Author Archives: The Voice

The Voice

“Reform MPs’ pay once and for all, says Clegg”

By The Voice | Tue 14th April 2009 - 10:21 am

From today’s Independent,

The Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg demanded yesterday that Gordon Brown swiftly set a date to discuss MPs’ expenses.

The Prime Minister said last week that the system of pay and perks must be sorted out “once and for all, adding that he was happy to discuss the issue with fellow party leaders.

But Mr Clegg said the email scandal engulfing No 10 had heightened the need for reforms. He said a meeting should be held “without delay to come up with a fair and open way of meeting MPs’ costs”.

He said: “As the events of the Easter weekend have

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Vince Cable – All aboard the 7.15 cattle truck to Westminster

By The Voice | Mon 13th April 2009 - 12:06 pm

Over at the Daily Mail, Lib Dem deputy leader Vince Cable delivers his Easter message, examining the vexed issue of MPs’ expenses. Here’s an excerpt:

This may be a time of national economic peril, but the Home Secretary’s patio heater and the Transport Secretary’s three homes dominate the news. It is now essential that this running sore is dealt with. MPs have to move quickly and decisively to introduce a system that is clear and clean and gives taxpayers value for money.

I was pulled up short when I saw a newspaper headline ‘MPs: They’re all at it’. My first reaction was

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The Voice

Walk with Brian for equality

By The Voice | Sun 12th April 2009 - 3:06 pm

An email drops into The Voice’s inbox from Brighton & Hove Lib Dems, which we are very happy to share:

Liberal Democrats in Brighton and Hove are calling on colleagues from across the South East to join Brian Paddick as he leads the Stonewall Equality Walk. The annual 10km walk takes place on Sunday 3rd May from 1pm meeting at the Royal Pavilion grounds. Last year Lib Dem campaigners raised over £1,200 for Stonewall.

Lib Dem Council Group Leader Paul Elgood said: ‘Come to Brighton and help support Brian as he leads the Stonewall Equality Walk. It’ll be an enjoyable day for

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Brian Paddick – Police leaders must regain control of their subordinates

By The Voice | Sat 11th April 2009 - 12:25 pm

Over at The Independent, former Lib Dem London mayoral candidate Brian Paddick, former Deputy Assistant Commissioner at the Metroplitan Police, examines the force’s mounting problems. Here’s an excerpt:

Seeing the video of Ian Tomlinson being assaulted by a police officer during the G20 protests – an apparently innocent man being subjected to what appeared to be an unjustified assault by a police officer – provoked in me an immediate desire for the perpetrator to be suspended, tried and punished.

On the other hand, having been the victim of “trial by media” myself, I realised the need for an independent investigation, the outcome

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The Voice

Liverpool Lib Dem loses election law breach appeal

By The Voice | Thu 9th April 2009 - 11:19 pm

The Liverpool Echo reports:

A LIVERPOOL councillor failed to have his conviction for breaching election law upheld . Lib Dem Steve Hurst was found guilty in December of delivering a leaflet entitled “Walton Scab”. It attacked sitting Labour councillor Pauline Walton and her firefighter husband in the May 2007 council elections.

But his appeal was dismissed after a three-day hearing at Liverpool Crown Court.

Judge Mark Brown said: “This sort of conduct brings considerable discredit on his party and local politicians in general, at a time when politicians are under the spotlight as never before. This was dirty tactics of the worst

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The Voice

Clegg: make MPs sell second homes to benefit taxpayer

By The Voice | Thu 9th April 2009 - 12:01 am

The Times’s Sam Coates has the story:

MPs should be forced to sell their second homes and return most of the profits to the taxpayer, under plans to be put forward by the Liberal Democrat leader. Nick Clegg moves to outflank both Gordon Brown and David Cameron today with the toughest suggestions to date in the effort to end the damaging row over MPs’ perks and allowances.

Under Mr Clegg’s proposals, to be put forward at a meeting with the Labour and Conservative leaders, MPs would no longer be able to claim mortgage interest payments on expenses and would be compensated

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The Voice

Lib Dems demand criminal inquiry into Tomlinson death

By The Voice | Wed 8th April 2009 - 9:39 am

The BBC reports:

The Liberal Democrats are demanding a criminal inquiry after video footage of the G20 protest showed a police officer pushing over a man who later died.

Newspaper vendor Ian Tomlinson, 47, who was walking home from work, suffered a heart attack afterwards outside the Bank of England in central London.

Lib Dem justice spokesman David Howarth said the footage showed a “sickening and unprovoked attack” by police.

The IPCC is investigating and said it would examine the footage.

Here’s Lib Dem shadow justice secretary David Howarth’s statement on the Guardian video showing a policeman attacking Mr Tomlinson shortly …

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Vince Cable bumper catch-up edition

By The Voice | Tue 7th April 2009 - 9:52 am

If only The Voice more regularly perused the pages of the Daily Mail, we would not have missed Lib Dem deputy leader Vince Cable’s most recent two articles for the paper. (Then again, if The Voice more regularly perused the pages of the Daily Mail we would most likely end up supporting flogging for immigrants, worrying about Facebook giving us cancer, and cheering on the Blackshirts). Anyway, Vince has penned two articles for the paper examining the impact of the economic crisis. Excerpts below – clcik on the headline to read in full:

We’re not going bust, but Gordon has …

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The Voice

Miriam attacks stem cell waste

By The Voice | Mon 6th April 2009 - 1:12 pm

The Independent has the full story:

The wife of the Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has criticised the financial and bureaucratic barriers that prevent British mothers from donating discarded umbilical cords to a national tissue bank.

Miriam Gonzalez Durantez, who married Mr Clegg in 2000, said she wanted to donate the cord blood cells of her third child, Miguel, to a national tissue bank but was told it was impossible.

Cord blood contains stem cells that can be used in transplant operations to treat a range of disorders relating to the blood and immune system, such as leukaemia and anaemia.

The Government has

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The Voice

Taking action on RIPA – what Oldham has done

By The Voice | Fri 3rd April 2009 - 9:20 am

From their press release:

STATEMENT RE: COUNCIL USE OF SURVEILLANCE LAWS

Councillor Howard Sykes, leader of Oldham Council said: “Following a recent review of the council’s use of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000, elected members are now consulted before the act is used in Oldham. This gives the council an additional level of oversight, something that most other council’s in the country do not do …

“During an inspection on 1 January 2009, by the Office of the Surveillance Commissioners, the government body appointed to oversee those allowed to commission surveillance, all of the council’s authorizations for surveillance were lawful.

“We will

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The Voice

Exclusive: party research into effectiveness of bar charts leaked

By The Voice | Wed 1st April 2009 - 7:30 am

Courtesy of the traditional route of documents left on Parliamentary photocopiers, The Voice has seen the results of an in-depth piece of market research the party has carried out into the use of bar charts in Liberal Democrat leaflets and other literature.

The research, including focus groups and a national opinion poll, found that by a margin of 63% – 18% the public disagree with the statement,  “We receive too many bar charts from the Liberal Democrats”.

This margin is likely to please many of the party’s most experienced campaigners, as is the finding that by 72% – 9% people agree with …

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The Voice

“G20 summit is no time for playing politics” – Nick Clegg

By The Voice | Mon 30th March 2009 - 4:26 pm

The Press Association reports,

Radical measures must be decided at the G20 summit or it could become the “fateful moment” when the global recession lurches into an outright slump, Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, said today.

Clegg said the meeting of world leaders in London this week was one of “immense psychological importance” and warned that failure to agree on immediate action could lead to a “dangerous market stampede”.

Disunity could spark further panic among jittery markets, sending the world economy into “freefall” and raising the spectre of a 1930s-style depression.

More too on the party’s website.

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Chris Huhne – Scalpel-sharp intelligence is needed to slash knife crime

By The Voice | Mon 30th March 2009 - 11:21 am

Over at The Times, Lib Dem Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne notes that a cosmetic surgeon helped to cut knife violence by 40 per cent in Cardiff, and asks: why isn’t his no-brainer idea being copied across Britain? Here’s an excerpt:

Nearly 50,000 people have been treated in hospital for knifings since the Government came to power. The toll of knife crime has rightly gripped the media, since there can be few more horrifying thoughts for any parent than to think of their child being attacked by knife- wielding thugs. …

Effective action is about stop-and- search, particularly working from intelligence.

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: David Steel – The night Labour self-destructed

By The Voice | Sat 28th March 2009 - 6:25 pm

Over at the Daily Mail, former Liberal party leader Lord (David) Steel recalls the dramatic evening of 28 March 1979, when the Labour Government lost a confidence motion by one vote, and the then Prime Minister James Callaghan was forced to call an early General Election. It was this election that swept Margaret Thatcher to victory. Here’s an excerpt:

The tension was palpable, politicians from all parties talking and arguing with one another, all speculating about what was going to happen next.

I had never seen the chamber so packed before. Not one of us had the slightest idea what the

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The Voice

Tories the late starters in Islington two-horse race

By The Voice | Sat 28th March 2009 - 6:17 pm

A correspondent not unadjacent to Islington contacts The Voice to note:

Islington South and Finsbury Conservatives have selected their PPC, more than two years after the Liberal Democrats re-selected Bridget Fox to fight the seat.

The Tory hopeful, Antonia Cox, is an investment banker turned journalist who lives in Kensington. She has promised to move into Islington if elected – a pledge she is unlikely to be called on to fulfil. Ladbrokes have given the Conservatives (surprisingly generous) odds of 25/1 to win the seat. The borough has 0 (zero) Conservative councillors. Even the ConservativeHome post announcing her selection

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The Voice

Vince reviewed on tonight’s BBC2 Newsnight

By The Voice | Fri 27th March 2009 - 6:08 pm

A quick plug for a quick plug – in this week’s Newsnight Review (BBC2, 11pm Friday 27th March, and online), Kirsty Wark and the panel will be discussing Vince Cable’s book, The Storm: the world economic crisis and what it means:

Vince Cable’s book The Storm is one of many pieces of non-fiction about to be published which attempt to explain the roots of this economic crisis.

The Lib Dem Treasury spokesman has been called the “sage” of the credit crunch.

He warned years ago about the over-heating housing market, and advocated the nationalisation of Northern Rock months before the

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The Voice

Evan: Labour has dealt serious blow to reform of the monarchy

By The Voice | Fri 27th March 2009 - 3:57 pm

Even as the Prime Minister was, according to the headlines, proving his commmitment to ‘ending anomaly of royal ban on Catholics’, his Government was conspiring to ‘talk out’ Dr Evan Harris’s private member’s bill reforming the right of succession and the laws preventing the monarch marrying a Catholic. Evan was not amused:

Despite the spin from the Prime Minister about amending religious and sexual discrimination in our constitution being a higher priority, the Government has dealt a serious blow to the prospects of reform by talking out my Bill. Jack Straw was asked three times to provide either a timetable,

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Nick Clegg – We need to know why we went to war

By The Voice | Fri 27th March 2009 - 12:59 pm

Over at The Independent today, Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg explains why an Iraq inquiry should examine every detail the Government would like ignored. Here’s an excerpt:

We had the whitewash Hutton inquiry, then the Butler inquiry, but the real truth about the political decision-making that led us into this war has never yet been exposed.

Labour and the Conservatives came together to drag our country into an illegal war: we need to know how that happened so that we make sure it never happens again. The government has finally accepted that it can no longer duck an inquiry. The question now

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Norman Baker – Iraq war inquiry is essential

By The Voice | Wed 25th March 2009 - 6:41 pm

Lib Dem MP Norman Baker has a letter published in today’s Guardian demanding an immediate and full inquiry into the Iraq war, which the Government has said will happen ‘as soon as possible’ after 31st July:

It is welcome that Carne Ross reminds us (March 20) that intelligence available to the government before the invasion of Iraq made it “very clear” that Saddam was not a threat, but it’s hardly a revelation. The confidential Downing Street minute from 23 July 2002 records Jack Straw, then foreign secretary, telling the meeting of senior ministers and officials that the case for

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Vince Cable – The Storm … how to survive it (and how to prevent its return)

By The Voice | Wed 25th March 2009 - 6:29 pm

Over at the Guardian today, there’s a lengthy extract from Lib Dem deputy leader Vince Cable’s about-to-be-published book, The Storm: The World Economic Crisis and What It Means. Here’s an excerpt of the excerpt:

Escaping this crisis will require a combination of approaches, and the mix will vary from country to country. In each case, however, the price for restoring stability will be a greatly increased role for the state in the banking sector. Beyond that, the challenge will be to build a regulatory regime that provides greater protection against systemic risk. After the calamities of the past year, few now

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The Voice

What’s in a name?

By The Voice | Tue 24th March 2009 - 7:03 pm

Question: When is a candidate for the Liberal Democrat Party not a candidate for the Liberal Democrats?

Answer: When he’s attempting to win a vacant parish council seat for the Bruche ward of Poulton-with-Fearnhead Parish Council in Warrington.

The local paper has the story, a nightmare familiar to election agents in all parties:

A CONTROVERSIAL by-election for a parish council seat will not go ahead after the Lib Dem party fluffed its paperwork.

Statements of intent to stand for the Bruche ward of Poulton-with-Fearnhead Parish Council had to be with the parish council clerk by noon on Friday.

But Lib Dem

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Michael Moore – Stop these broken promises

By The Voice | Tue 24th March 2009 - 6:58 pm

Over at the New Statesman, Michael Moore, the Lib Dems’ shadow international development secretary, argues that the G20 summit offers a key opportunity to revitalise the international community’s commitment to development at this difficult economic time. Here’s an excerpt:

The Liberal Democrats believe that the G20 summit offers a key opportunity to revitalise the international community’s commitment to development at this difficult economic time. In an interconnected world tackling the impacts of the crisis on the developing world is not just a moral imperative, but in our own self-interest.

If we do nothing it will not be long before humanitarian crises,

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The Voice

Eating a vegetarian meal = suspicious terrorist activity

By The Voice | Mon 23rd March 2009 - 1:45 pm

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Nick Clegg – Banks’ business is taxpayers’ business

By The Voice | Fri 20th March 2009 - 8:37 am

Yesterday The Guardian ran a piece from Nick Clegg on Barclays and its attempts to keep secret details of how it goes about reducing the amount of tax it pays:

Yesterday Barclays may have won on a point of law. But it cannot run away from the wider point of principle: now our whole banking system relies on the support of British taxpayers, how the banks run their business is our business, too.

So long as these banks are sustained by explicit or implicit Treasury guarantees, they have no right to deprive the Treasury of money by running circles round the taxman.

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The Voice

Former Lib Dem MP raises fear of sword attacker’s move

By The Voice | Thu 19th March 2009 - 12:37 pm

Today’s Telegraph reports on the concerns of former Cheltenham Lib Dem MP Nigel Jones, who was injured, and local councillor Andrew Pennington killed, in a brutal attack during a constituency surgery:

A former MP who was attacked by one of his constituents with a samurai sword fears for his safety after his assailant said he wants to move to a town just nine miles away. Lord Jones of Cheltenham is so concerned that Robert Ashman wants to live in nearby Gloucester that he is meeting Jack Straw, the Justice Secretary, to express his concerns. Ashman, now 58, stabbed and killed

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The Voice

CommentIsLinked@LDV: Nick Clegg – It’s time for a truly different banking system

By The Voice | Thu 19th March 2009 - 12:29 pm

Over at the Yorkshire Post, Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg argues that, after a decade when British banks have been allowed to get away with far too much, it’s high time for real reform of the banking industry. Here’s an excerpt:

I want a return to old-style high street banks so people’s savings are protected from bankers who are obsessed with taking high risk gambles with other people’s money. I propose that banks are given a choice: they can do ordinary consumer business like current accounts, mortgages, business loans, savings, they can even make sensible low-risk investments and we will protect

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The Voice

Lib Dems urge Tories not to join with homophobes

By The Voice | Wed 18th March 2009 - 9:39 am

Lib Dem equalities spokesperson Lynne Featherstone has written to the Tories shadow foreign affairs spokesman William Hague asking him to clarify if his party intends to join forces with a Polish party in the European parliament known for its homophobic remarks. Politics.co.uk reports:

The party in question is called the Polish Law and Justice party. The Tories are being pulled towards them after leaving their grouping in the European parliament – the centre-right European People’s party. It was the culmination of a promise David Cameron made while running to be party leader, but he must now form a grouping with at least six other parties to earn EU recognition and funding.

But Liberal Democrats and Labour warned the party could easily be thrown into the arms of non-mainstream parties, putting them on “the lunatic fringe” of European politics. Senior politicians from the Law and Justice party have made homophobic statements, as well as describing Barack Obama’s election in the US as marking “the end of white man’s civilisation”, the Liberal Democrats said.

The full text of Lynne’s letter to Mr Hague is below:

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The Voice

Poll: 72% back official inquiry into the UK’s role in the invasion of Iraq

By The Voice | Mon 16th March 2009 - 6:01 pm

The BBC reports:

Almost three quarters of British people believe there should be a public inquiry into the invasion of Iraq, an opinion poll suggests. The BBC Radio 5 Live poll also found almost two thirds are not convinced UK soldiers should be kept in Afghanistan. …

The survey, conducted by ComRes for the BBC, found 72% of those questioned believe there should be an official inquiry into the UK’s role in the invasion of Iraq in 2003. This figure increases to 81% in the 18-24 age group.

Just last week, Lib Dem shadow foreign secretary Ed Davey repeated the …

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The Voice

£853 a night – Lib Dems reveal true cost cost of locking up prisoners in police cells

By The Voice | Mon 16th March 2009 - 9:15 am

The BBC reports:

The cost of housing prison inmates in police cells is double the amount previously thought, the Lib Dems claim. The Ministry of Justice says it costs £385 a night to detain an inmate in a police station when prisons are full. But the Lib Dems say the true cost of ‘Operation Safeguard’ is £853 a night – a figure disputed by the government.

The article quotes Lib Dem justice spokesperson Paul Holmes:

For this amount of money, you could stay in the Ritz. … The government’s incompetence in managing our prison system is staggering and has left the

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The Voice

Davey slams Labour’s foreign affairs shame

By The Voice | Fri 13th March 2009 - 2:39 pm

Ed Davey, Lib Dem shadow foreign secretary, has taken to the airwaves today to make the case for inquiries into the two dodgy areas of Labour’s foreign policy – the basis for the war in Iraq, and allegations of British complicity in in illegal abduction and torture.

A full inquiry into the Iraq war

Commenting on the latest evidence to show the extent to which Labour’s spin doctors intervened to ‘sex-up’ the Iraqi weapons dossier prepared by intelligence officials, Ed said on this morning’s BBC Radio 4 Today Programme:

He said the emails show, “there was intervention, and we didn’t know that

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