Category Archives: Op-eds

Joe Otten

#Labstain: Labour’s mass indifference to the Welfare Bill

By Joe Otten | Tue 21st July 2015 - 5:17 pm

labstainspineYesterday, all but 48 Labour MPs abstained on government proposals to save £12bn from the welfare bill, in particular from the working age poor. This dithering follows 5 years of vitriol directed at Liberal Democrats over measures that did not go this far.

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Mark Argent

Opinion: The next election?

By Mark Argent | Mon 20th July 2015 - 6:44 pm

 

Three Lib Dem gains in council by-elections coinciding with Tim Farron’s election as leader are great news. They invite the language of a gradual comeback to a much improved result in 2020.

But is the next General Election five years away?

In the normal course of events the Conservative majority of 15 would be vulnerable to defections and losses through by-elections. In the last parliament, there were two defections from the Tories to UKIP and 21 by-elections. It is entirely possible that they would seek form a minority government, but the Tories would lose their overall majority of just eight seats moved to other parties. In the normal course of events, that happening in this parliament would be far from implausible.

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Callum Delhoy

Opinion: The reason I was nodding so much behind Tim Farron on Thursday

By Callum Delhoy | Mon 20th July 2015 - 2:56 pm

Screen Shot 2015-07-17 at 16.25.58I’ve always been a massive fan of Tim Farron. Like many, it started off watching his 2014 Conference Speech as Lib Dem President and only grew as I saw him being awarded Lib Dem MP of the year by the PatchWork foundationand fighting along side Caroline Lucas to improve mandatory PSHE in Schools over that year. It’s for that reason that, when I saw all these articles titling Tim as the ‘Bookies Favourite of next LD Leader’, I knew I would support his leadership campaign, whenever …

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Nicholas Belfitt

Opinion: Tim Farron’s Gut Liberalism

By Nicholas Belfitt | Mon 20th July 2015 - 1:14 pm

 

Last week I was on the train heading up to Guildford for a special opportunity to meet Tim Farron, potential leader of the Lib Dems. As I travelled I was nervous as any young party member would be. I was about to meet my first real big name in politics, someone who had taken his place in Parliament, someone who had sat on BBC Question Time, someone who had played the political game against numerous reds and blues. But what I did not expect was the passion I was going to feel after this meeting.

Tim spoke as he did a few days later after winning the candidacy about a new type of liberalism he wanted to introduce. This new type of liberalism was less a theoretical frame work but more an emotion and rejuvenation of what being Liberal meant. He coined this new experience, Gut Liberalism.

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Ben Boult

Opinion: Three small ways in which a British Bill of Rights could improve on the Human Rights Act 1998

By Ben Boult | Mon 20th July 2015 - 9:37 am

Every_Canadian_Needs_A_Copy

The title of this piece is fairly self-explanatory. As such, I shall get straight into the substance of my proposals:

1) Whereas any interference with a person’s human rights must be “necessary in a democratic society” according to the Human Rights Act 1998, let’s replace this test with “necessary in a free and democratic society” in the forthcoming British Bill of Rights

In recent years, it has become apparent that many in political life, as well as in our judiciary, would benefit from a liberal nudge when it comes to deciding cases involving our civil liberties. For the sake of brevity, I am not going to revisit every controversy in this regard, but suffice it to say, the Brown Government’s proposals for 42 days pre-charge detention, the Coalition’s plans to sanction “annoying and nuisance” behaviours in public places and the current Government’s proposals to turn Ofcom into a censor rather than review body were / are extremely concerning given our cherished status as a free country.

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George Smid

Opinion: Historia est Magistra Vitae: no Grexit, no Greece

By George Smid | Sat 18th July 2015 - 12:53 pm

The last few days showed the EU as a very resilient organisation: the Bundestag had just approved the Greek bailout, after Finland, France and Austria. But it also showed EU stretched to the breaking point: there is no Grexit but there is no Greece either.

Let us step back and look at the recent past from the future perspective through the prism of the UK. 100 years hence the history of the UK could read like this:

At the beginning of the 21st century the UK was the only state able to offer an alternative to the Franco-German concept of unified Europe. But, rather than introducing UK’s own concept based on liberal values, individual independence and social liberal policies, the UK spent its energy on questioning the EU concept (so called ‘opting out’) and fighting in-between themselves under the then Conservative leader Cameron. This meant that the UK was not offering any viable alternative and completely lost its direction. With the diminishing role of the USA, the Anglo-Saxon governance model, so prevalent during 19th and 20th centuries ceased to play any meaningful role as ‘the bureaucratic super-state’ took on an ever increasing role.

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Joe Otten

Channel 4: Cathy Newman, Tim Farron, sex and sin.

By Joe Otten | Sat 18th July 2015 - 9:22 am

Tim Farron had a grilling yesterday on Channel 4 news from Cathy Newman on his personal position on some moral issues. There’s been some criticism of Tim for sounding a little bit evasive on this, and indeed suggestions have been coming into Voice for better answers that he might have given.

Now I don’t know exactly where Tim personally stands on this, but I have no reason to doubt that he is basically a liberal dealing with the sensitivities of the “traditional Christian” view rather than the converse. My apologies for use of these terms, no doubt there were and are many traditional Christians around who are sound on LGBT+ rights and abortion, and many old liberals who are not. But you know what I mean.

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287 Comments
Oliver Hayes

The Independent View: Tim Farron’s election as leader provides hope that the party will embrace and enhance the green roots held dear by members and activists.

By Oliver Hayes | Fri 17th July 2015 - 5:03 pm

Congratulations to Tim Farron, an MP who has long championed environmental causes. His voting record, especially during the coalition years, was consistently green. In 2013 Farron was one of 16 Lib Dems to rebel and back a 2030 decarbonisation target. How different the energy politics landscape would look had more Lib Dem MPs (and later peers) joined him and ensured there was now a decarb target in the statute books to provide long term certainty for investors in the face of growing short term uncertainty.*

But that was then. With Tim Farron at the helm we look forward to the party adopting stronger green positions, such as Farron’s repeated pledge to oppose fracking. Most importantly – and in a move that puts clear water between him and Andy Burnham, the leading candidate for the Labour leadership – Farron’s opposition is on the grounds that burning shale gas is incompatible with tackling climate change:

Shale gas will only have a future in the UK if we abandon, or significantly scale back, our climate targets – and that’s something that I hope every Liberal Democrat would oppose

This is the sort of clear leadership sorely needed in the fight against climate change and the pressing need to keep fossil fuels in the ground. Only the Greens and Plaid Cymru have made so clear the climate change rationale for opposing fracking (in addition to the more widely accepted risks to communities’ air, water and peace).

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Also posted in The Independent View | Tagged , and | 24 Comments
Joanne Ferguson

Opinion: My problem with Scotland’s “Named Person” plan

By Joanne Ferguson | Fri 17th July 2015 - 12:00 pm

The other day I commented on a Facebook post about areas we share with the SNP, mentioning my concerns about the SNPs plans for every child in Scotland to have a “named person” who is their point of contact with the social services. Caron Lindsay mentioned that Euan Davidson had written for this site in support of the measures, and invited me to post a response. I made sure I had the facts right (some of which I had to be corrected on but didn’t change my overall view) and got started. To the best of my understanding, the named person would be someone the child could contact if they had a problem that they needed confidential help from. It could also be to obtain information on subjects that may be either too sensitive or too awkward to discuss with parents. I agree with what is trying to be achieved here, but I don’t think this is the way to do it. Here is why.

On May 15th 2015, I finished my final secondary school exam. I was finished school. I was an adult? I would never have a teacher again. Lecturers, sure, but I would never again be in the situation where I would have to ask someone if I was allowed to go to the bathroom. Some of my teachers I would miss more than others because I had grown to trust them enough to act in the same way around them as I would around my friends. Some teachers I still showed restraint around, as if I was an employee of theirs. You would think that my guidance teacher, whom I was supposed to approach with any problems, would belong to the first category. This was far from the case.
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Brian Paddick

Lord Brian Paddick writes…Standing up for evidence-based policy on drug laws

By Brian Paddick | Thu 16th July 2015 - 11:36 am

Yesterday in the House of Lords I called a vote to change the government’s Psychoactive Substances Bill. The Conservatives and Labour refused to support the change and we lost the vote 314 votes to 95, which was a great result. So how can such a crushing defeat be good? Because we established, on the record, that neither the Tories nor Labour support a scientific, evidence-based approach to reducing the harm caused by drugs. And here’s why.

The Tory government, supported by Labour, is pushing through a draconian, authoritarian law that would ban any substance that changes the way you think or the way you feel (your mental functioning or emotional state). There is no doubt some of the substances that the legislation covers are highly dangerous, but Lib Dems do not support a blanket ban that could do more harm than good. Things normally consumed as food and prescription medicines are not covered but tea, beer and cigarettes would all be banned except for the fact that caffeine, alcohol and nicotine (and only those three things) are specifically listed in the bill as being exempt.

The government has made it quite clear that they do not intend to add anything else to the list of exemptions and the law also prohibits anyone from removing ‘the establishment’s drugs of choice’ from the exempt list. So despite the wealth of scientific evidence that shows how much more dangerous alcohol is than, say, nitrous oxide (laughing gas), both in terms of the harm it causes to individuals and to society, the government intends to use this Bill to ban it.

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Caron Lindsay

Liberal Democrats should support a strong, member led trade union movement

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 16th July 2015 - 9:30 am

Without trade unions. we wouldn’t have many of the rights we take for granted today. From parental leave to paid holidays to the right to strike, these organisations have helped build the case for better working conditions over the years. The right of workers to take action and withdraw their labour is an important one.

That’s not to say that unions always act sensibly. I grew up in the 1970s and was horrified by these mass meetings where people had to vote by raising their hands in front of everyone. If you didn’t agree with the scary leaders, would you not be terrified of what might happen to you if you voted against them? Abuse of power, wherever it happens, is offensive to the liberal mindset and what we had at that time was massive abuse of power by collectivist union leaderships. So, there were quite a few aspects of the Tory reforms of the 1980s that were helpful. Introducing secret ballots before strike action could happen was a very good thing. If Scargill had balloted the niners in 1984, the outcome might have been very different.

But now the Tories have come up with measures to completely undermine the unions. Even if we were having 1970s levels of strikes, some of these plans would not be appropriate. The requirement for 40% of those eligible to back the proposals imposes on unions alone a restriction not faced by the Government itself. Elected on just over a third of the votes of just over two thirds of the people, it is now free to impose its overall majority on all of us. Is that fair? It’s effectively questioning its own legitimacy but can’t see it.

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Mark Argent

Opinion: Has the EU just come of age?

By Mark Argent | Wed 15th July 2015 - 4:28 pm

It sounds a daft question, given the number of articles critical of the solution to the Greece crisis which have been appearing in my Facebook and Twitter feeds, but things are not always what they seem. Looking at unconscious processes in organisations, the things that people act out without naming tend to be the really important ones

My sense is that we might just have tipped into the space where the EU functions like a truly federal entity — albeit with a deep faith in subsidiarity — and the griping is the griping one has when a government makes a difficult decision, not when it is seen as illigitimate.

What first sent my mind in this direction was the Greek referendum. Far from being an “in/out” referendum, this was one that assumed Greece was inevitably part of the EU, woven in so tightly that this bizarre stunt could not cause them to leave. The “no” vote was strong, but so was the desire to remain in the Eurozone and the EU. For Alexis Tsipras to have made such a fuss about democracy, and then ignore the referendum could seem bizarre, but it makes more sense if I compare it with the antics of a 1970s-style shop steward garnering the support of the workers as a negotiating tactic, or the rebellions of Liverpool City Council at the height of the Militant Tendency. In both cases, quite extreme behaviour is possible because people assume an underlying unity — the shop steward does not want their members to lose their jobs, and Liverpool was not going to cease to be part of the UK. As with Greece in the EU, the strong behaviour is possible because they feel they belong.

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Also posted in Europe / International | Tagged , and | 39 Comments
Jonathan Brown

Opinion: Race, reckoning and renewal? The EMLD leadership hustings

By Jonathan Brown | Wed 15th July 2015 - 2:56 pm

EMLD HustingsOn 30th June the Ethnic Minority Liberal Democrats held a dramatic leadership hustings, described by Simon Woolley, Director of Operation Black Vote, and guest chair as Tim and Norman’s “most difficult, yet most inspiring hustings event to date in front of a largely BME audience.”

It was certainly the highlight of the campaign for me. In his blog, Mark Pack noted that Simon took questions on themes, “intervening with follow ups and switching to the floor on regular occasions to explore issues in greater depth.” Both candidates handled a range of questions from a sceptical, if still hopeful audience, but whichever of them wins it is clear that they – and the party as a whole – has a lot of work to do to regain the trust and confidence of a great many ethnic minority party members and members of the wider public.

EMLD’s Marisha Ray had some revealing stats: for any given ethnicity except white British, the proportion of new members self-identifying as such were at best half as numerous as we would expect given the racial makeup of the UK today. This is worrying, especially in light of Mark Pack and former Cambridge MP David Howarth’s research finding that those describing themselves as ‘not white British’ are disproportionately likely to share values that ought to make them natural Liberal Democrats. Indeed, Simon Woolley revealed that the winning margin in many of our Tory-facing seats was smaller than the BME vote. Had the Liberal Democrats successfully courted it, we might have rather more MPs today.

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Caron Lindsay

The truth about Government measures on the gender pay gap – this was the work of the Liberal Democrats, not the Tories

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 15th July 2015 - 11:49 am

This week has seen David Cameron trying to portray himself as some sort of equalities champion as he announced plans to force companies to disclose data on the gender pay gap.  You would never have thought that his party had spent most of the last government fighting such a measure, only to finally agree it almost at the last minute. He may attempt to take the credit, but it’s Jo Swinson who did all the work. She tweeted:

Back in March, Jo announced on this site that the Liberal Democrat policy was to become a reality. Here’s what she said back then:

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Caron Lindsay

LIbLink: Willie Rennie: We need the facts on the M9 tragedy

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 15th July 2015 - 10:23 am

Ten days ago, a small blue car crashed just off the M9 near Stirling. A call was made to the Police reporting the incident. Nothing was done for three days. The driver of the car, John Yuill, was already dead. His partner, Lamara Bell was still alive but, sadly, she too died on Sunday.

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie is one of the MSPs for the area. He has called for a comprehensive and wide-ranging enquiry to which all police staff should be free to contribute without fear of repercussions. He is concerned at attempts by the Chief Constable to pre-judge the existing smaller scale enquiry. Sir Stephen House apologised for Police Scotland’s failures but made it sound as though the fault was down to an individual. That seems to me to be grossly unfair to a member of staff. We know that pressure on staff has increased as control rooms have been closed and we need to look properly at the impact that these measures have had on staff wellbeing and their ability to provide the service we need from them. 

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Caron Lindsay

Lib Dem Lords fight for votes at 16 in Council elections

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 15th July 2015 - 8:57 am

The Liberal Democrat campaign for votes at 16 enters a new stage today as the Lords debates the Cities Bill. Liberal Democrat Paul Tyler has put down an amendment which would enable 16 and 17 year olds to vote in Council elections in England and Wales.

Labour have said that they will support Paul’s amendment. If it passes, it will then be up to David Cameron’s Conservative MPs to overturn it. I suspect that they will have no problem doing that given that young people are hardly top of their list of priorities at the moment. However, you don’t need many Tory rebels to threaten the Government’s majority. The only thing is that you would need the SNP to vote in order to defeat the Government in the Commons. If the SNP does vote on this entirely English and Welsh matter, you would be less likely to get the Tory rebels. The chances of it becoming law therefore seem slim at this stage.

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Adrian Sanders

Adrian Sanders writes… Cameron’s cunning

By Adrian Sanders | Tue 14th July 2015 - 3:51 pm

John Stuart Mill is often quoted as describing the Tories as the stupidest party. The modern Conservative Party is many things, but at the top where they consider parliamentary and electoral strategy they are anything but stupid.

Those who think the withdrawing of the Statutory Instrument to amend the Hunting with Hounds Act is a victory for those opposed to any watering down of animal welfare legislation are cruelly mistaken.

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39 Comments
Jenni Hollis

Opinion: Why standing out from the crowd could be the key to success

By Jenni Hollis | Tue 14th July 2015 - 10:41 am

It would be wrong to abandon every campaigning technique used in the 2015 general election. Despite the result, some constituencies saw unprecedented levels or door knocking, innovative new literature items and original online campaigning techniques. In seats like Hornsey and Wood Green – retaining 32% of the vote when the national average was 8% meant we were doing something right.

But the party also has to think about what it lacked – and how we could do things differently to improve our share of the vote in upcoming elections.

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Tim Farron MP

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

By Tim Farron MP | Mon 13th July 2015 - 7:25 pm

 

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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G K Teh

Opinion: The impact of the Budget on students

By G K Teh | Mon 13th July 2015 - 11:42 am

 

George Gideon Osborne. Feared and distrusted by the left, the sensible and reasonable portions of his own party. And now he has given university students yet another reason to distrust him. In the Conservative majority budget issued on July 8 2015, the Chancellor introduced a barrage of attention-grabbing measures, many of which present disappointing news to youths – particularly university undergraduates.

The speculation that the first Tory budget since 1996 will be unforgiving for the young and the unemployed have, sadly, been realised. The National Living Wage (set to £7.20 by next April and £9 by 2020) is all very well for workers over 25, but will not apply to those under 25, who will still have to contend with a £6.50 minimum wage. This means that young people who have just left university will have to make their earnings stretch further to cover the rising cost of living that will result from a more robust economy, which will result from reduction in bank levies and cuts in corporation tax.

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Toby MacDonnell

Opinion: The UK is dead – long live the EU

By Toby MacDonnell | Sun 12th July 2015 - 12:30 pm

The English are the last on this sceptred isle to realise that Britain is dead.

It’s hard to remember that the nation-state is a modern invention: the Treaty of Westphalia gave birth to the conception of crown and country. Britain herself was an elaboration on 18th Century statecraft.

Each of our constitutional nations brought their talents to bear on Britain’s great endeavour: the British Empire. A merchant empire defended with regiments of Welsh and Scots infantry and English seamen; managed by a ruling class composed of feudal aristocrats and nouveaux riche industrialists and merchants.

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Mark Argent

Opinion: Ideas or leaflets?

By Mark Argent | Sun 12th July 2015 - 11:00 am

Something that stays with me from Monday’s East Midlands leadership hustings was Tim Farron saying that under him, our arms would ache with the quantity of leaflets we have delivered, while Norman Lamb pointed out that our pounding at the polls was not through any lack of leaflets, and that he wanted us to do more to stimulate liberal ideas, as the party had done in Jo Grimond’s time.

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Liam Trim

Opinion: Voting reform must take a back seat to maintain #LibDemFightback momentum

By Liam Trim | Sun 12th July 2015 - 9:30 am

Standing at a North London bus stop the evening after Britain went to the polls, I overheard a man give his take, on David Cameron’s surprising majority, to a friend:

You see people that don’t live in cities just don’t understand…they’ll always vote right-wing.

As someone from the countryside who has now voted for a hat-trick of different parties, I took offence in a quietly British way to his throwaway analysis of the left’s failure to make gains outside of London. And yet of course he had a point, too.

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NewsHound

Two ways to find out more about the Ethnic Minorities Liberal Democrats Leadership Hustings

By NewsHound | Sat 11th July 2015 - 12:20 pm

cropped EMLD logo
Last week, Ethnic Minorities Liberal Democrats held a very good hustings event in London where Tim Farron and Norman Lamb were put through their paces.

You can listen to the whole thing here on Soundcloud.

You can also read Lester Holloway’s report of for The Voice here.

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Opinion: We need to be more aware of neural diversity

By A Johnson | Fri 10th July 2015 - 2:55 pm

It’s obvious that whomever wins the leadership we’re going to have to nurture a lot of new people (as well as the `old hands`.

I think it’s important that we do so working with the grain of that individual’s personality to allow it to grow for the benefit of the Party. After all, celebration of the individual is supposedly part of the Party’s DNA.

We have started to talk about mental health a lot – and rightly so. It’s a key aspect of our view that everyone should reach their own potential.

Let me introduce you to another concept: Neural Diversity.

What I mean by that is really taking into account the way an individual’s brain ACTUALLY works rather than as we think it SHOULD work. A key difference is that between a preference for Introversion and Extroversion.

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The Voice

Liberal Democrat Leadership: Farron and Lamb answer questions on engineering and science

By The Voice | Fri 10th July 2015 - 1:25 pm

One of the great things about the leadership contest is that every party organisation has submitted questions to the candidates on their area of interest.

The Association of Liberal Democrat Engineers and Scientists is no exception and you can see all Tim’s and Norman’s answers to a series of questions about science.

You can read them all here, but here’s a flavour of one question:

Both of you signed an EDM in 2007 supporting provision of homeopathic medicines through the NHS but then revised your support after a Commons STC report questioned the evidence in favour of homeopathic treatments. What resources would you call on personally as leader in order to obtain expert advice and how could the parliamentary party make better use of evidence?

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Brian Paddick

Lord Brian Paddick writes…Lords debate Anderson Report – you have to know your onions

By Brian Paddick | Fri 10th July 2015 - 11:54 am

GCHQ Bude by Paul WalterDavid Anderson, the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation’s recently published report on investigatory powers was debated in the House of Lords last Wednesday.  Anderson was tasked with advising on what should replace the Communications Data Bill a.k.a. the Snooper’s Charter and other, existing legislation, that allows the state to invade individual’s privacy for the purposes of terrorism and crime prevention.

The Government Minister and other leading Tories talked-up the threat posed by terrorism.  I told the House we should listen to Anderson who said in his report ‘claims of exceptional or unprecedented threat levels – particularly if relied upon for the purposes of curbing well established liberties – should be approached with scepticism’.

Lib Dem Peer, Paul Strasburger led the charge with a comprehensive critique of the existing legislative framework and how the police and security services had been caught misusing existing powers.  Whatever follows must include greater safeguards and more effective scrutiny so as to ensure public trust.

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Tobie Abel

Opinion: Generational strife – where’s the fairness?

By Tobie Abel | Thu 9th July 2015 - 1:30 pm

The budget does make clear where society’s priorities lay. Cuts to incomes and services of the youngest and poorest, yet tax breaks and protected services for many of the oldest and wealthiest. Tax credits, housing benefit, student grants all sacrificed to reduce the deficit, yet inheritance tax, fuel allowances and state pensions are deemed too important to feel the knife. Why?

The answer of course, is that old people vote in record numbers. None of us who spend time trying to win elections doubt the wisdom of bending to the grey vote, but it is hard to defend. Today’s retirees worked through years of rapid wage and house price inflation, benefited from unsustainably generous final salary pension schemes, and enjoyed the full flowering of the welfare state. In contrast today’s graduates face years of paying off student debts before even dreaming of owning a home, will have to work longer for lower pensions, and are in competition with often better educated people from the four corners of the globe. And to top it all the older generation has bequeathed a national debt that now tops £1.5 trillion, on which the younger generation must pay interest for the next 40 years.

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Nick T

Surprises are not the same as radicalism – or where George Osborne went wrong

By Nick T | Thu 9th July 2015 - 10:42 am

Yesterday’s budget certainly had plenty of surprises. But it says something about the state of our politics that not allowing sensitive information leak ahead of the budget speech counts as a political success. Because surprises — rabbits out of hats — are not the same as radicalism, whatever much of the media, or Osborne himself, would have us believe this morning. The budget, when looked at more closely, was notable for its timidity, not its profundity.

In identifying the nonsense of those on low wages paying relatively large amounts of tax, only to receive it back with interest in tax credits, the chancellor identified a genuinely ridiculous (and illiberal) legacy of Gordon Brown’s time at the Treasury.

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Ed Goncalves

Opinion: Why we need to overhaul the organ donor system

By Ed Goncalves | Thu 9th July 2015 - 10:16 am

In a couple of weeks time, my 11 year old son and I will be competing in the UK Transplant Games for the very first time. As my friends among LDV readers will know, my son is a remarkable boy in many respects. Some say he is a ‘chip off the old block’. I rather think he’s in a league of his own.

His story is dramatic, yet sadly not unique. Three years ago, around his 8th birthday, he was suddenly diagnosed with kidney failure. It was the second time in that he faced a battle for life. As a baby, he and his twin brother were extremely ill with severe twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome. They are one of only a small number of twins to have both survived this condition.

Most of the following year was spent in Great Ormond Street Hospital, including birthdays and Christmas. He suffered multiple major infections, complications and assorted emergencies, and underwent 10 operations in as many months. An attempted transplant was aborted at the last minute due to liver problems.

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