Ed Davey has started to make his announcements of his shadow cabinet on Twitter.
Layla Moran made a huge impression during the leadership campaign and has been rewarded with a promotion to Foreign Affairs Spokesperson. https://twitter.com/LaylaMoran/status/1300410349913608194?s=20
Delighted to announce the @LibDems spokespeople for the great offices of state:
My friend @LaylaMoran has agreed to take a role in my top team. As Foreign Affairs Spokesperson she will bring the energy and enthusiasm she brings to all her work & hold Dominic Raab to account.
1/4— Ed Davey MP 🔶🇪🇺 (@EdwardJDavey) August 31, 2020
I can see an education dimension to this as well in terms of supporting education, especially for women and girls, around the world.
Pleased to have accepted the role of Foreign Affairs Spokesperson for the @LibDems. I look forward to speaking up for marginalised groups, human rights and Britain’s place in the world, and to holding this Government to account at a time when we need to be building bridges.
— Layla Moran 🔶 (@LaylaMoran) August 31, 2020
Christine Jardine takes up her third major office of state in three years. She covered Jo Swinson’s maternity leave at Foreign Affairs in 2018 and has been Home Affairs spokesperson for the last year. She is now the first woman to become Treasury spokesperson. As a former journalist, she will see this role very much in terms of stories and not numbers and will be able to articulate our liberal vision for a society that is fairer and values wellbeing.
Delighted to take on this important role innEd’s team for @LibDems looking forward to getting to work on that greener, fairer UK. #libdems https://t.co/OUU3yOzvlK
— Christine Jardine (@cajardineMP) August 31, 2020
And taking on Christine’s old portfolio at Home Affairs, Alistair Carmichael emerges from his Whiply shadows. It’s not clear if he will still be Chief Whip as well. We’ll have to wait and see.
The Home Affairs brief is one he has held twice before, briefly in 2006 under Menzies Campbell and between 2015 and 2016 under Tim Farron.
Watch this space for news of the rest of the top team when it comes.
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings
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8 Comments
A good start. No case yet of taking your bat home, or should that be throwing your toys out of the pram? Give ‘em a chance to show what they can do before ripping up your membership cards!
And the task ahead? Starmer’s Labour Party has apparently, if you believe them, just wiped out a 26 point Tory poll lead. What have they done? Nothing except appoint a leader, who actually appears to be competent. Now that the Lib Dems appear to have chosen someone, who also appears competent (sorry if some are offended by his being a white man with a title), we might see if that poll rating rises towards double digits.
You see, most people are really not that bothered about the kind of issues that appear to be the sine qua non for many LDV contributors. Whether they are liberals and don’t really know it, most of them know what is important in life for them. So, let’s have a bit less idealism (not that it doesn’t have a rôle to play in the long term) and a bit more common sense. We could start with one of David Raw’s hobby horses, namely child poverty, if I have read him correctly. Katharine Pindar’s ‘Social Contract’ sounds great; but let’s use language, which ordinary people can understand. The problem with those fighting poverty is that you have to experience it to understand what it really means. My problem, and I reckon that this could apply to a lot of people campaigning for a fair deal for all, is that I have had the good fortune never to have been poor in pecuniary terms.
@ John Marriott I don’t see that much wrong with someone being a straight, white, middle aged male, John, because that’s who he is, he can’t help it and he can’t do a great deal about it…. nor can many millions of other blokes in this country (all of whom have a vote).
Yes, the title (to me) is a bit iffy, but at least the bloke knows a bit about life having been an orphan and a carer – then and now. Much as I admire Nottingham High School (I have friends who teach there) it’s a fair bit less posh than Roedean….. and he wasn’t the daughter of an Ambassador who could well afford (or get the EU to arrange ?) to send him there. Depends how you define posh and identity I suppose.
So….., it’s a funny old world……. the Lib Dems (not always for the right reasons) have a great capacity to surprise and I hope he does O.K…… preferably getting some sort of rapprochement with his very competent fellow knight of the real who leads the Labour Party, and, shock horror, with the indefatigable hard working Nicola who is also more than competent.
Take care, Matey.
@ John M. PS. put an ‘m’ on the real to make it a knight of the realm. Careless work, boy…
You say, “I have had the good fortune never to have been poor in pecuniary terms”.
Me too, though my parents and grandparents experienced it. I hope you won’t mind if I suggest a chat with your local CAB and foodbank. I’ve done both and I hope Sir Edward does too.
Really pleased at Layla’s appointment and hope the Lib Dems will now be taking a more prominent position on international human rights, something I feel has been lacking in recent years.
Sir Ed continues his sure-footed approach by keeping Layla away from education and economics, and into a brief where she will shine.
I am concerned that Layla is being taken away from education. The virtue of having Layla as the education spokeswoman is that she knows education from the inside and also understands Maths. Apparently the education brief goes to Daisy Cooper who admirable as she is has no particular expertise in this area.
Education has turned into a high profile topic at a time when we should be making the most of available talents. Layla has the ability to understand advanced statistics. I can see why Ed wants to give Layla what is traditionally seen as more important job, but the government really needs to be taken to task on the results debacle and Layla was the person to do this.
That’s exactly where I would have put Layla, she will be excellent. Maybe, just maybe, our new leader is actually quite politically astute and the naysayers should give him and his new team a chance to show what they can do.