Folks, before I get into the thrust of my main item this week, a few readers got very hot under the collar in the comments section beneath last week’s column. So, if you’ll allow me, a few points.
Firstly, I now gather that the Lib Dem reshuffle was not triggered by Josh Babarinde stepping back from the front bench and had, in fact, been planned for a while. Happy to correct that.
Secondly, when I said I’d prefer just thirty Lib Dem MPs who were unashamedly liberal than scores more who sometimes appear very tentative, I was making a rhetorical point, of course I don’t want us to go backwards in number of MPs. I just wish we weren’t so blooming tentative the whole darn time.
Thirdly and finally, some commenters suggested that my referencing being pro-immigration and pro-LGBT+ rights as liberal principles (which they most certainly are and I hope no Lib Dem member would question that) was very limiting, I repeat what my dear friend Andy Chandler referenced in the comments, I spend the whole time saying we need to ensure we have stuff to say on the bread and butter issues most people care about; health, education, transport, housing, safe and vibrant communities and so on.
But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be absolutely clear and values-driven on the things that make our party pretty much unique in the British political landscape and, yes, that must include being proudly pro LGBT+ rights (especially, at the present time, the rights of Trans, non-binary, gender fluid and gender non-conforming people) and, without doubt, the many positives that come from immigration. Otherwise, what is the point of us?
And on that very point, on to how we might respond to the undoubted surge in interest and new members the Green Party of England and Wales are experiencing at the present time under the new and undoubtedly motivating leadership of former Lib Dem Zack Polanski. Since he took their top job the party’s membership has increased by a reported 55%.
Say what you like about Zack, no one who listens to him can surely be in any doubt about what he believes in and who he stands up for. I ask you honestly, can we say the same about our party? Are our values communicated in an effective way, which grabs people’s attention and which the media cannot ignore? Do we articulate meaningfully who we’re in politics to serve?
Our current strategy, such as it is, seems to be to say as little as possible on anything, at least in a way that might actually attract some attention/headlines, and hope that the Tories in particular will continue on their downward trajectory and we’ll inevitably benefit as a result. Really? Is that the best we can do? Is that the radical liberalism that first attracted me to the party? Is that Paddy Ashdown leading his troops into battle or Charles Kennedy bravely opposing the illegal invasion of Iraq? Are we now just the ‘least worst option’ party?
Just think how well we could be doing if we had inspiring leadership and the ability to grab the headlines. How many new members we could gain and voters we could attract? Being moderate is all well and good, but it shouldn’t mean being boring or beige.
I fear that, if something doesn’t change soon, we’re going to be lost in the shuffle.
In praise of… Donald Trump!
I bet you never thought you’d see me write something – indeed anything – in praise of Donald Trump. I have been and remain a vocal critic of the current U.S. President. He’s vile, vulgar, and instigated a violent attack on the United States Capitol in the hopes of overturning a democratic election in 2020.
But I try my best to be a fair man and, as I said on Twitter earlier today, whatever we may think of him I think Trump deserves significant credit for the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, for the return of hostages, etc. Of course, all the back-slapping in the Israeli Parliament, which Trump earlier today, was beyond over the top, especially when you consider the near destruction of Gaza and the deaths of at least 60,000 Gazans.
We’re grateful for this peace, of course, and hope it lasts but we don’t suddenly forget about what’s gone before, both the horrific October 7th 2023 attack by Hamas terrorists in Israel and the subsequent genocide by the Israeli authorities in Gaza. Both must ultimately be held accountable in courts of law.
Caron’s podcast debut
I’m delighted that the editor of this fine website and the Scottish Lib Dems Social Security Spokesperson Caron Lindsay joined me and my fellow co-host Chris Newton on the latest edition of the Political Frenemies podcast.
Caron was fab, as I knew she would be.
On the episode, we discuss: Tory Conference, Lib Dem prospects, the Greens surge and more! You can find it on YouTube and multiple podcast platforms.
You won’t want to miss it!
* Mathew Hulbert is a former Councillor, is a regular commentator on TV and Radio, and is Co-Host of the Political Frenemies podcast.
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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
Hywel
paul barker
Peter Chambers
Mark Valladares
Mark Smulian
38 Comments
I do worry that the Green Party of England and Wales will eat into our support, attracting particularly those on the left of our party. That said, going after moderate Conservatives will probably gain us more support overall than we will lose to the left.
Thanks, Mathew, for including me—very kind of you. Mathew is a good friend, and while we often agree, there are times we disagree. I did, however, feel that some comments made in jest were unfortunate, glad the record from Mathew was cleared up.
Great article again, Mathew. I do think we could risk trying to “out-do the Greens” in the same way that the Tories are trying—and failing—to “out-do Reform.” That’s not what Mathew is arguing. The progressive space is getting crowded. I tend to find that moderate voters are just more receptive from my anecdotal evidence that I’ve got. If we position ourselves as tagging the Greens, it could come across as too little, too late, or fail to resonate.
That said, I agree with Mathew that we need to have substance and values. I do feel we are not vocal enough about them. Being moderate doesn’t mean being boring like Mathew said. We could champion big-ticket policies that both appeal to an electorate and shift the conversation toward moderate Tory voters, showing the net benefit to the state that can be reframed as liberal solutions.
I’m reminded of Jeremy Thorpe: “Dress conservative and look left.” My own analogy would be radical but act respectable and appealing to the quieter, thoughtful voters rather than the aggressive activism that sometimes dominates perception of the Greens.
Finally, I do agree on the Trump. Credit due here – although the proof of the pudding is in the tasting.
The Greens will be hit by Corbyn’s new party, suspect many will take on a dual membership with both.
There are a couple of points I want to make about the Greens Membership boom, first, that they have had booms before & they were not always helpful.Secondly we beat them on every other measure, not just MPs & Councillors but in the Opinion Polls & in real Elections.
Its also worth keeping an eye on “Your Party” which has its founding conference in two Months, if it takes off then there is no doubt it will hit Green support badly.
Otherwise, what is the point of us? How about, build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community? Would that be a good purpose for us? A good point of us?
Now clearly part of that purpose is about giving everyone a chance for a free and decent life, and ‘everyone’ equally includes LGBT people, straight people, men, women, immigrants, and native-born British citizens, so we are going to seek to represent all groups – we’re not trying to exclude anyone. But to pick on any one or two minority groups in the way you’ve done and make out we have no purpose unless it’s specifically to support those groups is simply wrong. That would reduce us to a minority interest party that would deserve to lose every election because of not trying to represent the majority of the population. Liberalism is much, much bigger than that.
If you’ve called for us to say more on bread and butter issues elsewhere than that’s great – but I can only respond to what you’ve said here. 🙂
One fact that’s not being mentioned here is that Green membership under Zack Polanski has reached 100,000 whilst lib dem membership under Ed Davey has fallen to 60,000.
The fact that the they’ve had membership surges before or that members on their own aren’t everything is completely besides the point. The point is that the greens would not have nearly double tour membership unless we had screwed up really badly.
And people are not joining the Greens out of support for their more fringe policies, they are doing so because theres a massive gap in the market for an economically progressive and liberal party that both Labour and ourselves have been refusing to fill.
Even though our parties values might match with those voters this isn’t at all clear to them and its not like we have much in the way of big policies to tackle things like cost of living and the government’s assault on trans rights!
Might it help to consider these facets while considering advancing/promoting the L. D. Party?
1) Emphasize what would benefit our national community more than competing with other political parties
2) Review and deveolp the “How” of the party message/messages
3) Review the “What” ditto
Suggestions:
1. Praise the positive in other parties, criticise the negative and seek clarification of the unclear and deceptive
2 More simle esntences and fewr complex sentences
Present spokespersons as interesting, dynamic “characters” and have more of them
3) Return to “Social Liberal Democracy”, emphasising the following
a) The need for “Treedom From” to balance Neoliberalism’s “Freedom to” for the wealthy and powerful
b) Advocate and practicalize the “Mied Market”
c) Reform the current tax system which currently favours the wealthy/rentiers
d) Reform the current undemocratic electoral system with proportional represtentation, limits to political donations etc, removal of hereditaries from the H. O. L
e) Reorganise the governing bodies of the B. o E. and the B. B. C so that they are less scremingly unrepresentative of the whole of our national community
In short = more practical community power in “The What” and less carefully organised timidity in “The How”.
The cause of the Green membership surge was a Leadership campaign that was picked up by the Media with a slew of stories about Splits, a revolt against the Traditional Party Establishment & “Entryists” from the Far Left. In the last few weeks of the Campaign there was the big Sultana/Corbyn split in “Your Party” with a number of Left commentators announcing that Your Party was Dead & calling for supporters to join The Greens instead.
None of this is the sort of thing that can be planned, it was a series of “Happy” accidents.
Whether the new members will lead to more Green Votes remains to be seen, certainly they have gone up in the Polls but so have we.
Our problem is that while the Green party organisation is still largely a membership driven party, our party organisation has under Mark Pack’s presidency has become ever more centralised and controlled by the bureaucratic powerbase. Thus only three members of Federal board are directly elected by members out of sixteen places. Everybody knows everybody else and groupthink is endemic.
As a result, problems are glossed over or blame shifted to the innocents elsewhere. The collapse in membership over the last four years (after it had grown to a high of 120,000 due to our principled stand on Brexit) has fallen back to 60,000 in just four years. No strategy, no plan, no guidance to local parties from the centre on how to keep those members, just a complacent acceptance of the loss.
Likewise the General Election review totally lauded the five staff members at the centre as if they alone were responsible for our success due to their organisation skills, while the activists who poured into those four by elections we won in Chesham and Amersham, North Shropshire, Tiverton and Honiton and Somerton and Frome, and made it clear to the public that the Lib Dems could win – They didn’t even get a mention.
However, when it came to the massive problems faced by those volunteers running the approvals process due to Covid, and many local parties being very slow in initiating the process and Rishi Sunak’s calling a snap election, the centre washed its hands of it.
The Greens have a clear message which is being well-presented in an attractive way. All that people see or hear from us is ludicrous stunts and no real message. If I hadn’t been a member for 53 years I’m not sure that I would be attracted to join. What is our central message?
“Being pro-immigration … as liberal principles”
Being in favour of fair treatment and support for immigrants within Britain – Yes, that’s a liberal principle.
Recognising that immigrants bring benefits to the UK – Well, that’s common sense.
Believing that high net immigration to the UK is something that one must inevitably favour if one wants to claim to be a liberal – No, surely not. Why should the UK necessarily want a fast-growing population? Why should anyone who disagrees be disqualified from liberalism?
It is essential that the Lib Dems set out clearly their stall starting with the economy. The greens are hard left with a socialist agenda augmented by protest voters over various issues and doubtless as others have said the new Corbyn/Sultanna party will eat into the green vote but the Lib Dems do not and ought not occupy that space as the party must be more than a party of protest but one of clear eyed values and principles which underpin the policies.
We need to set out a fiscally responsible position and tackle the waste of opportunity for people
with an over blown welfare system
The party has become rather wedded to big state and what the government must do but that is essentially illiberal. It’s about empowering the citizen with solid education and health care with real housing opportunities with the safety net of welfare
That’s the battlefield and we need to be on the front foot with liberal values at the fore
“In praise of Donald Trump”
There is danger in Trump’s apparent achievement. The danger is that it makes strong propaganda for the supposed advantages of government by bullying strongman quasi-dictators. Expect Farage to exploit the propaganda against the old, “failed”, democratic parties (which, to Farage, include the Lib Dems and Greens as well as the Tories and Labour”.
So let’s not be too generous with praise. Trump supported the incipient genocide for far too long. He only acted belatedly because Netanyahu made the mistake of hitting Trump’s allies in Qatar, and thus metaphorically stepping on Trump’s blue suede shoes. His record in Ukraine has been disastrous. Boycotting Trump’s state visit, as Davey did, still looks like the right call.
Thank you David Allen.
Given the amount of financial and military assistance Israel receives from the USA, to say nothing of diplomatic cover and the invariable deployment of a Security Council veto, if the POTUS says “Jump” the only tenable response from the Prime Minister of Israel is “How high?”
Israel’s actions in October 2023 probably amounted to reasonable self-defence. At some stage they passed into disproportionate over-reaction and collective punishment, and at some further stage arguably shaded into genocide. Trump and his predecessor could at any time from late 2023 have said “This is is unacceptable and must stop”. They didn’t.
No, I’m not going to fall about praising Trump just because he’s taken it into his head that belatedly leaning on Netanyahu might get him a Nobel.
Libdems seem to be quite to the left of where they were 2010/2015 and with Polanski leading the greens further left and “yourparty” on the horizen it would be sensible to move the libdems back to the centre and attract the one nation conservatives and green voters who don’t agree with Polanski. If not, a lot of ex tory voters who voted libdem last time will head back to the tories.
@David Le Grice “Even though our parties values might match with those voters this isn’t at all clear to them…”
A big yes to that! 🙂
Members and activists might not feel like soft Tories (and might resent the association), but that is how the party has chosen to present itself since 2010! 🙁
And as Russell Simpson points out above, it’s a credible electoral strategy, but not one that will bring me back.
Hello Peter,
The point you raise is clearly important to you, but it all rather depends upon what you want the Lib Dems to achieve. If you want us to remain pure left wing liberals, quite simply there is no way for us to progress as a political force because there aren’t enough people out there who share that outlook. Indeed we will go backwards in 2029, quite likely catastrophically.
If however you want Liberal Democracy to succeed (as I do), we need to find more voters who share enough of our values before they get sucked up into some other grouping or just descend into apathy.
We all have a choice, but leaving them to drift back into supporting the Cons or even worse into the delusion of Reform on the basis “Well there is a problem with immigration,” will just undermine any chance of progress for us and our values.
Lib Dem purity or Lib Dem progress is the choice. We fool no-one but ourselves if we think we can have both.
David
@David Evans 15th Oct ’25 – 2:42pm
“If you want us to remain pure left wing liberals, quite simply there is no way for us to progress as a political force because there aren’t enough people out there who share that outlook.”
Hi,
I’m not so sure.
Despite fighting the Conservatives, the media, and his own MPs(!), in 2017 and 2019, Corbyn showed that there was a lot of support for left wing ideas. Much of that energy and enthusiasm appears to be moving towards the Greens, Corbyn’s nascent party, and even Plaid Cymru and the SNP. Meanwhile, the Lib Dems’ vote share increased slightly while its number of votes actually decreased between 2019 and 2024. Party membership figures tell a similar story.
6.8 million of us voted for the Lib Dems in 2010, 3.2 million more than in 2024. 0.5 million more people voted for Corbyn in Labour’s “disastrous” 2019 election than did for Starmer’s 2024 landslide (and another 2.6 million went awol after 2017). That’s a lot of potential votes that Lib Dems risk neglecting on their left flank. And if the Tories ever come to their senses, there could be quite a squeeze with them, Labour and Lib Dems fighting over a relatively narrow centre / centre-right spectrum.
Our awful electoral system makes it difficult to know how any of that would affect seats, but replacing that with something more representative is probably the one thing that we and Reform would agree on!
I wouldn’t interpret the 2017 election as showing mass support for left-wing ideas. People forget that Labour was completely on course for a landslide defeat at that election – until the Tory campaign unexpectedly totally imploded overnight (mainly over social care). At the time I was active in the Labour Party and I remember how the reaction on the doorstep suddenly changed – up until that weekend people were practically laughing at us because of Corbyn; then 2 days later we were being taken much more seriously. Left wing ideas aren’t the reason Labour did so unexpectedly well in that election: It was almost entirely because the Tories ran a totally incompetent campaign and suddenly made themselves look unelectable. Other than in those exceptional circumstances, Labour has never managed to succeed electorally on an overtly left-wing platform since at least 1950. I don’t see why that should be any less true for the LibDems – especially now the Greens are going full out for the left wing-socialist vote, so there’s not really any space there.
As I see it, the question is, do we want to be a permanent minority party that is ideologically pure, and therefore confined to 15%-ish support or do we want to reach out to enough voters that we can become a major party with a chance of governing?
Hello Peter,
Thanks for your reply. However, I have to say I think your reply is mainly a listing of fond wishes regarding Lib Dem growth, and not an analysis of what is actually out there to deliver it.
You talk of Jeremy Corbyn’s success in building a left-wing Labour party. You then imply that many these left-wingers could vote for us.
The problem is it is not supported by the underlying facts. Why do you think that we have hardly ever won even a handful of seats in Labour areas?
• In Hull we control the council, but have never had an MP there.
• In Liverpool we have fought against a well-known corrupt local Labour party and again controlled the council, but only ever had one MP there.
• In all of Greater Manchester we have only ever won two seats from Labour (Rochdale, Cyril Smith and Withington, with John Leech) and in neither are we anywhere close now.
• Birmingham had John Hemming – we are now in fifth place.
• London out of 73 seats we control 6 – all in SW London, all won from Conservatives.
• Elsewhere in London iirc only three MPs since merger – Simon Hughes (originally by-election), Lynne Featherstone and Sarah Teather (again by-election). In all three we are well behind now.
The fact is that very few Labour left-wing voters will even consider voting for us, fundamentally because many are not liberal, but also reinforced by us going into coalition with the Conservatives.
David
@ Simon R,
” People forget that Labour was completely on course for a landslide defeat at that election – until the Tory campaign unexpectedly totally imploded overnight ” </em.
True, the Tory campaign in 2017 wasn't great. But where do dissatisfied Tory voters go? If normally Labour supporters were unhappy with a more left manifesto , where would they go? In both cases it would usually be to the Lib Dems.
However, the Lib Dem vote, both as a percentage of the total, was down by 0.5% on the 2015 result. Better targeting of resources gave you 4 extra seats, up to 12, but this isn't evidence of any real discontent in the ranks of Tory and Labour voters.
There was a 5.4% swing towards the Tories and a 9.6% swing towards Labour.
We've heard the same argument from many others to justify the undermining of Jeremy Corbyn's credibility. The fear of those on the right of the Labour Party (Starmer, McSweeney, Mandelson, Blair, Reeves etc ) wasn't that Corbyn was intrinsically unelectable.
Just the opposite. Their worry was that he was.
But just look at the mess they've made of it since they've got their way by deception. They've split the Labour Party too, and there is no way back.
What really killed the Corbyn project was Brexit. Labour got away with strategic ambiguity masking deep divisions in 2017, but the ‘Brexit’ election in 2019 exposed the damage: the 2016 referendum irreparably fractured Labour’s electoral coalition. No viable pathway existed for Corbyn to assemble a winning majority in a post-Brexit Britain.
Things can change. But I suspect some future AI historian compiling a report on how a fascist government came to power in Britain will have a footnote about the Lexiteers. By eliminating Britain’s last chance at a genuinely left-wing government—arguably our only credible bulwark against right-wing populism—they inadvertently paved the way for the very forces they claimed to oppose.
Jonathan Midgley,
An active state is social liberal. There is not an overblown welfare system. Working age benefits are inadequate. The safety net of welfare has huge holes in it. I understand that once long ago pensions and unemployment benefit were the same amounts. For years pensions have increased above inflation while working age benefits have increased below inflation because of the Coalition’s policy of limiting increases to 1% a year followed by years of Tory freeze.
It is illiberal to cut benefits and increase the number of people living in poverty. Our liberal policy is to end deep poverty in the UK within a decade.
We need to tackle the waste of people being unfit to work and then support them into back into work when they are fit again to work.
@ Andrew,
“……..Britain will have a footnote about the Lexiteers. By eliminating Britain’s last chance at a genuinely left-wing government..”
The best chance would have required some co-operation from Lib Dem leaders Jo Swinson and Ed Davey. They voted against a motion in the HoC to remain a part of the Customs Union as part of a Brexit deal. It was lost by just 6 votes. This would have been won had the Lib Dems supported the motion. Instead they mainly chose to side with the Tory right and the Brexit Party.
It could have formed the basis of a sensible compromise deal with the EU and the whole process could have been completed before an election.
The idea of a second referendum was a political no-starter. Having the promise of one in a Labour manifesto ensured they would lose. Labour MPs might have been largely pro the EU, but not Labour voters in the heartlands. Even if the Tories were to have called for another one, the choice would have been between Remain and some cobbled up deal that neither the Remain nor the Leave side could have supported.
The Leave side would have boycotted and the result would have been years of civil strife.
@ Michael BG,
“……. Our liberal policy is to end deep poverty in the UK within a decade…”
What does deep poverty mean exactly? Is it that it’s OK to have some shallow poverty?
Your actually wording is “no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.”
So again this could mean that these are OK providing there’s no actual slavery involved.
In a relatively densely populated country like the UK there just isn’t the space for anyone to go off into the wilderness to do their own thing as might be possible for some in countries like Australia and America. We all have to conform to a large extent. The capitalist system requires that too. If we work hard, if we are able to, we’ll probably do OK. The GDP per capita in the UK is about £40,000 per person.
So what’s the problem? It can only be that the system does require some of us to be in poverty to keep the rest of us working hard. If there isn’t a need to get up in the morning to go to work to earn money and so provide food, clothing and housing for our families, then why would we bother? Those individuals who are fortunate enough to have an independent income largely don’t.
Peter,
What is your problem here? It is our preamble to the constitution which says “no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.” As I expect you realise the Preamble is a document setting out general principles and isn’t amended frequently.
We also had a policy motion discussed and passed at conference in Bournemouth in 2023 that included “In particular we will … Set a target of ending deep poverty within a decade, and establish an independent commission to recommend annual increases in Universal Credit to achieve it.”
Now if you want to make a point about the evils of capitalism by all means do so, but do so on the basis that you start with real facts and not just a generalised misleading comment on what we have said, especially where you are commenting on a post by Michael BG, who does know his stuff in this area.
That is very Farage and I know you aren’t that sort of person.
David Evans,
Thank you for your kind remarks.
Peter Martin,
Your question is very odd as you are someone who knows that a political party’s aspiration as set out in the constitution is not the same as their policy. I am sure you remember the old clause four of the Labour Party, which I believe was written on member’s cards – ‘to secure to the workers by hand and brain the full fruits of their labour through the common ownership of the means of production, distribution and. exchange’.
I am sure you have read on LDV that deep poverty is having an income below 50% of the median income. I expect you know that median income for the financial year ending April 2024 was £36,700 (https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwealth/bulletins/householddisposableincomeandinequality/financialyearending2024).
I am also sure you are aware that deep poverty levels need to be equivalised, where household’s income is adjusted for its size and needs. According to the latest Poverty report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, the deep poverty level for a single person is £8,200; for a couple with no children £14,200; and for a couple with two children under 14 it is £19,900
(https://www.jrf.org.uk/uk-poverty-2025-the-essential-guide-to-understanding-poverty-in-the-uk).
The preamble to our constitution is stating that if a person lives in poverty their liberty is restricted to such an extent that it is similar to them being enslaved. Katharine Pindar and I would like to see an end to relative poverty in the UK.
David Evans and Michael BG are right to emphasise our party’s commitment to fighting poverty in Britain, both in our constitution and our policies – a commitment which seems strangely missing from Keir Starmer’s government at present. And no Liberal surely would accept Peter Martin’s suggestion that ‘the system does require some of us to be in poverty to keep the rest of us working hard’ – I hope you wrote that tongue-in-cheek, Peter, and are committed as Socialists surely should be to fighting gross inequality as an evil. As to comparisons with the Greens, I think the solidity of our many significant policies, constantly reviewed and updated in our bi-annual conferences, is good reason for left-of-centre thoughtful citizens to return to us rather than flirt with another charismatic leader The challenge of course is for us to make them known, and our policy on poverty is one which should be promoted.
@ Katharine,
“And no Liberal surely would accept Peter Martin’s suggestion that ‘the system does require some of us to be in poverty to keep the rest of us working hard’ ”
I’m sure some Liberals will be aware of the NAIRU. The non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment. I’d add an extra U to include underemployment. The former is reckoned to be about 3-4%. Add in the extra U and this jumps to more like 10%.
What it means, in practical terms, is that some unemployment and underemployment has to be accepted to prevent ever increasing inflation taking hold. This causes poverty to those affected.
If poverty and inequality could be solved by growth alone we wouldn’t be having this conversation. Up until 2008 the UK had a sustained period of growth for the previous 70 years.
I’m not offering a simple solution, but I am suggesting that Liberals should recognise a fundamental flaw in a system they do basically support.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NAIRU
3-4% unemployment could be made up of short periods between jobs without anyone dropping into real poverty. Underemployment is likely to be more permanent. To end poverty among the underemployed requires that those on low incomes are treated better by the tax and benefits systems. We can afford to do that by taxing the well off because it is more likely to attract people to underemployment from unemployment than from full employment.
@ Peter,
I think you might be missing the point. What is the theory behind the NAIRU(U)? It isn’t that the 3-4% or the 10%, although I’m now thinking 10% might be an underestimate, dislike being unemployed or underemployed per se. They don’t like being poor. This isn’t the same thing!
Furthermore, neither do those who are lucky enough to have reasonably well paying jobs like the idea that they might fall into the ranks of those who are poor.
It’s best understood as a form of social discipline. Workers are told to get on with their jobs without complaint. If they don’t like it they can leave.
So offering a generous safety net, to remove poverty, is short circuiting the system. Incidentally, many workers, rightly or wrongly, think the system is too generous, and claim this is already the case. Workers naturally want higher wages. It’s the more affluent, more liberal, groups of the progressive middle class who push for higher benefits.
I’m not saying I approve, but the NAIRU is meant to work as it does. Even if we had a more socialist system we’d still need a way to ensure that everyone who was capable of working made a contribution. The challenge is to come up with something better.
I have been a member of the Liberal Democrats for 14 years, the longest I’ve been a member of any other party (SDP). I left the LibDems in 2014 when I moved to Wales, I found that in Wales, Plaid Cymru was the most effective liberal/green voice in the Senedd promoting liberalism and environmental issues.
Since retirement have moved back to England.
England where we don’t have a single liberal/green party like Plaid Cymru, but separate parties: The Liberal Democrats and the Green Party.
Both parties share many important policies and are similar membership size.
The real issues facing the countries is WEALTH INEQUALITY.
Why should that matter ?
….. Because wealth and power is hoarded by a small minority (0.1%) with this wealth inequality continuing to grow to a position where economic activity will freeze as there will be polarisation leading to economic stagnation.
What Gary Stevenson in his podcast ( @garyseconomics ) is largely true, and Zack Polanski is promoting this reasoning to which I agree.
The Liberal Democrats need to make their position clear.
The position is: DO LibDems want for the dismantling of this ssytem of monopoly capitalism and promoting the system of Egalitarian Capitalism of public ownership through wide share ownership. (Freedom of choice : social liberalism) ?
OR the current Oligarchy monopoly system we have now. (Tories/Reform UK and Labour).
OR the State owned monopoly capitalism: socialism (Your Party) ?
THIS IS GOT TO BE MADE CLEAR TO ALL VOTERS.
@Peter Martin I was not missing the point of NAIRU. I was disputing the inclusion of the extra U. Workers do not generally fear underemployment because a direct fall from full employment into underemployment is rare. When it happens it is generally among people who have specifically requested it. opportunities from unemployment to underemployment are far more common. They are a possible route back into full-time employment but often of very little real value to those that take them. You only get to keep 45% of what you earn and the loss of some benefits in kind and cost of working may reduce this to nothing. That is why I believe that increasing the net income of those earning something but not a lot could take a great number of people out of poverty without any significant adverse incentives.
Peter Martin,
Even if you accept that having zero unemployment would cause inflation to increase, this does not mean that those who are unemployed have to live in poverty. Keynesians have always accepted that there is frictional unemployment, where people are unemployed between jobs. Some countries have unemployment benefits much higher than ours. So it is possible to remove unemployed people from poverty. Then underemployed would also be removed from poverty. Even if unemployed people received benefits at the poverty level, people would still want to improve their situation by having an income well above the poverty level and so choose to work.
Ernest,
Some Liberal Democrats recognise the problem of shareowner capitalism and the running of companies just to maximise returns for shareholders. We have a history of encouraging worker share ownership. I would like the Liberal Democrats to support a wealth tax in the UK and to adopt this policy before the next general election.
@Michael: I think you’re overgeneralising too much. More correctly, if unemployed people received benefits at the poverty level, then some of those people would want to improve their situation and so still be keen to work. But not everyone. Some people would be happy to have an income at that level. Others might decide that, even if they’d ideally prefer to have more money, not working is enjoyable enough to be worth not having that much money. People are different and not everyone is going to react the same way. In the end, you can’t escape from that, if you pay all unemployed people a basic income that’s enough to live on at a basic level, without requiring them in return to be looking for work, then you will cause at least some people to opt out of working – which will slightly reduce everyone else’s standard of living. You might personally feel that’s a price worth paying to eliminate poverty, but it’s not realistic to pretend that such a policy would have no impact on people choosing not to work.
@ Simon @ Michael,
The other point to make is that there are ways to top up a relatively generous guaranteed basic income, or UBI, or whatever you want to call your favoured system of social benefits.
Dog walking, window cleaning, home decorating, gardening and lawn mowing, home hairdressing, unlicenced taxi and van driving all offer relatively easy cash-in-hand earning opportunities. I’m sure we all know someone who engages in at least some these activities.
Then there are even more illegal activities, such as in the drugs business.
The more the regular economy is taxed the more tempting is the ‘irregular’ economy. So I’d like to see a shift from guaranteed incomes to guaranteed jobs which have to be in the regular economy of course.
My one problem with this who debate around poverty is that we are setting ourselves an ambition of hitting a completely arbitrary target. We wish to eliminate ‘poverty’ that is defined entirely as relative to the median income and whether or not someone is working for a living being factored in.
Perhaps we should replace our current approach to ‘poverty’ with a couple of guiding principles…
1) no one working full-time should earn less than 60% of the median income
2) no one who is not working should receive state benefits greater than 50% of median income
3) Income Tax and National Insurance should only begin to be levied at 60% of median income levels
@Jean Melville You refer to “no one” but poverty is not about one. It’s about households. In particular, It’s about children who do very little paid work and it’s about families which neither have all adults working full time or all adults unemployed.