Author Archives: Andy Boddington

Andy Boddington is a Lib Dem councillor in rural Shropshire

Opinion: Cash in your pocket or green fields on your doorstep?

By Andy Boddington | Fri 6th December 2013 - 10:48 am

Cash in your pocket or green fields on your doorstep?

Does anyone think the planning system is working? I don’t and neither do many communities and local councils. Ministers certainly don’t think so. Buried in the National Infrastructure Plan published on Tuesday are proposals for more planning reform (pdf). They are bad proposals.

One plan is to set up a specialist court to deal with planning disputes. That’s a good idea, but as with so much legislation under this government, the detail undermines the principle (for example, the Lobbying and Antisocial Behaviour bills). What the government is really aiming for here …

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Opinion: Women must stop stepping into the political shoes of men

By Andy Boddington | Thu 5th December 2013 - 8:55 am

It’s a cute piece of research for two reasons. It sits comfortably with what so many of us think, even if we don’t say it out loud. Yet it challenges every one of us.

University of Pennsylvania researchers have shown that women’s brains are wired from left to right – that’s linking logic with intuition. In men, the neural connections go from front to back. That strengthens their spatial and motor skills. This research suggests that those age old stereotypes are true. Overall men are better at reading maps and being single-minded when tackling a problem. Women are in general …

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Opinion: After 150 years, the Gettysburg Address still matters

By Andy Boddington | Tue 19th November 2013 - 12:06 pm

LincolnIt was just ten sentences long. A mere 273 words delivered in less than three minutes. Yet the Gettysburg Address has resonated through history, finding relevance in every age.

In May 2003, I was researching history in Los Angeles. The news channels had cleared the decks for just one story. One hundred or so miles to the south, President George W. Bush trying to define his own place in history.

The USS Abraham Lincoln was stationed off San Diego after a long deployment, including action in the Bush/Blair war in the Gulf. Beneath a banner of “Mission Accomplished”, a jubilant Bush told the assembled crew and an attentive nation that major combat operations in the Iraq War had ended. In a speech that lacked humility, he said: “We have fought for the cause of liberty, and for the peace of the world.” Bush boasted of the precision of war, of how “new tactics and precision weapons the guilty have far more to fear from war than the innocent.” Seemingly oblivious to the huge cost in human life, he declared that war against terror, against Al Qaida, was being won.

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Opinion: Lib Dem Voice compromised its independent voice with Heathrow sponsored post

By Andy Boddington | Wed 13th November 2013 - 3:02 pm

LDV Heathrow advertLib Dem Voice got it wrong yesterday publishing a propaganda article on behalf of Heathrow Hub. It compromised its integrity. It undermined its independent voice.

In my view, it is wrong in principle and wrong in practice to take the corporate shilling for editorial content.

The post on Lib Dem Voice yesterday came just three days into Heathrow’s big money PR offensive on “the plan for a quieter Heathrow expansion that isn’t being heard”, which began with a full page advertisement in the Sunday Times. Advertising is fine. But advertorials in a political context are not. They distort the editorial process because “he who pays the piper, calls the tune.”

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LibLink: Julian Huppert calls for greater public scrutiny of spying

By Andy Boddington | Sat 9th November 2013 - 9:02 am

Julian Huppert Sherlock HolmesWriting in the Guardian yesterday, Julian Huppert called for greater public scrutiny of national security. It was not just the work of the intelligence services that was scrutinised in parliament last Thursday, he says, but secretive intelligence and security committee which oversees the services.

This sort of public scrutiny is exactly what we need to restore confidence in our intelligence service, whose work keeps us safe. It does make you wonder why this should have been such a massive event: shouldn’t public scrutiny be at the heart of the way our intelligence and security service operates anyway?

Huppert says that he is not asking for details to be discussed, just principles.

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LibLink: Are the Liberal Democrats a Lea & Perrins party?

By Andy Boddington | Fri 8th November 2013 - 4:03 pm

Liberal Democrat Political SauceIn today’s Telegraph, Isobel Hardman says that Nick Clegg is targeting the green, metropolitan  middle-class “who fret about whether they are doing the recycling properly.”

Work is being done on the “repeal” sections of the party’s manifesto, explaining how the Lib Dems will reverse certain Coalition reforms, including the unpopular employee shares-for-rights scheme. But, Hardman says some party figures want more distinctive Lib Dem thinking:

To avoid being seen as a Lea & Perrins party – one that is capable of improving any government, but shouldn’t be taken alone.

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Clegg condemns sneering Paxman and tussles with terrorism prevention

By Andy Boddington | Fri 8th November 2013 - 9:02 am

Nick Clegg LBCThey are a way of dealing with a “dilemma”. That’s Nick Clegg’s view of TPIMs after the escape of Mohammed Ahmed Mohamed. He was being challenged on his weekly Call Clegg phone-in on LBC 97.3. He went on to blast Paxman as a taxpayer funded broadcaster who “sneers at politics.”

Clegg defended the Terrorism Prevention and Investigation Measures as essential where people can’t be prosecuted or deported:

What do you do about people who you can’t get on a plane to deport them but you want to keep an eye on them? There is this dilemma.

He said that TPIMs are the toughest regime in the world he knows of for dealing with “this category of characters.” People absconded under old system of Control Orders, which were riddled with problems because they were “constantly being shredded by the courts.”

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We need to embrace Russell Brand – he’s the new political messiah

By Andy Boddington | Wed 6th November 2013 - 3:32 pm

Cow votingHe’s not going to go away. After all, celebs rarely do, even after their stardom has faded. My instinct is to ignore him. But I’ve talked to young friends. And they tell me my instinct is wrong.

They are saying to me that even if I can’t embrace the anarchic politics of Russell Brand, I should at least try to understand why he is so in tune with the next generation of non-voters.

This whole fuss started with Brand editing an edition of the New Statesman, then throwing Paxo into a state of complexity on Newsnight. Our media, bored to its teeth with the professional dullness of today’s politicians, drooled on every rebellious word.

Yesterday, Brand was back on ebullient form in the Guardian:

I’ve had an incredible week since I spoke from the heart, some would say via my arse, on Paxman. I’ve had slaps on the back, fist bumps, cheers and hugs while out and about, cock-eyed offers of political power from well intentioned chancers and some good ol’ fashioned character assassinations in the papers.

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David Steel on the Scottish referendum and reforming the House of Lords

By Andy Boddington | Fri 1st November 2013 - 9:03 am

David Steel 200Yesterday evening, Lord David Steel delivered a lecture on Lords reform and the forthcoming Scottish referendum. He called for a wide constitutional overhaul, including reforming the House of Lords into an indirectly elected chamber.

Speaking earlier to Scotland Tonight, he called for a grown-up debate about whether Scotland wants to be a separate nation or not. He rejected David Cameron’s assertion that an independent Scotland would be more vulnerable to terrorist attacks and Nicola Sturgeon’s claim that fuel bills will come down, saying such comments obscured the real issues of the campaign.

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The biggest urban myth: the Tories have a birthright to the Shires

By Andy Boddington | Thu 31st October 2013 - 1:30 pm

Countryside Alliance web shotgunChampions of the Countryside Alliance boast that it is the voice of rural Britain. I disagree. It is just one voice within rural Britain. It’s like saying that the Tories are the voice of the Home Counties and Labour is the voice of the Industrial North. That’s just lousy stereotypical language. There are many different voices within rural England.

I am forever angry that the London press, especially the right leaning press, routinely trots out stereotypes about life in our rural areas. They seem to believe that “Escape to the Country” is something authentic. It’s a reality show, no more.

One reason why rural areas get such a bad deal in public policy is that London journalists rely on urban myths about the countryside rather than trying to understand rural reality. This reality game is not without victims. The media’s glib characterisations of country life distort discussions of pressing issues like rural funding, schooling and a working landscape. And most of all, the need for jobs and decent housing in rural areas.

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Boris Johnson is not the only politician to stand up for immigration

By Andy Boddington | Sat 26th October 2013 - 10:15 am

boris and cameronThe Telegraph reports Boris Johnson’s claim that he is the only politician to stand up for immigration.

I’m probably about the only politician I know of who is actually willing to stand up and say that he’s pro-immigration.

Nonsense. I can only guess that Boris doesn’t know many politicians. He even jokes that the only party backing immigration is the Greens. That’s not right and I am sure he knows it. The Lib Dems are the party that takes a positive attitude to immigration, and unlike the Greens, we are part of the government.

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Tim Farron on leading the Lib Dems and the coalition’s record on social justice

By Andy Boddington | Wed 23rd October 2013 - 6:04 pm

Tim FarronThe Huffington Post today carries a frank interview with Tim Farron by Mehdi Hasan who asks whether he a a Lib Dem leader in waiting.

Farron tells Hasan he is a social liberal not a classical liberal and, making the distinction between free markets “with a referee”, which he supports, and “laissez faire”, which he dismisses.

On energy, Tim admits he is uneasy with the decision to approve the Hinkley Point reactor:

The most fundamental thing is that we keep the lights on and so that the investment is justifiable in that sense. Personally, I don’t think the time has come for us to go down the nuclear route again.

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Our politicians should be dull, worthy and never seen wearing a leopard print bra

By Andy Boddington | Mon 21st October 2013 - 1:02 pm

Nelson TorsoWriting in today’s Daily Mail, Dominic Sandbrook rages against the cult of celebrity and declares that “the lines between politics and show business have become dangerously blurred.” Is he right?

Today is Trafalgar Day, a celebration of the victory of our nation’s greatest celebrities, Horatio Nelson. Many may be surprised to hear Nelson described as a celebrity rather than a hero, but a celebrity he was, and he so knew it.

When, on 14 September 1805, Nelson arrived at Portsmouth to board the Victory, he could not make his way to the ship due to the pressure of crowds who wanted to cheer off their national hero. Nelson did not misjudge his own fame. He was loved by the nation and he loved their adulation. He told Thomas Hardy as he left English soil for the last time:

I had their huzzas before, I have their hearts now.

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Vampire railway: High Speed 2 to suck life out of local economies

By Andy Boddington | Sat 19th October 2013 - 10:03 am

HS2 Distortion 200The case for High Speed 2 is looking more and more like a Tonka project – a big showy toy that politicians can brag about, but will do little for the UK’s economy. And it is not an equitable project. It is set to damage the economy of areas like east of England and boost London at their expense.

It’s not long since KPMG published a report claiming that the line could boost the economy by £15 billion a year. Now BBC’s Newsnight reports that the KPMG report left out data on those areas that stand to lose out from the project.

In cash terms, the BBC lists Aberdeenshire, Aberdeen City and Moray  as faring the worst, losing £220m a year by 2037. But local economies are different sizes, so it helps to look at percentages.

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Caron Lindsay defends Jo Swinson’s right to stand

By Andy Boddington | Fri 18th October 2013 - 2:00 pm

Jo Swinson GlasgowThe government has been introducing a lots of “rights to” of late. Communities have rights to bid and to build. Individual have rights to buy and to personal budgets. After the last 48 hours of media coverage, it may be that we need to bring in a “right to stand.”

The story runs like this. Jo Swinson arrives for Prime Ministers Questions at a point when the house is already crammed out. She stands for a while and she’s happy with that. The political editor of the Spectator, James Forsyth however was horrified and tweeted.

Quite remarkable that no MP has offered Jo Swinson, who is seven months pregnant, a seat. Really shocking lack of manners and decency

The Daily Mail then took up the case. Caron Lindsay took that newspaper to task last night, concluding:

I find the Mail’s attitude to women much more offensive and harmful to society than anything that happened in the House of Commons yesterday.

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Nature can’t be shuffled around like politicians or for profit

By Andy Boddington | Fri 18th October 2013 - 1:30 pm

lichen - ramalina siliquosaBiodiversity offsetting? It sounds as interesting as a ministerial reshuffle. But a reshuffle is here today, gone tomorrow. The government’s proposal to allow developers to build over wildlife spots providing they ‘recreate’ them elsewhere is more than a minor change within the incomprehensible thicket of environmental rules. Biodiversity offsetting could threaten our fragile biodiverse landscapes.

Owen Paterson told the Independent:

For the developer there are massive advantages. You’d have certainty, you’d have clarity, and you’d have speed and a massive reduction of cost. But you’d also leave the environment in a better place than you found it for the longer term.

Wildlife groups are nervous.

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Jeremy Browne talks to the Times on his sacking and not being a Tory

By Andy Boddington | Fri 18th October 2013 - 9:45 am

Clegg and BrowneIn today’s Times, Jeremy Browne reveals that he has been approached by senior Tories, including Grant Shapps, who “he suspects were seeking his defection” (£). He describes his sacking from the Home office as disorienting, puzzling and painful. He says that he received a black mark over the Go Home poster van row. The Telegraph’s Benedict Brogan, however, has tipped Browne for defecting and joining a future Tory cabinet.

Talking to the Times, Browne signals his dismay with Clegg’s effort to distance the Lib Dems from the Tories. He urges the party to take credit for the government’s “central pillars”: reducing the deficit, crime and education reforms, and also curbing immigration.

He says the party is a “shopping trolley that defaults to the Left” and accuses a “substantial number” of Lib Dems of being happy as a “peripheral force that campaigns against the Conservatives.”

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Employment: Jobs are growing – but there is a long way to go

By Andy Boddington | Wed 16th October 2013 - 5:15 pm

Employment trendsA million more people are in work compared to early 2010. The number of unemployed people in the UK has dropped by 18,000 in the last three months. And the number of people in jobs is at the highest level ever, according to the Office for National Statistics.

Liberal Democrat minister Steve Webb says:

The Liberal Democrats in government have helped business create more than a million private sector jobs, and now we are working to help create a million more… There is a long way to go, but the economy is on the mend and jobs are crucial to building a stronger economy in a fairer society that allows everyone to get on in life.

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Casked Crusader battles zombie enterprises over “Great British Pubco Scam”

By Andy Boddington | Wed 16th October 2013 - 1:30 pm

The Casked CrusaderBeer. Don’t you love it? I do.

In the last 40 years, the brewing and pub industry has failed to be a drinker’s best friend. Small brewers built near local monopolies and went national. Prices went up, landlords got poorer, and the beer fouler. A quarter of a century ago, the Beer Orders were launched to breathe new life into our pubs. But the orders led to the loathed zombie pubcos, which have eaten away at the viability and traditions of our locals.

Enter Greg Mulholland, the Lib Dems pub and beer champion – also dubbed the Casked Crusader by the Sun. He took to the floor of the House of Commons on Monday night to continue the his crusade against the pubcos.

Not taking the right action now would be a disaster not only for many pubco publicans and the communities that stand to lose their local pubs, but for the recovering UK economy.

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Want to buy a bandstand? Bracknell Lib Dems have one for sale on ebay

By Andy Boddington | Fri 11th October 2013 - 4:30 pm

When I joined the Lib Dem Voice editing team, I knew I would have to edit and write about a huge range of politics, skulduggery, Uncle Tom Cobley and all. Never once, not even in my dreams, or even nightmares, did I think I would write about a bandstand.

Or for that matter a bandstand put up on ebay for sale by Lib Dems. Here is the billing:

Bracknell Bandstand ebay

Now this bandstand has history. It’s is fair to say that Bracknell is not the most vibrant or attractive of …

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Has Eric Pickles destroyed the government’s role in communities?

By Andy Boddington | Fri 11th October 2013 - 12:03 pm

Pickles Hot AirEric is clearly bored out of his mind. He’s been raging around about parking, yellow lines, even about bin collections in Wales – but then he likes to bash the Welsh. In my mind, he is truly the minister of hot air and no substance.

In recent months he has taken meddling in applications for really rather small gypsy and traveller sites. Now he has somewhat imperiously declared that he will call in planning appeals for small renewable energy projects for his own decision (£). When he first came to office, Pickles said he would only use this right occasionally. Now, it seems, such call ins are becoming his hobby.

I can only guess Pickles is doing this because he is bored. He claims he is doing so because he wants:

To give particular scrutiny to planning appeals involving renewable energy developments so that I can consider the extent to which the new practice guidance is meeting the government’s intentions.

Nonsense.

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Norman Baker talks about immigration, conspiricies and taking on Teresa May

By Andy Boddington | Fri 11th October 2013 - 11:03 am

Norman BakerThe Independent today carries an interview with the new Lib Dem Home Office minister, Norman Baker. You know, that minister of conspiracy theories according to some media wags.

In his interview, Baker comes across as eminently sensible and defiantly Liberal. He is poised to reign in Teresa May’s excesses and tells the newspaper that has been told by Nick Clegg to range across all policy areas to “make sure there is a liberal voice clearly heard in the Home Office.”

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The Lobbying Bill – How Lib Dem MPs voted

By Andy Boddington | Thu 10th October 2013 - 4:31 pm

The controversial Lobbying Bill got a clear majority on its third reading has now moved to the Lords. The current text of the bill was robustly defended by Tom Brake in the Commons but many MPs expressed their dissatisfaction with the current drafting, especially Part 2 which constrains the freedom of charities to campaign in election periods.

Forty Lib Dem MPs voted for the bill. Seven voted against: Greg Mulholland, John Pugh, Alan Reid, Adrian Sanders, David Ward, Mark Williams and Roger Williams.

Here is our team voted on the third reading:

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Badgers moving goalposts? It’s the government that’s playing football with badger cull policy

By Andy Boddington | Thu 10th October 2013 - 10:45 am

Dead badger probably roadkillThe badger cull has always been controversial. It has set wildlife groups and animal lovers against farmers. Many argue that it is being pursued against scientific opinion. And now the cull is struggling to meet its targets. The shooters in Somerset should have delivered 1,015 cadavers but so far they have piled up just 600.

What is going wrong? Defra chief Owen Paterson told the BBC: “the badgers have moved the goalposts.” Shame on badgers for not cooperating with a scheme to kill them!

This trial is not about increasing our scientific knowledge of bovine TB in the badger population. If that was the case, the government would be testing the carcases for TB. It is not. We will never know whether the dead brocks were disease carriers.

The trial is about the efficacy of shooting. And the result is that it is not efficacious.

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Reshuffle – Lib Dems demoted at Defra as Heath axed

By Andy Boddington | Tue 8th October 2013 - 9:02 am

David Heath has been sacked as Minister of State for Agriculture and Food at Defra. In his place is North Cornwall Lib Dem MP Dan Rogerson, but at the more junior position of Parliamentary Under Secretary.

Dan Rogerson

In his letter to Heath, Nick Clegg said:

I am very aware of the pressure on you within Defra over the last year, and I am particularly grateful to you for the clarity and objectivity you have brought to issues of animal and plant disease, your defence of environmental issues, your commitment to agriculture and rural areas, and the development of new and exciting policies to enhance our forests.

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Telegraph accused of Labour bias over Miliband’s dad – or was it the BBC? #LOL

By Andy Boddington | Sun 6th October 2013 - 9:36 am

Milk Bottle Politics 200I cannot help but be amused by the coverage of the affair of Ed Miliband’s dad in the Sunday Telegraph.

First up is an article declaring the “BBC accused of becoming Ed Miliband’s mouthpiece.” It seems that Andrew Bridgen, Tory MP for North West Leicestershire – a champion of a living wage for MPs – has reported Auntie to its governors for allowing Miliband to “milk” coverage for Labour’s advantage.

It’s a story on fairly thin ground, but I have long imagined that there is an old adage among right wing journalists. “If in doubt where a story is going next, bash the BBC.”

Of course party politics has had a role in the affair of Ed Miliband’s dad. But it has mostly been a debate about the nature of our press. Above it has been an examination of the character of the Mail’s journalism under Lord Rothmere and its daily weekday editor Paul Dacre. Nick Clegg was forthright on the matter: the Mail is “overflowing with bile about modern Britain”. As I said earlier, that’s just right.

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They shoot planning ministers don’t they?

By Andy Boddington | Fri 4th October 2013 - 1:02 pm

Pickles and Quelch BolesThe planning minister wants to be shot. I’m not making this up. At the Conservative Conference he was asked about Tory proposals for further planning reform after the next election (£). The minister replied: “I’m going to answer it very simply. If I’m still planning minister after the next election, I want you to shoot me.”

Of course, planning minister Nick Boles has form in this territory. Back in May, he said that “if anyone comes to me with an idea for new planning legislation I am going to shoot them” (£). Putting aside the fact that new planning guidance and permitted development rights are gushing out of his department like an overflowing sewer, he’s obviously a man used to swaggering around Whitehall with a gun in his pocket.

But then, as I have noted before, Nick Boles is Mr Quelch from Billy Bunter reincarnated.

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If Alistair Cooke reported the Obamacare standoff: “A real shutdown… not really!”

By Andy Boddington | Fri 4th October 2013 - 9:15 am

Alistair CookeThere are voices from history that cannot be forgotten. Among them is that of Alistair Cooke, a Brit who understood America like no other.

There are times when I really miss Alistair. He had a unique ability to explain to us the seemingly bizarre and sometimes incomprehensible machinations of American politics and government.

Of course, he spoke of much more than politics in his Letter from America broadcasts. His tale of Gershwin and Russian immigration still gives me goose bumps. His lament on the closure of Woolworths captured the aspirations of a generation. He even managed to make golf sound entertaining, even vaguely important.

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The cost of a Lotto gamble doubles. Is this a tax hike on the poor?

By Andy Boddington | Thu 3rd October 2013 - 9:30 am

Lottery ApologiesThe price of the National Lottery doubles today. The odds of winning the top prize remain the same: 14 million to one.

The price hike is being launched by floating giant balls under the world renowned historic Ironbridge. That’s as tacky as it comes. But the Lotto was always a tacky business that supported good charitable causes.

The BBC is finding itself in an awkward position this morning. On the one hand, it has been dragged into Camelot’s campaign to keep ticket sales up. But on local radio at least, there is coverage of why people gamble and gambling’s negative effects. Yet what I hearing and seeing across the news channels is mostly an unadulterated promotion for the lottery.

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Why every minister should know the price of bread

By Andy Boddington | Wed 2nd October 2013 - 6:53 pm

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAIt is a classic journalist’s trap. David Cameron was challenged on LBC Radio. “How much does a value loaf cost?” His guess was “way north of a pound.” “Caught you”, the presenter almost said. A value loaf, in London at least, costs 47p.

Now, I simply did not believe this. To my certain knowledge – until this afternoon – an 800g white loaf costs a full £1. Of course, I was wrong.

I live in a classic rural market town of around 10,000 people, three supermarkets, four convenience stores, a great market, local butchers and bakers, and much more. Ludlow has streets that are amongst the 10% richest in the country. But walk just half a mile from the historic centre and you will find housing areas that are amongst the 10% most socially deprived areas in Britain.

We are a town famous for its food and we have some of the best bakers in Britain. But for so many of our residents, the price of bread really matters.

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