was no protest or criticism pre-2008. In fact there was a public meeting of concerned people as long ago as Autumn 1999 following the Mardi Gras of that year.

Visit FactsMCR.com for the latest.

 

Fooled by a fake (video)

How a fake descendent of the Russian Tsar fooled gay Manchester in 1991.

 

Cruising crackdown prompts call for a 'tolerance zone' (video)

How things have changed! The City Council and LGBT organisations now collaborate with the police to demonise men who choose to meet in public places rather than in the gay village and gay saunas (video).

 

Lesbian & Gay Foundation: the beginning of the end?

The employment tribunal reaches a decision, Outnorthwest magazine is slashed in a funding crisis, 62% of the annual income goes to pay 23 employees. Read more. Or see the 2007/08 accounts here. Including a cost of £61,589 to generate voluntary income of £100,736!

Also: LGF is awarded £121,165 from a hardship fund (Nov 2009).

 

Robinson Crusoe

The gay love story behind the classic 1960's BBC TV series. A special article for LGBT History Month.

 

VIDEO MAKING

A home-made windshield for the Zoom H2 recorder

How to make your own 'dead cat' windshield for this popular portable audio recorder.

 

Why relatively few good videos get made

Despite the great advances in digital technology.

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