Author Archives: Nik Alatortsev

Opinion: Dealing with critics on our own terms – graduate contributions

By Nik Alatortsev | Tue 28th August 2012 - 11:21 am

At an ALDC conference a number of weeks ago now I was encouraged by Nick Clegg’s call to be brave enough to “deal with our critics on our own terms” rather than accepting the (often false) basis for their criticisms and trying to explain away the difficult choices our party has had to make since May 2010.

So it got me thinking: why not develop our own narrative about the issue that has arguably caused us the most grief?

By accepting the premise of calling the charges incurred by students entering university from this year “tuition fees”, we tacitly accept that these are indeed fees which students pay for their tuition. Which gives the impression – thanks to all the uproar at the time the system was reformed, back in late 2010/early 2011, from the Labour Party and the NUS – that these are indeed upfront charges that students have to pay to go to university.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged tuition fees | 33 Comments

Opinion: the forgotten deadline in the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill

By Nik Alatortsev | Fri 3rd December 2010 - 12:22 pm

With the Yes to AV campaign getting into full swing (and attempts by the No camp to do the same), it is perhaps unsurprising that the majority of the recent commentary on the Parliamentary Voting System and Constituencies Bill has revolved around Part I of that Bill, which deals with the AV referendum (and the earlier post on LDV by Keith Sharp about the message of the pro-AV campaign is essential reading). But in the excitement, we seem to have allowed a very significant deadline to pass by – the deadline for the compilation of Electoral Rolls on …