Category Archives: Op-eds

Stephen Tall

Just imagine if you’d got over one million new poster sites

By Stephen Tall | Sat 1st May 2010 - 7:45 am

So today the Guardian officially, and surprisingly, came out in support of the Lib Dems for the coming general election. Most of us who are resolved to ‘Keep Calm & Clegg On’ are happy to recognise that newspaper endorsements – certainly by left-of-centre newspapers – do not swing elections.

But, equally, it would be wrong to dismiss the Grauniad’s conversion to the Lib Dem cause as irrelevant. For a start, it is the first time since 1974 that the paper has unreservedly supported the party. That alone is a real fillip to activists.

It’s good for morale, therefore. But …

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Also posted in General Election | 8 Comments
Stephen Tall

Kudos to Clegg: the TV debates wash-up

By Stephen Tall | Fri 30th April 2010 - 8:15 pm

Three programmes, four-and-a-half hours of debate, endless analysis – but one thing’s for sure: Nick Clegg is alone among the three leaders in being able to reflect on them with real pleasure.

David Cameron and the Tories are buoyed by his performance yesterday; understandably so, as most instant polls called it a ‘win’ for him. But three weeks ago the Tories were polling in the 36-39% range, with most pundits predicting a narrow-but-decisive Tory majority. Currently, just a few days before polling day, the Tories are stuck in the 33-36% range.

Perhaps more significant, though is the way Cameron has had to re-write his script during this campaign. Tory advisors hoped it would be enough for their leader to portray himself as the only alternative to Gordon Brown. But then along came ‘Cleggmania’ and suddenly Cameron looked old hat: the mantle of change was snatched away from him by a more dynamic rival. With ratings dipping, the Tories’ answer was familiar enough: turn to the right.

And that’s exactly what Cameron has done. In the third debate last night, he showed the authentic face of Toryism: anti-European, anti-immigrant, anti-welfare. No wonder he looked more comfortable, and no wonder the Tory tribe was smiling today. At long last, their leader had ditched any pretence of building a big-tent mainstream party, and was reverting to the party’s comfort zone, shoring up its core vote.

But of this I am certain: that right-wing c.2005 Michael Howard display from Cameron last night was absolutely not where he wanted to be at this stage of the campaign.

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Opinion: Why a nationalist should vote Lib Dem

By David Lawson | Thu 29th April 2010 - 6:18 pm

So much of the attack on the Lib Dems is based on the idea that we are a “sell out” to Europe. That we won’t stand up for Britain – though it often really means England. This attack has – to us at least – the slight feel of the American survivalist right criticising the US Democrats for selling out to a UN-based “world government”. In other words: it’s nonsense.

But that is an argument to be settled by details. We should also make a positive case. Of course we could have said patriot but let’s go the whole way: why should a nationalist vote Lib Dem? This has been especially relevant following the foreign policy debate which the other parties have seen as the best attack on the Lib Dems.

The two-party system sets up a contest of opposites and then lets one of them win.

For decades those opposites were based on class interests with a sharp north-south regional divide and a simple conflict between capitalism and socialism. What nationalists want is a nation divided – by class or by region or by any other sectarianism.

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Catherine Bearder

Lib Dem MEPs help expose draft ACTA text

By Catherine Bearder | Thu 29th April 2010 - 11:20 am

The secrecy surrounding Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA) has concerned me and many of my constituents as it has many MEPs. As a member of the European Parliament’s Committee on International Trade, I met the European Commission in early March to discuss the unacceptable level of secrecy in which these negotiations are shrouded, and demanded that we in the European Parliament, as the only directly elected representatives of the public at European level, be given immediate access to the final draft of the consolidated negotiating text. You can view my question here.

Following severe criticism from myself and a number of my …

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Stephen Tall

Clegg, Obama & the new Lib Dem voters

By Stephen Tall | Tue 27th April 2010 - 5:45 pm

Cross-posted from the International Business Times:

Let’s be clear: the Obama-Clegg comparisons that a few (a very few) in the media have made are not designed to flatter. They have been peddled for two reasons. First, because journalists are lazy, and will grab for the easiest political analogy. And secondly because journalists from the rightwing press have been hoping to over-hype ‘Cleggmania’ to try and provoke a backlash.

But there is one single instance in which I think the comparison holds. The first TV debate was the equivalent of Obama’s victory in the Democratic primaries: the time when a …

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The Independent View: Letter to Nick Clegg from Radical Future

By Ben Little | Tue 27th April 2010 - 3:15 pm

Dear Nick,

This election had the promise of being the most significant for a generation. My generation. It should be an opportunity for a radical change in direction in the same way that the elections of 1945 and 1979 were for our grandparents and parents respectively. This seems to be lost on Labour and the Conservatives, who simply want to preserve the status quo.

You’re making an appeal to the youth vote. If you’re listening, we’ve got plenty to say.

Those of us in the eighteen-to-thirty age bracket have been collectively failed by the electoral system. We

…

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Also posted in The Independent View | 7 Comments
Stephen Tall

1992 déjà vu? Or can 2010 be different?

By Stephen Tall | Mon 26th April 2010 - 5:35 pm

If there’s one thing worse than being talked about, it’s not being talked about. That might be true normally, but perhaps not when the subject is hung parliaments and what the Lib Dems might do in the event thereof.

Nick Clegg made a perfectly uncontroversial point on Sunday: that it would be inconceivable for the Lib Dems to prop up Gordon Brown as prime minister if Labour came third in terms of votes cast on 6th May. Of course it would be, no matter what the constitutional niceties might say about the right of an incumbent prime minister to try …

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Also posted in General Election | 12 Comments

Opinion: Free Zone Revolution

By S | Mon 26th April 2010 - 2:17 pm

In New Labour’s puerile and patronising ‘Animated Manifesto Film’ their first pledge is the desire to instigate a ‘new industrial revolution’. This is followed by no explanation whatsoever as to how precisely they are going to do this. If you look deeper, however, the reality is damning. It is an acknowledgement that after 13 years of power many urban areas, especially in the North of England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and South Wales, are still experiencing crippling poverty and high unemployment.

The LibDems go one better; they at least acknowledge a truth that policy to tackle the state of the …

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Mark Pack

Labour set for worst share of vote since 1918: why isn’t that a big story?

By Mark Pack | Sun 25th April 2010 - 12:49 pm

Iain Dale quite rightly has queried why the prospect of Labour finishing third in the popular share of the vote isn’t a big story being talked about in the media.

But actually Iain is too kind to Labour.

Because the voting abyss Labour is teetering on the edge of is more than simply coming third. More than simply doing worse than Michael Foot. It’s on the verge of its worst share of the vote since 1918.

In 1983 Labour scored 28.3% and in 1918 it was 22.2%. (Both of these are figures for Great Britain, i.e. excluding Northern Ireland, as that’s the …

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James Blessing

Opinion: View from the sidelines

By James Blessing | Sat 24th April 2010 - 12:09 pm

For many years I’ve been a quiet Lib Dem, helping out where I have time but not going to any major effort. Watching the last week to ten days has been very interesting for me.

First came the launch of the Lib Dem manifesto, better organised and easier to watch than the previous Labour or Conservative launches and full of policies that are have been honed and developed of a long cycle of policy refinement. The only thing missing was a serious commitment to investing (or find a way to invest) in the telecoms infrastructure but one omission (admittedly one close …

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Ed Randall

Opinion: A Diminished Clarke – a picture of electoral calculation and desperation

By Ed Randall | Sat 24th April 2010 - 11:20 am

What Ken Clarke has been sent out to do (FT.com – requires registration) – and has been willing to do – diminishes him. It can hardly diminish his party.

Ken Clarke is a fervent European but he has been willing to return to the frontline of Tory politics. No doubt he believes he has done a deal…and he has calculated that he can hold back the forces of Euro-scepticism in the Tory party. The gag he is now prepared to wear, on European matters, is a measure of how unsound his judgement has become.

He has a point when he complains …

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Ruth Thorlby

The Independent View: The chilly reality awaiting health policy

By Ruth Thorlby | Fri 23rd April 2010 - 3:20 pm

For an issue that ranks second only to the economy in importance for voters, the campaign debate on the NHS has been oddly disconnected from the chilly reality that awaits it beyond May 7th: a significant reduction in the generosity of funding compared to the past ten years, regardless of which party comes into power. Most parties have been making offers in their manifestos with resource implications: more single rooms, shorter waiting times for cancer tests, more choice of GP. But on the whole there has not been much discussion of the need to save, beyond the ubiquitous offers to cut …

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Also posted in The Independent View | 3 Comments
Ed Long

Geeking the Vote

By Ed Long | Fri 23rd April 2010 - 12:50 pm

The Geek the Vote campaign has started spreading the message that the Liberal Democrats have the strongest case for building a geek-friendly Britain. I registered the domain name and started work on the site on Monday lunchtime. By Wednesday evening we had 408 Facebook fans, 272 supportive tweets using our campaign hashtag #geekthevote and a mention in the London Evening Standard.

Geeks are an emerging force in the political game. I personally became more interested in politics through following a number of single-issue campaigns online: Ben Goldacre’s tireless assault on irrationalism in public health (among other issues); a Number10.gov.uk petition …

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6 Comments
Seth Thevoz

Opinion: Gordon must resign if he loses his majority

By Seth Thevoz | Fri 23rd April 2010 - 11:44 am

There is a strange bit of spin being put out by the Tories that a hung parliament with a large number of Lib Dem MPs returned would mean Gordon Brown remaining as Prime Minister. Well, they would say that, wouldn’t they? This assumes that somehow the Liberal Democrats who clenched their teeth throughout 13 years of Labour violation of civil liberties, corruption, and senseless war, are suddenly going to fly to Brown’s rescue. That’s playing fast and loose with the facts.

For a good precedent, look no further than the last hung parliament in 1974, when Ted Heath’s Tories …

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Niklas Smith

Opinion: A Swedish lesson for Gordon Brown

By Niklas Smith | Fri 23rd April 2010 - 10:25 am

So far in British political debates the word “Swedish” is usually bandied about in support of “free schools” by the Conservatives. But you won’t see anything about schools in this post – instead I will highlight a different political lesson from Sweden.

In 2006 the centre-right Alliance for Sweden (which includes our sister party) ended twelve years of Social Democratic government; this was only the third time that the centre-right has defeated a Social Democratic government since the Second World War. An important factor in the victory was …

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Mark Pack

In praise of Chris Huhne

By Mark Pack | Thu 22nd April 2010 - 4:20 pm

As we get ready for tonight’s second TV debate, it’s worth taking a moment to reflect on one of the reasons why Nick Clegg did so well in the first debate and also why the party was poised in a happy and strong position such that Nick’s debate victory boosted the party to first place in many polls. That reason? Chris Huhne.

Not only did Chris Huhne play the role of Gordon Brown in the debate preparations, but the very fact that a closely defeated leadership candidate was used in such a role reflects on how closely and how well Nick …

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Charlie Garnett

Opinion: A vote for the Lib Dems is a vote for the Lib Dems

By Charlie Garnett | Thu 22nd April 2010 - 3:30 pm

A vote for the Lib Dems is a vote for the Lib Dems. It is not a vote for the Conservative or Labour Parties. It is not a way of ‘Letting Gordon in through the backdoor’, or of tacitly consenting to a Cameroonian ‘DIY’ society. It is a vote for the Lib Dems.

Since the debates, the other two main parties have woken up to the idea that people may genuinely want a change in British Politics but, whether because they are deliberately obtuse or have simply been too well conditioned by their duopoly on power, neither seems able to grasp …

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Opinon: Osborne should not belittle public sector workers

By Golden Sarah | Thu 22nd April 2010 - 2:44 pm

As a public sector worker I was extremely disheartened and have to question George Osborne’s analysis of the public sector which he dismissed in an arrogant and superficial manner. This is the organisation that will have to implement the policies of any incoming government and George, for all his political ambition, does not appreciate the sector’s commitment to duty and society.

The ‘low morale‘ that he refers to among 40% of public sector staff is directly as a result of the uncertainty that we are all living under as to whether we will have jobs still in the …

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Malcolm Wood

Opinion: A weapon we could use?

By Malcolm Wood | Thu 22nd April 2010 - 11:36 am

When Nick Clegg made the case for scrapping Trident in Thursday’s debate, his case was that it was too expensive, and designed for a threat that no longer exists. And the predictable response was to accuse Nick of being soft on defence. But there are more fundamental problems with the type of defence offered by Trident.

Trident provides “defence” only in a very limited sense. It’s actually just a “deterrent”. It can’t shoot down incoming missiles or turn back advancing enemy armies. Its point is to dissuade an enemy from attacking us in the first …

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Stephen Tall

Torygraph smears Clegg: is this the best the rightwing press can do?

By Stephen Tall | Wed 21st April 2010 - 11:35 pm

Tomorrow’s Daily Torygraph has the absolutely D-E-V-A-S-T-A-T-I-N-G story that before Nick Clegg became Lib Dem leader he received donations from donors which he declared in the MPs’ register of interests in order to pay a researcher on his staff. Shock, horror etc.

The story is here. It shows that three Lib Dem donors, Ian Wright, Neil Sherlock and Michael Young – all of them registered Lib Dem donors – paid £250 each per month directly into Nick’s personal bank account. The figures were contained in personal bank statements submitted by Nick to the House of Commons. It was officially declared …

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Christopher Lomax

Opinion: The opposite of a heated debate

By Christopher Lomax | Wed 21st April 2010 - 5:45 pm

For four years now I’ve steered clear of blogs and online forums. If you look at the kind of people who seem to spend their time posting at the bottom of the BBC websites, you’ll perhaps share my sense that those are the places where the freaks hang out.

I only started looking at this site a few days ago, but I haven’t see any of that sort of thing here yet. I’ve always thought that this party is where the calm and sensible debate is had. It doesn’t surprise me one bit that Nick Clegg did well in that style of …

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Opinion: The perils of candidateitis

By Tony Woods | Wed 21st April 2010 - 2:20 pm

In the last few days the tectonic plates of British politics appear to have shifted. The slow growth of the Liberal Democrats over nearly half a century is finally exerting massive pressure on the old duopoly. A sprinkling of Nick Clegg’s fairy dust may just have been enough to trigger a political earthquake.

The arguments are well known. Britain has one of the largest Liberal votes in Europe but our electoral system ensures one of the lowest Liberal representations. It actively preserves the old duopoly. But the unfairness goes much further. If the current …

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Can we keep things Clegg-tastic for 2 more weeks?

By David Lawson | Wed 21st April 2010 - 9:50 am

We have basked in a warm glow of new glory for a few days now. Or at least if you get your news from TV and radio we have. The newspaper review has been a bit less enthusiastic – or downright hostile and biased, depending on your point of view.

The weekend papers showed the problem we face in the next two-and-a-bit weeks. The Mail on Sunday gave us a double spread. Headlines included “Is there ANYTHING British about Lib Dem leader?”. “Most would vote Orange … but they will get Brown” and “Billionaire convicted of fraud …

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Antony Hook

Opinion: Volcano! Will Europe erupt as an election issue?

By Antony Hook | Tue 20th April 2010 - 8:45 pm

Part of our shared European heritage is Ancient Greece, the birthplace of democracy, where Hephaestus (called Vulcan in Rome) was the god of fire and controller of volcanoes. He was born after his mother was impregnated by a spark from a fire.

Thousands of years later, in last Thursday’s debate, Nick Clegg provided a spark to our national imagination that was more potent than any of us dared to dream.

Now we read that our opponents will try to make Europe the issue of the general election. The same strategy failed badly …

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7 Comments
Ed Randall

Opinion: Baleful – keeping our heads despite the ‘debate tsunami’

By Ed Randall | Tue 20th April 2010 - 4:50 pm

The fact that Tim Bale, an academic from Sussex University and author of The Conservative Party; From Thatcher to Cameron, is represented in the FT as attempting to answer a silly question about the Liberal Democrats illustrates the extraordinary nature of the ‘debate tsunami’ that has struck British politics. It also serves to underline the need to resist any temptation (limited I know so far as most Liberal Democrats are concerned) to build castles in the air, on the basis of a few days of post ‘debate’ polling.

Bale’s piece is entitled: ‘Lib Dem Revival not yet a Revolution’. There is, of course, a slight problem with the …

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The Voice

Can the surge last? Lib Dem bloggers give their views …

By The Voice | Tue 20th April 2010 - 2:35 pm

Lib Dems leading the election race, and polling above 30% – that’s not a line (m)any of us expected to be able to type with a straight face. But it’s the present reality. The questions is: can the Lib Dem surge last? Here’s what a handful of Lib Dem bloggers think …

James Graham

Anyone who claims to know what will happen electorally next month simply doesn’t know what they are talking about. But there are a number of reasons to suggest that the Liberal Democrats’ poll leap over the weekend might last.

Firstly, polls tend to be mutually reinforcing. This is why some countries ban them during election time. The same factor which has reinforced the Lib Dems’ image as no-hopers in the past might well work in our favour now, especially since it is such a dramatic development.

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Stephen Tall

The Lib Dem poll surge: temporary blip, or political earthquake?

By Stephen Tall | Tue 20th April 2010 - 12:00 pm

Cross-posted from the International Business Times:

Forget a week being a long time in politics. In this hyped-up, ultra-connected world 90 minutes on television can see your electoral fortunes transformed. And so it is that, as I write, the Lib Dems have just been placed in the lead in the opinion polls for the first in the party’s modern history, with 33% of the vote, leading the Tories on 32% and Labour slipping back to just 26%.

This is heady stuff for a party accustomed to being sidelined by the national media as a distracting irrelevance from two-party politics. …

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Eleanor Black

The Independent View: Tory plan for marriage tax allowance flies in face of what Lib Dems stand for

By Eleanor Black | Tue 20th April 2010 - 10:40 am

David Cameron’s policy to give £3 a week in marriage tax allowance to a third of married couples is to ‘send a signal’ that marriage is better than any other type of relationship. Today, a new campaign launched to ‘send a signal’ back: don’t judge my family.

Inspired by JK Rowlings’ attack on the policy last week, The Don’t Judge My Family campaign (www.dontjudgemyfamily.com) is seeing people sign up in droves. The issue has clearly touched a nerve: in just a few days 1,500 people had signed up to the Facebook page, before the website had even …

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Ed Randall

Opinion: Fair taxes – radical and challenging Liberal Democrat plans

By Ed Randall | Mon 19th April 2010 - 1:50 pm

Stuart Adam and Mike Brewer of the Institute of Fiscal Studies argue, in their April ‘observations’ piece on Liberal Democrat tax cutting policies, that it is meaningless to make the claim that the poor pay more of their income in tax than the rich.

However, no sooner do they make this observation than they go on to confirm that official statistics show this is the case. No one, they explain, disputes the ONS data which shows that the poorest fifth of households paid 38.7% of their income in tax. Neither is there any dispute that this compares with a tax take of £25,926 or 34.9% from …

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Mark Pack

According to the Daily Mail, I’m a foreigner

By Mark Pack | Mon 19th April 2010 - 11:20 am

Given the Mail on Sunday’s story casting aspertions on Nick Clegg for not being properly British in their eyes (“His wife is Spanish, his mother Dutch, his father half-Russian and his spin doctor German. Is there ANYTHING British about Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg?”) now seems a good time to revive a post I wrote on a previous occasion when the Mail took to defining British:

As Sunder Katwala has pointed out, the Daily Mail has said it thinks it is a mistake for people who were born here but whose parents where born overseas to be counted as

…

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