I wrote yesterday that Tim Farron might be the longest serving party leader by the Autumn. He is certain to lead us into General Election 2020. Cameron and Corbyn have looser grips on their parties.
Liberal Democrats should use this internal stability to answer fundamental external questions.
It seems to me that chiefly among these are:
- What is our electoral objective for 5 years, 10 years, 20 years? This is essential for answering further questions like whether our candidates should adopt 1 or 2 General Election plans.
- Do we have non-electoral, legislative, objectives? UKIP and the SNP have legislative goals (repeal of the 1972 and 1707 Acts respectively) to which electoral results are secondary or a means to the goal. In the past the Liberal Party campaigned for:
- an end of ID cards (1950s)
- the legalisation of abortion (60s)
- international action to destroy the Apartheid regime in South Africa (70s/80s), and achieved these without winning control of Parliament. Do we have such aims now?
- What is our strategy to achieve electoral and non-electoral objectives?
- Which tactics will we select to fulfill this strategy?
- In what ways, if any at all, should we work with any other political party?
These questions need to be answered. Once they are answered, those decisions need to be communicated openly and widely throughout the whole party.
* Antony Hook was #2 on the South East European list in 2014, is the English Party's representative on the Federal Executive and produces this sites EU Referendum Roundup.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
A perpetual pirouette of prevarication?
Michael Meadowcroft: A Liberal of Intellectual Rigour and Uncommon Integrity
Debt-ridden graduates claim they are seen as cash cows
Why non-fiction books need their indexes
Changes in status: Local Elections wrap up
Daniel Walker
David Raw
Jenny Barnes
Tom Bailey
Gill Travers
74 Comments
In regards to legislative goals a digital bill of rights (protecting privacy etc) should called for and a safeguarding of the Human Rights Act.
We should make more noise about electoral reform too – not only is it essential for a modern democracy but it will resonate with much of the public too
Thanks for this, Anthony. Couldn’t agree more. I would say that one non-electoral goal could be the true federalisation of the country (which among other things would break the overbearing and deeply illiberal concentration of power in the Treasury and Home Office).
When did the Roman Empire go to war with the Chinese Empire? Ask Andrew Marr, because many of us are trapped by a narrow understanding of history. Start the Week with Andrew Marr on BBC Radio 4 on 4/4/2016 is worth listening to, for people who are busy enough.
It is noticeable that British euro-sceptics gloated about the troubles of Greece, which could have led to Grexit. They wanted the Eurozone and the European Union to disintegrate. They are not saying that about the UK referendum. If Brexit happens they assume that the remainder of the EU would continue, which may be a lack of imagination, but if not, something worse, a return to the 1930s in terms of economic policy.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b075pb4r#play
John Grout 4th Apr ’16 – 9:55am What Greg Clark MP is doing does not break the power of the Treasury, quite the opposite. During the inter-war depression local government had difficulty raising sufficient funds from the rates and was helped by grants from central government. The position now is that the Chancellor openly states (and the Prime Minister presumably supports) the reduction of some central government taxes and the devolution of deficits to the local level. Greg Clark’s borough council in Tunbridge Wells (Tory majority) has said so publicly. So has the leader of Kent county council (Tory majority).
The reality nowadays is that the Home Office is a misnomer because the division of responsibilities between Home affairs, Foreign affairs and Commonwealth affairs (and predecessors in the former Colonial Office) is not clear-cut. For instance crime is international and the response of governments needs to be international as well.
Broad vote, not core vote, should be the strategy. Non electoral goals? Well we all have these, but ultimately if I don’t think it makes an electorally sustainable policy I don’t support it, so it is hard to separate pragmatics from principle in such way.
all very good questions
Right now we would be trying to answer these questions without any facts, in 5 weeks time we will know a lot more but even then we still wont know much. We know there will be Labour splits but not when or how big. Whatever plans we make have to be provisional, we need to be able to adapt quickly.
This all seems a bit top-down to me. Someone (a few of the party elite?) decide a strategy and all kinds of “goals” and then tell everyone else? Hm. Anyway, won’t work.
And it all seems to be based on the assumption that the party will still exist in five years time. We are in an existential crisis (as people nowadays like to say about organisations which are set for extinction). A bit of thought about how to avoid such a fate would be useful for a start. But don’t expect much sense from the self-sustaining elite!
Tony Greaves
Cheer up, Tony.. It’ll probably take six years by which time we may be in Elysian Fields – or not as the case may be.
Elysian Fields? Is that one of the new constituencies the Tories are plotting in order to eliminate our Commons representation (or get it down to three perhaps)?
@Tony Greaves – two years ago on this forum (just before the Euros) I described the Lib Dems as being “on the cusp of an existential crisis” – https://www.libdemvoice.org/opinion-why-i-joined-the-lib-dems-20-years-ago-and-am-still-proud-to-be-one-39590.html#comment-290517.
When viewed in context of what happened at the time of the Euros, this is deja vu all over again. The same people who behaved as though the party was in no danger then are still behaving that way now. I sometimes think that if an asteroid was imminently about to sterilize the Earth the Lib Dems would set up a sub-committee to examine the impact on recycling rates.
If the party is to survive then it needs to spend less time circumnavigating itself and more time addressing issues of real and vital interest – as has been frequently observed it might be helpful to start by analysing the Bernie Sanders phenomenon.
But I have less and less confidence that this will happen. Instead those who call the shots will continue discussing matters of vital interest to nobody except themselves and the party will simply fade away.
I sometimes wonder if we are too Liberal ? There is no point appealing to the people who constantly post entirely negative comments, their egos are too big for them to see beyond them; so I am appealing to the plucky volonteers who run this site. Can we not restrict entirely negative comments (including this one) to one each per thread ?
Our long-term goals should be to be seen as the party that rewrites the British constitution to bring it into the 21st century. Or even the 20th, would be nice. As John Grout says above, that means federalism. We need to have as our goal the restructuring of the United Kingdom to ensure its survival. This is, of course, something that should have been our clear goal even before the Scottish Referendum since it is clearly something essential as a reaction to and even pre-emptive to the referendum. It would be good if the Lib Dems at least could catch up with the goals they should have had five years ago or more.
This is what our position should be in relation to the positions of the SNP and UKIP, as mentioned above seeking to repeal Acts from 1702 and 1972. This is the big picture. Without a big picture I fear that we are pretty irrelevant. Evidently not many people really care about “core Lib Dem beliefs” otherwise rather more of them would have continued voting for us after 2010.
I think lots of people still care about what were “core Lib Dem beliefs” in the pre 2010 days. Unfortunately the party has changed, it’s now beginning to look like Labour of the 1980’s. People that are full of their own importance, obsessed with minority causes and offering the vast majority of the population nothing. Federalism won’t excite or even interest most voters and you badly need something that will.
These are very important questions to ask, but it feels that there is a missing question zero which asks what exactly do the Lib Dems stand for and what are their priorities? Without this being agreed, clear and consistent (and not wanting to start another debate about what “liberalism” means), it does not seem feasible to establish goals, strategy and tactics.
Perhaps party members do agree on a consistent set of principles which will translate to prioritised policy objectives, but based upon debate on this site and policy reversals by the party during and since coalition, it does not look like that.
IMO there is a huge need for a completely fresh vision of how our society could be ordered. A broad collection of liberal policies together under a meaningful banner of giving power back to people e.g. electoral reform, further constitutional devolution, limits on government snooping, more caring capitalism, encouragement of localised/community solutions to problems etc etc. People feel so distant from & disenchanted with politics, politicians & big business that a movement to restore the perceived balance is probably only a matter of time. Unless the Lib Dems can define a credible, unifying & engaging purpose for the party, & communicate it in a motivating way, the party will struggle to recover, if at all.
Tony and David Raw are absolutely right. We have been in catastrophic decline for six years now; the so called #libdemfightback is no such thing and we are only just making the occasional gain in local council by-elections. The message from the top seems to be as it was during the coalition, “Keep working hard, and leave us to deny that there are any problems.” Sadly trust in an individual at a local level can only overcome the loss of trust that the national party did to the name of Liberal Democracy in the most exceptional circumstances. As a result we lost nearly 90% of our MPs in 2015 and if things don’t change soon we will lose most of the rest in 2020.
The question is do we have the courage to admit we messed up, or are we so full of our own self importance that we will allow Liberal Democracy to disappear rather than change ourselves?
Steve Bradley
I’m not sure people are disenchanted with politics. When UKIP had their conference in Doncaster you couldn’t get a seat – it would have been easier to get centre court Wimbledon tickets. The SNP are flying in Scotland with a very popular leader and even the Scottish Greens are doing very well. The Tories may have their european problem, but most Tories are happy with their lot. Labour members are thoroughly behind their leader even if the MP’s and voters aren’t. There is a lot of enthusiasm out there, but it’s by-passed the Lib Dems and they don’t seem to have noticed.
Malc – all those phenomena you mention are largely symptoms of popular disenchantment with politics, rather than proof of its absence.
Indications are that politics and politicians are held in lower esteem currently than they have been for decades.
I’m curious to know what the kind of bold plan the “anti-lemmings”, as one might call them (Tony Greaves, Paul Murray, David Evans, et al), are calling for would look like, *in specific terms*. At present a lot of the “anti-lemming” commentary has been mainly to denounce or dismiss whatever is being suggested in the main article (whatever that article is), usually because it doesn’t go far enough, is barking up the wrong tree, or fails to adequately self-flagellate.
It would be great if one of them, or perhaps even more than one of them, could put concrete proposals into a longer piece – perhaps even one published on LDV – setting out what I’m sure is their positive, radical vision. I mean that seriously – it would be great to read a piece like that, given that they clearly feel that most other peoples’ contributions merely fiddle around the edges.
Malc – also, the conferences argument is all very well, except that the most recent Lib Dem conferences in York and Bournemouth broke records for attendance and first-timer attendance. Unless, of course, they don’t count for some reason?
I think that the questions which Antony Hook puts here would be proper ones to be considered by the National Executive of the Party – if the Party continues to exist as anything more than a talking shop. The voices criticising this discussion point, quite rightly, to the appearance (which could be wrong) that ‘grand’ questions like this are being postulated by people who cannot win elections and do not appear to realise that our Party is, to 90-odd per cent of voters, presently no more relevant to electoral considerations than it is to the price of fish or the result of the Premiership or the Oscars. So, while Antony Hook’s questions are worth thinking about they can not be the priority for a party which is totally on its uppers.
John Grout asks, quite reasonably, whether conference attendances count for nothing . The answer, I think, is that they count for very slightly more than nothing. But not a lot. Opening the doors to the previously-excluded can artificially boost attendance for an event which is considered by the country at large to be pretty irrelevent. But how many scones does it butter?
@John Grout “the most recent Lib Dem conferences in York and Bournemouth broke records for attendance and first-timer attendance”
And appeared to reverse or change previous policies on fracking, drugs, all-women shortlists, … It looks like at a grass-roots level there is a move away from the party’s positions up to May 2015 that is not reflected or acknowledged throughout the party, while in Scotland and Wales Lib Dems also make noises that are very different to what we have heard for the previous 5 years. This is part of what makes Lib Dems look inconsistent and unpredictable at the moment.
In a way I suppose this is progress: for 5 years the Lib Dems looked like a party I could no longer support and now I have no idea whether I can or not! I wish I could see a plan or obvious direction of travel.
There is an obituary of Hans Dietrich Genscher in the Guardian.
Enid Lakeman told me that he had persuaded Jim Callaghan to allow a different electoral system in Northern Ireland for the euro elections.
Voters everywhere should be allowed to have what they voted for, which is particularly important in Northern Ireland.
Presumably chaired by Lembit Öpik
The trouble is its a year on and your still having to ask these questions.
The answers have been given time and again on this site.
Renounce the failed approach of the Clegg/Laws/Marshall/Alexander aka Tory Lite.
The party has to accept that they are toxic and the party needs to rebrand. The failure of Clegg to resign and the loss of trust is near terminal.
Recognise the scale of the defeat that means things such as targeting of Parliamentary seats are near irrelevant.
Recognise the approach of the 1980’s, loads of leaflets and a 10 year slog by a PPC no longer work, and was overrated anyway.
Recognise the difference between community politics, political campaigning and bland FOCUS that could be from any party.
Stop pretending it can’t be done and get party members voting online for policy stances and other issues.
Learn that they way the party operated in coalition was a disaster for the party and for coalition Government – it has to be done differently next time.
Above all the party needs to have ideas and clear distinctive policies relevant to the lives of people. That’s what saved the party under Grimond. Its what revived the Liberals from 1926-1929 and kept them going 1935-1945. The SNP didn’t sweep the board with drivel like part-time Trident and alarm clock Britain.
20 years is too long, the party need to shake things up now, work with other parties and expound a view of what liberalism is about that appeals to people.
At a recent and very useful Lib Dems workshop on our referendum campaign in Brussels we received the following advice from a leader of a Dutch liberal party that is now recovering from a ‘near death’ experience.
‘ Find 3 things to consistently campaign on that become fixed in the minds of voters. You are the party of ….1,2,3. And you must start to win again. Win something, somewhere quickly.’
My 3 would be:
Education – rolling back privatisation, a new relationship with devolved local government.
NHS – a policy for staff and users to believe in and fight for
‘Government – a new relationship with the people. Devolution, reformed voting, funding political parties,
Winning something? Nationally there is nothing more immediate and urgent than winning the referendum.
Anthony Hook’s questions are all perfectly reasonable but there is something deeper than that in our collective party psyche. I remember going to a constituency party meeting after the Euro elections disaster fully expecting rage and a the commitment to clear out the deadwood and start again. What I heard was the pitiful reminiscences about how we had been in this position before – we are used to failure and simply need, apparently, to brush ourselves down and continue as before.
Although I acknowledge that I have banged on about this before but frankly we have to make alliances across the centre left in order to help build a coherent parliamentary and street level movement against this government. Such an alliance needs to include Labour, the Greens, the SNP and Plaid Cymru as well as ourselves. We have the added incubus of the need to recover trust and credibility since the coalition debacle.
Electorally, we have to accept that it would be a very good result indeed if we could increase our HofC representation to the giddy heights of 15 or 20 in 2020. There is not the slightest hope of getting back to our previous position until 2030 at the earliest. Therefore, our focus must be on extra parliamentary campaigning alongside others.
The way forward for a person, city, institution or in our case a party with an image problem is to find a ‘game changer’.
These do not come along very often and whilst we are waiting we have to do good solid local campaigning on specific issues – not the general headings that Ian Jones uses above. The issues will be found by drilling deeper and more locally, that is closer to human experience, than those general concepts.
These local campaigns need to be supported by activity at all levels of governance, ie from parish to one of the parliaments in which we have representation. It is acalled in
However – an opportunity that should be a game changer has come along and that is the Prime Minister’s financial affairs – whether he benefits directly or indirectly from either passive or active involvement in these ‘special’ firms created to both evade and or aggressively avoid tax.
In short we need to make Parliament Square look like Iceland last night. That is the objective and should be the single objective of every brain in the Party for the next few days.
Everything else is distraction and wasted opportunity at the moment.
It will be a crowded field, but given the fantastic lawyers that our Party has as supporters and often as members taking our whip in the House of Lords, we should be able to help our leader play a significant role in this potentially game changing campaign.
Bill is absolutely right. We need a game changer, simply to get noticed. So far we have missed/ducked? two opportunities where we could have done it ourselves – firstly in May 2014 when we could have turned the corner before the general election and secondly when we elected a new leader and a new direction could have been announced. Neither of these two things happened and as a result we have continued to drift.
If Cameron is exposed in this area, we need to campaign on it and exploit it to the maximum, but this time we need a clear statement that we will do something real about it. Unlike last time when we talked big about the abuse of the banking system, but let the Conservatives kick it all into the long grass.
John Grout 4th Apr ’16 – 9:55am
‘I would say that one non-electoral goal could be the true federalisation of the country’
I would have thought that is now is essential – irrespective of whether it increases or decreases the power of the Treasury – but simply because it is the right thing to do.
It is presently virtually impossible to make any real sense of what is going on in the UK – or to do much about it – because of the mishmash of systems of governance. It seems to me that Wales, NI and the English regions each should have the same system/rights/powers as Scotland – if just for the sake of equality and fairness. I would also think that this should attract votes.
This is a very good thread.
Caracatus 5th Apr ’16 – 8:37am
‘The trouble is its a year on and your still having to ask these questions.
The answers have been given time and again on this site.
Renounce the failed approach of the Clegg/Laws/Marshall/Alexander aka Tory Lite.
The party has to accept that they are toxic and the party needs to rebrand. The failure of Clegg to resign and the loss of trust is near terminal.’
Yes – this is the most fundamental issue facing the Party – and must be resolved if there is to be any chance of it surviving as a mainstream party.
What troubles me is that those individuals of the ‘Tory Lite’ must know that their continued presence and desire to influence the Party is the core reason that the Party is failing to make any progress – from which it can only be concluded that they are prepared to see the extinction of the Party – if they cannot be major players!
Bill le Breton 5th Apr ’16 – 11:10am
‘The way forward for a person, city, institution or in our case a party with an image problem is to find a ‘game changer’.
However – an opportunity that should be a game changer has come along and that is the Prime Minister’s financial affairs – whether he benefits directly or indirectly from either passive or active involvement in these ‘special’ firms created to both evade and or aggressively avoid tax.’
BlB – I think a solution to this issue has been offered in the past. Any multinational company or any business that cannot prove categorically that they are not using a tax haven to avoid corporation tax – are removed from the corporation tax system and simply charged a transaction tax [or profit tax] of 5-10% through the system that collects VAT.
I would have thought that this should be a big vote winner from an electorate who must be outraged at the latest revelations from Panama.
Ian Jones
I’ed agree with the idea of 3 things and bang on about them, but not the ones you chose. Firstly having the issues that are that board is pointless. Then the detail:
Education: so that sounds like “lets play with structures, perhaps back to a few years ago but not too many years ago” also what are you meaning by “privatisation” if you actually want to say much about vocational training (an open niche) then you will be looking at private providers and will end up tied in knots. If you are talking about academy sponsors, it is very easy to look dishonest when someone explains that relationship.
NHS: Nothing the LibDems will say will cut through, it is an issue that Labour “own” and given how badlt the BMA are doing at loosing their current fight with the government (they are in the right but have terrible tactics) it will not cut through. Mental Health is something that the LibDems can catch hold of as the other parties clearly don’t care about it and there has been ground work.
Government: With you in general and I would always have Accountability and People Power as an important point (I don’t think top 3) but it has be to comprehensive and clear, something I haven’t seen in discussion of this topic.
I would suggest having nothing economic related is a risk, either it is in there or there has to be a very comprehensive set of policies sat behind. I would suggest governance and economy would end up being the 4th and 5th issues that would undoubtedly come up but would not be the ones that could be pushed.
This is a sensible question and a good time to ask it.
In terms of electoral objectives, we should not focus purely on parliamentary seats, or indeed Euro-seats if still applicable. We used to run some big-city councils and some shire counties. We have two excellent mayors (apologies if I’ve missed any), but in fairly small places. Regaining this sort of strength is not only good for the improvements we can make where we have power, but gives us back a lot of credibility.
Our legislative objectives must include a more democratic form of devolution, protection of key civil liberties and equality legislation, and rolling back some of the childish Tory cuts to “green crap”.
But it’s not enough to have electoral and legislative objectives. How many areas now without a working Liberal democrat presence will have one by 2020, by 2025?
Bill le Breton
I would agree that a “game changer” is occasionally necessary but you can’t self generate these and I think your optimism that the Cameron’s dad’s involvement in setting up tax schemes will bring Cameron down is misplaced. The papers are making probably about to step over the line and end up generating sympathy for him. I can’t see the PM being stupid enough to have money in anything other than general retail products that are sold to everyday members of the public (or private companies like a family non-financial business).
If there is a game changer on that side it will come after the referendum result when the Tories may do any number of weird things. Or it will come from an entirely unpredictable area.
Psi 5th Apr ’16 – 2:36pm
‘Bill le Breton
I would agree that a “game changer” is occasionally necessary but you can’t self generate these and I think your optimism that the Cameron’s dad’s involvement in setting up tax schemes will bring Cameron down is misplaced.’
Yes I agree – although the fact that it was the case is going to dog Cameron throughout the remainder of his premiership – and probably lead to it ending sooner than he had planned.
You don’t think that a transaction or profit tax for those using tax havens would be a ‘game changer’ – given the significant extra revenue that this would provide at the expense of the ‘bad guys’?
John Roffey
I think any change in Corporation Tax should be considered with an intention to avoid driving companies to get bigger and bigger (which I believe the current system does) so we could see a market of smaller less powerful (and hopfully more innovative) companies.
I don’t think a policy alone would be a “game changer” I think if there was an event where there was a policy already in place (or completely thought through and ready to go) and then an event made the policy relevant/acceptable when it had previously seem not to be the case. For the most part, big claims of “x tax will raise £Y and have no adverse impact” is viewed with suspicion by most people. I think it better to propose gradual changes that simplify taxes (reducing complex opportunities for avoidance) which could move the system to better taxation (e.g. LVT). If you make claims that are to big or appear too fast people will be too scared to accept it (the public are risk averse), when a “game changer” event were to arise then it may be the opportune time to accelerate a plan or scale it up, but go in too big and most people will see it as too big a risk.
@Antony Hook
Hi Antony,
Longer-term members may know better than me, but I don’t think the three campaigns you mention were the primary campaigns of the old Liberal party, and I thought that abortion was an area that the Liberal party didn’t adopt policy on.
We’re different from UKIP and the SNP, because they were both founded to promote single issues.
For me, what defines us is the following extract from the preamble to the constitution:
“to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community, and in which no one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.”
When Labour and the Tories have pitched themselves as moderate and liberal, some of their supporters would have claimed they also stood for the above. But I think a gap is opening up for us to exploit.
Unfortunately, we’re being ignored by the media. If we can use an issue as a game-changer, as Bill suggests, I think we’ll see a recovery in our poll rating. If we can’t, a parliamentary by-election of a parliamentary defection might do the job.
If not, I’m afraid it’ll be down to the hard graft of fighting for local people, recruiting new activists, and then, by gains made in local elections, being seen as credible campaigners again. And this May could be too early to see much of an improvement.
@Ian Jones I think we need to be careful about the advice from our Dutch friend.
In a proportional representation system, 10%+ of the vote will get you representatives elected. Many of the elections we fight are under FPTP, where we need to get the largest number of votes in specific council wards and parliamentary seats. That may require different tactics.
Picking a few issues to campaign on may make sense for now. That was the strategy that Tim outlined in his leadership campaign, and which I voted for. I remember Tim saying that the asylum seekers issue could belong to us, because Labour wouldn’t touch it. As Corbyn has taken the issue up, he may need to adapt that plan.
I wouldn’t be so happy if three non-mainstream issues became what defined us as a party in the long-term. I like to see the party as a financially responsible party of social justice. Now that a gap *is* opening up in that area, I hope we can start to exploit it.
Some good points from Caracatus – we are not going to win back our credibility by putting out loads of leaflets these days. The Penhaligon/community politics strategy needs a serious re-think. Anthony Hook’s point about non-electoral, legislative objectives is interesting, and it could be argued that the Liberal Party’s influence was much greater than on the few issues he mentions: homosexual equality, otter hunting, an awareness of the environment as something central to civilised life, the outlawing of racial discrimination, gender equality – there have been massive changes in our society during my political lifetime and as a Liberal Party/Liberal Democrat activist I have seen things move in our direction, sure, not just because of our campaigning, but without us might be a less comfortable place for progressives than it is. But that is one of our problems now: there are no ‘easy’ liberal issues for us to seize as our own, only things like immigration, housing, globalisation, de-industrialisation, neo-liberal market rigging – big, complicated issues which don’t lend themselves to simple liberal solutions. As you can see, I am not optimistic, but optimism is the most important requirement for sustaining liberalism.
Psi 5th Apr ’16 – 5:03pm
‘I think any change in Corporation Tax should be considered with an intention to avoid driving companies to get bigger and bigger (which I believe the current system does) so we could see a market of smaller less powerful (and hopfully more innovative) companies.’
I agree – some who have agued for a transaction tax have suggested that corporation tax should be scrapped entirely and replaced with a TT – however, CT does provide opportunities to help fledging UK based companies in their early stages through reliefs etc.
‘I don’t think a policy alone would be a “game changer” I think if there was an event where there was a policy already in place (or completely thought through and ready to go) and then an event made the policy relevant/acceptable when it had previously seem not to be the case. For the most part, big claims of “x tax will raise £Y and have no adverse impact” is viewed with suspicion by most people.’
I suppose this decision depends on how close you believe the Party is to becoming extinct as a mainstream party in 2020. The recognition that such a policy is likely to have flaws [but is right in principle] is not going to be a problem in practical terms since a] there are four more years for revisions before 2020 and b] the Party is not going to be in sole power alone then – the best that can be hoped for is ‘in coalition’ – a time when further revision would me made.
Correct me if I am wrong, but all of the coverage of the Panama Papers that I have seen seems to agree that ‘tax havens’ simply give larger UK tax payers the choice of how much tax they will pay. It costs £1500 to set up an ‘overseas company’ – profits funnelled into this company are not subject to UK rates of tax – but the very low rates in place in the tax haven – so a fundamental flaw in our tax laws. The one area that would need further consideration would be how a TT would be applied to the City where thousands of transactions take place each minute in order to make small gains on each transaction. A TT on these processes would have to be very low if it were not to undermine the whole of the system currently in place.
For some weird reason would-be strategists routinely forget that strategy must, like the Roman god Janus, face two ways, EXTERNALLY to plot a route to achieve desired objectives and INTERNALLY to ensure that the organisation is fit-for-purpose and can efficiently deploy the available human, financial and other resources to achieve that end.
Lib Dems typically have no difficulty in listing lots of motherhood objectives (a free, fair and open society for instance) that few would disagree with but they are often desperately woolly. To succeed a strategy must be based on a deep understanding of what’s not working in society and why. (That is, of course, informed by political values and judgements about what’s good and what’s bad). Such an analysis invariably reveals weaknesses, pressure points where a small application of force can have a large result just as it does in Judo. These are the places where the return on effort is greatest and where scarce resources should be targeted.
The shorthand for this is a ‘narrative’, an account that explains things in ways that people can relate to and points directly to what needs to be done. And if it’s any good, if people can relate it to their own experience of life, they will soon identify with and get behind it.
The Lib Dems greatest weakness is that they don’t understand this INTERNAL dimension of strategy. Studying leaves is a worthy exercise as far as it goes but it doesn’t lead to a rounded understanding of a tree let alone the forest. Similarly, the party’s structure is designed to craft detailed policies but can’t create context or narrative because it simply doesn’t have the organisation; policy is made in a series of ‘silos’ largely isolated from each other and the membership and accessible only to a home-grown politburo. There is no conductor so the talents of the musicians are wasted in cacophony. (Sorry for the many metaphors!)
This really shows up at leadership elections. Other parties judge candidate leaders at least in part by the narrative they propose. Lib Dems don’t ‘do’ narrative and regard policy as a decided matter once it’s been to conference so they simply choose the best ‘talker’, apparently in the belief that better sound bites will win the day. What could possibly go wrong?
@Ian Jones – that’s a good three ‘identity policies’ and they all complement each other by being about local power and complement an electoral strategy of focusing on winnable local elections rather than – in most cases – unwinnable national elections.
Events, dear colleagues. events. Haven’t you noticed that this Government is falling apart? It was a disaster for them to abandon Cabinet responsibility, then IDS thrust a dagger in their heart, and now Tory MPs and council leaders are jumping ship in increasing numbers over, for instance, the academy plans and treatment of the junior doctors. ‘Things fall apart, the centre cannot hold’, and while we don’t want anarchy we can expect the country to be realising that the Tories would have done well to keep us in coalition. The image counts as well as the strategy and tactics, and it is playing well for us.
Until the negative and personal attacks on individual politicians in the coalition stop,
and until unity is based on respect for differing views and recognition that mistakes are not treachery ,
and until those who are such know alls on any wing of the party have the humility to know we can all get things wrong ,
and until people recognise all views of members have validity as Liberal Democrat views unless they are racist , which they never are,in our party , thankfully
and until people understand that we are more of a part of this era and the next and not more of a part of the past which has past
and until we as a party smile when we think of our party , whether it has failed electorally or not , because we share a sense of purpose and values
We shall not even begin to suceed
Gordon 5th Apr ’16 – 10:12pm
I enjoyed your post – metaphors and all – essentially because it highlighted the key issues that have been difficult for me in relating to the Party. For me politics is about trying to gain political influence, which generally means winning votes, to implement policies that will make the nation a better place for the majority. Your post provides the main reasons why this is not the case – and is aimed, I must assume, at achieving changes that will provide greater success.
Your post seems also to contrast directly with Lorenzo Cherin post above which seems to view ‘liberal values’ almost as a religion – and this approach does not seem entirely rare within the Party.
For me, someone who has a religion that has values that I would not deliberately breach, political parties are agents for change – which should operate against decent values – but are not fulfilling their purpose unless they are doing all that they can to win influence/votes. However, from LCs post, it is clear that electoral success is not the primary purpose.
The question for me is – what is the dominant view within the Party – electoral success or liberalism?
@John Grout – apologies for the delay in responding to your question but having suggested that the party should look to Bernie Sanders’ campaign for ideas I thought it sensible to wait until the result of the impending Wisconsin primary was known. Well now we know: Sanders won by 12% (56% to Clinton’s 44%) in a state where as recently as March 29th the psephologists on fivethirtyeight.com gave her an 83% probability of winning.
Why has Sanders’ campaign been so successful? I would suggest that it is because he has stuck to two simple messages: “Rigged economy” and “Broken political system”. These are ideas that resonate with people and can be expanded into many policies and actions.
In 2001 the Lib Dems were the party of “a penny on income tax to pay for education”. Polls showed people immediately identified this as Lib Dem policy. In 2005 we were the “no Iraq war” party. In 2010 we were (sorry but it needs to be repeated) the “pledge” and “no more broken promises” party. In 2015 we were… well… I really don’t know. Maybe we were (to borrow from the Euro debates) the “much the same” party. And we got pasted.
I am not going to prescribe what our policies should be: that is for FPC and conference. But I am certain that we need to be offering clear messages that resonate with the public. But since 2010 those who are tasked with setting national strategy have failed to offer anything that achieves that objective and I have little confidence that they will now do any better.
Some of the ideas above – from people in all parts of the party – seem to be to be quite excellent.
Just heard ‘the Papers’ on the Today programme. What are they ‘screaming about’?
Dave’s failure to to explain whether or not he will ‘at some stage’ benefit from assets presently linked to tax havens/tax avoidance schemes.
They scent blood.
I scent blood.
How weird that so many of you above don’t.
If you can’t see newspaper headlines the day or more before they are written, then, you remain part of the problem, not part of the solution.
John Roffey
“some who have agued for a transaction tax have suggested that corporation tax should be scrapped entirely and replaced with a TT”
I see that a TT would be relatively simple but I’m still concerned that it would still have a significant number of issues (possibly having more severe perverse incentives). I would favour a system where the charge hit “leakages from the initial purpose of “investment” (either management wages/bonuses or dividends) so as not to incentivise corporates holding on to more and more as a method of tax efficient risk management. As that would be wrapping up several taxes in to one it would be at a higher rate than any of the current taxes impacting on this area. The problem I see is that I can see how this system could be open to manipulation and haven’t had time to work out how I would see it working to avoid that.
Re the coverage of the Panama issue, it is hard to pick what is actually new information from the papers and what is old stuff that the media are recycling. Lots seems to include already discussed issues such as the use of in-EU(/EEA) transfer pricing to manipulate the system. Some seems to be concerned with the perverse situation that is driven by the bizarre US tax system and its incentives to hold vast quantities of foreign profit offshore rather than taxing on a consolidated basis like a more rational system would. The specific evasion matters such as mechanisms to remove required transparency has been covered but seems like it is being lost in the “noise” and I am surprised how little the AML has come out yet (but as it is more sensitive I’m sure there is much more to come).
JR cont.
As for the “game changer” issue I’m not sure I was clear. I think the party should have the good principled policies developed, but I don’t think they in and of them selves will be the “GC” how they play in relation to external event may provide that. I think significant changes should be included (I would avoid the term “radical” but we should not rule out approaches others would consider to be that) but the time frames and claims of how large the change in should be very conservatively estimated. Over promising (even when it may actually be realistic) can make ideas seemed far fetched.
My biggest concern is actually that policies are moving away from areas where policy actually has real positive impact (like what we are discussing) and disappearing down an identity politics rabbit hole at a time when this is coming to be noticed (and disliked) by the general public. I can see irrelevance and oblivion beckoning but is internally generated.
Bill le Breton
Ask your self this, after Cameron got a scare for Wisteria do you think there will be anything in his life that has not been sterilised from a PR point of view? His personal arrangements are one of the few things he can control and the PR outcomes of that are easy to predict. I’m not interested in today’s headlines, the question is what is the eventual long term impression. So what he is doing is killing the story by slow release of information:
Media: do you benefit from shares:
Pause (a few hours)
DC: No
Media: Do you benefit from other mechanisms
Pause (a few more hours)
DC: No
Media: Do your wife/children benefit
Pause (over night)
DC: No
Media: Will you benefit in the future
Pause (few hours)
DC: No
Media at some point start digging over his dead father.
At the end there will be lots of accusations none of which will have been shown to be true, DC looks more sympathetic and no effort will have been put in to the Tory donors who may have been implicated. The media has over reached, those who hate him still hate him, and those who are indifferent may feel sympathy.
Cameron will makes 10s of millions after leaving office like Blaire has, he will not risk that over (at most) a few hundred thousand pounds in saved tax on return on investments. You can dislike Cameron and still respect his ability as a PR man when he can control events (which he often can’t).
If you are impressed with a vicious mirror or Guardian story today you are worrying about tactics not strategy.
Bill le Breton 6th Apr ’16 – 7:56am
‘If you can’t see newspaper headlines the day or more before they are written, then, you remain part of the problem, not part of the solution’
I posted above that I did not think that Cameron’s dad’s involvement in setting up tax schemes will bring Cameron down – although the fact that it was the case is going to dog him throughout the remainder of his premiership – and probably lead to it ending sooner than he had planned.
I think one of the problems for the Party on this issue is that should Cameron be forced to resign – the credit[?] will most likely go to Corbyn & Labour – as they started the attack – also they have the numbers to pursue such a campaign.
Having said that, I have no doubt that the Panama Papers will be a great source for attacking Tory motives, MPs and Lords [some have already been identified] – also possibly some Labour officials – hope no LD members names pop up.
Psi – so the Party dies wondering.
We have sufficient experience in the Party to begin a forensic challenge.
What has infected the ‘high command’ of this party over the last 10 years is timidity.
What has it got us?
Bill
“We have sufficient experience in the Party to begin a forensic challenge.”
Fine, but go for targets that will yield results. Donors, particularly with access and those with photos of themselves with ministers in the public domain. Big money is a weak spot for the Tories, hit it hard and repetedly. Cameron is a dead end job affairs will have been sterilised at least a decade ago.
John Roffey
I get your perspective on my comments but I not only do not see Liberalism as a evangelical religious movement , I see it as a pragmatic common sense philosophy . I am very keen on electoral success and believe had we govened in the radical centre , not veering off to the right with the Tories or left with Labour , we would have succeeded . I do not believe the radical centre is centrism , a dull concept , but is Liberalism .There is much I would advocate that is in keeping with such a position and would be very popular .
So for example I would be for staying in the EU only if we advocated ongoing reform .
I would be for release of non violent offenders only if we were tougher with violent ones .
I would be for taking in more refugees , only if we did not allow Turkey any influence until they satisfy as democratic .
I would be for the junior doctors concerns , only if they ceased to strike .
And would massively increase funding for the NHS, only with a policy of plurality of provision integrating best practice everywhere it is found.
I would be for academies , only where they were really wanted and needed .
And would involve teachers and parents in policy , only where it is in partnership with local and national government , not as an add on.
I would abolish the work capability assessment , only to involve the claimants doctor in a genuine understanding of the claimants needs .
I would create a Liberal and Democratic Britain .
Psi 6th Apr ’16 – 10:40am
I did attempt an addendum to my last post – which was removed – it read:
I have little doubt that many of the policies of UKIP and the Greens – the Party’s rivals for political influence and growth – have not been thought through in full detail because they know that they will not be in a position to implement them for some while. These policies are essentially statements of the principles they believe should be applied and help significantly to impart a ‘brand image’ to the electorate. I believe TT would significantly improve LD’s image [as TT would help the poor at the expense of the rich]. I would suggest that the Party’s image is presently at an all time low.
This appears to affirm your ‘My biggest concern is actually that policies are moving away from areas where policy actually has real positive impact (like what we are discussing) and disappearing down an identity politics rabbit hole at a time when this is coming to be noticed (and disliked) by the general public. I can see irrelevance and oblivion beckoning but is internally generated’.
It also highlights the question I asked in my reply to Gordon concerning what is the priority for the majority of Party members: Electoral success or liberalism?
I see the two in conflict [along with left or right of centre]. I don’t see how the Party can possibly survive unless these fundamental questions are resolved.
Lorenzo Cherin 6th Apr ’16 – 12:03pm
Thanks for trying to help me understand what you view Liberalism to be – however, the collection of matters that you view as ‘liberal’ stem from an unidentified mindset that gives me very little more to decide how you would view other issues. If this is the case for me – someone who has posted on LDV for a while – do you not acknowledge that for the electorate – those who have never been a member of the Party – describing something as liberal or otherwise – is totally beyond their comprehension.
Do you not agree that for the floating voter – those the Party must attract to survive – it is specific policies on current issues and how they would affect their lives – that are the all important matters in the current crisis for the Party?
John Roffey,
Thanks for the support. You ask whether electoral success or liberalism is the dominant view in the party. The two ought to go naturally and comfortably together; a proper liberalism would I think be immensely popular electorally. Unfortunately, too many members are fixated on getting votes as their primary objective and thereby joining the establishment. It always seemed to me that what Clegg really meant when he talked of being “ready for government” was demonstrating we would play nicely and not rock the boat and I think there is a faction within the leadership that still thinks like that. Well, count me out of that game and clearly also a great many (former) Lib Dem voters.
When it comes to liberalism we are in the exact same position as the group of blind men of Indian legend who come across an elephant and then fall out over whether it’s more like a tree or a hose or a polished stick depending on whether the bit they got hold of was a leg, the trunk or a tusk. Absent a context and a narrative, an understanding of elephants in the legend (or forests in my earlier comment), arguments are inevitable and the best way to stay friends may indeed be to allow that anything goes – but just don’t expect to have any political impact at all if that’s the choice you make.
So, what is the elephant in the room in this case? I suggest it is understanding money and power (largely interchangeable) and how they work in society and the economy. That can be difficult for individual Lib Dems if their background happens to be in, say, social work or teaching because those professions don’t lead naturally to understanding the language let alone the concepts involved. But at the party level that should be easy and there is a massive amount of material out there – a capable attack would destroy this government’s vain pretensions within six months. But is there the will (on the part of some) or the independent thinking (on the part of others) among the Lib Dem leadership class? Notwithstanding the constitution, it’s a group that always strikes me as a hotbed of conformism.
John Roffey
“priority for the majority of Party members: Electoral success or liberalism?”
“I see the two in conflict [along with left or right of centre]. I don’t see how the Party can possibly survive unless these fundamental questions are resolved.”
I’m not sure there is as much a difference in some areas between liberalism and electoral success as some think. The position on legalising cannabis for example I think is a position where people perceive it as electorally damaging (mainly due to the papers hatred of it), a lot of people can see what has been tried has failed. New ideas that are sensibly approached (like having a way it would work as the recent approach has) makes it clearer to have a discussion.
My point on identity politics was that it is in no way liberal, it all relies upon unfalsifiable theories that fall apart under basic logical scrutiny. The attitude that accompanies it has been to ignore actual issues when they are raised. As to the conflict left vs right I see it as the same problem with peoepl simply proposing different solutions, I’m not sure that any political party ever achieves the level of “intellectual purity” to remove these disagreements, they just manage them better internally.
Bill le Breton
I’m somewhat mystified why anyone would attack Cameron through the doings of his late father. Throwing mud around may indeed lead to some sticking by association but is this really what the lib Dems ought to be about? Is that the best we can do?
Why not instead use the plentiful evidence of government (sometimes via
regulatorsits placemen, sometimes directly) facilitating or even covering up the, umm, misdeeds of powerful people. That is the context in which the likes of Mossack Fonseca thrive.Here for instance is a juicy example, told by one of Scotland’s foremost financial journalists, that ought by rights to be getting Nicola Sturgeon a public roasting.
http://www.ianfraser.org/sturgeon-berated-for-creating-environment-in-which-bankers-are-above-the-law/
Gordon 6th Apr ’16 – 12:44pm
Thanks for your post Gordon – but as I responded to Lorenzo – I really do not have a much greater understanding of Liberalism specifically – although I certainly do recognise ‘But is there the will (on the part of some) or the independent thinking (on the part of others) among the Lib Dem leadership class? Notwithstanding the constitution, it’s a group that always strikes me as a hotbed of conformism.’
Perhaps my difficulty is that I am essentially a democrat whose greatest concern is the ‘democratic deficit’ – is there a conflict between this and how you view Liberalism?
Not surprised to find so little support for my position on this
However – have a look at this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pb5fnWwczTE
And have ourfront bench said/written anything.
Even Jess Phillips (sorry John H) has managed a splash in Huffington Post that others papers and media channels are picking up.
Psi 6th Apr ’16 – 12:54pm
‘As to the conflict left vs right I see it as the same problem with peoepl simply proposing different solutions, I’m not sure that any political party ever achieves the level of “intellectual purity” to remove these disagreements, they just manage them better internally.’
Yes – I agree. However, from what I have seen on the BBC, Sky and C4 News their preferences for comment from the Party are VC, NC & DL and less often TF. Each of these, apart from TF, reputations have been besmearched by their actions, in different ways, whilst in the coalition – and therefore continue to undermine the reputation of the Party when they appear.
I do not know if it is TF’s lack of boldness that allows this to continue. However, I do believe that the Party should insist, if these interviews are arranged with the individuals directly – as seems likely – that the commissioning TV outlet are obliged to state clearly before the interview that the views expressed cannot be considered as the official policy or views of the Party.
In my view TF should try to take up any opportunity to appear in the media he can – so that it is made very clear that he is now the leader of the Party.
@Bill le Breton
Whatever we say, mostly we are ignored. I think for the LibDems to get reported, we need a LibDem angle on this.
David Laws book has provided some (though very little) coverage for us on this issue.
https://twitter.com/georgetsk/status/717743205895290880
Unfortunately, too many of our people react negatively to anything David Laws says. I wish they’d put the same energy into attacking the Tories instead.
John Roffey
I’ed agree that there is too much of former LD ministers on TV and not enough of the current front bench. I would also hope that they could work to do as much substitution as possible.
Bill le Breton
“Not surprised to find so little support for my position on this”
Perhaps because other people want to concentrate of more promising tatgets. Cameron has at best 2 years left (possibly only months), if there was obvious personal financial involvement the papers would have found it like they have with the Icelandic PM. People I know who have a really person hatred of Cameron have been very exercised by this assuming he will have some personal involvement, everyone else seems disinterested.
The Tories spent approx. £50m between 2010 and 2015 with a lot targeting unseating LibDem MPs. Big money is the Tories greatest strength but in these situations its greatest weakness. If the Tories have a number of donors who are caught in this and their funds were funnelled to seats the LibDems are trying to retake next time that would be much more fruitful to tie individual MPs we want out than insinuations about (what will be by then) the ex-Tory leader.
I don’t think you will find any smoking gun on the top Tories, but much better would be to get a target on Tories who the LibDems could unseat, along with the Tory party in general, forcing the issue of party funding.
Who cares about Cameron in those circumstances?
Bill le Breton
“Even Jess Phillips (sorry John H) has managed a splash in Huffington Post that others papers and media channels are picking up.”
I’m not sure I would advocate copying the sort of MP who spouts off without thinking to the point where they make very unpleasant claims about their own city.
I would suggest the LD front Bench should be using the issue to push the “we need to get Big Money out of politics” line, that at least would give an opening to start using when the first donor is identified who is connected.
Remember, the UK is obsessing about tax evasion on this but the secrecy issue is more likely to also have Money Laundering or Terrorist Financing aspects to it. There are more avenues to this than the media are currently covering.
So we now know that the Prime Minister bought shares in a Panamanian based fund (was it in 1997?) and only sold them in 2010.
Every thing that is wrong about buying such funds was wrong in 1997 and remained wrong everyday until he eventually sold them.
I don’t buy Psi’s belief that what we have seen over the last 5 days was an organised communications campaign by clever types in No 10 to slowly release the information as he suggested above.
Jolyon Maugham QC wrote back on the 4th April, “It is true that tax avoidance is – whatever you think of its moral quality – legal. And it is true that people living in the UK might have assets in or that have passed through Panama for perfectly proper reasons. True, but not very likely.
“And here’s why.
“For the purposes of UK tax law, most tax havens are the same. There is no magic effective in UK tax terms that can only be performed in Panama. Moreover, Panama is not next door. It is not a British tax haven with the comforting familiarity such brings. It does not enjoy an especial reputation for trust and solidity.
“People think of these things when they are choosing where to put their money. They are big disadvantages for Panama.
“So there has to be a reason why you go there.
“What Panama has offered – its USPs in the competitive world of tax havenry – is an especially strict form of secrecy, a type of opacity of ownership, and (if the reports of backdating are correct) a class of wealth management professionals some of whom have especially compromised ethics.
“You go to Panama, in short, because, despite its profound disadvantages, you value these things.”
Poor judgement and not just by the Prime Minister.
@ Psi ” I don’t think you will find any smoking gun on the top Tories,”
Yes, well………………………………
It will be interesting to get Danny Alexander’s take on the nearly five years ‘activity’ he had after his speech to the Lib Dem Conference in September, 2010.
“Alexander launches ‘ruthless’ tax evasion clampdown
By Gavin Stamp
Political reporter, BBC News, in Liverpool
19 September 2010”
Downing Street says “Hindsight is a wonderful thing”
Foresight is pretty important too.
The above thread shows in detail why the Libersal Democrats are where they are and why it is more than likely that this is where they will stay – weighed down by the dead weight of fantasists playing at politics. Amateurs run the show.
Bill le Breton
“The above thread shows in detail why the Libersal Democrats are where they are and why it is more than likely that this is where they will stay – weighed down by the dead weight of fantasists playing at politics. Amateurs run the show.”
I’m sure who above you think is “run[ning] the show” I don’t see anyone commenting who is that important.
I’ll happily admit to to being wrong on how well Cameron would handle this. It beggers belief that he waited until 2010 to scrub his personal financial matters, or that he is putting up such a poor explanation now (there is a better way to answer these questions that they aren’t using).
But the point remains that when Cameron goes (which could be as soon as just after the referendum) how do the LibDems make the most of it? I still think the donors pose the best prospect. If the Tories have taken large sums from people with vast amounts of funds hidden is a secretive jurisdiction (which would be most attractive to money launders and terrorist financiers), then they demand to snoop UK citizen’s communications with little control. The LibDems have been clear on that point.
Bill le Breton
RE: the Jess Philips comments, I think John Mann’s comments come over much better. He made it clear Cameron shouldn’t be judged on his father’s actions but his own (a principle most people would support) then went for the jugular when Cameron was personally involved.
Phillips looks hyperbolic, Mann sounds fair but tough. I know what I would rather have the LibDem front bench seen as.
Well Psi, the daily email from the Times Red Box is well worth reading, if you have a moment to spare.
It is Monday and the story that we have failed to campaign on still has legs, very strong legs.
I wasn’t suggesting that any of the above commenters were running the show, though who knows when you hide behind your anonymity, but those that are running the show, clearly had no idea of the campaigning potential of this issue. Confirming that over the last 7 or 8 years they had no idea of how to campaign.
Bill le Breton
Unfortunately the RedBox appears to be one of the pay walls I don’t have access to.
“who knows when you hide behind your anonymity”
I can confirm I am not in a position of power in the LibDems, my policy preferences on several issues are very different to those who do run things.