Category Archives: Op-eds

Neville Farmer

Opinion: Boundary nonsense

By Neville Farmer | Mon 4th February 2013 - 1:23 pm

Boundary - Some rights reserved by ank0kuOn the face of it, the boundary change proposals were about cutting costs by having less MPs and strengthening democracy by having each MP represent roughly identical numbers of voters. Neither of these claims bear close scrutiny.

Our democracy is not a simple thing – it struggles its way through the conflicting needs of the nation and the individual. It is unrealistic to base our representation on population statistics alone. It’s true that there are a few Parliamentary seats with fairly sparsely populated

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Daniel Russell

Opinion: UK sets the right example on same sex marriage

By Daniel Russell | Mon 4th February 2013 - 11:23 am

The Polish parliament - Some rights reserved by Kancelaria PremieraIt’s been a week of ups and downs with regard to marriage equality and I am not just talking about in Britain. This week the Polish parliament voted down a bill that would have introduced civil partnerships. Despite an impassioned plea by Prime Minister Donald Tusk, a significant part of his governing party voted against the bill, teaming up with conservative members to destroy any chance it had of becoming law. Indeed, one member declared that she would be voting against the bill because gay people “are of no use whatsoever to society.” From this position, equal

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Richard Giddings

Opinion: Tackling homophobic bullying in schools

By Richard Giddings | Mon 4th February 2013 - 9:53 am

Gay teen supporters of Stonewall and its campaign against homophobic bullying in schools, celebrating London's Gay Pride. July 2009 - Some rights reserved by lewishamdreamerLiberal Democrat colleagues may remember that one of Liberal Youth’s big campaigns was to stop homophobic bullying.

As the former Liberal Youth Chair in Northamptonshire it was a campaign that is very close to my heart. Too many LGBT young people are subjected to terrible abuse and bullying – just because of who they are.

When I was elected to the County Council in 2009 I wanted to do

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Joe Otten

Budget: No tax break for married couples

By Joe Otten | Sat 2nd February 2013 - 9:33 pm

The BBC and Comedy Central are carrying news that there will be no new tax break for married couples in this year’s budget. The measure is in the coalition agreement, with Liberal Democrat MPs free to abstain. The BBC also reports significant unrest on the Conservative backbenches where many are calling for a new tax break to sugar the “pill” of equal marriage. However there are still plans to introduce a limited transferability of the personal allowance between partners this parliament.

I find the idea that the government knows the best way for you to define your relationship supremely …

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Andrew Tennant

Opinion: We feel the handbrake of history on our Liberal reforming.

By Andrew Tennant | Sat 2nd February 2013 - 5:30 pm

I doubt it’s gone unnoticed, but there are rather a lot of Tories in parliament.

Some 306 Tory MPs were elected in May 2010 (47% of the total on 36.1% of the vote), compared to a meagre 57 Lib Dems (only 9%, despite the party actually getting 23.0% of the vote).

And so the Lib Dems in parliament have had quite a battle to achieve their successes so far in government.

First Past the Post is neither a fair, nor a kind system …

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Israel/Palestine: trying to find some balance

By Charles Beaumont | Fri 1st February 2013 - 2:21 pm

Israeli children visit Palestinian village of Tuwani and participate in bilingual activities together - Some rights reserved by delayed gratficationWriting about Israel and Palestine is a bit like that bit in Great Expectations when Pip asked whether it was a good idea to lend money to a friend. The cynical Mr Wemmick responds “choose your bridge and pitch your money into the Thames over the centre arch”. Or put another way, don’t waste your time.

I think that, at our best, Liberal Democrats are fair-minded people who try to accept that most arguments have two sides. So what follows is not my opinion on who is right, but five things that have

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Nick T

Putting the party’s message in a distinctively liberal context – Part 3: a fairer society

By Nick T | Fri 1st February 2013 - 12:50 pm

Liberal Democrat badge - Some rights reserved by Paul Walter, Newbury, UKThis is the third of three posts looking at the party’s messaging. The introductory post was published here, and yesterday’s on the economic part of the message is here ; this last and final post concentrates on the second part of the message: social justice.

The second part of the party’s message is “building a fairer society”. Fairness was, of course, the theme of the party’s 2010 manifesto, linking the four key policy platforms on which we fought the election (fairer taxes, a fair start for every child, fairer politics and a fairer, more balanced economy).

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Celia Thomas

Baroness Thomas writes… Getting Personal Independence Payments right

By Celia Thomas | Thu 31st January 2013 - 3:53 pm

This afternoon the Department of Work and Pensions announces a significant change on the new Personal Independent Payments following significant Lib Dem pressure. Celia Thomas, the Lib Dem peer who has campaigned tirelessly on the issue, explains why it’s a major win.

Getting the rules governing Personal Independence Payments right is vital. The new benefit, which will begin to replace Disability Living Allowance later this year, will have a huge effect on disabled people up and down the country.

I’m broadly in favour of the change to PIP, which seeks to clarify the eligibility of disabled people to this benefit, the purpose …

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Karen Wilkinson

Opinion: The hidden costs of pushing parents to conform

By Karen Wilkinson | Thu 31st January 2013 - 2:00 pm

I heard odd things yesterday.  Talk of getting women back into the workplace by subsidising childcare for all parents – and this after means testing child benefit.

Then someone proposed that all child carers should have good GCSE Maths & English whilst increasing ratios! How did the human race survive before academic qualifications? Here we have another narrowing of work opportunities for people who are not so hot at academic stuff.

To add to my indignation, I heard someone say on the radio that only working parents provide a positive role model  for children and that “non-working” parents don’t contribute to the …

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Nick T

Putting the party’s message in a distinctively liberal context – Part 2: the economy

By Nick T | Thu 31st January 2013 - 12:37 pm

This is the second of three posts looking at the party’s messaging. The first was published here yesterday; the last and final post will appear tomorrow.

The first half of our message emphasises economic competence: bringing back (as David Laws once put it) Gladstonian Liberalism to the Treasury and setting us up to be competitive in a fast-changing, globalised economy.

So far, much of the focus has been on our willingness to take “tough decisions”. Here, for example, is David Laws speaking to the Independent recently: “in the past people have known we stood for a fairer society but have …

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Paul Haydon

MEPs call for review of funding for European far-right

By Paul Haydon | Thu 31st January 2013 - 11:56 am

Last year, for the first time, the far-right Alliance of European National Movements (AENM) organised itself into a pan-European bloc, and has therefore recently been allocated almost £400,000 in public funding from the European Parliament. This group includes the BNP, the Front National in France and Jobbik, a far-right political party in Hungary renowned for its racist and anti-semitic views. Of particular concern is the possibility that public money could now end up being used to incite racial hatred.

Under EU regulations, parties must observe fundamental principles such as liberty, democracy and respect for human rights in order to …

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David Heath MP

David Heath MP writes… The future of our forests

By David Heath MP | Thu 31st January 2013 - 10:54 am

I was delighted when I was asked to take on ministerial responsibility for our forests. If I had any doubt about what forests offer, and I didn’t, I would have been even more convinced as I’ve had the opportunity to travel around the country. Our woodlands are places where people can get out in the fresh air and enjoy walking, bike riding and picnicking. But they’re also important for public health, preserving wildlife, storing carbon dioxide, and have huge potential to provide sustainable employment in some of our most rural areas.

That’s why I have worked hard over recent months …

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Chris White

Opinion: Gove’s A Level reforms risk pushing many universities out of reach

By Chris White | Wed 30th January 2013 - 12:30 pm

I am not from the educational establishment and, having seen two daughters through state schools, I have plenty of zeal for major reform.

But that reform does not encompass sending a copy of the King James Bible to every school nor yet banishing the Arts from the nation’s principal academic qualification.

In so many ways Michael Gove uses the same techniques as his colleague Eric Pickles: pander to the right wing press, eschew evidence based thinking, make a splash.

The AS level announcement this week is just one more example. I didn’t have the option of AS levels. I sat O-levels in a …

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Nick T

Putting the party’s message in a distinctively liberal context – Part 1

By Nick T | Wed 30th January 2013 - 11:24 am

In my New Year review of the party’s position, I emphasised the need to get the basics right; political competence before all else. I touched on the party’s messaging only perfunctorily, because my view was (and to an extent still is) that there are more pressing concerns than the message itself (we can have the best message in the world, but if we are failing when it comes to the basics of political strategy and tactics it is next to useless). Here’s is what I did say, in my concluding remarks:

There’s already been talk over the Christmas break of

…

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Anthony Hawkes

Opinion: War on Weltschmerz

By Anthony Hawkes | Tue 29th January 2013 - 1:28 pm

A Liberal Youth training sessionWhen friends have lost their belief in religion, they usually describe not the freeing of bonds, but the emptiness left without a moral compass to guide them.

My youngest daughter popped in after work today looking rather sad. When I asked her the problem she described herself as feeling weltschmerz. Never having heard of this before, I got her to elaborate. She told me of the alienation, the resignation and the overwhelming sense of the cruelty of the world. This is not a woman prone to melancholy, …

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Stephen Tall

I apologise for my lack of enthusiasm for HS2. It’s been unavoidably delayed owing to the lack of evidence

By Stephen Tall | Tue 29th January 2013 - 9:45 am

HS2‘All aboard!’ exhorts the email I received last night from Lib Dem transport minister Norman Baker, hailing his announcement of the Coalition’s plans for Phase Two of Britain’s High Speed Rail Network (aka HS2). I’m afraid, though, I’m going to have to apologise to Norman for the delay in arrival of my goodwill owing to what I suspect is the wrong type of investment on the lines.

HS2, we are told, will cut journey times, help the environment, heal the North-South divide and boost growth. Each of these arguments is less …

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Paul Pettinger

Opinion: It’s the economy stupid

By Paul Pettinger | Tue 29th January 2013 - 8:55 am

The announcement on Friday that the UK economy contracted again in the last quarter of 2012 offers a damaging blow to the Government, and our leadership in particular, who have rightly and continually reaffirmed during this parliament that generating economic growth is by far their greatest priority.

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Ed Davey

Ed Davey MP writes… The Green Deal goes live

By Ed Davey | Mon 28th January 2013 - 2:55 pm

Today marks a very significant achievement of our party in Government. The Green Deal is being launched.

After two and half years of toil the pledge in our manifesto to, “offer a home energy improvement package … paid for by the savings from lower energy bills” has become reality.

Chris Huhne started the ball rolling way back in 2010 and Nick Clegg and I are visiting a college in Sheffield today to mark the opening of a brand new market in home energy efficiency and meet trainees in home insulation.

Millions of homes do not have full double-glazing. More than half do not …

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Norman Baker MP

Norman Baker MP writes… High Speed 2: Transforming our national rail network

By Norman Baker MP | Mon 28th January 2013 - 1:53 pm

High speed rail Medway - Some rights reserved by Matt's photostreamIn the two centuries since the Golden Age of British railways, from the opening of the Stockton and Darlington line in 1825, Stephenson’s Rocket and the railway boom of the 1840s, Britain has tumbled from the position of being the envy of the world, to lagging sadly behind. The busiest sections of our old Victorian railways are now struggling to cope as the railways become increasingly popular. As anyone who travels regularly by train as I do will know, the West …

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Nick T

Nick Clegg’s son’s schooling is none of your business

By Nick T | Sun 27th January 2013 - 11:58 am

Appearing on the Andrew Marr Show this morning, Nick Clegg was asked once again which secondary school he would send his eldest child too. He quite rightly dismissed the question as a personal one – he and Miriam have strived to keep their children out of the public eye, so why should they change that now?

As I tweeted at the time:

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David Thorpe

Opinion: A radical idea for the post office network

By David Thorpe | Sat 26th January 2013 - 6:25 pm

Isle of Iona Post Office, Scotland - Some rights reserved by Freddie H.A typical Saturday morning in the Thorpe household typically involves me meandering, in my usual untidy fashion, to one of the menagerie of corner shops which cosset Hammersmith high street from the unkempt collection of bookmakers, pawnbrokers and fast food joints which seem to be the fate of most urban centres.

From the shop, I will descend to the most desolate corner of a quiet bar and languidly let the tensions of the week be traduced by …

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Laura Willoughby

Opinion: Down with marriage

By Laura Willoughby | Sat 26th January 2013 - 12:00 pm

bouquetIt’s always the smallest things that seem to end up creating the biggest noise. Take the current debate over marriage: I know it seems like a big issue, but if you really look, it’s a debate about semantics and contracts that’s become complicated by the fact that history is so unclear about its origins.

The Church thinks that marriage is theirs and that therefore they have a right to dictate who gets to do it. I used to be partly persuaded by the fact that marriage was the Church’s brand and that those of …

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Libby Local

Libby Local, Episode 9: “Civilisation”

By Libby Local | Sat 26th January 2013 - 9:25 am

"Demsbury" - Bekonscot Model Village and Railway - London - Some rights reserved by bortescristianOn Wednesday, I got back on the last train to Demsbury and was strolling homeward through the icy streets. The town centre is a fairly safe and usually free of drunks and ruffians on a midweek night. I half thought of popping in to the Market Tavern for last orders, but it’s Dry January and I was heartily fed up with drinking glasses of orange.

A few seconds later he was in front of me, …

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David Thorpe

Opinion: the UK has many economic lessons to learn from Ireland

By David Thorpe | Fri 25th January 2013 - 2:51 pm

When various commentators and critics of the coalition’s economic policy cast around for alternative solutions, not many look to Ireland for a model to follow, but perhaps they should.

My native country’s economy is in the sort of doldrums which make the current UK growth and employment rate look utopian, but the economy formerly known as the ‘Celtic Tiger’ is healing itself and there are many lessons for UK policy makers to learn. This year growth is forecast to be 1.8%, double what the UK can expect to achieve, while the country was recently able to return to the bond markets …

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Simon Beard

3 facts about assisted dying (or ‘it’s not all about Switzerland you know’)

By Simon Beard | Fri 25th January 2013 - 1:51 pm

The debate around legalising assisted dying seems increasingly to centre on the case of suicide tourism; whether people should ‘have to’ travel to clinics in Switzerland where they can legally end their lives. Whilst this is undoubtedly an important trend, it is merely a side show to the real issue and masks three important facts about assisted dying.

1 – Very few people travel to Switzerland to end their lives.

In the last 10 years less than 200 people have travelled to Switzerland to end their lives. That’s quite a lot. However, it’s far fewer than the estimated 500 …

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The Voice

Opinion: what living on benefits really means

By The Voice | Fri 25th January 2013 - 12:51 pm

Suel writes:

Every time I hear the phrase “a life on benefits”, it’s like a slap in the face to my brother, who lives in my spare room while looking for a job. He’s not lazy or a scrounger, he just can’t find a job. As Sarah Teather said two weeks ago

the term “scroungers” has become so pervasive in social consciousness that even those on benefits do not attempt to debunk the entire category, only to excuse themselves from the label.

I asked my brother if he was willing to share what his life on benefits was like:

Her brother writes:
I have …

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Giles Goodall

Opinion: Cameron is wishing for an EU that already exists

By Giles Goodall | Fri 25th January 2013 - 11:21 am

The prime objective of David Cameron’s Europe speech was always to placate anti-European critics on his right flank rather than to set out a bold vision in the national interest. And in that sense, his ‘red meat’ pledge of an in/out referendum after 2015 may succeed in sating his own party’s Eurosceptic appetite, at least in the short term. But there are at least three reasons why his strategy is not only mistaken, but risks deeply damaging the national interest.

First, while the ‘repatriationist’ wing of Cameron’s own party may be satisfied with the promise of a renegotiation of as yet …

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Duncan Stott

Opinion: we must force the Tories to follow the evidence on khat

By Duncan Stott | Fri 25th January 2013 - 9:52 am

I feel sorry for the Academic Council on the Misuse of Drugs. It’s this panel of drug experts’ task to try and inject some sense into our country’s failing drug policy. Sadly, in the latter years of New Labour’s reign, it became the default option to ignore their advice on drug classification. On magic mushrooms, then on cannabis and then again on ecstasy, Labour couldn’t resist ignoring the ACMD, opting instead for populist posturing in an attempt to appear ‘tough’.

The Labour government’s unscientific urges on drug classification were deeply frustrating to Liberal Democrats, and this led us to a 2010 …

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Chris Rennard

Lord Rennard writes… Individual Electoral Registration: a journey from Tory instincts to Lib Dem legislation

By Chris Rennard | Thu 24th January 2013 - 5:37 pm

In 2003, the Electoral Commission recommended that Great Britain should follow the example of Northern Ireland and move to a system of Individual Electoral Registration (IER), where everyone fills in their own form. Labour havered for six years, fearing that ‘their’ voters might not register individually. It took until 2009 for them to introduce framework legislation to bring in individual registration at some future point, with no guarantees as to exactly when.

When the Coalition took office, the two parties agreed to speed up Labour’s glacial process.  Ministers settled on a transitional period encompassing the next General Election. The new system …

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Fiona Hall MEP

Fiona Hall MEP writes… Cameron is putting British interests at risk

By Fiona Hall MEP | Thu 24th January 2013 - 3:24 pm

In his speech on Europe yesterday, David Cameron spoke not as Prime Minister but as a Tory party leader backed into a corner by his outspoken tea-party backbenchers. It was never going to be possible to appease his own right-wing and at the same time reassure his European partners. By promising an in-out referendum following an anticipated but far from certain renegotiated EU treaty by 2017, he has chosen to prioritise party political interests.

As a result, the UK will lose further influence in Europe as other Member States anticipate a “Brexit” and discount the UK’s views altogether. Even worse, he …

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