Author Archives: Niklas Smith

Opinion: Are hyper-injunctions compatible with the Human Rights Act?

By Niklas Smith | Published 21st March 2011 - 7:25 pm

“Justice should not only be done, but should manifestly and undoubtedly be seen to be done.” That famous aphorism is commonly quoted, though perhaps not in the courts that hand down hyper-injunctions whose very existence is kept secret on the pain of imprisonment. This incredible situation was exposed in Parliament by John Hemming MP, whose work deserves to be widely read.

When you read a hyper-injunction what strikes you is the sheer sweeping arrogance of the way they make themselves almost totally secret. One of the many questions raised these injunctions is how they can be compatible with …

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Opinion: Why Lib Dems should support free schools

By Niklas Smith | Published 28th August 2010 - 6:45 pm

The news that a motion criticising free schools was to be debated at the Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference caused a rush of excitement among journalists looking for their next “coalition splits” angle. This lazy interpretation ignores the strong tradition within the Liberal Democrats of having open debate and grassroots influence on policy. Although I disagree with the motion, I welcome the chance for our party to debate the pros and cons of free schools.

So far too much of the public debate on free schools has been uninformed by the high-quality …

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Opinion: A Swedish lesson for Gordon Brown

By Niklas Smith | Published 23rd April 2010 - 10:25 am

So far in British political debates the word “Swedish” is usually bandied about in support of “free schools” by the Conservatives. But you won’t see anything about schools in this post – instead I will highlight a different political lesson from Sweden.

In 2006 the centre-right Alliance for Sweden (which includes our sister party) ended twelve years of Social Democratic government; this was only the third time that the centre-right has defeated a Social Democratic government since the Second World War. An important factor in the victory was …

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Opinion: Attack YouGov if you want to – but at least say who you are

By Niklas Smith | Published 3rd April 2010 - 5:50 pm

Last week’s Daily Telegraph article attacking YouGov’s polling raises some disturbing issues about the quality of political debate as we fast approach the general election.

Firstly, the article’s authors seem to have no understanding about how polls should be conducted. They complain that the raw data in one large aggregated survey “were…‘weighted’ using an undisclosed YouGov formula which reduced the lead to sex per cent [from 12 percentage points in the raw data].” But all reputable pollsters know that their sample will not usually be representative of the population, for example by having …

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Posted in Op-eds, Polls | Tagged , , , , | 4 Comments