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Category Archives: Op-eds

Opinion: Lessons from the Netherlands on Lib Dem strategy

By Henk van Klaveren | Thu 29th May 2014 - 9:36 am

A few months after the UK Coalition Government formed in 2010, the Dutch Christian Democrats (CDA) formed a minority government with our sister party, the liberal VVD. To get a majority agreement, the VVD-CDA coalition made a confidence and supply agreement with right-wing Geert Wilders and his Freedom Party (PVV), which set out a number of policy concession to Wilders, e.g. on immigration. That was a decision with huge impact: the PVV was about as toxic as it could get for many CDA and VVD supporters. The fall-out …

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Tagged coalition, holland, Mark Rutte and vvd | 53 Comments

How to rally your team in the wake of defeat

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 28th May 2014 - 10:00 pm

The north London wipeout in the local elections meant that the Camden team were decimated. Only one councillor remained in the borough. Maajid Nawaz, their PPC sent them an email in which he grieved with them and looked forward to better days, immediately taking tangible action to motivate them again.

Here are some highlights:

When I was first selected as your candidate, I had little clue how our local party machinery works. I had little appreciation for why you took such pride in your achievements

…

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Tagged camden and maajid nawaz | 38 Comments

Opinion: The final frontier of the electorate

By Guy Russo | Wed 28th May 2014 - 6:30 pm

At the core of the problems we’ve faced over the last few days is the daunting realisation that something has to change. But in the ensuing skirmish over what to change, it has become apparent that it is not the leadership. The #libdems4change movement has not provided a political coup in the party. But it has provided a mental one, a revolution of hearts and minds. Not towards a new way of thinking, but towards a new vigour in pursuing our cause. In many ways, it had to happen.

I …

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Tagged internet and political campaigning | 12 Comments

Opinion: Why I joined the Liberal Democrat Phoenix, not the Liberal Democrat Titanic

By Wayne Chadburn | Wed 28th May 2014 - 5:49 pm

No-one can deny that this has been a horrible week electorally for the Liberal Democrats. It might also be argued that to join the Liberal Democrats at this time is akin to landing on the Titanic prior to it hitting the iceberg. At least that is what has been said to me but to no avail. A few weeks ago I resigned my membership of the Labour party and joined the Liberal Democrats. Whilst the events of the last few days have saddened me and caused me considerable angst, not for …

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35 Comments

Opinion: Setting the record straight

By Helen Flynn | Wed 28th May 2014 - 4:48 pm

I was misquoted on BBC radio 4 on Monday. They said I had asked for Nick Clegg’s resignation. Would that it were as simple as asking for a leader to resign–as if that would change everything. But it isn’t. And I don’t feel in any way that I am being evasive or woolly by not asking for a change of leadership. What I am asking for is a root and branch review of our campaign strategy.

Let’s examine the facts.

We have just suffered a disastrous set …

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Tagged future party, leadership and radio 4 | 24 Comments

Opinion: What does the evidence tell us about our strategy should be?

By David Howarth | Wed 28th May 2014 - 3:40 pm

As a party committed to evidence-based policy, we should be asking what the evidence tells us about the questions of strategy and leadership we now face. The discussion is currently impressionistic and getting fixated on the past. We need instead to stick to the evidence and to what it suggests we should do in the future. There are many examples one could give about the leadership issue, but here is one about strategy.

Nick Clegg has explained the party’s strategy like this: ”

We said in 2010 we were going

…

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Tagged coalition, economy and party strategy | 56 Comments

Opinion: We need discipline and compromise from both leadership and members

By Paul Rowen | Wed 28th May 2014 - 2:42 pm

Last week’s local and European elections were truly awful.

Those of us who joined the Liberal Party back in the dark days of the 1970s remember the many false dawns and disappointments that followed local and General Elections.

We built our base bite by bite from the bottom up and fighting Labour it was tooth and nail.

The loss of all our Councillors in Manchester or seeing Liverpool reduced to just three Councillors or in my own Rochdale where we have gone from 33 to …

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Tagged european elections 2014, leadership, lynne featherstone and nick clegg | 54 Comments

Opinion: No more casual flings

By Simon de Deney | Wed 28th May 2014 - 1:46 pm

One of our candidates, telling last Thursday, was told by his Green party counterpart that this particular ward, Clissold, was the Green Party’s one target in the whole of London. They had volunteers coming to Hackney from places as far flung as Orpington and Grimsby. So, how did they do? Well, they didn’t beat Labour, but they pushed us into third place. Clearly where they work, they win. Well, come second, anyway.

Only here’s the thing. Apart from the one ward, Cazenove, in which we kept all our councillors, the Green …

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Tagged day of light, future party strategy and hackney | 28 Comments

Opinion: I’m fed up with process stories. Let’s work out how to win in 2015

By Allan Knox | Wed 28th May 2014 - 12:55 pm

Dear Liberal Democrats on Twitter, Facebook and Liberal Democrat Voice,

I am tired of process stories.

I don’t need another analysis of Annette Brookes’ email, Nick saying where we work we win, Lib Dems 4 Change setting up a website on 22 May or Matthew Oakshotte’s self-indulgent polling.

The simple truth is this. In the euro elections we lost 10 out of 11 seats and got 6% of the vote, the same as in 1989 when we had all just discovered we were Democrats. In addition we lost a wealth of MEP …

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Tagged future party strategy and general election 2015 | 21 Comments

A day of light and ideas

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 28th May 2014 - 9:51 am

These last five days have been among the worst I have known in my almost 31 years of being a part of this wonderful party. I’d pretty much prepared myself for winning only a couple of MEPs. Even those limited ambitions proved to be wildly optimistic. Seeing massive Labour fiefdoms recreated in London and Manchester. t’s been bruising, brutal and fraught. Seeing friends and colleagues lose their jobs and seats through no fault of their own is heartbreaking. And to lose them to wrecking, scapegoating UKIP types …

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Tagged day of light, european elections 2014 and local elections 2014 | 52 Comments

Opinion: A change of leader will make no difference. A change of heart and pride just might.

By Ben Nicholls | Tue 27th May 2014 - 5:33 pm

As a young, recently-selected Lib Dem candidate for next year’s general election and in a winnable marginal seat, I’m rather more interested in what my fellow voters think – over 70,000 of them in my area – than a small number of disaffected Party members looking for a scapegoat after recent election results.

Standing in an area which includes smart middle-class patches as well as tougher urban ones, I’ve spent the past few weeks meeting hundreds of constituents. The words ‘Nick Clegg’ have been mentioned about three times. Nobody I’ve met really seems to mind who the leader is. They DO mind that the Lib Dems are no longer clear enough about what we stand for and that we once appeared human but increasingly sound like political robots.

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Tagged coalition and romsey and southampton north | 36 Comments

Opinion: Where we work we get a pasting

By Nick Perry | Tue 27th May 2014 - 3:08 pm

After another bruising local government election in Hastings & Rye – a parliamentary target back in 1997 – the Liberal Democrats remain without any councillors on Hastings Borough Council and notched up a pallid 7% of the vote across the town.

This is pretty much a re-run of the 2012 result. Once again, targeting just one Council ward, we achieved a swing from Labour to Lib Dem, but did not come close to a gain.

This is one of the foremost bellweather constituencies of the South East, and is already a key Tory-Labour battleground for the 2015 General Election.

We have a functional local party here, with committed folk, many of whom have been members for a very long time.

I know that we have worked like stink for as long as I have lived down here (since 2007, when I was first selected as PPC) trusting in the leadership and the old slogan of ‘Where we work, we win’. Except it’s not true.

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Tagged hastings and local elections 2014 | 23 Comments

Paul Burstow writes … How can we achieve the home care workforce that we all deserve?

By Paul Burstow | Tue 27th May 2014 - 1:35 pm

A couple of weeks ago the diary of a home care worker shone a light on highs and frankly far too many lows that care workers all around the country face, day in, day out.

When we have all heard too many shocking stories of neglectful, malicious, taunting “carers” which now dominate perceptions of social care, this is the antidote. It was been truly inspiring to read the dedication, compassion, and genuine care motivating this fantastic woman.

But it is also deeply depressing …

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Tagged careworkers | 7 Comments

Opinion: Six reasons why Lib Dems need to support the leader

By Paul Reynolds | Tue 27th May 2014 - 12:20 pm

(Warning. This is not comfortable reading)

The decline in popular support for the Lib Dems since 2010 has been painful, culminating in Sunday’s near-wipeout in the European elections – and being beaten in the popular vote by the Greens.

We are a year away from the general election. The improving economy and Lib Dem policy successes like the Pupil Premium and larger tax allowances have not fed, so far, into electoral success. Can and should anything be done to recover the situation in the coming year ? Is ‘holding one’s nerve’ (or as critics might say, ‘doing nothing different’) a viable option ?

There have been a few calls for the leader to resign. Uncomfortable though the reasons are, here are six why the leader should stay beyond the general election:

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Tagged nick clegg | 44 Comments

Opinion: we lead when we’re brave

By John Abrams | Tue 27th May 2014 - 10:47 am

Like many others I was a sub-agent for the European Elections. My ‘chosen’ borough was Tameside where we stood precisely zero candidates at the local elections. A bizarre contrast compared to Lib Dem led Stockport just down the road where I live.

It will come as no surprise from the North West results that one of my samples was devoid of any Lib Dem votes at all – a first after 30 years in politics. (Luckily there were samples that were a bit rosier!)

Once proceedings were complete something troubled me: there were Labour, Green and Conservative sub-agents and little old me. What was missing: ah yes, good old UKIP. I wonder if this is a sign of how they’ll be acting in the European Parliament? For a party who came second to absent themselves at a count so as not to represent the democratic process let alone their own voters is baffling and perhaps a little alarming.

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Tagged european elections 2014, libdems4change and ukip | 39 Comments

Opinion: The messenger or the message?

By Mike Biden | Tue 27th May 2014 - 10:07 am

Coalition government is very tough on the junior party. No surprise there. The prize, in our case, was lots of our favourite policies implemented – something we haven’t achieved for 100 years. The downside is a massive amount of negative media coverage.

Your coalition allies hate you because they see you as imposing policies on them. The opposition see it as an open goal, a chance to squeeze you out of the next election. It is a two party nut-cracker with the potential to crush us. The voracious appetite of the press pack has a constant supply of stories.

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Tagged coalition | 37 Comments

Opinion: A perspective on the 2014 European elections

By Andrew Garratt | Tue 27th May 2014 - 9:13 am

The Lib Dems have suffered their worst European election performance for 25 years.

In 1989, that election was fought by six parties – Labour, Conservative, Lib Dem (as SLD), Green, SNP and Plaid Cymru – which also fought the 2014 election.

Of those six parties, five got fewer votes in 2014 than they got in 1989. One got more. Can you guess which one?

Let’s look at the figures:

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Tagged european elections 2014 | 54 Comments

Opinion: We need to stop helping the other parties and change our message

By Iain Roberts | Mon 26th May 2014 - 7:03 pm

The Liberal Democrats have achieved many good things in Government and stopped the Tories doing many bad things. As with every government, there have been mistakes and much that could have been done better, but with fewer than one in ten MPs the party has punched well above its weight and, as a result, many good Liberal Democrat policies are now being put into practise.

And yet the party is being hammered in the polls and we’ve just seen a disastrous set of local and European elections with the Liberal Democrats down to just a single MEP.

What’s gone wrong, above all …

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40 Comments

Opinion: Political scalps grow back

By David Schmitz | Mon 26th May 2014 - 5:34 pm

Until Friday, I was a Lib Dem Councillor in the London Borough of Haringey, where I enjoyed a reputation as an effective local representative. As one constituent put it

I have never been able to fathom why for example, people express their anger at the government in Westminster by voting out of office the guy in the next street who gets your drains unblocked or your broken windows fixed. And the same here is true of David. I hope that when election time comes around, people

…

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Tagged leadership, local elections 2014 and nick clegg | 16 Comments

Opinion: An open letter to Nick Clegg

By Benjamin Mathis | Mon 26th May 2014 - 4:16 pm

Dear Nick,

When I joined the party in 2006, one of the first things I did was to hit the streets of Dudley, my hometown, delivering Focus and canvassing voters. I’ve been an active, campaigning party member ever since.

Another of the first things I did was to locate and read a copy of the Orange Book. And I liked it. I agreed with a lot of it, and “Orange Booker” has been a badge I have worn with slightly perverse pride ever since.

I like what you’re doing, Nick – and I like …

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Tagged leadership and nick clegg | 73 Comments

Some quick questions for LibDems4Change

By Caron Lindsay | Mon 26th May 2014 - 1:44 pm

In the interests of transparency, a key Liberal Democrat value, it would be good if a representative of LibDems4Change could answer the following questions about their campaign:

1. Who registered for and paid for the domain name and website?

The website was registered either late on Thursday evening/early Friday morning, but who set it up and who financed it?

2. Where did you get the email addresses from? Which email lists did you use and what are the Data Protection implications of this?

In 2012, I signed up to the No to Secret Courts campaign. I expected to receive correspondence on that campaign, not …

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Tagged libdems4change | 151 Comments

Ouch. My first thoughts on the European election results for the four main parties

By Stephen Tall | Mon 26th May 2014 - 11:55 am

The results are all but in (Scotland will formal declare later today) and the scores on the doors make depressing reading for the Lib Dems – here’s the BBC’s breakdown:

Here are 5 quick points:

1) A good night for Ukip

Fair do’s to Farage: he inverted the usual expectations management game by vowing Ukip would top the poll, and they did. Their share of the vote, 27.5%, means they become the first party since 1906 to beat both the Conservatives and Labour. They’ve gained at least 10 MEPs, and may …

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62 Comments

The Independent View: Positively fighting back online

By Jonathan Russell | Mon 26th May 2014 - 11:07 am

With the seemingly endless news of global and domestic extremism – whether about the 250 girls kidnapped in Nigeria, the 500 Britons reportedly waging jihad in Syria, or the worrying allegations made against several Birmingham schools – it is rare that a report devoted to countering extremism should fill us with positivity. However, research released last week by Quilliam about the state of online extremism should encourage us all, not …

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Also posted in The Independent View | Tagged censorship, civil liberties, extremism, internet and quilliam foundation | 3 Comments

Opinion: Let’s not throw away all we have worked for just as it’s starting to pay off

By Paul Scriven | Sun 25th May 2014 - 7:36 pm

As a working-class Northern lad it would be fair to say that in terms of personal background I don’t have much in common with Nick Clegg. And like Carl Minns and Richard Kemp I’ve been on the wrong end of some tough election results in recent years. But I totally disagree with George Potter – I passionately believe Nick should lead our party into the next General Election and beyond.

I’ve probably had more arguments with Nick than most commentators on

…

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Tagged featured, general election 2015, leadership and nick clegg | 49 Comments

Now THAT is how to write an email to supporters

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 25th May 2014 - 6:32 pm

On Friday night at 18:42, we sad Liberal Democrat election geeks were almost feeling punch drunk as the results came in from London. It was bad enough at a distance of 400 miles to hear of wipeout after wipeout, of decades of hard Liberal Democrat representation on councils coming to an end. Heaven knows what it must have been like to have been there. Actually I do know what that feels like, having gone through the Scottish elections in 2011.

Just as all that horror was unfolding, into my inbox came an …

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31 Comments

How did shuttleworths get their name?

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 24th May 2014 - 8:00 pm

It is a truth universally acknowledged that if you want to know anything about the olden days of liberalism, you ask The Lord (Tony) Greaves. A few days ago, somebody emailed a group of friends how shuttleworths got their name. For those of you who don’t know, these are the pads that used to have the names and addresses of supporters in a particular area for use on polling day. I knew I’d heard the story before and the various answers that were being told didn’t seem right but I couldn’t remember what it was and, frankly, I had lots of voters to talk to so I didn’t look any further.

Then, with extraordinary serendipity, a comment from Tony Greaves got caught in auto-moderation. I actually saw his slight grumble about it in the main thread before I saw the actual comment. Anyway, it was the first thing that made me smile all day yesterday, so I emailed him to tell him. I also too my chance to ask him. This is his reply, reproduced with his permission.

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Tagged campaigning and tony greaves | 26 Comments

Opinion: Prince Charles has gone too far this time

By Steve Coltman | Sat 24th May 2014 - 10:07 am

It was ironic to watch the news today. Two politicians who (I suspect) do not much care for Prince Charles’s views in general were speaking in his defence, whereas one who might be expected to be more sympathetic was being more critical. It was the latter, Nigel Farage, who was right. He said of Prince Charles’s comments, likening Vladimir Putin to Adolf Hitler, that there are some things the Prince should leave to the professional politicians.

Nick Clegg and Ed Milliband, on the other hand, were arguing that the Prince had a right to have his views and express them, or words to that effect. Prince Charles does indeed have a right to have his own private opinions, and he is not the first to have compared the actions of today’s Russia with yesterday’s Nazi Germany.

BUT, Prince Charles does not have the right to drop a bomb into the middle of British-Russian relations like this. It’s not just indiscreet, it is downright dangerous. There is no knowing what sort

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Tagged diplomacy, ed miliband, nick clegg, nigel farage and prince charles | 35 Comments

Opinion: Why I was persuaded to back LibDems4Change

By George Potter | Sat 24th May 2014 - 8:37 am

I’m no one special in the party. I’m Secretary of my local party, acting Chair of South East Liberal Youth and I once sat on a regional executive for a year.

And since 2010, despite the mistakes I think we’ve made in how we’ve handled being in coalition, until now I’ve always thought that getting rid of Nick Clegg as leader would be a very bad mistake. I thought that by doing so we’d be seen to be rejecting our achievements in coalition whilst failing to win back any of the people we’d already lost.

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335 Comments

Opinion: Public services need public involvement

By David Boyle | Fri 23rd May 2014 - 11:28 am

I must admit, I have become sceptical about the word ‘empowerment’. For two reasons. One is that it is a Blairite word, and based on a misunderstanding about where sovereignty lies. Power isn’t distributed by an all-powerful prime minister. People already have it – they give it to the governments – but sometimes they have to be encouraged, persuaded or cajoled to use it.

The other reason I have become sceptical is my experience of the word. I have sat in too many conferences where disabled people are encouraged to …

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Tagged centreforum and public services | 8 Comments

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Politics at School (Geoff Reid)
Zack Polanski on the Fringe (Caron Lindsay)
Enough is enough: Women and girls deserve better (Lib Dem Women)
To paraphrase Shakespeare’ ‘something is rotten in the state of Britain’ (Judy Abel)
Born to be a Refugee… (Dalila Henniche Maali)

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Recent Comments

Mick Taylor
@TristanWard. I have never been Mike my entire life. Please don’t take it upon yourself to unilaterally change my name...
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Oddly the article leaves out the full context of the Kirklees result. This was a lib dem ward prior to the may elections which reform gained from us. So winnin...
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Delighted to have contributed to the win in Almondbury by making several hundred phone calls to voters. Winning Here!...
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@ Mike , yes an encouraging night....
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