Author Archives: Tim Farron MP

Tim Farron is Liberal Democrat Spokesperson on Agriculture and MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale.

Tim Farron: Time to end pointless housing targets

Be honest. When did you last collect a campaign leaflet from the doormat, see a six-figure housing target, and scream, “this is the Party for me!”?

Probably never.

Why? First, because everybody knows housing targets are empty slogans. No Government has hit their magic number since 2007, but they’ve never been held accountable for missing it. Second, every Party picks the same number… or tries to out-do the other lot by 50,000.

On Saturday evening, Conference will debate and vote on Policy Motion F20: Building Communities. I’m supporting an Amendment to the Motion which increases local authorities’ compulsory purchase powers, ensures that 40% of new build houses are social homes, and erases the proposed national target of 380,000 new homes per year.

And if anybody suggests the removal of this target is in any way NIMBY, they are… well, let’s put it politely – they’re totally wrong.

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Tim Farron: Planning reforms are an ineffective, illiberal and dangerous power-grab

There is a housing crisis in this country and it has been going on for years. Lack of housing is forcing people out of their areas where they grew up, while high rents mean young people cannot afford to save for a deposit. That’s why Liberal Democrats want to build 300,000 new homes a year, including 150,000 homes for social rent.

But decisions on local housing should be made by local authorities working with their communities. Not by Tories in Whitehall. Local authorities, working with their communities, know best where homes are needed and what infrastructure is needed to support them.

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Why the Liberal Democrats campaigning to back British Farmers

Liberal Democrat agricultural spokesperson Tim Farron explains why his party is launching a campaign to Back British Farmers.

British farmers have been let down by the Conservatives. They’ve been promised that British standards will not be undermined, yet this hasn’t been guaranteed in law.

They’ve been promised that levels of funding will be maintained, yet the transition will see huge amounts of income lost.

And the Government is still expecting our farmers to be the stewards of our landscape, and work with us to cut emissions and help maintain and improve our natural environment – but if they’re not careful there won’t be any farmers left.

Family farmers are the backbone of our countryside, and that’s why the Liberal Democrats are launching a campaign to ‘Back British Farmers.’

Protect

Alongside launching this campaign, I am introducing a Ten Minute Rule Bill in Parliament to create a new environmental and agricultural regulator, to better protect our farmers and our natural environment.

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Tim Farron writes…Theresa, put your country first

The largely confected outrage at the EU rejecting the Chequers deal has made me reconsider my view of Theresa May. It seems she is more canny than I had thought, and not in a good way.

I often stick up for the PM, at least on a personal level. I go back a long way with her. In the 1992 general election, we toured the working men’s clubs of North West Durham together as we each cruised to a heavy defeat at the hands of Labour’s Hilary Armstrong. Theresa and I didn’t become best mates or anything but I learnt to admire her for her determination and unfussy straightforward approach. She was a Conservative, but she seemed to put duty before party politics.

Chequers has made me question my opinion of the PM’s approach and here is why:

The EU very clearly stated two years ago, and consistently restated, that they would not accept a proposal of the Chequers sort, so who seriously thought that the EU was ever going to accept Chequers? Was the PM hopelessly deluded? I don’t think so.

Chequers would have only given us a single-market type deal for goods, not services. Services make up 80% of our economy, so Chequers would only have been marginally better than no deal.

Nevertheless the proposal was presented as a kind of ‘soft Brexit’ and dressed up to be a reasonable compromise.

Isn’t it obvious now that the Prime Minister drew up Chequers fully expecting it to be rejected by the EU? In fact, they were more than just expecting to be rebuffed, Theresa May and her advisors were clearly banking on it. It was all part of the plan. Not part of the plan to secure any kind of deal with the EU you understand, but the plan to shift the blame and have a shallow political win.

Canny and disgraceful.

Chequers was a deliberately crafted Aunt Sally ready to be knocked down in order to give the Government the opportunity to make a disastrous no deal Brexit someone else’s fault. And the best kind of someone else: the nasty foreigners!

Which begs the question: Surely Boris Johnson, David Davis et al knew that Chequers was never actually going to happen? Surely they knew that it was only a ruse to make the UK government look reasonable and the EU look nasty? I assume that the thinking behind this strategy was discussed at Chequers? Isn’t that why Boris Johnson toasted the PM after the deal was agreed by ministers? So, why did they break ranks – why on earth did we get the flurry of resignations starting with David Davis and culminating in some little-known PPSs?

I can only assume that David Davis had an attack of vanity, and spied an opportunity for some welcome publicity. What fun to have the chance to be vaunted by the right wing press as some kind of Tory Robin Cook!

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Tim Farron writes: Corbyn is handing the incompetent Tories the next election

The guilty pleasure of my political life is the years I spent involved in student politics. Back in the late 80s and early 90s, I attended no fewer than 10 conferences of the National Union of Students – as a result I accidentally became a connoisseur of the various factions of theLabour party. Even as a Liberal, if one spends much time in student politics you are bound to make friends with folks in Labour. To me, Labour is like a fascinating enemy country. We are at conflict with them, but I am somehow fond of their natives and traditions.

Those who today are running Her Majesty’s Opposition, were – back then- selling newspapers outside the Student Union building. Who’d have thought it?

I don’t know Jeremy Corbyn very well but quite like him on a personal level having had the occasional chat over the years. WhenLabour were in power, he was always in the Lib Dem lobby…

Jeremy and his former newspaper selling mates have a problem. They don’t know how to talk to people who aren’t already converted. Jeremy Corbyn has a 40 year history of talking only to friendly audiences on left-leaning causes. He speaks in favour of Palestine to pro-Palestine meetings, speaking up for Irish Republicanism to pro-Republican audiences, promotes unilateral nuclear disarmament to crowds who already agree with him.

The Labour leader is a master of preaching to the converted. I’m not sure how principled this is, but it is neither brave nor wise. If all you do is to go with the grain of the earnest and like-minded people around you, you will ruffle no feathers, win no converts and never get to test the effectiveness of your arguments.

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Tim Farron MP writes…Vision before vanity

Former leaders probably shouldn’t write articles in the run up to a party conference, but here goes…

Let’s start by turning the clock back eleven years.  In September 2007 we arrived at our conference in Brighton with Ming Campbell as leader, expecting an early election.

Gordon Brown had just succeeded Tony Blair as Prime Minister without a fight.

Actually, there had been quite a fight as the Blair / Brown psycho drama had played out over the course of a fractious decade in Downing Street.  But there had been no electoral contest as Gordon took the top job.  David Miliband had bottled it, and John McDonnell had tried and failed to get enough signatures to get on the ballot paper.

Perhaps this one horse race struck many in Labour as not being terribly healthy and whilst they might not have sympathised with McDonnell’s hard-left views, they felt – on reflection – that it would have been better if he had got enough signatures to ensure that Brown had to experience some democracy before stepping into Tony’s shoes.

I suspect that McDonnell’s experience led to many Labour moderates choosing to sign the nomination forms of Diane Abbott in 2010, and of Jeremy Corbyn in 2015… A word to the wise: never back someone if you don’t want them to win.

Whatever we Liberal Democrats might have said at the time about his lack of democratic legitimacy, there really wasn’t an enormous clamour for Brown to seek his own mandate having taken on the role a few months earlier.  After all in 2005 Blair and Brown had very much been presented as a joint ticket.

Nevertheless, Labour looked good in the polls.  They were ten points ahead of a fairly wobbly looking Cameron and Osborne (who looked like a kind of very wealthy, poor-man’s Blair and Brown, if you see what I mean…).  Brown fancied his chances of crushing the Tories and so the weather was set fair for an October 2007 election.  Westmorland and Lonsdale Liberal Democrats had 40,000 flying start leaflets printed, 25,000 target letters stuffed and a thousand poster boards pasted up ready…

But – two weeks after our conference – on the same day that the England Rugby Union team surprisingly defeated Australia in the 2007 World Cup semi-final, Gordon Brown delivered his own surprise.  He backed down, there would be no early election.  A decision that trashed his reputation and ultimately led to his defeat in 2010… and to the formation of the coalition.

Gordon’s decision to march his troops back down the hill was to make a difference to the Liberal Democrats in 2010, but it also affected us there and then in 2007.

Ming Campbell had taken on the mantle of leading the party in the sad turmoil after Charles Kennedy’s resignation in early 2006. Ming chose to step down following Gordon Brown’s announcement that there was no longer the prospect of an early election. Ming gave immense service to the party by putting his own ambition to one side in the party’s interest.

In the Autumn of 2007, the party needed an Acting Leader to take the helm.  Up danced our Deputy Leader Vince Cable. Having been PPS to Ming, I became Acting PPS to the Acting Leader – I was the lowest of the low!  But I got to see first hand the cross-party respect that Vince built, not only for his deft handling of PMQs (who could forget his observation that Gordon Brown had transformed from Stalin to Mr Bean?) but also for his integrity.

Fast forward eleven years, and as we gather again in Brighton this September, Vince is back at the helm of the party, and has shown the same selfless strength that Ming showed in 2007.    

As we approach the third decade of the 21st century, the structures of all political parties are still locked into the Victorian model.  Reform is greatly needed. Not everyone will agree with the proposals that Vince has put forward for reform, but the fact that he has put the cat among the pigeons and opened up the debate should be seen as visionary and vital.

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Tim Farron MP writes: Lib Dems would restore decency and dignity for refugees

The sight of refugees arriving on the Greek coast in 2015 will never leave me. It’s not the sort of thing you forget.

Parents and children were packed onto makeshift boats in search of safety, fleeing Syria, Iraq, Eritrea and other brutal conflicts around the world.

This isn’t a ‘refugee crisis’, even if that is what we have ended up calling it. It is a crisis of violence and persecution, with dictators and murder squads killing and displacing families across the world. Refugees are the human face of what has gone so badly wrong. 

Refugee Week is underway (it is World Refugee Day tomorrow), which is a timely reminder of Britain’s role supporting people who have been forced to flee their homes, both in the work we do in refugee camps around the world and in how we treat asylum seekers who make it to our shores and ask for help.

The current system lacks decency and dignity. The Lib Dems would restore these values.

Firstly, and crucially, the quality of asylum decisions is nothing short of a national scandal. The Home Office wrongly refuses people sanctuary so often that around 40% decisions are overturned on appeal each year. The result is that people who have already endured so much are left scared and uncertain, when they should have been promised safety here much more quickly. 

This can’t be allowed to continue. The whole process needs reform, from top to bottom.

We shouldn’t just focus on decisions, though. Even as the government focuses on improving integration in our country, for example, asylum seekers are barred from working. 

Work helps people integrate, learn English, and contribute to society – all things asylum seekers badly want to do.

So let’s join-up government a bit better and give people the chance to work if their asylum claim is delayed. There is nothing liberal about forcing people who can work to sit around all day doing nothing. 

Plus we should celebrate what we already do well, and plan for how to do more of it.

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The Calais ‘Jungle’ One Year On

Today marks one year since the makeshift refugee camp in Calais known as the ‘Jungle’ was demolished.

Three weeks after becoming leader I got to visit the Jungle for myself, and the experience was both eye-opening and heart-breaking. The word ‘jungle’ is actually not an appropriate or accurate description of what these desperate people had built for themselves. It was more like a city. It sprawled for miles. Conditions were grim, but it was amazing to see the strength and grit of the people living there, despite the unimaginable situation they had …

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Tim Farron writes: A nuclear weapons-free world?

 

I recently revisited an article that I wrote ahead of Autumn Conference in 2015. My article opened with the line, “Another Lib Dem conference and we find ourselves talking about our nuclear deterrent once more.”

And they say politics has changed in the last eighteen months!

In York this week, we will again debate the future of the UK’s nuclear deterrent. At conference’s request, the FPC has commissioned a policy paper on nuclear weapons (pdf). The paper, written by party members after long consideration, advocates a step down the nuclear ladder by moving to a medium-readiness posture, and proposes an end to continuous at-sea deterrence. It also calls on the UK to become a leader in the disarmament and control of nuclear weapons. This position reflects the UK’s continued need for a minimum nuclear deterrent, suitable for the 21st century, which sits alongside the Liberal Democrats’ commitment to working for a world free of nuclear weapons, working within international institutions, particularly the UN.

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Tim Farron’s New Year Message: Don’t shrug your shoulders. Get involved.

2016 was a year when the unexpected happened.

Britain voted for Brexit. Donald Trump is going to be President of America. Leicester City won the Premier League.

So what you won’t get from me are any predictions for 2017.

We go into the New Year surrounded by uncertainty.

The Government has no plan for Brexit. No plan for life outside the Single Market.

Our NHS and social care system is in crisis.

We have a refugee crisis on our doorstep.

There is widespread insecurity in our economy, in our world and in the lives of too many of our fellow citizens.

If you believe, as I do, that Britain is at its best when it is open, tolerant and united, then 2017 is a year when you must make your voice heard.

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Tim Farron writes… “Help me to help the fight against homelessness”

This week is the 50th anniversary of the ground-breaking BBC film Cathy Come Home, the gripping and controversial 1966 film about poverty and homelessness.

It tells the story of Cathy and Reg, a couple with three young children who find their life spiralling into poverty when Reg loses his job. Cathy is left homeless and her children are taken away.

The film had a profound impact on me as a teenager. I watched it and decided to join Shelter. Then I realised I could do even more by getting involved in politics.

Although in the last 50 years there have been some changes, …

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Tim Farron writes: Good wishes to mark Eid al-Adha

As more than 2 million Muslims from around the world, including thousands from the UK –  mark the end of their holy pilgrimage of Hajj in Mecca, I would like to extend my warmest wishes to everyone celebrating Eid al-Adha.

Eid al Adha’s themes of reflection, sacrifice and charity seem more and more relevant each year given the global challenges we face. For those suffering oppression across the world, we must continue to work towards peace, safety and security.

These values of tolerance, compassion and generosity towards one and other are at the heart of Islam and the heart of Eid – …

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Tim Farron MP writes…A Liberal Democrat plan for Britain in Europe

Today, I am announcing a plan to keep Britain at the heart of Europe. First and foremost, I believe the British people should be given the right to vote on the government’s negotiated Brexit deal.

Voting for a departure is not the same as voting for a destination. This is not an attempt to re-run the first referendum; we must respect the result. But the British people should be allowed to choose what comes next, to ensure it is right for them, their families, their jobs and our country. Our relationship with Europe affects our economy, our security, climate change, our influence in the world and so much more.

Until people get that choice, we will hold the Conservative Brexit Government to account and fight to make sure that Britain gets the best deal possible. So I am also setting out our approach on everything from the triggering of article 50 to the rights of EU citizens in the UK. While all the other parties are ducking these vital issues, we are tackling them head on. These questions are simply too important to ignore.

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Tim Farron MP writes…The Government must deliver for refugee children 

In October 2015 I used my first PMQ as leader to urge David Cameron to give a home to 3,000 vulnerable unaccompanied children who had fled war and persecution and were now in Europe. Save the Children, who launched the campaign, had calculated that 3,000 was the UK’s ‘fair share’ of the 26,000 unaccompanied children estimated to have arrived in Europe since the start of the refugee crisis. Six months on and with the numbers of unaccompanied children in Europe having skyrocketed to 90,000 the Government has finally capitulated in principle to take some children from Europe.What started as a …

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Tim Farron MP writes…The liberal challenge on immigration

It’s not often that regional elections in other European countries get much attention in our press, let alone become headline news. The fact that elections yesterday in a handful of German states made front pages here today demonstrates the unusual situation Britain and Europe find itself in. It also highlights the growing need for strong, liberal voices across our continent.

Those of you who heard my speech on Sunday, or in fact have heard me speak since I became leader, will hopefully have a sense of my beliefs on the refugee crisis and on the wider issue of immigration. Our government has tended to bury its head in the sand, but with no short term end to the conflicts scarring the Middle East and climate migration on the rise, we cannot let a policy of ignorance be maintained.

More than ever, it is our responsibility as liberals to stop the immigration debate descending into hard line, xenophobic rhetoric that sets community against community. The relative success of Alternative fur Deutschland in these German elections shows how challenging that can be. Especially when the “pro-immigration” parties in Germany still vastly outweigh the anti, just one story makes better headlines than the other. Similarly, here in the UK, we would be foolish to think the decline of UKIP will see an end to the blaming of the other. 

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Tim Farron MP: We must show the world we mean business on diversity

It’s International Women’s Day, when we celebrate the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women.  But, the IWD website reminds us, the latest estimate of the World Economic Forum is that, at the present rate of progress, full parity between genders will not be achieved till 2133.  Our record in Britain, while improving, is doing so painfully slowly.  The pay gap between genders has not closed in spite of legislation, and has remained relatively consistent for the past 20 years.  Britain elected more female MPs than ever in May 2015, but still sits at 48th in the world league table, behind many of our European neighbours, and behind some of the world’s poorest nations. Lindsay Northover is right to point out that had it been based on the Lib Dems, the UK would be bottom, grouped with Yemen and Qatar.

Why is that? Well, because we have no women MPs any more, just 26% of our approved parliamentary candidates are women, and women are under-represented on many of our internal party committees.  We are in a similar situation where BAME, LGBT+ and disabled members are concerned.  I don’t know about you, but I find that shaming for a party that holds equality as one of its fundamental commitments.  In our constitution, we say that we “oppose all forms of entrenched privilege and inequality.” It’s time to show that we practice what we preach. 

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Let’s celebrate LGBT history month

LGBT history monthLGBT History Month is a wonderful opportunity for us all to celebrate LGBT’s contribution to society and promote a more equal and diverse society which benefits us all.

The Liberal Democrats have been steadfast in campaigning for LGBT equality and inclusion working with a variety of organisations to make sure that a multiplicity of voices are heard and considered in Westmister and beyond.

The last Parliament marked a historic step in challenging the status quo. The Equal Marriage Act driven by the Liberal Democrats in Government was celebrated up and down the country but it is not always just the big things that count. We have been calling for proper sex ed in schools, an end to discrimination against transgender individuals by the state and better representation of LGBT individuals in public life. This change will not come overnight but I am certain that with a coalition of organisations, activists, politicians and public personalities all working together with common purpose change will come.

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Tim Farron’s New Year Message: 2016 can be a year of hope and opportunity

The New Year is a time to look forward and it is as important for us as a party to set ourselves new goals and ambitions as it is as individuals.

I am determined that the Liberal Democrats face the new year with a new sense of purpose, a new drive and a sense of ambition.

David Cameron and Jeremy Corbyn both lead parties that are fundamentally divided. Whether it is over Europe, like the Conservatives, or their leader, like Labour, both the government and the official opposition are at war with themselves.

This obsession with their own internal problems is bad for politics and bad for Britain.

For the Conservatives, David Cameron and George Osborne are more and more obsessed with appeasing their backbenchers, resulting in policies that are punishing people that are trying to provide for themselves and their families. To make things worse, they are taking a wrecking ball to public services, particularly local government.

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Tim Farron MP writes…Thanks to our team in Oldham West and Royton

I am not going to sugar-coat it, the result in Oldham West and Royton is disappointing.

It was always going to be tough. Liberal Democrats have never won this seat and the highest we have ever finished is third.

But, nevertheless, I am hugely proud of Jane and the campaign the team has run. I cannot thank her, Claire, Nassar, Lisa and Chris enough.  They went above and beyond.

Jane worked tirelessly and was a great candidate for the party whether it was in hustings on the television.

It is has been great to get back to pounding the streets and even better to see so many new activists getting involved.

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Tim Farron writes… continuing the fight against the affordable homes flog off

 

I made it clear over the summer and in my conference speech that housing and homelessness would be a top priority for me as leader. I said we would oppose the Right to Buy extension to Housing Associations and fight the Government tooth and nail in the Lords.

The fight is now well underway. I have been speaking in Parliament and will continue to lead our campaign in the House of Commons. After Christmas the legislation will be debated in the Lords, where our Lib Dem team will aim to cause the Government serious problems – which they have shown us in the last few weeks that they can do!

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Tim Farron MP writes: We need a holistic approach to eliminate domestic violence once and for all

Today is the Comprehensive Spending Review and all eyes will be on The Chancellor. However, it is also the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, marking an issue that affects all of us in the UK and across the globe.

Here in the UK domestic violence continues to be a horrific, often hidden scar on our society. Websites such as Counting Dead Women are a terrible reminder of the human cost of violence against women. Figures show that one in four women will suffer domestic abuse in their lifetime and two women are killed by partners each week. It is incomprehensible to me that more isn’t being done to eliminate this abhorrent crime.

We need to make sure that women feel they can speak out and get the help they need so they aren’t left trapped in their own homes. Women’s Aid have said that on average a woman will have suffered 35 separate incidents of domestic violence before going to the police. We need to ask ourselves why.

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Tim Farron MP writes…Come and help Jane Brophy in Oldham West and Royton

Tim Farron & Jane Brophy OldhamThis party has given me so much. I joined as a 16 year old and it has given me lifelong friends and an extended family.

Today I am asking a favour from you. I hope you know me well enough to know that I only do that when it matters. I am asking for your help to support my good friend Jane Brophy and our Oldham West & Royton campaign.

I was there a couple of weeks ago to launch the campaign and to be honest you will struggle to keep me away! Our MPs and virtually all of our peers will be going too to support Jane. So I am asking you to help her too.

The energy of the campaign was brilliant. It was great!

We are campaigning on our record – the only party that actually opposed tax credits, fought the welfare changes and is standing up for small business and entrepreneurship. We have a strong message. We just need to sell it.

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Tim Farron MP writes…If we allow fear to win, then really we have lost

 

In the aftermath of the atrocities on Friday, my thoughts remain with the families of those killed and injured. As the world watches on in collective horror and mourning, the families and friends of those who are lost will be dealing with their own private grief, and among the discussions of international response and foreign policy consequences we must not forget that each of the 129 who have died is a personal tragedy as well as a global one.

As events unfolded over the weekend the political stage was crowded, in most cases with people simply responding to events, but also with those desperately using it to justify their own positions or forward their own agendas.

It is critical that political leaders here in the UK fight the temptation to do the same, and instead work together to understand the facts before attempting to state with confidence what should or shouldn’t be done, at home and abroad, in response to the attacks.

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Tim Farron writes… Liberal Democrats can and must oppose a snoopers’ charter

snowdenLast week, Theresa May finally published the Investigatory Powers Bill. It isn’t surprising it has taken her so long to come back with a new Bill after we blocked her first attempt in 2012. At the time, I said the Liberal Democrats can and must oppose a Snoopers’ Charter. The 2012 bill was a disproportionate invasion of all our privacy, forcing internet service providers to keep a record of all your texts, emails and every website you visited.

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Tim Farron MP writes…Introducing my new Chief of Staff

I am delighted to announce that Ben Williams will be joining  my Leader’s Office team as my permanent chief of staff.  He joins my PA, the brilliant Christine, Sam who helps me with my correspondence and my press officer Paul to fully staff my office. Natasha sadly leaves us at the end of the week but will, I am in no doubt, go on to bigger things.

Ben was the standout candidate and brings a wealth of experience at all levels of the party from council campaigner to Head of Liberal Democrat Whips’ Office and latterly a Special Adviser. Everyone who has worked with him knows his skills and how brilliantly he works under pressure. There were many points over our years in government when I saw Ben, at first hand, make sure the government kept delivering liberal policies under tremendous pressures. He is exactly what our party needs – someone who can help me to help our party grow and thrive.

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Tim Farron MP writes…Liberal Democrats will not support like for like Trident replacement but Conference motion doesn’t answer key questions

Another Lib Dem conference and we find ourselves talking about our nuclear deterrent once more. This is a huge and timely issue as the Tory Government will be taking the decision to proceed with the Trident replacement programme next year. In fact, with the recent announcement of an additional £500m for Faslane they have already nailed their colours very firmly to the mast. So it’s absolutely right that conference should debate the issue, and I think members deserve to hear where I stand on it.

There are obviously strong views on both sides, but I do not support the existing motion. Judith Jolly has submitted a very sensible amendment which asks for the motion to be referred back to the Federal policy Committee. I want to see a full and open consultation on this issue so that we can consider the threats we face and be completely clear on the options, implications and costs of any decisions. We need a party working group to look at the questions of how best to allocate scare resources, guarantee security, and fulfil our international obligations while facing up to the type of threats and challenges Britain will face in the 21st Century. And we need Lib Dem answers.  

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Tim Farron MP writes…Liberal Democrats will work with anyone to reform the House of Lords

Yesterday, the news was released about the latest tranche of appointments to the House of Lords.  The Liberal Democrat peers will be, as they always have been, constructive and conscientious. Where we agree with the government we shall support them and where we don’t we shall work to amend and if needs be oppose.But the principle matters, Liberal Democrat peers were appointed on the pledge ‘to abolish themselves’.

The Lords has two functions. To revise and to hold the Executive to account. The first it does quite well, the second it does not at all – how can it when, by definition, it is a creature of the Executive?

The Lords is wholly undemocratic and will never have the legitimacy it needs for a healthy democracy until this is changed.

Every party in their manifestos hints at reform or abolition of the second chamber, but the Liberal Democrats are the only party committed to it. So today we recommit our party – and its new Peers – to working actively for the reform of the House of Lords and ideally its abolition in favour of an elected second chamber. We urge the other parties to join us in this effort.

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Tim Farron writes … Zero carbon Britain put at risk by Conservatives

 

You might have missed it if you weren’t looking, but on Friday the Conservatives threw a bit more of our green policy out of the window, by scrapping a technical (but crucial) part of Zero Carbon Homes – allowable solutions. This measure essentially meant that developers would still be required to offset carbon emissions by paying into a green pot –  even if they couldn’t build new homes to Zero Carbon standards.  I wrote about it here, when the measure was previously announced by Stephen Williams:

“Where it would be all nigh impossible to build a carbon-tight home “on site”, developers aren’t let off the hook. Instead they contribute to a central pot of money which will go straight back into locking up any remaining carbon leakage in other “off-setting” schemes and carbon reducing initiatives. The net result is, as Lib Dem minister Stephen Williams describes, “No Carbon. None. Nil. Nought. Zip. Zilch.” Now that is not the case.

I still amazed when the Tories try to tell us that we can’t afford to green the UK economy. The truth is, we can’t afford not to. The UK’s low carbon business sector grew rapidly in the last parliament and is now five times larger than the aerospace industry and twice as large as the chemicals sector. The sector is well placed to capitalise on new global low carbon markets, which are now worth more than £3 trillion. We want to seize this opportunity, not throw it away.

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Tim Farron MP writes…The Human Rights Act is vital and we must fight to keep it

The Tories have blinked on the Human Rights Act but the fight is not yet won. They are still going to make ‘proposals’ this year, with still the threat of a bill next year.

The Human Rights Act is a favourite target of the right wing press. They hate it because it is ‘European’ (even though the European Convention on Human Rights springs not from the EU but from the quite different Council of Europe – and anyway, what’s wrong with being European?). They hate it because it contains a right to private and family life and so it interferes with that part of the media’s business model. And they hate it, above all, because, although human rights law protects everyone, some of its beneficiaries will always be unpopular and isolated minorities, people it is popular to attack.

But the Human Rights Act is vital for a fair society. Last year, for example, a court declared incompatible with human rights an Act of Parliament that retrospectively cancelled the Department of Work and Pensions’ debts to thousands of jobseekers who had been illegally denied benefits. How else could this unfairness be rectified? Parliament had passed the law only the year before. Jobseekers are demonised and although we should never stop campaigning for people being bullied by the government, it was clear that no political campaign was going to help. Only the court could do the job.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 41 Comments

Tim Farron MP writes…It’s time to make a fresh start

This is a critical moment for our party and for our country. The general election was won through the politics of fear. But we need to be honest: we failed to make a strong enough case for liberal values. Now we face a new and greater challenge: to show that we are still relevant, to speak what we believe, and to prove that we matter. In a crowded political market dominated by negativity, we have to be clear about the beliefs and philosophy that set us apart.

This is a process which needs to involve the whole party, not just its leader. But this is what I believe.

As my hero William Beveridge once wrote, ‘Liberalism is a faith, not a formula’. The core of my liberalism is a belief in the essential goodness of men and women, an optimistic confidence in the capacity of ordinary people to make the most of their lives, fulfil their talents and realise their dreams. I believe it is the duty of government to make this possible – to create the conditions in which individuals and their communities can flourish.

Individuals can best pursue their dreams when they can control their own destinies. That means being free to act on their own values and commitments. A state that constantly interferes with personal life stifles individuality and demotivates people. But most people also need the support and respect of the communities they live in to be able to form and act on their own plans of life. Only a more equal society can provide the stable base most people need to succeed.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 42 Comments
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  • Michael BG
    Simon R, My point was that as rich people ignore their social responsibility there should be no surprise that those who feel excluded from the economic benef...
  • Mary ReidMary Reid
    @Simon R. I think you will find it a fascinating read. The authors set up The Equality Trust https://equalitytrust.org.uk/ - which explores the ideas further....
  • Simon R
    @Mary: Thanks for the link to The Spirit Level. That looks an interesting read, which I have now just added to my Amazon wishlist :-) I do though tend t...
  • Simon R
    I totally agree with Alan's article. There's nothing inconsistent with being liberal and being patriotic, and liberals should feel able to be proud of their cou...
  • Hywel
    I came looking here as I'd not seen the party's response reported anywhere. I'm not sure it was worth the Mbps I used up to get it as it is so vague and could ...