Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 274th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere … Featuring the seven most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (13-19 May
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As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:
Here’s a round-up of stories we haven’t had time to cover on the site this past few days…
Lord Ashdown and Lord Phillips in Lords reform clash (BBC News)
Former Liberal Democrat leader Lord Ashdown has clashed with one of his party colleagues during a debate on government plans to reform the House of Lords. Lord Phillips of Sudbury complained that the proposal would turn Parliament’s second chamber into a clone of the House of Commons, with politicians simply following the party line when it comes to voting. In finger-jabbing exchanges, Lord Ashdown argued that most peers should be elected. A
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That’s Paddy’s view, as reported in the Independent’s diary here:
Paddy Ashdown, the first leader of the Liberal Democrat party, has remarked on how politics has been taken over by people who have never had a job anywhere else but in politics, giving the strong impression that he does not approve. “The difference with politics today, and politics when I was leader of the Liberal Democrats, is the people working in politics,” he said. “I worked in the military. I was involved in business. I have been unemployed twice, working as a voluntary youth worker. Today’s politicians have simply only
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Voters had to take some care when voting in Prestatyn North on May 3rd, as the Labour candidate was called Paul Penlington and the Conservative Allan Pennington. But the council’s counting staff did not take the same care when it came to the count, as WalesOnline reports:
Returning officer and council chief executive Mohammed Mehmet said a block of ballot papers which should have been allocated to the Labour candidate Paul Penlington were “inadvertently” allocated to Tory Allan Pennington, who won the last of the three seats available on the ward.
Mr Penlington or Labour now have until May 24 to decide whether
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Writing in the Financial Times, former Lib Dem leader Ming Campbell has urged Britain to drop the so-called ‘Moscow criterion’ — which commits us to maintaining an independent nuclear deterrent capable of obliterating the Russian capital — in order to open up the possibilities of a more targeted, and cheaper, nuclear alternative to the renewal of Trident:
Nuclear weapons have no intrinsic merit. Their significance is in deterrence. If you ever have to use them it can only be because they have failed in their primary purpose. But nuclear policy ought always to be assessed in its political context. It is
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Perhaps some less serious points made here about the Leveson Inquiry into media regulation than were made by my Co-Editor Mark Pack here — but enjoy nonetheless…
Just a few weeks after the fierce battle for the London mayoralty concluded, a very different election is due to take place — an election which hasn’t even been contested for more than a century. But now London Lib Dem member Patrick Streeter is standing for the post of City Auditor, and promising to ask some tough questions, according to an email received by the Voice this week:
Patrick Streeter of Tower Hamlets Liberal Democrats is contesting an interesting election on June 25. Each year the City of London Corporation elects its auditors, although the position has not been contested
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The government is bringing back to life earlier talk about removing the rent subsidy for those in social housing whose household income is over £60,000.
At the moment, rents in social housing are capped at 80% of the market value, but with around 34,000 homes in England occupied by families with a household income of over £60,000 the government is commencing a consultation on removing the 80% limit for them:
Government research shows that as many as 6,000 social rented homes in England are lived in by people who earn a combined income of more than £100,000, including Bob Crow, leader of
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There’s no prize at stake – just the opportunity to prove you’re wittier than any other LDV reader…
Remember the Rose Garden? It must all seem such a long time ago to Tory leader David Cameron pictured here giving Nick Clegg the evils. What do you think might be being said or thought by or about them?
Some fantastic entries for our most recent caption competition, Boris & Dave “Happily ever after” Edition.
If, like me, you were one of the 12,000 people who was a candidate in 2012′s local elections you may have received a letter recently from Plymouth University’s Elections Centre, run by Professors Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, inviting you to take part in an online questionnaire:
This year the centre has ran its seventh annual candidate survey for the Local elections. Over 12,000 candidates stood for election to local government this year and we are lucky enough to have sampled 6,450 of them (i.e. sent a letter inviting them to participate in the survey). We do this to collate information
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Back in 2010 I took up the issue of paperwork gone mad at the Ministry of Justice, using a series of Freedom of Information requests to reveal the ludicrously over-bureaucratic safe driving polices in place at the MoJ:
Despite the government’s rhetoric of cutting bureaucracy, the Ministry of Justice – one of the largest Whitehall departments and responsible for many important administrative systems – is spectacularly failing to set a good example with its own hugely bureaucratic approach to health and safety when people are driving as part of their work according to information I’ve unearthed in a series of freedom
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You don’t often see politicians redirecting their gaze at election time. However, the Aberystwyth University Liberal Democrats spent the early days of May raising money and awareness for a disease that is renowned for afflicting young people, many of which are students.
What the AULD had planned was to raise money for the Multiple Sclerosis Resource Centre (MSRC) through cross-party football, selling cakes on an industrial scale and using social media to promote their cause. It’s fair to say, we could not have expected such a successful campaign, let alone such a whirlwind of support from students and University staff.
It all …
It’s Friday. It’s five o’clock. Here’s a fistful of lists that sum up the LDV week:
Each year at Autumn Conference, the Party President presents three awards to party members who have gone above and beyond for the party for longer than most of us can remember. There are three awards available:
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I’m not always the most prepared person in the world, especially when it comes to meetings. Usually, that doesn’t matter, because I’m surrounded by people who are prepared. But what happens if they don’t turn up on time?
The sun was shining in Armenia’s capital, in the shadow of Mount Ararat, and whilst one of the delegation’s Parliamentarians was meeting ‘Our Man in Yerevan’, I was off to attend the Resolution Working Group, where resolutions on a Common Consolidated Corporate tax base for Europe and on Cyprus were to be …
The Pupil Premium (PP) is great politics. As a way of increasing funding for schools with more pupils from poorer backgrounds, with all the incentives that implies, is has laudable political features. It contrasts us well as ‘pro-poor’ relative to the Conservatives. It is a kind of remedy for the ‘student fees’ debacle. And it is simple – easy to understand and to implement.
It is worth having a closer look at its features and context. Are there any broader lessons for the Lib Dems?
First, what is it? In effect PP is an additional dimension to the way that central government …
The capital of Europe is not exactly what a visitor from an alien civilisation would expect. There is little in the way of grand boulevards, monumental buildings, overblown statuary. Indeed, it all seems a little down at heel. I’ve always suspected that Belgians don’t waste money maintaining facades on the basis that, soon enough, someone will invade and do it for them.
In Howard Blake’s ‘New National Songbook’, he writes, “”Good heavens, look at that Empire!”, we thought. Most of us were thinking about trees and birds all the while.”. …
This is the second of three articles, based on interviews with Lib Dem MEPs Phil Bennion and George Lyon, covering the future of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP). This article addresses the specific changes they want made to current EU plans for reform.
When I spoke to him, Phil Bennion explained to me that, while Lib Dem MEPs are broadly supportive of the Commissioner’s plans for reform (the key idea being to start spending 30% of ‘pillar one’ payments on environmental elements), they have serious concerns with the detail.
An example he gave was the proposal for farmers to have …
Well, there’s a headline you probably didn’t expect to read today.
Guy Verhofstadt, the former Belgian prime minister and current leader of the liberal grouping in the European Parliament, has rejected talk of Greece leaving the Eurozone. Interviewed on the Today programme yesterday he said such speculation was aimed more at influencing public opinion in Greece than it was a prediction of the likely outcome of the current crisis.
Verhofstadt warned that the EU is unprepared for the contagion that would result from a Greek Euro exit, saying:
There is no real firewall around the other economies of Europe, we only have a few fire extinguishers.
You can hear the full interview – including …
The Guardian reported on Tuesday that Equalities Minister Lynne Featherstone is to reform the Equality and Human Rights Commission, cutting its budget and removing some of its responsibilities, most notably its obligation to assess how Government policies would affect the poorest.
Now, if ever there was a quango in need of reform, the Equalities and Human Rights Commission is that body. Dysfunctional seems to be the best word to describe the EHRC. Wasteful would be another. For three years running, the National Audit Office qualified its accounts. Last year was the first year since its formation in 2007 when it managed to …
“It might surprise you to know that under Section 5 of the Public Order Act, the police and the courts can decide if you or someone else might feel insulted” states the front page of the Reform Section 5 campaign’s website.
But this is unlikely to surprise many Lib Dems, who just a couple of months ago, at our Spring Conference in Gateshead, passed a motion (pdf) which called for the right to free speech to be protected through:
The repeal of section 5 of the Public Order Act, which creates ‘non-intentional’ speech offences, and the removal of ‘insulting’ from Section 4A of
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Over the weekend, I wrote about how welcome the ancillary details are in the newly published Electoral Registration and Administration Bill. Those are the “and Administration” part of the Bill, but the main act is electoral registration, with the Bill laying out details of the move to individual electoral registration across Great Britain, catching up with Northern Ireland.
I’ve written before about why individual electoral registration is a good policy, and hence has been long pushed for by the Electoral Commission and supported by all the main political parties. In brief, it is to do with principle (your right to vote shouldn’t depend on whether or not someone else fills in a form on your behalf), with fraud (individual registration will be a bit like putting window locks on, cutting crime by making it harder) and with the problem of landlords registering themselves rather than their tenants. You can read more about that in What’s the point of switching to individual electoral registration? but on to the Bill…
Tomorrow it’s a year since Willie Rennie became Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader. What have been the highlights of that first year?
Well, on his first day, I interviewed him for Liberal Democrat Voice and you can still listen to that here. He said that his priorities for his first hundred days were to work out what our message was, to sort out our organisation and to get out there and meet people, members and ordinary people on their doorsteps. So how has he done with these things and more?
David Cameron’s adviser Steve Hilton heads off for a sabbatical in California, where he will be learning more about governance.
However, he is reported in several newspapers to have left a wee parting present, a paper calling for a further £25 billion cut in welfare spending. He wants to see people, particularly single parents, encouraged into full time rather than part time work. No mention is made of how the resulting child care costs would be met, of course. Maybe he hadn’t thought of that.
The Times (£) reported that these plans had not been shared with the Liberal Democrats but, …
MPs’ offices get stacks and stacks of mail. Every day all manner of things arrive, from invitations, to big glossy brochures from various organisations, to letters from constituents, to replies from letters written to various Government bodies on behalf of local residents, to thank you cards when problems have been resolved.
Today, Lynne Featherstone’s constituency office received a special surprise in the post. Ben and Jerry’s, in conjunction with Stonewall, had produced a specially designed ice cream tub, complete with the Equality Minister’s photograph and the title Lynne Honeycomb, to show the company’s support for Equal Marriage. Sadly for her office …
The Independent reports that Liberal Democrat MPs are trying to change the new assessment process for the Personal Independence Payments which will replace Disability Living Allowance. They believe that they may lead to blind people being denied the help that they need. This is a measure introduced by the Welfare Reform Act. The MPs are concerned that the new assessment process focuses on mobility and does not sufficiently take into account the ways in which being blind or partially sighted can affect everyday life.
People who have sight loss need the extra help to, for example, help with cleaning, ironing …
I was wondering how I could amuse readers on my own blog yesterday and I came up with this amazing idea of going back and finding out what I was writing about around this time in previous years. It was only later that I realised that Helen Duffett does this for Liberal Democrat Voice every Friday in the Friday Five . I hope she doesn’t mind me borrowing her idea and adding in a little extra spot.
What was good about my post yesterday is that a few other Liberal Democrat bloggers got in on the act and I spent …
Every week Liberal Democrat Secretary of State for Scotland writes a column for local newspapers in his Borders constituency. Here is this week’s edition.
Last week, we saw the State Opening of Parliament by the Queen. Her Majesty set out the legislation planned for the second session of Parliament following the formation of the Coalition. The legislation outlined in the speech supports our efforts to reduce the deficit, rebalance the economy and put the country on the path to sustainable growth. It also sets out our commitment to provide families, businesses and communities across the country with the support they …
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Which of the five Lib Dem reshuffle options will Nick Clegg pick?
In praise of Councillor Neil Hughes - 56 Up
Lynne Featherstone's honeycomb surprise
Opinion: A letter to a constituent regarding equal marriage
Police urged to investigate campaign against Labour and Lib Dem councillors in Milton Keynes
Opinion: Pupil Premium. Extend the concept? (Paul Reynolds)
Opinion: The future of the CAP – specific proposals by Liberal Democrats (George Potter)
Willie Rennie’s first year as Scottish Liberal Democrat Leader (Caron Lindsay)
John Leech MP writes… It is not just the Leader’s job to sell the Pupil Premium (John Leech MP)
Opinion: A letter to a constituent regarding equal marriage (Tom Papworth)
Cameron and Fruit Ninja-gate
In Praise of The Sun: Finding strengths in Vince Cable
Unusual Guitar Configurations
Seattle's Best 15K
Rubbish - More Photographs of Urban Bristol
Vince Cable, York City and Arthur Bottom
Top of the Blogs: The Lib Dem Golden Dozen #274
Olympic flame coming to South Glos
Sandy Denny: Fotheringay
The origins of the Olympic flame
Jonathan Walls 20th May - 9:49pm
John Roffey 20th May - 9:46pm
Chris_sh 20th May - 9:32pm
tony dawson 20th May - 8:30pm
Rebecca Hanson 20th May - 8:13pm
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