Stephen was Editor (and Co-Editor) of Liberal Democrat Voice from 2007 to 2015, and writes at The Collected Stephen Tall. He writes a fortnightly column for ConservativeHome and 'The Underdog' column for Total Politics magazine. He edited the 2013 publication, The Coalition and Beyond: Liberal Reforms for the Decade Ahead, and is a Research Associate for the liberal think-tank CentreForum. He was awarded the inaugural Lib Dem ‘Blogger of the Year’ prize in 2006, was a councillor for eight years in Oxford, including a year as Deputy Lord Mayor, and appears frequently in the media in person, in print and online. Stephen combines his political interests with his professional life as Development Director for the Education Endowment Foundation, though writes here in a personal capacity. Follow @stephentall
Welcome to the 154th of our weekly round-ups from the Lib Dem blogosphere, featuring the seven most popular stories according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (24th – 30th January 2010), together with a hand-picked quintet, usually courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.
Don’t forget, by the way, you can now sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox – just click here – ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.
As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:
By Stephen Tall
| Sat 30th January 2010 - 12:00 pm
A moment of sympathy, please, for Tory leader David Cameron as he tries to steer a middle ground as the UK falteringly exits recession.
On the one hand, he needs to keep happy his shadow chancellor George Osborne and the die-hard right-wingers at ConservativeHome who are desperate to start cutting public spending now:
Spending cuts need to be extensive and immediate. … We also need to get the pain out of the way as quickly as possible. Waiting until Years 2 or 3 of any Conservative government to cut spending will harm the chances of re-election.
This election will make or break Britain. It is already certain that the government that takes office after the election will face the greatest peace-time crisis we have known since the dark days of 1931… Before any government can begin to get to grips with the economic situation, it must regain the confidence and respect of the electorate.
A big tip of LDV’s hat to Rudolf Fara, co-director of Voting Power and Procedures (VPP) at the LSE (via Politics.co.uk) for pointing out the similarity.
Mr Fara, who was speaking ahead of a lecture last night by Vince Cable setting out his …
Brentwood Tory councillor Keith Parker has shown the caring, sharing side of his party in the last week. PinkNews reports:
A Tory councillor in Brentwood who made a joke about promoting gay rights and help for domestic violence victims has been accused of being offensive.
Keith Parker, the councillor for Brizes and Doddinghurst ward, remarked at a committee meeting last week that the “scream team will be conversing with the queen team”.
Following the meeting, he was criticised by Labour and Lib Dem councillors for the remarks.
Lib Dem Cllr Karen Chilvers told the Brentwood Gazette she had made a formal complaint to
‘Dads will be able to take up to six months’ paternity leave while their child’s mother returns to work, under government plans announced today,’ reports The Guardian.
The Lib Dems’ shadow children, schools and families secretary, David Laws, is deeply unimpressed with Labour’s approach:
The Government fails to understand that all families are different and need far more flexibility when it comes to parental leave. Labour seems to think it knows best when it comes to how families should arrange their lives.
“Instead of more rigid and complex reforms, the Liberal Democrats would introduce fully flexible parental leave which
Lib Dem members on email will have received the following message from the party’s interim chief executive Chris Fox this afternoon advertising the new members’ site, designed to complement the main party website and the ACT social networking website.
Dear Stephen,
Today we are launching the new Liberal Democrat members’ website: www.libdems.org.uk/members
This provides a new channel of communication right across the Party and it is an important resource for all party members.
The new members’ website is there to give you the things you need. It includes our latest news,
Here’s how The Economist’s Bagehot characterised the performances of Gordon Brown and David Cameron at their respective press conferences this week:
On Gordon Brown: “… was his usual funereal self (even if he did manage a decent joke about the date of the general election). I thought he looked exhausted. But what he had to say was relatively upbeat: the recession is over; the government has plans for the “job-rich prosperity” that is just around the corner and an expanded middle class.
On David Cameron: “… was his usual breezy self, cracking jokes, remembering journalists’ names, etc. But what …
The Guardian’s monthly ICM poll, published today, asks a couple of intriguing questions.
For a start, we discover where Lib Dem supporters perceive they sit within the class system (however self-defined) – 50% say they are middle-class, and 48% that they are working-class. This compares with 38% middle-class to 61% working class for Labour; and 56% to 39% for the Tories.
(Slightly bizarrely, it turns out the Lib Dems have more supporters who identify themselves as upper-class (2%) than the Tories do (1%); the poll’s margin of error may explain that finding.)
But the ICM/Guardian question which interested me most …
There can be no “change” whilst the wheels of State rumble on. Changing how the State is run for a few years does not alter the fundamentally evil reasons for which “State” was invented and which it continues to pursue, inevitably.
By Stephen Tall
| Sun 24th January 2010 - 10:45 pm
Welcome to the 153rd of our weekly round-ups from the Lib Dem blogosphere, featuring the seven most popular stories according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (17th – 23rd January 2010), together with a hand-picked quintet, usually courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.
Don’t forget, by the way, you can now sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox – just click here – ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.
As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:
Forget data sets, interquartile ranges and margin of error. The Guardian recently reported the collective wisdom of the wet-fingers-in-the-air of the UK’s pollsters, who met this past week “to refine their methods ahead of the election, and ended with off-the-cuff predictions for the final result.”
And here’s what they came up with:
Statisticians from most of Britain’s main polling companies attended the session, organised jointly by the British Polling Council and the National Centre for Research Methods.
Four of them were brave enough to come up with predicted vote shares for the main parties. Put together they average a shade under 40%
The Tories’ shadow chancellor George Osborne was proud to declare on this morning’s BBC Radio 4 Today Programme that he had been in favour of banking reforms now being championed by President Obama – to break up the big banks – “since last July”. This will come as something of a surprise to anyone who’s been following Tory policy on the banking industry over the past six months.
In fact, let’s take a look at what the Tories were saying last July, the month the party launched its white paper on financial regulation. Mr Osborne put forward six policy …
It’s nine days since Nick Clegg challenged Gordon Brown to volunteer to appear before Sir John Chilcot’s inquiry into the Iraq war this side of the general election “before people decide how to vote on his record in government?” And now it seems that Nick’s pressure has paid off – the BBC reports:
Gordon Brown will give evidence to the Iraq Inquiry before the general election, the BBC understands.
Mr Brown, who has said he is “happy” to face the inquiry whenever called, had been under pressure to do so before the election, which must be held by June.
The inquiry’s chairman is expected to confirm later that the PM will be asked to appear but will not set a date. However, the BBC understands he will appear in late February or early March.
You can re-live the exchange between Nick and Mr Brown, either on video courtesy the BBC or via the Hansard transcript, here on LDV.
Nick has welcomed the Prime Minister’s decision to face the Chilcot Inquiry:
It is well known that the Prime Minister was a key figure in Britain’s decision to invade Iraq. It is only right that Gordon Brown should explain his role in this disastrous foreign policy failure before asking the British people for their vote.”
This is an excellent result for Nick. Good in its own right: the Prime Minister should be asked about his role in the invasion of Iraq. And good for Nick’s growing stature as leader: once again, as over the Gurkhas and Michael Martin, it is Nick who is making the running, and punching above his weight at Prime Minister’s Questions.
This in stark contrast to David Cameron, whose string of lacklustre Commons’ performances are beginning to be noticed even by his friends at The Spectator. Here’s how the magazine’s Coffee House blog compared the performances of Nick and the Tory leader at this week’s PMQs:
The LibDem leader took a pop at Labour with a very smart weapon. He wondered why the government hadn’t acted to stop RBS lending tax-payers’ money to Kraft which is about to sack Cadburys staff. That’s three bogymen in one. … hate him because they can see he’s capable, plucky and politically shrewd. The house has strange ways of honouring talent. …
Cameron risks turning into the Rafa Benitez of Westminster. He’s living on a reputation which is rapidly fading from memory.
US firm Kraft’s proposed takeover of Cadbury’s has made headlines in recent days. First, because it’s a major, historic British brand being snapped-up by a non-UK business (or ‘foreign predator’, as Vince Cable labels them). Secondly, because of the fear that job losses will result. And, thirdly, because of the role of the Royal Bank of Scotland – in which the British government has a majority stake-holding – in lending the money to Kraft which will fund its acquisition of Cadbury’s.
The Lib Dems – in the shape of Nick Clegg and Vince – have sharply questioned the role of the Government in the takeover. At Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, Nick asked Gordon Brown:
… there is a simple principle at stake. Tens of thousands of British companies are crying out for that money to protect jobs, and instead RBS wants to lend it to a multinational with a record of cutting jobs. When British taxpayers bailed out the banks, they would never have believed that their money would be used to put British people out of work. Is that not just plain wrong?
Almost two years ago, in the early weeks of Nick Clegg’s leadership, the Lib Dem parliamentary party managed to tie itself in knots over the question of whether to support a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. In the end three frontbenchers, David Heath, Tim Farron and Alistair Carmichael, quit after defying the party’s three-line whip to oppose a referendum.
Well, Sky News has the interesting story that the party still hasn’t managed to get its line straight and agreed, re-opening that split:
Now it seems to be deja vu all over again, with a new Lib Dem split in voting
Yesterday we announced that Peter Tatchell had won LDV’s annual Liberal Voice of the Year award (open only to non-Lib Dems) in recognition of his fearless campaigning work for international human rights. We emailed Peter to let him know the news, and here’s the message he sent to all LDV readers …
Wow! What an honour. I’m chuffed. Thanks to everyone who voted for me.
What a surprise too. A socialist Green wins Liberal Voice of the Year.
It shows that your readers are non-sectarian and inclusive, putting
values and principles above party politics, which is how it should be.
Alex Finnegan at the Mandate blog has identified Burnley as one of the key seats to watch at this year’s general election, with the Lib Dems tipped to take the challenge to Labour in one of its heartland seats:
With former Government Minister Kitty Usher standing down because of her expenses’ claims, Burnley is the sort of seat the Liberal Democrats need to gain from Labour in order to do well. The Lib Dem candidate, Gordon Birtwistle, is the current leader of Burnley Council and has strong local roots and the Liberal Democrats have performed well in recent local elections.
Congratulations to Peter Tatchell, who has won Liberal Democrat Voice’s third annual Liberal Voice of the Year award – an award which publicly acknowledges the campaigning work of non-Liberal Democrats in promoting liberal values. Peter gained a plurality of votes, with 27%; the runner-up was author and journalist Ben Goldacre, with 20%.
Over 700 votes were cast, and the results were as follows:
On this day, in 1788, Britain established a penal settlement at Botany Bay in Australia; while, in 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt sent the first transatlantic radio transmission originating in the United States to King Edward VII. Even more excitingly, it’s the birthday of AA Milne (b. 1882), Oliver ‘Laurel &’ Hardy (b. 1892), Cary Grant (b. 1904) and Peter Beardsley (b. 1961).
But without further tarrying …
2 Must-Read Blog Posts
What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here’s are two posts that have caught the eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:
The Internet is a fantastic place. It can also be an angry place. Lib Dem Voice has a high quality of passionate-but-reasoned debate in our comment threads, with many of our 30,000+ readers contributing their thoughts and enjoying LDV’s role as “Our place to talk”.
However … it’s not unknown for debate on LDV to get heated, for commenters sometimes to get personal with the authors of articles, or with each other. The editorial collective has generally adopted a laissez faire moderating policy: save a handful of exceptional circumstances, comments are left untouched.
A parish notice here from the LDV editorial collective … Eagle-eyed readers may have noticed that a new person has recently joined the Voice’s team – Sara Bedford.
Sara joined the LibDems as a student in the 1980s, becoming National Chair of YLD (the predecessor to LDYS and Liberal Youth) between 1990-92. After serving as a member of the Federal Executive and Federal Conference Committee between 1991-95, in 1996 Sara settled down to motherhood and serving as a councillor for Abbots Langley on Three Rivers District Council, which has been majority Lib Dem controlled since 1999. She is also an active …
Eric Pickles has, we hear, labelled Paddy Ashdown “frail and confused”. It seems an odd charge for the lifelong political hack and current Tory chairman, Mr Pickles, to level against Paddy – a former Marine, diplomat and spy, who’s placed himself in danger in service of his country more times than Eric’s had hot dinners (no mean feat).
Here’s a picture of Eric.
And here’s a picture of Paddy (taken just last week, I believe).
And now let’s see Eric in action – in his infamous car-crash appearance on BBC1’s Question Time. A cruel person might observe that Eric seems a little, well, “frail and confused” as he tries to justify his second home allowance:
Welcome to the 152nd of our weekly round-ups from the Lib Dem blogosphere, featuring the seven most popular stories according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (10th – 16th January 2010), together with a hand-picked quintet, usually courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.
Don’t forget, by the way, you can now sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox – just click here – ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.
As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:
By Stephen Tall
| Sun 17th January 2010 - 10:20 am
It’s an issue that arouses passions on either side. For some, home schooling is an absolute right, for parents to be able to educate their children in the manner of their choosing without interference from the state. For others, the concern is to ensure that children whose parents are not suitable to home school do not suffer for the rest of their lives as a result.
Where, as liberals, do we draw the line between the rights of parents to know better than the state; and the rights of children to achieve the best possible education?
Now LDV doesn’t, as our readers know, usually focus on individual opinion polls – but this one’s a little out of the ordinary, as it focuses on the voting intentions of teachers. The survey of nearly 4,000 teachers for the education charity the Sutton Trust by Ipsos MORI revealed the following voting intentions:
Labour 25%
Tories 18%
Lib Dems 14%
Here’s what the Independent had to say about the poll in relation to the Lib Dems:
Today’s poll showed the Liberal Democrats lagging behind the two main parties with just 14 per cent. Traditionally, third parties have done well in polls
Five days ago, LDV launched our search for our annual Liberal Voice of the Year, open only to non-Lib Dems, with you, our dear readers, forming the electorate. Voting will close this Sunday, 17th January. Here’s how the votes currently stack up:
11% (69) – Guy Herbert, general secretary of NO2ID, for his campaigning work against the database state;
30% (180) – Peter Tatchell, for his tireless and fearless international human rights campaigning;
13% (79) – Joanna Lumley, for her campaigning for justice on behalf of Gurkha veterans;
2% (13) – Rory Stewart, for his straight-talking common sense on
By Stephen Tall
| Thu 14th January 2010 - 10:20 am
Calls for the First-Past-The-Post voting system to be abolished in the UK were given a real kick-start last year after it became clear – thanks to the work of Lib Dem blogger Mark Thompson – that it was MPs with large majorities who were more likely to be implicated in cheating the expenses system.
It’s obvious if you think about it: if you were given life tenure in a safe seat where the Labour/Tory majorities are weighed not counted, how concerned would you be with the irksome business of being transparent and accountable? To put it bluntly – as …
Nick Clegg pressed Gordon Brown to volunteer to appear before Sir John Chilcot’s inquiry into the Iraq war this side of the general election “before people decide how to vote on his record in government?” The Prime Minister replied that it wasn’t a matter for him. (Odd how when you become the most powerful person in Britain, you seem to lose the power to volunteer to do something inconvenient).
So Nick asked again, telling the Prime Minister he “should insist on going to the inquiry now”, and asking “What has he got to hide?” Again Mr Brown said, “Sorry, guv, more than my job’s worth” (or words to that effect).
Nick still wasn’t happy, so has now written to the Prime Minister, chalenging him to do the decent thing:
Dear Gordon,
I am writing to urge you to indicate immediately to Sir John Chilcot that it is your strong preference to go before the Iraq Inquiry ahead of the General Election.
Following developments yesterday at Alastair Campbell’s hearing, your personal role in the decisions that led to the war in Iraq has now come under the spotlight. The notion that your hearing should take place after the election in order that the Inquiry remains outside of party politics therefore no longer holds. On the contrary, the sense that you have been granted special treatment because of your position as Prime Minister will only serve to undermine the perceived independence of the Committee.
As I said to you across the floor of the Commons today, people have a right to know the truth about the part you played in this war before they cast their verdict o n your Government’s record. I urge you to confirm publicly that should Sir John Chilcot invite you to give evidence to the Inquiry ahead of the election you will agree to do so.
Nick Clegg
Well, I don’t suppose Mr Brown will change his mind – but Nick has at least exposed the Prime Minister’s relief-cum-satisfaction that he can dodge the Chilcot bullet, dominating the main political headlines as a result. And by the time Mr Brown does eventually appear he will be a genuinely powerless ex-Prime Minister so who’ll care what he has to say any longer?
Meanwhile David Cameron asked some windy, unfocused and instantly forgettable questions of the Prime Minister who gave at least as good as he got. Score-draw for theatrics; no-score draw for content.
Here’s Nick’s questions, courtesy the BBC. The Hansard transcript’s below it.
At the same time it betrays the Guardian’s usual unawareness of the party’s democratic decision-making principles. According to the Grauniad, Nick “ordered his party to drop some of its favourite policies”, issuing “instructions” in order to transform the Lib Dem manifesto from “a third-party wishlist” into “a credible agenda for directing a government”.
By Stephen Tall
| Mon 11th January 2010 - 10:50 pm
David Miliband’s reputation has taken a bit of a knock over the past week. Today Labour MP Geraldine Smith went on the record to give her withering assessment, as noted by The Guardian’s Andrew Sparrow:
David Miliband needs to display a more mature attitude, really. … I think he’s yet to prove himself in any capacity. … I think David Miliband is probably finished as a potential leadership candidate. … he hasn’t covered himself in a glory. I think he’s behaved in quite an immature way. Labour party members are very angry about what’s gone on in the last few days.
Strong stuff, even in a backbiting party hellbent on imploding this side of the general election. But I don’t feel much sympathy for Mr Miliband, who has brought his woes on himself.
The big decisions in life are nearly always binary: you either choose to do something, or you choose not to do it.
Peter Martin @ Nonconformistradical.
So you're saying that the correct sentence was imposed albeit for the wrong reasons.
You could be right about the sentence. But we...
Simon Paul your wrong about Lambeth. That is a Green minority administration. The Lib Dems voted to allow the Greens to take up the leadership but given their betraya...
Ben Austin Hi Paul,
Just a correction, the Lambeth Lib Dems are not in coalition with the Lambeth Green Party. The Lambeth Greens are running a minority administration....
Matt Wardman I'm not convinced by heavy targeting of the most wealthy - and 1-2% a year is heavy, no matter how we phrase it. For example as one comparison, an investment i...
Neil Hickman @Simon - I think you should also note that Dan Neidle goes a long way beyond the "oh, we can't possibly touch the obscenely wealthy" position. He specifically a...
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Violent Bonham Carter features on Fake or Fortune?
Have resignations led to a rethink?
High Fell leaflet watch (2)
Peter Martin 
Simon 
Ben Austin 
Matt Wardman 
Neil Hickman 