• Lib Dems say China witness statements raise “more questions” than they answer and call for statutory inquiry
• Hospices: Govt must reverse NI hike to deliver real change
• GDP growth: Govt must kickstart growth and “quit slowcoach approach”
• Lib Dems: Summon US ambassador over secretive meetings with Farage on rolling back women’s rights in UK
• If China is a “daily threat” then “insane” not to cancel super-embassy, say Lib Dems
• Chinese embassy plan must be “put out of its misery”

Lib Dems say China witness statements raise “more questions” than they answer and call for statutory inquiry

Responding to the Government publishing evidence regarding the collapsed China spy case, Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, Calum Miller MP, said:

These witness statements are only part of the puzzle and raise yet more unanswered questions.

Did emphasising the government’s desire for a positive relationship with China effectively cause this trial to collapse? What evidence was the CPS requesting which the government failed to provide?

And who was aware of these statements and the evidence being asked for both among ministers and in Number 10?

We clearly need a statutory public inquiry to get to the bottom of this whole fiasco.

Hospices: Govt must reverse NI hike to deliver real change

Commenting on the Government’s announcement on hospice funding, Liberal Democrat Care and Carers spokesperson Alison Bennett MP said:

While this announcement goes some way to help children’s hospices, it entirely ignores the profound issues in funding adult hospices. The Government must go much further to deliver the real change hospices are crying out for.

For starters, to have any chance of tackling this ticking time bomb, the Government must reverse their cruel National Insurance hike that cost hospices £34 million last year, and make sure funding keeps pace with local need.

For too long, the vital role played by hospices in our health and care system has been overlooked. The Liberal Democrats are campaigning to save the nation’s hospices. Everybody should have access to the very best palliative care, and to dignity at the end of life. This will never happen while government ministers are burying their heads in the sand.

GDP growth: Govt must kickstart growth and “quit slowcoach approach”

Responding to the news that GDP only grew by 0.1% in August, Daisy Cooper, Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson, said:

Today’s figures show the economy climbing slower than a sloth under a government simply not doing enough to kickstart growth.

The Chancellor must quit her slowcoach approach to the economy and finally drop her damaging national insurance hike, which has stifled business and hit high streets up and down the country.

The Government must take today’s news as a wakeup call and put an ambitious growth plan front and centre of their Budget later this Autumn – starting with a bespoke new UK-EU customs union which would unleash the potential of British exporters to trade more easily with our European neighbours.

Lib Dems: Summon US ambassador over secretive meetings with Farage on rolling back women’s rights in UK

The Liberal Democrats have called on the Government to summon the US Ambassador to explain why the US embassy in London held secretive talks with Nigel Farage on rolling back women’s rights and online safety laws in the UK.

The party also said Nigel Farage must come clean on his shadowy ties with the Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), a US group reportedly involved in setting up meetings between the Reform UK leader and representatives of the Trump administration.

Recent reporting by the New York Times has revealed that the ADF organised Farage’s three-hour testimony to US Congress earlier this year, where he described Britain as “awful” and rallied against the Online Safety Act. In a breakfast meeting apparently overseen by the US embassy and attended by their diplomats and aides, Farage also reportedly met with representatives of the ADF to discuss rowing back online safety laws and protections for women seeking abortions.

Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader Daisy Cooper said:

Women across the country will be horrified that Nigel Farage seems to be actively colluding with the Trump administration to roll back women’s rights in Britain.

Nigel Farage needs to come clean on these meetings with this shadowy US group and explain if his party would weaken women’s rights if he came to power.

The US ambassador should also be summoned to explain what looks like a blatant attempt to interfere in the UK’s domestic laws.

The Liberal Democrats will stand up against these attempts to turn Trump’s America into Farage’s Britain and roll back the clock on decades of progress.

If China is a “daily threat” then “insane” not to cancel super-embassy, say Lib Dems

The Liberal Democrats are calling on the Government to immediately block the Chinese super-embassy after MI5 Chief Ken McCallum said the state’s espionage posed a “daily threat” to UK national security.

The boss also revealed a Chinese counterintelligence operation was disrupted by MI5 as recently as last week.

In light of these revelations, the party’s foreign affairs spokesperson Calum Miller is ramping up his call for the Government to immediately block Beijing’s application for a super-embassy on the site of the Royal Mint, directly over sensitive cables into the City of London.

Calum Miller MP, Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, said:

The MI5 chief has offered absolute clarity on this labyrinthine issue, and the strongest confirmation yet of China’s threat status.

Chinese efforts to target and undermine our national security were live as recently as last week. This revelation must be the final nail in the coffin of Beijing’s hopes for a super-embassy in the heart of London.

It would be insane to allow it to go ahead – a blank cheque for China to hoover up sensitive data from London’s financial heart, and to threaten Hong Kongers who fled their repressive regime and we have vowed to protect.

The Government must stand up to China, put its duty to our democracy first and refuse to allow the CCP to expand its spying network in Britain from the inside out.

Chinese embassy plan must be “put out of its misery”

Responding to the confirmation that the Chinese embassy decision has been postponed until December, Calum Miller MP, Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs Spokesperson, said:

This week we have seen the extent of China’s espionage efforts laid bare. But instead of blocking the monster embassy for good, the Government is kicking the can down the road in the hope no one will notice if it approves it at a later stage.

It’s beyond time this embassy proposal was put out of its misery – and that the Government send a signal to China that we will no longer roll over in the face of their industrial espionage.