Author Archives: The Voice

Tim Farron and Lib Dems mark Remembrance Sunday

By The Voice | Sun 8th November 2015 - 10:17 am

As always on the Sunday closest to November 11th, the anniversary of the Armistice in the First World War, the country stops to remember those who have been killed in conflict.

Here are how senior Liberal Democrats are marking the occasion.

Today we stop, honour and remember all those who fought and died for our freedoms. #RemembranceSunday

— Tim Farron (@timfarron) November 8, 2015

This morning i am attending the #RemembranceSunday service at #StChads #FarHeadingley #Leeds pic.twitter.com/I1LeXuaS12

— Greg Mulholland (@GregMulholland1) November 8, 2015

Posted in News | Tagged remembrance sunday | 1 Comment

In Full: Tim Farron’s speech to Yorkshire Liberal Democrat Conference

By The Voice | Sat 7th November 2015 - 4:43 pm

Tim Farron has been busy today. Not only has he been opening our campaign headquarters in Oldham West and Royton (of which more later), but he’s been at the Yorkshire and the Humber Liberal Democrats’ Regional Conference in York. The core speech is not really knew – what he’s delivering as he goes round the regional conference is what they would call in The West Wing “Modified Stump”. Anyway, enjoy.

Here is his speech which is pretty much in full. You can’t make this guy stick to a script – and one thing in particular is how the joke changes as he goes round the country about who comes to the report sessions at Federal Conference. In today’s version he singled out Jennie Rigg along with former LDV co-editor Mark Pack.

Thank you, it’s a massive pleasure to be here – despite the inherent risk for a Lancastrian in crossing the Penines.

Then again, I’m told that York was actually on the side of the Lancastrians in the War of the Roses so I’m sure I’m amongst friends.

What’s more, there one thing that will always unite both sides of the Pennines and that’s discrimination from Westminster against the North!

It’s absurd that it takes me over an hour longer to make the 100mile journey here from my constituency in Cumbria than it would to travel the 200 miles from London. So let me start with a pledge: we need to be absolutely solid in demanding better transport links across the north of England and the early electrification of the cross-Pennine route.

That’s not just self-interest: if this government’s rhetoric about northern powerhouses is to mean anything then it’s time to put up or shut up and that means some real solid investment to enable the north to come together and really take on London and the south east – I mean in a spirit of friendly rivallry of course and we Yorkists and Lancastrians know all about that don’t we?

Posted in News | Tagged speeches and tim farron | 11 Comments

Tim Farron on Lesvos: epicentre of the European refugee crisis

By The Voice | Tue 3rd November 2015 - 5:11 pm

We covered Tim Farron’s visit to Lesvos last week and his raising of the situation at PMQs. Now Tim writes of the experience for politics.co.uk.

At one centre I spoke to Armet from Iraq, who was staying in a UNHCR provided metal shelter for the night with his family. Armet told me that as he got off the boat in Lesvos his seven-year-old son asked him “Is ISIS here too?”

That little boy demonstrates the reality of this crisis. The right-wing press and lazy politicians would like us to believe these are people either coming to Europe for

…

Posted in LibLink | 16 Comments

A bumper Lib Dem Job Watch

By The Voice | Tue 3rd November 2015 - 4:03 pm

If you want to work for the Liberal Democrats, there are plenty opportunities at the moment. Let’s start with opportunities outside the party which may interest Liberal Democrats, though. Are you a campaigner with a passion for Europe? Then Britain Stronger in Europe needs you. They have no fewer than 13 jobs going at the moment:

Field Operations Executive

This is a hands-on position with the Field Operations Executive providing support to staff and volunteer teams throughout the UK.

Essential Experience
• Supporting the delivery of plans designed to identify, recruit and activate volunteers in a campaigning environment, especially young people
• Supporting senior staff in the implementation of campaign activities across the UK

Desirable experience
• Experience of a variety of modern on-the-ground campaign techniques
• Experience of integrating online and offline volunteer and voter contact
• Managing relationships with external suppliers or agencies
• Working in a political or campaign environment and exercising political judgement
• Working in a fast-paced environment and to tight deadlines

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged libdemjobwatch | 3 Comments

“We came home to be greeted with a line of riot police”

By The Voice | Mon 2nd November 2015 - 4:55 pm

On Saturday night – Hallowe’en – the riot police were called to a massive illegal rave in Lambeth. Some rather ugly scenes developed and a petrol bomb was thrown.

Simon Hughes’ former Head of Office, George Turner, lives opposite the site where the rave was held and gives a firsthand account of the incident in his blog, under the headline Nightmare on Whitgift Street.

Posted in News | Tagged george turner | 5 Comments

A familiar face behind a medical breakthrough

By The Voice | Sun 1st November 2015 - 2:45 pm

Did you see the BBC report the other day about how antiretrovirals normally used to treat HIV had enabled a woman with Multiple Sclerosis to walk. The drugs had a dramatic effect:

Shana Pezaro, 36, from Hove, East Sussex, was given antiretroviral drugs after fearing she may have contracted HIV.

Within days, Miss Pezaro noticed an easing of her MS symptoms.

When a doctor saw her walking up stairs after years of using a wheelchair he set up a clinical trial.

Multiple sclerosis is an incurable condition that can lead to sight loss, pain, fatigue and disability. It affects around 100,000 people in the UK.

Miss Pezaro was a dancer and piano teacher before being diagnosed with MS at the age of 28. The condition affected her hands and feet and she used a wheelchair.

If you thought you recognised Shana, you’d have been right. She has made some fantastic speeches at Liberal Democrat Conferences outlining the practical effects of the welfare reforms enacted by the Coalition on people.

She made a video blog from the Birmingham Conference in 2011 which you can see here:

Posted in News | Tagged ms society and shana pezaro | 3 Comments

LDV’s Sunday Best: our 7 most-read articles this week

By The Voice | Sun 1st November 2015 - 1:14 pm

Many thanks to the 12000 visitors who dropped by Lib Dem Voice this week. Here’s our 7 most-read posts…

“Missing the Lib Dems” (29 comments) by Paul Walter

A Labour leopard doesn’t change its spots (44 comments) by Sarah Noble

“Stuff the convention”, says Farron, “Lib Dems will block “cruel, heartless, mean-spirited and misjudged” tax credit cuts” (19 comments) by Caron Lindsay

Posted in Site news | 2 Comments

The #libdemFRIGHTback is go: The 2015 Liberal Democrat Voice Pumpkin Parade

By The Voice | Sat 31st October 2015 - 5:00 pm

It’s Hallowe’en. It’s dark. The streets are starting to fill with witches, goblins, ghouls, zombies and all sorts of scary creatures.

It’s time for the 2015 Liberal Democrat Voice Pumpkin Parade. What have talented Liberal Democrats round the country been carving? Have a reminder of what they produced two years ago.

Don’t for a minute think that we invented that hashtag, by the way. It came from Lib Dem organiser Alice Megan and it’s for that reason that she’s kicking off our festivities:

If there isn’t a Party.Political.Pumpkin competition, there should be… I’d win! #LibDemFRIGHTBack @LibDems pic.twitter.com/DDbIYL8Gvp

— AliceMegan (@alice_bw93) October 29, 2015

Posted in Humour | Tagged featured, halloween and humour | Leave a comment

Farron: Lib Dems will resist Snoopers’ Charter

By The Voice | Sat 31st October 2015 - 10:27 am

It looks like the Tories’ Snoopers’ Charter to be unveiled this week will be the blinged-up version, with even more sweeping powers than they tried to introduce before. Tim Farron told the Independent that the Liberal Democrats would oppose it just like we did in Government:

Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat leader, signalled that he would be prepared to muster his 112-strong bloc of peers to oppose measures which undermined individual liberty. “We would use all parliamentary tools available to us to ensure any proposed legislation is properly scrutinised,” he told The Independent.

“Liberal Democrats will always support proportionate measures to increase our security, but we must not allow cornerstone civil liberties to be swept away. We will wait with interest to see the detail of the draft Bill, as the Tories have long argued for powers that are not targeted and not proportionate. We blocked the ‘snooper’s charter’ in government and would strongly resist any attempt to bring it back.

“It would be a dramatic shift in the relationship between the state and the individual and fundamentally strikes the wrong balance between liberty and security.”

Back in 2012, Nick Clegg almost agreed to this but after interventions, one by angry bloggers who understood the technicalities in a Conference call with a special adviser, he pulled back. Instead, a draft bill was tabled and subjected to scrutiny by a committee made-up of representatives from both Houses of Parliament, including our Julian Huppert. They rejected the plan and you can read their report here. They determined:

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged civil liberties, julian huppert, nick clegg, snoopers charter and tim farron | 4 Comments

LDVideo: Lead not leave, the Lib Dem campaign to stay in the EU

By The Voice | Fri 30th October 2015 - 10:57 am

This video was made at Autumn Conference in Bournemouth. In it, activists, some of whom are also parliamentarians, talk about why they think Britain should stay in the EU. How many can you recognise?

It was great to see so many young people taking part in this.

Posted in News | 3 Comments

“I realised my vote was not enough” – why Wendy Chamberlain joined #libdemfightback

By The Voice | Thu 29th October 2015 - 1:40 pm

One of the highlights of Scottish Liberal Democrat Conference last Saturday was seeing new member Wendy Chamberlain introduce Willie Rennie for his keynote speech.

New member Wendy Chamberlain introduces @willie_rennie pic.twitter.com/4vmfLWl3vh

— Caron Lindsay (@caronmlindsay) October 24, 2015

This is what she said:

Firstly, may I offer my thanks to Sheila Thomson and the Conference Committee for asking me as a new party member to speak and introduce Willie to you to deliver his leader’s speech.

Posted in News | Tagged #libdemfightback, new members, wendy chamberlain and willie rennie | 2 Comments

Cable: Counter-extremism bill will lead to “bland exchange of views” in universities

By The Voice | Wed 28th October 2015 - 8:33 am

The Guardian reports:

The onus placed on universities by the government’s new counter-extremism strategy will lead to inoffensive and bland campus debates without preventing any student radicalisation, according to the former business secretary Vince Cable.

The former Liberal Democrat MP instead says that banning extremist speakers from universities may in fact exacerbate the problem by driving underground hitherto non-violent extremists.

Posted in LibLink | Tagged counter-extremism bill and vince cable | 8 Comments

Tim Farron arrives in Lesvos

By The Voice | Tue 27th October 2015 - 11:52 am

Tim Farron arrived in Greek island of Lesvos (Lesbos) this morning to speak with refugees arriving from Turkey, fleeing conflict in the Middle East.

Posted in News | 12 Comments

Farron on Tax Credits vote: Osborne must go back to the drawing board

By The Voice | Mon 26th October 2015 - 9:03 pm

Commenting on the votes in the House of Lords tonight which resulted in two Government defeats on tax credits, Tim Farron said:

The Government has been forced into an embarrassing climb down. George Osborne must now go back to the drawing board and come back with plans to balance the books that don’t simply attack working families who are already struggling to get by.

We have sent a clear signal to the Tories that the British people will not accept this scale of attack on the vital support they need.

Tonight’s vote gives people hope, but the threat still looms large.

Posted in News | Tagged house of lords, tax credits and tim farron | 42 Comments

In full: Tim Farron’s speech to Scottish Liberal Democrat Conference

By The Voice | Sun 25th October 2015 - 1:15 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

Here is Tim Farron’s speech to Scottish Liberal Democrat Conference in full. The official version obviously doesn’t include his “stuff the convention” departure on tax credits or the bit where he got Aird and Loch Ness by-election winner Jean Davis’s name wrong. He called her June and quickly corrected himself, reminding us that he knows how it feels after the Sun got his name wrong this week.

Enjoy:

Thank you, it’s a massive pleasure to be here – not least because it only took me half the time to get here as it did to get to federal conference in Bournemouth!

But federal conference was the biggest ever, with three times as many members as last year attending for the first time. 500 of them were new members – so thing is, they turned up to everything, even the Federal Executive report. When I was President you were lucky if six people turned up – poor Sal had to cope with a room full of engaged people, keen to ask searching questions. And the constitutional geeks had to cope with the concept of actually having some company for this event!

Posted in News | Tagged scottish liberal democrat conference 2015, speeches and tim farron | 3 Comments

Tim Farron and Sally Hamwee speak out against £20 a week cuts to asylum seekers’ support

By The Voice | Sat 24th October 2015 - 2:42 pm

Posted in News | Tagged asylum seekers, sally hamwee and tim farron | 8 Comments

A lesson for Tim Farron from Justin Trudeau?

By The Voice | Fri 23rd October 2015 - 2:40 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

Liberals around the world are cheered by the Canadian Liberals’ emphatic victory this week. There are many serious lessons we can learn from Justin Trudeau’s party, both in terms of grassroots organisation and messaging. Not for the Liberals any talk of “we’re not them and we’re not them so vote for us”. For months there was a clear message of #realchange. The Canadian Liberals are a bit like Liberal royalty. They can be pretty establishment, but they managed to show that they wanted to reform politics and Canadian society in a way that resonated with people.

This video from May this year shows how Trudeau was happy to step out of the normal space allotted to politicians. He took his kids to Comic Con in Ottawa, wearing a Superman t-shirt and talking about his lifelong enjoyment of the Superman series. It was fun, authentic and natural.

I guess it kind of helped that he didn’t look terribly unlike the movie version.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged Justin Trudeau and tim farron | 10 Comments

Willie Rennie to highlight gender balance in his Conference speech

By The Voice | Thu 22nd October 2015 - 11:58 am

We know that Willie Rennie is determined to improve the appalling gender balance record of the Scottish Liberal Democrats. He has to persuade a party which has historically rejected any proposals for positive action in candidate selection to adopt proposals to be drawn up by a working group made up of himself, Jo Swinson, Sophie Bridger, Sheila Ritchie and Fred Mackintosh. The ultimate aim is for half of Scotland’s Liberal Democrat parliamentarians to be women within 6 years.

The proposals will be debated at the Scottish Party’s Spring Conference just a few weeks before next year’s Holyrood elections. You can’t accuse Willie of not being willing to take a risk. He will be talking about it in Saturday’s speech to Autumn Conference too:

I want our party to change.

All our MPs in the United Kingdom are men. And four out of our five MSPs are men too.

I know many in the party instinctively do not favour positive action but I need to be frank with you. Nothing else has worked.

Posted in News | Tagged gender balance, Scotland and willie rennie | 6 Comments

Lib Dems to table “fatal motion” to halt planned cuts to tax credits

By The Voice | Wed 21st October 2015 - 8:12 pm

The Lib Dem team in the House of Lords has announced that it will table a so-called “fatal motion” to the government’s proposed tax credit reductions.

Zahida Manzoor, our work and pensions spokesperson, will table the motion, which would decline to approve the regulations. If passed, the government will have to come up with a revised version of its proposals.

The motion is additional to a motion by Labour peer, Baroness Hollis of Heigham, which would decline to approve the Tax Credit cut unless the Government puts in place transitional measures.

Posted in News | Tagged tax credits | 42 Comments

LibLink Special: Nick Clegg’s El Pais article: “We are losing the war on drugs”

By The Voice | Wed 21st October 2015 - 3:30 pm

Earlier this month, Nick Clegg wrote for Spanish newspaper El Pais about the need to totally change the way we deal with drug use. Liberal Youth Scotland co-president Hannah Bettsworth, a final year Spanish student, has kindly translated it for us.

On 19^th April next year, United Nations member states will hold a special session in New York to discuss the future of the world’s drugs policy. The starting pistol for government negotiations around the summit was fired last week, in a meeting at the Commission on Narcotic Drugs in Vienna.

The last time an event of this importance was held, in 1998, the meeting was dominated by US Government strategy, which still consisted of the doomed ‘war on drugs’, thought up by Richard Nixon in 1971. (awkward sentence in English) The gathered member states, in a move we can today see as a false collective delusion, solemnly agreed to reach the goal of “a drug-free world in 2008.”

Of course, 2008 came around and nothing happened. Not only had production, supply and use of illicit drugs not been wiped from the Earth, trafficking continued to flourish and bring millions of dollars to organised crime. The well-intentioned efforts of law and order had had hardly any impact in the long term. Violence in origin and transit countries had skyrocketed (in Mexico alone, it is calculated that 100,000 people have died in the war on the cartels since 2006.) Around the world, millions of drug users are still hounded and incarcerated. This serves only to ruin lives – it has no deterrent effect.

Posted in LibLink | Tagged drugs policy, el país and nick clegg | 17 Comments

Farron and Davey attack Tories’ “systematic unravelling” of our commitment to tackle climate change

By The Voice | Wed 21st October 2015 - 12:55 pm

Tim Farron and Ed Davey have written to Davey’s Conservative successor as Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change Amber Rudd to challenge her on her record so far of undermining practically everything the Liberal Democrats brought to the table. They warn her that her actions jeopardise the UK’s chances of meeting legally binding climate change targets. Their full letter is published below:

We are writing to you regarding our concerns for the future of Britain’s renewable industries and our global leadership on climate change.

We are utterly appalled at the systematic unravelling of the renewables industries that is taking place under your leadership. We stand with business executives, trade associations and environmental NGOs and call for an end to this ideological assault on green energy which is economically nonsensical and is undermining Britain’s ability to push for a more ambitious global Climate Change Treaty at the UN in Paris this December.

Despite your statement in May this year that you planned to unleash a ‘solar revolution’, your department has enacted a series of devastating policies which make a mockery of this and will ultimately dismantle much of the work on green policy that the Liberal Democrats achieved in Government, costing thousands of jobs and jeopardising our economic future. Severe cuts to solar and wind subsidies, as well as ending the Green Deal and abolishing Zero Carbon Homes, together mean that progress towards tackling climate change is fundamentally undermined.

Posted in News | Tagged climate change, ed davey and tim farron | 9 Comments

Reinforcements arrive for the Parliamentary Party in the Lords…

By The Voice | Wed 21st October 2015 - 8:55 am

Now that Parliament has returned after the summer recess, the process of introducing the new Peers has come. And, to allow LDV readers to keep up with the new intake, here is the list of new Peers and when they are to be introduced;

26 October – Shas Sheehan (Baroness Sheehan)
27 October – Jonny Oates (Lord Oates)
5 November – Sir Menzies Campbell (Lord Campbell of Pittenweem) and Don Foster (Lord Foster of Bath)
10 November – Lorely Burt (Baroness Burt of Solihull)
19 November – Sir Malcolm Bruce (Lord Bruce of Bennachie)
23 November – Sir Alan Beith (title yet to be confirmed)
26 November …

Posted in News and Parliament | Tagged house of lords | 38 Comments

Lib Dem Lords will try and kill off Tory tax credit cuts as Farron decries Osborne’s “Poll Tax”

By The Voice | Tue 20th October 2015 - 9:30 pm

George Osborne could be told to think again on tax credits by the House of Lords next week if a “regret motion” co-sponsored by Lib Dem peer Archy Kirkwood is successful.

Party leader Tim Farron has asked all Lib Dem peers to support it, making a government defeat possible.According to the Guardian, though, some Labour peers might get the collywobbles about challenging a government’s financial bill. According to the Guardian:

By custom and practice, the peers do not challenge financial measures, but Farron has been arguing that the specific tax credits measure was not in the Conservative party manifesto and was even specifically denied by David Cameron in a leaders’ TV election debate, after the Guardian revealed a document leaked by the Lib Dems showing that the government had been considering cuts to tax credits.

This has also attracted coverage in the Express and Star, Sky News and the Evening Standard.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged archy kirkwood, tax credits and tim faron | 23 Comments

How to get Lib Dem Voice by email

By The Voice | Tue 20th October 2015 - 2:35 pm

Why not join hundreds of other Lib Dem Voice readers in getting our latest headlines by email?

Some people like regularly visiting a site to see if there’s new stories of interest. But if you prefer email, you can instead sign up to get a daily early morning email with a summary of the previous day’s posts from Lib Dem Voice, complete with a note of how many comments each post has got and convenient links to click on if any take your fancy and you want to take a read.

Posted in Site news | 1 Comment

ALDE Congress – feedback needed before Thursday

By The Voice | Mon 19th October 2015 - 4:35 pm

Belinda Brooks-Gordon represents the East of England on the ALDE Congress. She’s asked us to share the report she gave out to members in her region. Please note the looming deadline of this Thursday for amendments to motions to be discussed at the Congress in November.

ALDE Report

The post of President and five, possibly six Vice-Presidents are to be voted on at the ALDE Congress in Budapest from 19^th – 21^st November. ALDE is now the fourth group in the European Parliament, and unable to do accomplish as much as it was able to do when it was the third party (don’t we just know how that feels in Westminster too). The new President certainly has their work cut out.

I was delighted at a briefing for the ALDE representatives and meet a candidate for ALDE Bureau President Hans van Baalen MEP as he laid out his vision. A prominent liberal, Hans spoke of the value of a joint action on sanctions to deal with international threats and of co-operation between liberal parties in the forthcoming referendum, Hans said he and his party VVD of the Netherlands would be helping with the LibDemFightback: “It is vital that we stick together to bring Liberalism together as a force.”

Baroness Ros Scott selected for VP of ALDE Bureau

Posted in News | Tagged ALDE, ALDE congress and belinda brooks-gordon | 2 Comments

Ashdown’s speechwriter Max Atkinson to get an award from the Speechwriters’ Guild

By The Voice | Mon 19th October 2015 - 3:29 pm

We were very pleased to receive an email from Brian Jenner of the Speechwriters’ Guild telling us that Paddy Ashdown’s former speechwriter, Professor Max Atkinson, is to receive an award from them in just over a month’s time:

Dr Max Atkinson is to be awarded a ‘Lifetime Achievement’ award by the UK Speechwriters’ Guild.

The award is being made for his outstanding contribution to the theory and practice of speechwriting and public speaking over the past 35 years.

Dr Atkinson came to national prominence when he used his academic research into the speaking techniques of top politicians, and applied them to a speech delivered by a novice at a party political conference.

The speaker Ann Brennan went on to win a standing ovation at the SDP conference in Buxton in 1984.

The results were made into a ‘World in Action’ TV documentary, produced by Gus Macdonald, (now Baron Macdonald of Tradeston).

Dr Atkinson published the results of his research in a book called Our Masters’ Voices.

Posted in News | Tagged max atkinson, paddy ashdown and speechwriters' guild | 2 Comments

Five posts from five years

By The Voice | Mon 19th October 2015 - 10:55 am

We thought it might be fun to take one of our occasional trips down Memory Lane to see what we were writing about on this day in 5 of the 9 years of our existence.

19th October 2006

Pre the Crash, leader Ming Campbell takes Labour to task on poverty and talks about, guess what, a fairer society. Who says we are inconsistent. Worth reading as much of it is relevant now.

I am determined to take the fight for a fairer Britain into the mainstream of British politics, and into the heartlands of the Labour Party.

I am determined to show that defeating poverty and increasing opportunity does not mean creating a state of dependency.

I am determined that Britain should not simply swap the days of calculated neglect under Mrs. Thatcher for years of benign neglect under Mr. Cameron.

I am determined to show that there is an alternative to the Dependency State of Gordon Brown.

I am determined to show that there is a sustainable way to remove the scourge of child poverty that does so much to undermine our social cohesion.

I am determined to show that way is the Liberal way.

The mainstream, not the centre, but essentially means the same thing.

19th October 2008

Posted in News | Tagged nostalgia | 1 Comment

Wilson Doctrine: Carmichael says Lib Dems will demand protection for journalists, lawyers & parliamentarians from state snooping

By The Voice | Thu 15th October 2015 - 12:25 pm

Liberal Democrat politicians have reacted with alarm to yesterday’s ruling on the Wilson Doctrine The Investigatory Powers Tribunal basically shrugged off Harold Wilson’s declaration in 1966 that MPs’ phones would not be intercepted without him knowing, saying that it had no basis in law.

This comes on top of two Police forces abusing their powers to try to find journalists’ sources. If an MP, or a lawyer, or a journalist is investigating the Government for doing something it shouldn’t, the idea that the Government could snoop on that investigation is alarming.

This is why Liberal Democrats from across the UK have been quick to demand appropriate protections. Home affairs spokesperson Alistair Carmichael said:

This ruling could have a chilling effect on democracy in the UK. MPs, MSPs and other elected representatives must have the ability to talk to their constituents without fear that their private communications are being routinely monitored by intelligence agencies.

It was reported earlier this year that changes in guidelines meant the Wilson Doctrine no longer applied to MSPs. Now it has been confirmed the doctrine never offered democratically-elected representatives at Holyrood any protection at all. The response of the Prime Minister to this risk to freedoms is just plain weak. We need urgent answers from the UK government.

The Liberal Democrats will be demanding journalists’ sources, legal professional privilege and protection of the communications of democratically-elected representatives are all given a strong legal basis and protection in the new Investigatory Powers Bill.

Posted in News | Tagged civil liberties, interception and wilson doctrine | 7 Comments

Tom Brake on why Liberal Democrats opposed George Osborne’s Fiscal Charter

By The Voice | Thu 15th October 2015 - 10:55 am

It’s all quite simple, really – the Liberal Democrats, unlike Labour, were not going to fall into Osborne’s trap. Here is Tom Brake’s speech from last night’s debate:

The Liberal Democrats will not support the charter tonight. Whatever the machinations in the Labour party, our reasons for opposing it are clear: the charter is just as much about fantasy economics as was Labour’s magic money tree. We remain committed to abolishing the structural deficit by 2017-18, and to seeing debt fall as a percentage of GDP in the following years. We will not, however, abandon the critical need for continued investment in infrastructure, and we will ensure that our economy remains competitive in the medium and long term. We are for sound and stable economic policy—something that sadly has been abandoned first by the official Opposition and now by the Government.

Posted in News and Parliament | Tagged economy, Parliament and tom brake | 10 Comments

Tom Brake to fast in support of Shaker Aamer

By The Voice | Thu 15th October 2015 - 8:39 am

From today, friends and family of Shaker Aamer, the last British resident left in the notorious Guantanamo Bay prison camp, will be fasting in support of him. They will go without food for a minimum of 24 hours to highlight his plight. From the Fast for Shaker website:

On 25th September 2015, the US told the UK that Shaker Aamer, the last British resident held in the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, will be released and returned to his family in the UK after being held for nearly 14 years without charge or trial.

By US law, 30 days’ notice must be given to Congress before any prisoner can be freed from Guantánamo, and in the meantime Shaker has embarked on a hunger strike protesting constant and ongoing abuse and his fears that, in his weakened state, he won’t live to see his family again.

To show solidarity with Shaker, his lawyer Clive Stafford Smith, celebrities, MPs, Shaker’s family, campaigners and supportive members of the public are pledging to undertake a hunger strike of their own, starting on 15th October, for a minimum of 24 hours.

Liberal Democrat MP Tom Brake has pledged to fast next Monday:

Posted in News | Tagged human rights, shaker aamer, tom brake and torture | 2 Comments

Op-eds

Recollections of 9/11 (George Cunningham)
Why we need a Trade NATO (Dominic Sokalski)
‘I Fear a Target on My Back’ — A Liberal Democrat’s fight for Hong Kong’s freedom (Alan Dai)
Making the most of the Government’s belated action on illegal Israeli settlements (Jonathan Brown)
Somerset’s farmers are on the front line of climate change (Sarah Dyke)

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