It is fantastic that Conference passed the Fairer Society policy paper yesterday. As a member of the working group, I spent a significant amount of time working across a number of aspects of the paper, including providing a lot of the drafting for the workers rights section, alongside fantastic contributions from Laura Gordon and others.
A brief aside, while I am very disappointed that UBI was not picked from the options, it was absolutely fantastic to see Members of Parliament rally behind a commitment to end deep poverty within 10 years. It will make a real difference to a great many people and shows great courage to make a commitment that is likely of the scale of £50-60 billion.
Back to workers’ rights.
The paper as a whole commits the Liberal Democrats to the most pro-worker group of policies from any political party. Thank you to Ellen and Kevin for moving their amendment which very validly updated a motion that was drafted last summer.
It unlocks flexible working while providing stronger protections to those workers. Legally enforceable lengths of notice and forced compensation will mean that every worker is able to plan their lives and work properly.
It also commits the Liberal Democrats to significantly strengthening the rights of Trade Unions to access workplaces as well as supporting a Right to Switch Off and not be available for work calls without appropriate pay. It backs sectoral bargaining, reverses the Coalition decision to raise the unfair dismissal threshold and broadening the rights of collective bargaining to new areas.
Laura’s section on supporting families is brilliant, protecting and improving shared parental leave as well as creating a new right to take sick leave when it is to look after their ill child.
Finally, the section I’m proudest of is the Employee Partnership and Ownership section. It improves upon existing LD policy, proposing more concrete support for employee participation in companies with over 250 employees. Finally it suggests a policy that would have significant lasting impacts on inequality in this country. It would work to distribute the ownership and profits from the biggest companies among their employees, increasing over time. It is a courageous commitment to a new Liberal Paradigm on the economy.
I’m so proud of our party for passing this radical policy and I’m so thankful for the hard work of my colleagues on the working group.
* Oliver Craven is the Liberal Democrat candidate for Sleaford and North Hykeham.
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17 Comments
It seemed that of the main arguments against the UBI option was that the wealthy would profit, even after tax changes.
UBI was proposed to be (partially) funded by eliminating the income tax / NI allowance such that most earners would pay more tax equal to the UBI payment they receive.
But at over £100K p/a income, the allowance is reduced and reaches zero at around £125K, so these high earners would make a net profit.
But that isn’t a flaw with the concept of UBI, but the specific implementation offered to Conference.
Would it really be unviable to take account of this? Should the motion even have been sent back with instructions to fix the UBI option?
Andrew: as the originator of the 2020 motion, I agree. It was a strawman motion in that it was not progressively funded. I hope in the fullness of time, a progressively funded ubi will become party policy.
But much as that was my preferred option, the GBI that was actually passed is the best benefits policy that the lib dems have had in recent decades, better than any Conservative or Labour policy in the same time, and better than any UK government policy in my lifetime. If implemented, it will make a massive difference to millions. We can really be proud of it and we should campaign hard on it, even as we nurture plans for a truly universal basic income.
This was clearly a start. And we need to keep pushing for a proper, fully funded UBI that isn’t just putting the poorest in society through another shake up of the benefits system that sees far too many fall through the net.
This was fantastic work, Olly, and really encouraging to see the party’s appetite for radical policy (even if that appetite wasn’t yet quite big enough for full UBI). Very well done to you and everyone else in the working group – and thank you!
As a non LD member but long time trade unionist I am interested in the details. Where can I find such? As someone who counts radical social liberalism amongst my political influences it certainly may help me to vote LD in a GE. There are many videos on your Spring Conference on YouTube, which session covers the debate on this area?
There is nothing “radical” about UBI.
Distributing money universally means there is significantly less for people who actually need support. It is regressive, shambolically complicated and doesn’t do what it says on the tin.
@Barrie Wood
Sadly the debate focused mostly on the UBI/GBI options, the best place to find more details is in the actual paper at
https://www.libdems.org.uk/conference/papers/spring-2023/towards-a-fairer-society
@Olly Craven
Thank you. The debate on UBI / BGI would be of interest too – which session to watch is applicable?
I agree with others that this is a good step forward and that the proposed funding mechanism for UBI has problems that need to be resolved. I hope they are resolved because ultimately UBI could be better, but GBI has a lot going for it, not least that it works.
I’m wary of relying too heavily on the removal of personal tax allowance to fund UBI. In part because I think a tax free allowance is a good thing. It wouldn’t need to be so big if we had UBI.
I favour pairing the introduction of UBI with some kind of carbon tax. Some are put off carbon taxes on the grounds they are regressive, but they don’t need to be if done right, and especially not if paired with UBI. But again, I recognise that coming up with a coherent carbon tax policy is easier said than done.
It’s not good enough to come up with the policies. We need to be able to sell them, and we know that some policies won’t be fairly represented during a general election campaign, so at this stage of the election cycle it’s useful to have a policy that’s less easily misrepresented.
@Barry, the session was on Sunday morning. You can find it here: https://www.youtube.com/live/ENuoAra3wDQ?feature=share&t=4633
(hopefully the link will take you to the right place, but if not the session starts 1 hour and 17 minutes into the video).
I remain baffled about the GBI/UBI options. Thoroughly baffled that it did not appear to be highlighted that a UBI would ultimately have to be partly funded by increased taxes on the wealthier who do not need the UBI. If this isn’t inherently obvious, I don’t know what is. Making it seem entirely reliant on the elimination of the allowance seemed suspiciously like a set-up, to me, avoiding what I would consider absolutely necessary and significant changes to taxation rates and/or thresholds, ones which would be a rational part of the solution to remove poverty and fairly distribute national wealth alongside.
I generally detest all the unnecessary and uncomplicated means-tested and tapered mess that pervades our tax and benefit system. To have Child Benefit, for example, not universal the way it used to be is just another unnecessary and inelegant complication that would be better solved by an increase in the upper marginal tax rates rather than yet more mess cluttering up one’s tax return form. I don’t believe mathematicians would devise systems like this, but politicians always cobble together any old bits and bobs.
Lastly, seeing the way that benefits generally (don’t) work in this country, I’m very much of the belief that something that isn’t Universal is most definitely not Guaranteed.
It has just been intimated to me that the working group for this paper were expressly forbidden from considering further taxation changes in conjunction with the UBI/GBI options. I would to hear if this is true from a member of the working group.
I believe what I said in my above comment is correct in that UBI must rely on significant changes to the tax rates, not just the elimination of the allowance, if it is to be vaguely sensible. To prevent proper discussion of the two in conjunction is to deliberately limit the UBI proposal to something incoherent and unfair. This is an abuse by those setting the remit, I my view, if this is true.
“But at over £100K p/a income, the allowance is reduced and reaches zero at around £125K, so these high earners would make a net profit.
But that isn’t a flaw with the concept of UBI, but the specific implementation offered to Conference.”
The “Withdrawal of personal allowance” is just another tax rate. It’s called that so that the government can claim a top rate of tax of only 45%. There was no proposal to abolish it even in the specific implementation offered to conference.
” It will make a real difference to a great many people and shows great courage to make a commitment that is likely of the scale of £50-60 billion.”
It might have taken more courage if this figure had been mentioned. The only figure mentioned was for UBI which was said to be unaffordable at 32 billion.
32 billion for UBI?
Say 50 million people over the age of 18 in the UK. That’s a massive 640 pounds for everyone over the age of 18.
We raise the sum to a “courageous” 50 billion. That’s a ginormous 1000 pounds for everyone eligible.
State help need to be focused on the people who need it.
People in poverty need far more than these trifling sums.
Criteria for judging who is eligible for REAL help will remain under UBI and GBI.
So UBI/GBI do NOT eliminate the disadvantages of the benefits system. They merely add another enormous layer of complexity. And they obviously DDN’T make any serious impact on poverty.
What we need is serious money given to reforming the administration of the benefits system to make it quicker and fairer. And serious increases in benefits for those who need them.
@Chris Moore. No. Help doesn’t need to be focussed on those that need it. Means testing ensures that many who are in need don’t get what they’re entitled to. Universality means that everyone gets the same, but those that don’t need it, that is high earners, pay more tax and effectively have the benefit taxed away. The Liberal Party used to support the concept of negative income tax, where everyone completed a tax return and then then those that were due to pay tax did so and those with less that they needed got the cash benefits they need. Simple, easy to understand and fair.
Apply that sort of regime to either UBI or GBI and many of the ‘problems’ people speak about vanish.
While the policy is progress and a stated ambition to eliminate poverty over two parliamentary terms, it is not a worked through policy. This may be in large part due to the fact, as Michael Kilpatrick comments that “the working group for this paper were expressly forbidden from considering further taxation changes in conjunction with the UBI/GBI options. ”
Mick Taylor is spot on when he says “Universality means that everyone gets the same, but those that don’t need it, that is high earners, pay more tax and effectively have the benefit taxed away.”
What is sorely needed is some serious work on integration of the tax and benefit system utilising modern micro-simulation tools and a policy as Mick Taylor comments that is “Simple, easy to understand and fair.” We have a ways to go yet before we are able to present such a policy to the voting public”.