Category Archives: Op-eds

Why do people think it’s ok to hit children?

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 28th December 2013 - 1:30 pm

David Laws is about as far away as you can get from me in economic terms in this party, and for a long time I was very wary of him. Then, way back in 2008, he did something that made me actually squeal with joy when I read it. He was education spokesman at the time and he and Annette Brooke came out in favour of a ban on smacking children. Since then, I’ve had a much more rounded view of him. On the economy, we’re still a million miles apart, but I do respect him as a liberal …

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80 Comments

Opinion: is a more human, more engaging politics too much to ask for?

By Mark Valladares | Fri 27th December 2013 - 9:55 am

I joined the Liberal Party, or rather, the Union of Liberal Students, in 1984, because I believed, as I still do, that individuals should be nurtured, but not at the expense of community, and that people had a right to their dignity and freedom. It was a reflection of my upbringing and a gut instinct. For me, democracy and civic society offered a gateway to liberty for all.

Despite that, I never really wanted to be elected to public office – recognition perhaps that I lacked discipline and the necessary level of commitment. Retail politics wasn’t that attractive, and life offered …

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22 Comments

Opinion: Merry Christmas, Mr Turing

By Benjamin Mathis | Tue 24th December 2013 - 3:15 pm

Merry Christmas. What’s on your tree this year? Baubles? Tinsel? Some of that fake snow that looks a bit like candy floss and gets everywhere by New Year? Almost certainly some fairy lights.

However you decorate your Christmas tree, you would probably think it looked a bit bare if it only had the star on the top. You’d be right. Which is why, however big an achievement it is for those who have campaigned for it, I can only raise one-and-a-half cheers today at the news Alan Turing has at long last received a posthumous pardon for the conviction he received …

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Tagged alan turing, equality, john leech, john sharkey and LGBT | 9 Comments

My grumpy Christmas

By Mary Reid | Tue 24th December 2013 - 8:54 am

I really do not like the practice adopted by most party leaders of sending out Christmas cards adorned with portraits of themselves and their families. Having caught a glimpse of the card sent by Charles and Camilla this year, it seems this is not limited to politicians, but it is certainly not widespread amongst the rest of us.

Most of us send cards that illustrate the significance of the season, drawing on religious or mid-winter symbolism. So why do politicians usurp the underlying message of peace and hope with their blatant acts of self-promotion? Even Nick Clegg’s ironic take this year, which was charming and playful – and yes, I did receive one of those through the post – was still saying ‘look at me’.

There are subtler ways of harnessing the power of the Christmas card. Many MPs invite children in local schools to submit Christmas card designs, and the winner has the pleasure of seeing their card in print and sent to hundreds, if not thousands, of local people. This gives a great message to constituents – the self-effacing MP supports local schools, likes to encourage young people, and endorses the true meaning of Christmas.

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Tagged christmas, featured and nick clegg | 7 Comments

Opinion: The raging south east property boom must be stopped, without harming the rest of the UK

By Gareth Wilson | Mon 23rd December 2013 - 12:03 pm

Vince Cable speaking on the BBC’s Andrew Marr show today warned of a ‘raging housing boom’ in the South East where large parts of London could end up inhabited by only ‘foreigners and bankers’ (boroughs such as Camden, Haringey, Hammersmith and Fulham already have an average house price to earnings ratio of over 11).

One solution would be to raise interest rates making borrowing less affordable. But as Vince said today:
“The danger of raising interest rates is that you hit those parts of the country which are not yet fully recovered, you push up the exchange rate …

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Tagged house prices and land value tax | 30 Comments

Opinion: Shades of Grey 2: Six Useful Facts to Help You Chillax this Christmas

By Jemima Bland | Mon 23rd December 2013 - 8:46 am

There are nine countries to which Romanians and Bulgarians can travel to from 1 January: Austria, Belgium, Germany, Luxemburg, Malta, Netherlands, Spain (only Romanians), the UK and Switzerland.
There are around 6.5 million Romanians and 2.1 million Bulgarians in the age group 20-39, 8.6 million in total.
So far, 1.9 million Romanians and 0.35 million Bulgarians have already emigrated to other EU countries (Eurostat 2010, Open Society Insititute Sofia, 2011), including 80,000 Romania-born persons to the UK (ONS 2011) and 160,000 to Germany (German Office of Migration Studies , 2013).
Labour and skills shortages are reported from Bulgaria and in

…

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Tagged bulgaria, eu, immigration and romania | 7 Comments

Postcard from China (2): The Pearl of the Orient

By Alexander Payton | Sun 22nd December 2013 - 10:30 am

Should the Head of State be elected? Who should be allowed to be a candidate, and who should be allowed to vote?

Hong Kong currently faces these questions in its quest for universal suffrage and a democratic future, and was the recurrent theme during the second part of the trip to China organised by the British Chinese Project, in which I and three other Lib Dem delegates – Merlene Emerson, Sarah Yong and Steven Cheung – took part along with representatives from the other two main …

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Also posted in Europe / International | Tagged a postcard from, china and hong kong | 6 Comments

Opinion: Half an hour that changed the future

By Bill le Breton | Fri 20th December 2013 - 3:43 pm

Yesterday, the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) announced it would reduce or ‘taper’ its level of QE acquisitions from $85 billion a month to $75 billion. In the physical world it was not a touch on the break so much as a slight easing of pressure on the accelerator.

Back in September the FOMC had announced it thought the time for ‘tapering’ was at hand. Long term interest rates (a window on future expectation for growth and inflation) veered up and down as markets tried to gauge the warring claims of the liquidity, income and expectation effects. No clarity: US stock …

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Tagged economic policy | 23 Comments

Opinion: Justice for Simon Hughes

By Linda Jack | Thu 19th December 2013 - 5:45 pm

As someone who has never exactly been a supporter, there have been very few bright spots in the otherwise suffocatingly dark firmament which is the Coalition Government. One was and is the appointment of Norman Lamb as Care Minister who has been doing a remarkable job, also the undoubted achievements of Lynne Featherstone. So the news yesterday that Simon Hughes has been appointed a justice minister was one of those rare occasions when some of my perennial despair was tinged with just a little hope.

I have a lot of time for Tom McNally and I think he …

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Tagged justice, simon hughes and youth justice | 8 Comments

Ed Davey MP writes: Energy Act will create 200,000 green jobs

By Ed Davey | Thu 19th December 2013 - 2:59 pm

We will have to get used to calling it an Act, as the Energy Bill that I’ve been driving through Parliament is now law.

Creating the world’s first ever low carbon electricity market is a major achievement for the Liberal Democrats and the Coalition. And it has been delivered on time.

So, what will the Energy Act deliver?

It will create 200,000 green jobs.

The framework we’ve now put in place will create 250,000 jobs in the energy sector by 2020 – and 200,000 of them in renewables. The investment that we’re unlocking will produce green jobs up and down the country in offshore …

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Tagged climate change, energy act and green jobs | 16 Comments

Tim Farron MP writes: Liberal Democrats must stand up against blanket internet surveillance

By Tim Farron MP | Thu 19th December 2013 - 12:00 pm

I regularly get asked “who are your Liberal Heroes?” and I’ll reel off a list of people like Beveridge, Penhaligon and Paddy Ashdown and usually the person who has asked the question nods and smiles. Then I will tell them that the person I most admire is Harry Willcock. That’s typically met with a look of bemusement! I got similar looks of bewilderment when I cited Harry in 2005 in one of my first speeches in the House of Commons when I opposed Labours ID cards bill…

But Harry is at the top of my list because he was the Liberal that helped stop ID Cards in …

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Tagged civil liberties, digital rights and surveillance | 5 Comments

Edward Davey MP writes: Liberal Democrats continue to oppose Heathrow expansion

By Ed Davey | Wed 18th December 2013 - 6:20 pm

The Davies Commission’s interim report published yesterday has elicited many column inches in the newspapers but little clarity from the other two major parties as to the basis on which they will judge the final report.

In contrast, Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats made our approach to the Davies Commission clear yesterday. We will not endorse an expansion in airport capacity which would increase noise pollution for the hundreds of thousands of residents living beneath the flight path or break the Committee on Climate Change’s recommendations on aviation. Of course we will look at what the final …

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Tagged davies commission, ed davey, heathrow airport and nick clegg | 8 Comments

Opinion: Europe and peace – the ties that bind and the dangers of the rise of the right

By Ian Jones | Wed 18th December 2013 - 4:30 pm

There are many sound economic reasons why Britain’s continued membership of the EU is good for our country and for Europe itself. We are already making that case as the Euro elections approach in May 2014 and must continue to do so.

However, there is one over-riding reason that is barely getting mentioned as the whiff of ‘little-Englander patriotism’ in euro-sceptic campaigning risks once again becoming the stench of right-wing xenophobic nationalism in Britain and across Europe.

The historical development of the EU has provided the ties that bind European nations together in peace after a century of vicious blood-letting, including the …

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Tagged eu, immigration and peace | 9 Comments

Why you need to register for Liberal Democrat Spring conference NOW

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 18th December 2013 - 12:00 pm

I’ve just thought to myself that I’d just take 5 minutes to register for Liberal Democrat Spring conference in York, which takes place from 7-9 March. Every time I’ve thought that in the past couple of months since registration opened, I’ve never done anything about it, thinking that it was fine, I had till 31st December to get the cheap rate, don’t need to do it now. By some minor miracle, while procrastinating from something else, I got as far as the Conference registration page this morning.

Then, of course, I couldn’t remember my user name. I tried all the …

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Also posted in Conference | Tagged liberal democrats spring conference 2014 | 4 Comments

Opinion: Immigration – the shades of grey

By Jemima Bland | Wed 18th December 2013 - 9:51 am

Immigration remains a toxic topic for politicians in Britain – but those of us in the political centre cannot afford to dodge this debate, or we risk standing by while Britain becomes a country known for xenophobia, not tolerance.

Across the UK, people are facing a tough Christmas this year. If you can pay your electricity bill without too much trouble this winter, you’re one of the lucky ones. Many argue that immigration, or immigrants, are somehow to blame for this hardship. After all – ‘they’ are taking our jobs, using up our welfare budget, and filling up our local A&E …

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Tagged eu and immigration | 19 Comments

Opinion: Teresa May’s Right Hand doesn’t know what her Hard Right hand is doing

By Alisdair Calder McGregor | Tue 17th December 2013 - 5:16 pm

The leaks from the Home Office of Tory plans over immigration, rightly shot down as illegal by Nick , are the mark of a Tory Party abandoning moderate politics to placate its increasingly vocal right wing.

But the juxtaposition of Tory isolationist leanings with yesterday’s official announcement from the home secretary on modern slavery exposes the total lack of joined up thinking within the Tories on trafficking & immigration.

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Tagged immigration and slavery | 19 Comments

Opinion: As Liberals, we must stand up For sex workers

By James Shaddock | Tue 17th December 2013 - 4:38 pm

Today, 17th December, is the 10th International Day to End Violence Against Sex Workers. It seeks to raise awareness of the violence and hate experienced by sex workers around the world and help fight the stigma, discrimination and persecution brought on by society’s attitudes towards sex work and dangerous prohibitionist laws.

It’s is all the more poignant this year following the anti-sex work actions that have occurred throughout 2013. From Rhoda Grant’s attempt to criminalise the purchase of sex in Scotland, to the condom ban in Edinburgh saunas, through to the recent raids in Soho only two weeks ago, the …

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Tagged sex workers | 29 Comments

Steve Webb writes… 2 Millionth Person auto enrolled into a workplace pension

By Steve Webb MP | Mon 16th December 2013 - 5:24 pm

Today, the latest figures for the number of people placed into a workplace pension have been announced, and I am delighted to say that the 2 millionth person has now been auto enrolled into a pension.

It is essential that workers are encouraged to save towards their retirement, if they wish to maintain a standard of living comparable to what they have grown accustomed to whilst earning a wage. In the year leading up to the start of the scheme, across the private sector, only one worker out of three had any pension at all from their job – and …

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Tagged pensions | 2 Comments

Norman Lamb writes… A once-in-a-generation opportunity to fix our health and care system

By Norman Lamb MP | Mon 16th December 2013 - 12:58 pm

In 1997 Tony Blair told the Labour Party conference “I don’t want brought up in a country where the only way pensioners can get long-term care is by selling their home.” And yet speaking to the Health Select Committee in 2010, in Labour’s final months in office, Andy Burnham said, “every member of the Cabinet believed social care to be an area that had not been properly reformed and was one of great unfairness”. In thirteen years of talk, and promises, Labour did nothing to fix our dysfunctional, and profoundly unfair, system of funding social care.

In …

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Tagged care, care bill, dilnot commission, featured, liverpool care pathway and social care | 15 Comments

Opinion: This could be the historic moment the banks shift

By David Boyle | Mon 16th December 2013 - 8:34 am

Tuesday will see one of those moments which may prove a turning point in the development of an effective UK banking system.

That is the day that the banks will reveal the geographical spread of their lending, down to 9,000 different postcode levels.

It is the culmination of a major effort by Lib Dems in the House of Lords earlier in the last two years, with a great deal of help from elsewhere, to make sure that this happened.

It is also a creative moment of possibility – not to criticise the banks, because they need to be given the credit for this …

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Tagged banking, featured and lending | 3 Comments

Postcard from China: Reflections from a visit to Guangdong province (Part 1)

By Sarah Yong | Sun 15th December 2013 - 9:07 am

After returning from my first ever trip to China, I felt a ‘postcard’ was in order to summarise this wonderful experience. It was a huge honour to be asked to represent our Party along with fellow Chinese Lib Dems Merlene Emmerson, Alex Payton and Steven Cheung on this visit by official invitation of the Chinese Government in the Guandong province in Southern China. The trip was organised by the British Chinese Project, a not for profit organisation that works to increase awareness and greater engagement in politics by the British Chinese population. Our sixteen strong delegation included representatives from all …

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Also posted in Europe / International | Tagged china and featured | 4 Comments

Opinion: Political deference to today’s orthodoxy is the UK’s economic problem

By Paul Reynolds | Fri 13th December 2013 - 10:54 am

All three main political parties in the UK today broadly accept the Bank of England’s (BoE’s) programme of buying the paper ‘assets’ of banks with printed money – worthless and valuable alike (quantitative easing – QE). There are few dissenters, but I am one of them.

My dissenting post-2008 remedy was a managed partial default/bankruptcy of the UK’s insolvent banks with a quick operational reboot, on the grounds that it would be cheaper than a printed-money ‘bankers subsidy’. The quantity of intricately interwoven bad assets was unknown, and thus the UK government was subsidising a pig-in-a-poke, I believed.

But hey ho we …

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Tagged economic policy and quantatative easing | 26 Comments

Lib Dems should aim for a budget surplus not because the Tories want to, but because it is right

By Nick T | Thu 12th December 2013 - 1:54 pm

All parties have a mixture of deficit hawks and doves – those who believe in balanced budgets and those who aren’t too bothered. The Lib Dems are no exception, but I think we are different in the motivations underlying these positions.

Many Tories often seem to see deficit reduction as an end in and of itself, not even necessarily because they want to see a smaller state and lower taxes, but simply because their ideology teaches that budget deficits are Bad Things.

And in recent years, some Labour figures have begun to sound like their ideology teaches that budget deficits are inherently …

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Tagged deficit reduction, featured, prateek buch and vince cable | 57 Comments

Norman Lamb MP writes…Have your say on dementia care

By Norman Lamb MP | Thu 12th December 2013 - 12:36 pm

Back in 2008, when I was Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary, I spoke out about poor diagnosis rates for dementia sufferers, saying that “the NHS must do more to ensure people are encouraged to seek early help and that they have access to care from their GP, specialist assessment and accurate diagnosis.” Dementia diagnosis rates across the country vary significantly – and although they are improving, they are still not good enough. And, while there is some excellent dementia care – there has also been much that is inadequate.

I could never have imagined then that – 5 years on – …

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Tagged dementia | 3 Comments

Opinion: Ukip’s not-so-respectable European allies

By Paul Stocker | Thu 12th December 2013 - 11:27 am

Recently, Nigel Farage rejected the overtures and offer of alliance from the French Far Right party, Front Nationale, led by Marine Le Pen, stating “Whatever Marine Le Penn is trying to do with Le Front National, anti-Semitism, is still deeply embedded in that party, and for that principle political reason, we are not going to work with them now, or at any point in the future”. The alliance also included the Dutch Freedom Party, led by blonde bombshell, Geert Wilders – famous for his anti-Islam tirades.

This attempt by Farage to place Ukip in the ‘respectable’ wing of European politics …

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Tagged efd, europe and ukip | 19 Comments

‘Good’ gender segregation and ‘bad’ gender segregation?

By Stephen Tall | Thu 12th December 2013 - 9:08 am

I’ve just heard the Chief Executive of Universities UK be put through the mill on BBC Radio 4’s Today Programme following its decision to publish advice that gender segregation might not necessarily be discriminatory as long as “both men and women are being treated equally, as they are both being segregated in the same way”. The guidance – which you can read here – is specific to invited external speakers at meetings on university premises.

I do not like gender segregation. At all. Maybe it’s the result of having …

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Tagged featured, schools, universities and Universities UK | 73 Comments

Better in Cameron’s Black Book than on the Statute Book

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 11th December 2013 - 11:55 am

“The Lib Dems have held us back, says Cameron” screams today’s Daily Mail headline. Yes, it’s the Prime Minister showing that he can play the differentiation game too.

If there’s one thing that David Cameron and Nick Clegg can agree on, it’s that the Liberal Democrats and the Tories have divergent views on many issues. Both will take every opportunity to point that out to anyone who will listen.

The Daily Mail quotes Cameron’s interview with the Spectator in which he says that Nick Clegg has stopped him doing all sorts of things he would love to do. None of this is …

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Tagged david cameron, differentiation and the spectator | 15 Comments

Opinion: Our liberal identity crisis

By Steve Bradley | Mon 9th December 2013 - 3:34 pm

Does anyone know why the Liberal Democrats exist ? It’s an important question.

IPSOS/Mori research in 2012 into voter perceptions found that 64% “don’t know what the Liberal Democrats stand for these days” (57% for Labour, 44% the Tories). This was echoed even amongst party supporters, with 41% of Lib Dem voters unclear (42% for Labour voters, 37% Conservatives). “Our polling now shows that the Liberal Democrats have the toughest task telling voters what they stand for”, the report concluded.

We need to acknowledge that our party has an identity challenge nationally, and blaming the coalition would be too convenient. …

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Tagged community politics and narrative | 81 Comments

Poverty at its lowest since 2004/5?

By Joe Otten | Mon 9th December 2013 - 10:55 am

A report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (pdf) shows that 13 million people in the UK were in poverty in 2011/12, a poverty rate of 21% which, while still too high, is the lowest it has been since 2004/5.

There is a mixed picture behind this: improvements for pensioners and children, and declines for adults in work, the latter being the angle picked up by the BBC.

The data predates some of the more recent benefit changes, which are not likely to help, although even a 1% uprating of benefits will be faster than many people’s wages, which …

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Tagged poverty | 33 Comments

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

By The Voice | Sun 8th December 2013 - 2:00 pm

Many thanks to the 16,600 visitors who dropped by Lib Dem Voice this week. Here’s our 7 most-read posts…

Opinion: Child taken from the womb by social services. Really?( 137 comments) by Evan Harris

Jo Swinson takes on Daily Mail’s Liz Jones, who thinks she shouldn’t be “procreating” (11 comments) by Caron Lindsay

Hemming helps woman in forced caesarean and adoption case (28 comments) by Caron Lindsay

Times: “The increasingly confident and powerful Mr Clegg” (28 comments) by Newshound

Opinion: Women must stop stepping into the political shoes of men (45 comments) by Andy Boddington

Nelson Mandela: the long walk is …

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Also posted in Best of the blogs and Site news | Tagged sunday best | Leave a comment