Category Archives: Op-eds

Libby Local

Libby Local, Episode 2: “The selection panel and Mad Max”

By Libby Local | Sun 4th November 2012 - 2:15 pm

Last Wednesday I was up before the selection panel. Beforehand I was experiencing that curious mix of feelings that is at once confidence and nervousness. I had no idea how to dress. What does a typical Lib Dem wear? A bit of lippy and my poshest high heels? My usual casually crumped look, replete with a hat that Dr Seuss would be proud of? A business suit? Lipstick and high heels won.

The day began badly with an encounter with Maxwell Tarmac-Smyth – the “Mad Max” of Libbyshire politics. He’s second peg in the Tory oligarchy that runs Libbyshire. He’s the …

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Opinion: Parish pump politics and apple pie undermine Police Commissioner elections

By Andy Boddington | Sun 4th November 2012 - 9:50 am

Sometimes having a microphone thrust under your nose instantly crystalizes your thoughts. As you hear yourself speak, you realise you have strong opinions when a moment before you didn’t know what to think.

On Thursday night, as I left a Police and Crime Commissioner hustings in Shropshire, I was struggling to gather my thoughts. A reporter from BBC Radio Shropshire, gloriously named James Bond, thrust a microphone at me. “Andy. What did you think of the candidates?”

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Shas Sheehan

Opinion: Slower traffic saves lives

By Shas Sheehan | Fri 2nd November 2012 - 2:22 pm

The sad fact is that the UK has the highest proportion of pedestrian road deaths of any European country – followed closely by Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Greece. An even sadder statistic is that the most common cause of death among 5-14 year olds (more boys than girls) is being a pedestrian hit by a motor vehicle.

All the evidence suggests that moving from a 30mph to 20mph limit on residential roads will reduce the death toll. A recent PACTS (Parliamentary Advisory Council for Transport Safety) report found that child casualties fell by 67% where 20mph schemes were introduced.

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Graeme Henderson

Opinion: Heseltine report puts the State back on the hook for helping lead economic recovery

By Graeme Henderson | Fri 2nd November 2012 - 11:52 am

The lack of a joined-up growth strategy has been this Government’s Achilles heel. This week’s report from the Heseltine Review finally provides one. Some on the Tory backbenches will urge David Cameron and George Osborne to ignore many of the recommendations, and the swathes of evidence standing behind them, in favour of abdicating responsibility for the economic recovery to the private sector. Jacob Rees-Mogg predictably caricatures the findings as favouring a 1960s approach to regional development – his preferred course being deregulation. The Heseltine Review embodies …

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Mark Pack

Judging Jimmy Savile

By Mark Pack | Fri 2nd November 2012 - 7:50 am

OK, I know due legal process and all that is important. Innocent until proven guilty and all that.

But sometimes you don’t have to wait until the police and legal systems have done their stuff to have a firm view.

And when you look at all the evidence the media has been reporting, it’s pretty clear he’s guilty, isn’t it?

It’s even become a standing joke that you just have to look at him to know he’s just the sort of person who would commit those crimes. Perhaps like me you heard the jokes on the last episode of the News Quiz and …

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Opinion: Heseltine is calling for return to cap in hand culture

By Andy Boddington | Thu 1st November 2012 - 12:24 pm

I take my hat off to Michael Heseltine for producing a report on growth that has passion, commitment and vision. It is far cry from the usual dry as dust, Treasury reports that obsessively tinker at the economic margins. Alas, despite its punchy prose the Heseltine report is flawed.

There is a lot to celebrate in this report. Heseltine condemns a dysfunctional Whitehall for neutering local leadership: “As Whitehall has taken more powers so its distrust of local decision makers has increased. At the first sign of trouble, further powers are wrested back to the centre.” But like Eric Pickles, he does not trust

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Stephen Tall

I don’t agree with Nick. We should be in Europe to reform the EU

By Stephen Tall | Thu 1st November 2012 - 9:20 am

Nick Clegg will today make the kind of speech which makes it very hard for Lib Dems to push the idea that our party is serious about reform of the European Union. According to the BBC, he will dismiss the chances of any significant changes to the EU’s budget:

In a speech to be delivered to the Chatham House international affairs think-tank, Mr Clegg will say Labour is well aware there was “absolutely no prospect” of achieving a real-terms cut. “Their change of heart is dishonest, it’s hypocritical.

…

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Phil Ling

Opinion: Canvassing – a few steps to success

By Phil Ling | Thu 1st November 2012 - 9:06 am

Dundonald ward, in Merton, was awarded the “most canvassed ward in London” at the London Liberal Democrats regional conference.  As one of the people co-ordinating the campaign in the ward, it was great that the hard work was recognised, but I was also a bit surprised.

Not surprised as in “can’t believe we’d won”, but surprised in the fact it didn’t feel like hard work, once the initial groundwork had been done. In reality, although there were times where we were out doing surveys, recruiting or canvassing twice a week, it averaged about once a week. The canvass teams were never huge, 3-5 people, with the

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Tim Purkiss

Opinion: Debate around mental health must be in the political mainstream

By Tim Purkiss | Wed 31st October 2012 - 2:25 pm

On Monday Ed Miliband made a speech to the Royal College of Psychiatrists concerning the taboo surrounding mental illness. He spoke about the devastating human and economic consequences of failing to address the under- provision in mental health treatment and promised that, amongst other things, a Labour Government would re-write the constitution of the NHS in order to address this under provision.

In my previous post on this website I wrote about the motion concerning mental health which was passed at the Lib Dems autumn conference in Brighton.

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Norman Lamb MP

Norman Lamb writes… Lessons from Winterbourne View

By Norman Lamb MP | Wed 31st October 2012 - 12:10 pm

On Friday last week, eleven former members of staff at Winterbourne View private hospital were sentenced for the shocking neglect and abuse of their former patients. Six have been jailed, and five others given suspended sentences. I hope that these sentences will send a clear message that such criminal behaviour will not be tolerated and that there will be real consequences for the perpetrators. It was abuse of power of the worst sort.

The case should reinforce to everyone, from frontline workers, to regulators, service commissioners, managers and board members, that they have a shared responsibility in preventing abuse of people …

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Paul Reynolds

Opinion: The importance of party unity over the economy

By Paul Reynolds | Wed 31st October 2012 - 11:15 am

There has been a rise in factionalism across the Liberal Democrats during their time in the Coalition Government – with the Liberal Left, Social Liberal Forum, Liberal Reform and other groups, all promoting their different perspectives. At Party Conference a left/right divide over economics and fiscal policy was very noticeable.

My thesis is that this divide is a serious one which is widening, not narrowing, and without measures to halt the fragmentation,

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Opinion: A mansion tax that is fair and seen to be fair

By Ben Tyler | Wed 31st October 2012 - 8:55 am

The natural mechanism for raising a mansion tax on high value UK property is not Council tax. Councils lack a home by home market valuation database and the means to build one. HMRC can raise a tax far more effectively and then might distribute it to councils.

Current Conservative policy will block a mansion tax based upon the rich contributing more but might accept a new tax targeted solely at non-owner occupied homes. Not only do these homes

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Also posted in News | Tagged | 10 Comments
Oranjepan

Opinion: The Savile row – why paedophile scandals continue to haunt society

By Oranjepan | Tue 30th October 2012 - 3:55 pm

The stunned response that has crystalised around the proposed inquiries into alleged abuse at public institutions following the broadcast of ITV’s Exposure investigation is perfectly understandable/

Yet after decades of scandal, alarm and outrage, controversy after controversy, following numerous inquiries and reports, and despite the best efforts of huge numbers of dedicated staff, one conclusion is inescapable: Britain has created, in the words of Nick Davies, “an elaborate and sophisticated failure, a child protection system which does not protect children.”

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Philip Young

Opinion: Farewell to Lib Dem News

By Philip Young | Tue 30th October 2012 - 10:56 am

As a former Editor, I’m sad to see that Liberal Democrat News is now compiling its final issue.

The idea of a weekly newspaper began in 1947.There were numerous attempts to axe it. I fought off at least two, and it was only thanks to the likes of David Steel, John Pardoe, and the ALC, that the treasurer was persuaded otherwise in the 1970s. Then, the party was financially bust, despite Trevor Jones delivering a string of remarkable by-election successes that

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Tracy Connell

Opinion: Let’s unite against George Osborne’s employee rights grab

By Tracy Connell | Tue 30th October 2012 - 9:54 am

George Osborne has many faults, but we have to thank him for one thing – uniting the Liberal Democrats. There are groups within the Lib Dems holding different, even opposite views. However, many Lib Dems are united in their opposition to Osborne’s idea of exchanging workers’ rights for shares in their company.  If you agree, please help us by taking part in the consultation on these proposals which ends on 8th November.

Whilst the Lib Dems are fully behind the idea of Employee Share

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Ewan Hoyle

Opinion: The doping scandal that wasn’t

By Ewan Hoyle | Tue 30th October 2012 - 8:57 am

Two doping scandals hit the headlines last week. One was very serious, apparently very long-running, and seemingly ignored by the sport’s governing bodies for a great many years. The other culminated in Lance Armstrong finally being stripped of his 7 Tour de France titles.

In case you’re puzzled, I should inform you of the apparently entrenched practice of dosing up on an addictive stimulant drug before top level football matches. Glen Johnson, Rio Ferdinand and Phil Neville have all admitted recently that they take this drug before matches and have been doing so for some time. They don’t seem to think

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Stephen Tall

A headline I didn’t expect ever to write: Tory right-wing calls for affirmative action in public sector

By Stephen Tall | Tue 30th October 2012 - 7:45 am

I did a bit of a double-take on reading Fraser Nelson’s latest column in the Telegraph complaining that David Cameron has been ‘strikingly relaxed’ about appointments to government-funded bodies.

‘His allies say that he has been too much of a gentleman to play Labour’s game and start stuffing quangos with Tory placemen,’ says Fraser, whose tone suggests he’d like nothing better than for the Prime Minister to start stuffing quangos with Tory placemen.

His plea for greater patronage was taken up with alacrity by Tim Montgomerie at ConservativeHome who …

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David Thorpe

Opinion: The Mansion Tax is unfair and illiberal

By David Thorpe | Mon 29th October 2012 - 4:23 pm

Since 2010 the word ‘fairness’ has been deployed on an industrial scale across the political spectrum.

To want ‘fairness’ is to want a distribution of the spoils which reflects the value of the contribution of each to the economic and social resources of society. A fair tax system should seek to tax according to capacity to pay. It must also act to discourage those, such as polluters, whose economic choices negatively impact on society.

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Giles Goodall

Opinion: A storm in a jam jar – my top 5 Euromyths

By Giles Goodall | Mon 29th October 2012 - 11:53 am

Those of us familiar with the EU are used to its complicated processes, obscure acronyms and often unfathomable procedures. We sometimes forget that it is still a hybrid project that no-one has ever tried before: a multinational, multilingual experiment in international cooperation where countries decide by common accord to pool decision-making in certain areas and under certain conditions for their own mutual benefit.

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Mark Pack

How leaflets used to look: Labour’s Citizen leaflet from 1929

By Mark Pack | Mon 29th October 2012 - 10:53 am

Today’s leaflet in my series on old election leaflets is a centrally produced Labour party 4-pager from 1929. As with the Conservative leaflet from 1931 which I previously featured, the design may be very different from good modern leaflets, but the content has some very familiar overtones.

The May 1929 contest was the first general election in which women under 30 could vote and also one of only three elections in the modern era where the party with the most votes did not also win the most seats. Despite being slightly out-polled by the Conservatives, Labour won more seats in …

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David Allen

Opinion: Awesome?

By David Allen | Sun 28th October 2012 - 4:50 pm

We went to the Tate Modern recently. We saw early twentieth century art which explored ambiguous, disturbing images and dreams. Female sculptors depicted fantastical women as drinking vessels, or as Diabolo players entwined by their own diabolical game. The horror of war was a subject for art and contemplation, not just another brief film of routine carnage on the nightly news.

The mood was shattered by the eight-year-old whose T-shirt was loudly emblazoned with a twenty-first century slogan, “AWESOME!” It took me a while to work out just why this felt so incongruous. Being in an art gallery, I had time. Bear with me, please. The

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Kirsten de Keyser

Opinion: Hug a Hoodie or Mug a Hoodie? What would Borgen do?

By Kirsten de Keyser | Sun 28th October 2012 - 9:25 am

It’s really rather a good feeling being a Danish Brit nowadays. Repeated requests for jumper-knitting instructions are admittedly a drawback, but one I can live with. More interesting are daily questions about policy matters as practised Borgen style. (For those who’ve been living under a stone for the past several months, “Borgen” is short for Christiansborg, the Danish Parliament building as well as the title of the appointment-to-view Danish version of the West Wing).

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James King

Opinion: Four point plan for a liberal, democratic Europe

By James King | Sat 27th October 2012 - 2:35 pm

Europe is rising up the political agenda. It’s an issue that could bring down David Cameron or break-up the coalition. Yet the Liberal Democrats are strangely silent. The EU didn’t appear on the Brighton conference agenda and we no longer have a Minister in the Foreign Office. We need to develop a vision for a liberal, democratic EU and get smart about fighting for it.

Here’s my four point plan:

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Also posted in Europe / International | Tagged , , , , and | 47 Comments
Mark Pack

Jimmy Savile: can we have the police crisis now, please?

By Mark Pack | Sat 27th October 2012 - 11:25 am

The BBC is rightly in crisis over its handling of the Jimmy Savile case. But the mix of some journalists loving taking pot-shots at the BBC and the BBC’s own love of reporting itself (did you see the Newsnight piece on the Panorama episode about the Newsnight story?) means the BBC’s troubles has been over-shadowing the role of others.

The police, in particular.

One police force we now know investigate Jimmy Savile and their work at least got as far as serious consideration of whether or not there was enough evidence …

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Geoff Crocker

Opinion: Give us an energy policy

By Geoff Crocker | Fri 26th October 2012 - 4:21 pm

Our party’s energy policy is totally inadequate, consisting only of motherhood and apple pie statements in favour of efficiency and green policies. We went into the last election on the populist platform of no new nuclear power generation and no new coal power without carbon sequestration. Like the student fee policy, this has also proved predictably unsustainable. It was seriously irresponsible. Hence the familiar u-turn

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Julian Huppert

Julian Huppert MP writes… Liberal solutions for policing and justice

By Julian Huppert | Fri 26th October 2012 - 2:10 pm

Another Lib Dem Conference, another set of exceptional debates on policing and justice. We agreed on greater accountability through an empowered IPCC; minimum standards for private contractors; and community sentences and restorative justice in place of ineffective, short-term prison sentences.

Our party has the most distinct strategy for crime reduction of any major party. It’s based on clear, liberal principles and, crucially, it’s based on the evidence staring us right in the face. At every Conference I’ve been to we raise the level of debate, and provide liberal solutions for policing and justice.

Rarely do these debates, and these policies, make it …

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Kathryn Parminter

Baroness Parminter writes… Food labelling: a cautious welcome but much more to do

By Kathryn Parminter | Fri 26th October 2012 - 11:50 am

For many years, the Liberal Democrats have been calling for more consistent food labelling, most recently with our Autumn conference motion, ‘Good Food Shouldn’t Cost the Earth’.

That’s why I welcome the announcement that a new consistent system of ‘front of pack’ labelling will be up and running by summer 2013. It is a cautious welcome because the new system will be voluntary and the biggest challenge – getting all the food industry fully on board – still lies ahead. But, it is encouraging to

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Kay Barnard

Trans-fats, your health and politics

By Kay Barnard | Fri 26th October 2012 - 8:50 am

Do you eat cakes, chocolate bars, ready meals or chips from a take-away? Who doesn’t eat some occasionally? All those foods I mentioned and many others may contain high levels of compounds called trans-fats or trans-fatty acids.

The reason that trans-fats are important is because they cause much higher levels of heart disease – and yet we rarely hear about them. Trans-fats are an unnatural product of food processing. Vegetable oils are sometimes chemically treated by “hydrogenation” to give them a thicker consistency or they are purified at a high temperature. Food manufacturers do this to increase storage life …

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Andrew Tennant

Opinion: Hard-headed realism should guide our dealings with the Conservatives

By Andrew Tennant | Thu 25th October 2012 - 5:03 pm

I’m an unreserved coalition enthusiast.

The coalition means Lib Dems in government; something which, in turn, means the implementation of many Lib Dem policies, the likes of which I have campaigned and voted for over the years, believing said policies to be long overdue and beneficial for the country.

But, despite what our critics say, that doesn’t make me a Tory; and I have very little interest in seeing the Conservatives have an easy ride, in helping them implement their policies, or in keeping their members happy.

The embrace them closely strategy of the first coalition year now looks naive, and most Lib …

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Linda Jack

Opinion: What kind of PCC do you want, and why does it matter?

By Linda Jack | Thu 25th October 2012 - 2:54 pm
This week the candidate list for Police and Crime Commissioners was published. Given the party’s ambivalence towards the idea we have ended up fielding candidates in only just over half the Police Authorities in England and Wales. The decision to allow local parties to make the decision about whether to field a candidate or support an independent took no account of the fact that in many areas independent candidates have been forced out because of the cost, or the fact that in other areas finding a liberally minded independent may be tough. Sadly only 18% of the declared candidates are

…

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