Something I read over on The Asian News a few minutes ago made me stop and think. It seems that the Liberal Democrats are going to have to do without the services of their former Mayor for a while. She has been automatically suspended from the party - after the car she was driving was involved in an accident in which a rear passenger in her car sustained fatal injuries

Councillior Shan Alexander, who became Stockport's first Asian Mayor in 2005, was behind the wheel of her Mercedes when it was involved in an accident in May this year, an accident in which a rear seat passenger sustained injuries from which they later died. Details are sparse but the Councillor has been "asked to appear" at Macclesfield Magistrates Court on October 21. Now that is a strange way to put things for a start. Most people are not "asked to appear" in a court they are "charged with an offence and issued with a summons".

Does the court have a public gallery and do we have anyone with time on their hands in two weeks time ?

Anyway, there can be little doubt the Councillor's appearance is not as a witness. A spokesman for Stockport Council says her suspension follows the procedure laid down in a "Party Standard Order" that demands anyone charged with an offence that could lead to a custodial sentence be suspended from the party until the issue has been resolved. So no voting and no acting as their financial advisor until the issue is settled.

Another twist in the tale is that the Councillor will have plenty of faces she knows in that hearing, for she has also been suspended, pending the outcome of the case, from her post on the bench of Stockport's Magistrates.

I have mixed feelings on this one. "Guilty until  Proven Innocent" comes to mind. I wonder when the Lib Dems invented this Order as I can think of a few people it should have applied to. But on the other hand you have to say it shows the difference between Clegg''s Lib Dems and Gordon The Clown Brown's lacklustre foot soldiers. And it would have buggered  Harriet "Hit And Run" Harman's podium appearance at the Party Conference !