Author Archives: Baroness Joan Walmsley

Opinion: Get your facts right Polly

By Baroness Joan Walmsley | Published 21st July 2010 - 9:20 am

In yesterday’s Guardian Polly Toynbee criticises “casual law-making by arbitrary diktat” in relation to the unseemly haste with which the Academies Bill is being shunted through the Commons. She claims the bill was “catapulted” through the Lords (where, by the way, we debated it for a full 31 hours!) and that there is now “no revising chamber: a redundant House of Lords whipped this Bill through with as little scrutiny as it will get in the Commons”. Wrong!

Far from being redundant, the House of Lords obtained five important amendments and numerous significant statements on the record, one of them …

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Posted in Op-eds, Parliament | Tagged , | 8 Comments

Conference policy motion: “Respect, Consent and Personal Data”

By Baroness Joan Walmsley | Published 5th September 2008 - 6:15 pm

The policy motion “Respect, Consent and Personal Data” is the culmination of many months’ work from Sue Miller, Tim Razzall and a number of other Lib Dem Lords including myself to address the increasing intrusion by government, public and private organisations into our privacy. At the core of Liberal Democrat philosophy is a fundamental belief in the freedom of the individual, and the importance of strengthening and upholding fundamental rights. In recent years we’ve protested as the government introduced more and more measures to collect and store more and more information about individuals, such as the extending the remit of …

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Posted in Conference | 2 Comments