Author Archives: Max Parish

On liberalism and NIMBYism

By Max Parish | Wed 12th August 2015 - 10:26 am

I was delighted to see Tim Farron taking on housing as a personal campaigning priority. In order to do this effectively, though, he will sooner or later need to take on a culture of expedient NIMBYism in his own party.

Local campaigns against new development are often highly effective in garnering media attention and engaging people who might join or support the party. At times, they are also the right thing to do for an area. At other times, however, they can be opportunistic and exaggerated: in a recent example I came across, a local party deliberately misinterpreted a proposal in a non-party, think-tank style report on the housing crisis for a concrete, Conservative plan to pave over a large swathe of the district. Local campaigns which proudly ‘see off’ developers may leave a legacy of usable sites remaining derelict for years, and seek to spin this as some sort of victory over vested interests, when in fact it is anything but.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged housing and tim farron | 57 Comments

A smaller state is a liberal ideal to be proud of – the question is how you get there

By Max Parish | Wed 5th August 2015 - 12:54 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

New leader, new members, wins in the Lords – the fightback is on. But Liberal Democrats shouldn’t ditch the crucial debate about what the party is for.

A values-driven blueprint for opposition is essential, but doesn’t answer the killer question. If the Lib Dems didn’t exist, why invent them? The party cannot simply become a vessel for virtue signalling. I believe that a bold, liberal vision should rest on a progressive case for a smaller central state.