Since our stunning victories back in July, something has been gnawing away at me: Who are we in the LibDems for? Talk to any LibDem activist and you will likely hear the following: Liberalism is about the ordinary citizen against concentrations of power, stultifying social conformity and unjustified privilege. The same activists will often say that Liberalism champions equality of opportunity, human diversity, material justice and civil participation. But throughout 2024, the messaging around Liberal Democrat identity has been troublingly murky. Back in the summer, Ed Davey gave voice to a vision of centre-left liberalism in his New Statesman interview, praising the equalitarian philosophy of John Rawls. In seeming confirmation of this stance, much of our General Election campaign focused on the taxation of big banks, social media giants and the wealthiest asset-owners in an effort to repair our dysfunctional public services. But even in the run up to the campaign, there were signs of opportunistic ambiguity. There was much talk of us ‘replacing’ the Tories, a posture which suggested to some Conservatives (most notably David Gauke) that we could become a new vehicle for disaffected Centre-right voters.
So who are we for? Egalitarian liberals or disaffected Tories? It is certainly possible to appeal to both groups on a temporary basis, but I fail to see how we can satisfy both groups indefinitely. As Arya Chanda (of the liberal Tory thinktank Bright Blue) noted perceptively back in October, there is now a fundamental mismatch between the staunchly fiscally conservative attitudes of many (highly affluent) new LibDem voters and our high tax, redistributive, public service-orientated manifesto. This tension has come to a head most recently in the form of the leadership’s attitude to Labour’s policies on private school fees and the reform of agricultural inheritance tax relief. The LibDem opposition to both in Parliament is suggestive of short-term tactical thinking rather than a studied application of principle. Is the leadership a little frightened of some of its new voters?
Take the first issue. How can Rawlsian Ed Davey, champion of equal opportunity, be reconciled with the Ed Davey who wants to retain a special tax status for private schools? The notion that it is ‘wrong in principle to tax education’ sounds wonderful, until one remembers that these schools are businesses who serve a small and selective part of the community. Why should institutions that benefit some of the wealthiest families in society get special tax treatment? Should we base our tax policy on the preferences of wealthy interest-groups or on the basis of wide social fairness? On private school VAT we appear to be suggesting the former.
A similar criticism can be made of the party’s official position on inheritance tax relief on agricultural land. As the IFS has noted the tax changes will disproportionately impact larger estates, and not small family farms. Again, who are we seeking to support? Do we really want a tax system which is disproportionately generous towards wealthy landowners? On other issues too, like workers’ rights, we have failed to articulate a distinctively liberal message. The 2024 Manifesto wanted to see greater promotion of employee ownership. Why weren’t we making this pitch loudly and proudly during the recent passage of the Employment Rights Bill? Won’t they wear it in Witney? We have been effective in championing the reform of England’s broken water monopolies, but what is our wider position on non-profit and public enterprise as a remedy for other broken industries? We have given lukewarm welcome to GB Energy, but what role do we see the State playing in decarbonising our energy system in the coming years? Answering these questions of policy and principle, confidently and intelligently, will allow us to transcend narrow enclaves (so many disjointed and contradictory client causes) and branch out into new territories.
I want to see us developing an ambitious political platform which explicitly cares about improving the lives of people in Blackpool and Bradford, alongside addressing the needs of people in Cheltenham say, or Stratford-upon-Avon. We need to be much clearer about the ideals guiding our preferences. That means saying ‘no’ sometimes, even to some of our new Blue Wall voters. Our principles should not be casually traded away for short-term gains. We may be grateful for our principles when and if the Tory dragon reawakens in the Blue Wall. At present, our success is built on perilously (and deceptively) shallow electoral foundations. If we want to deepen them, we need to display a much more coherent philosophy. The present writer admits that he is on the Far Left of the Party (decidedly more Kropotkin than Clegg), but whether you’re a Radical Liberal like me, or sit much nearer the notional political centre, we should all care about the coherence of our distinctive liberal story. If we’re unable to tell it clearly and compellingly, it will be conflated with other stories or simply caricatured as a hapless band wagon picking up voters.
* Ben Wood is a Project Editor at the John Stuart Mill Institute. He is a member of Leeds Liberal Democrats.
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55 Comments
“until one remembers that these schools are businesses who serve a small and selective part of the community.”
You need to get the facts right, whether you want to abolish private schools or support their freedom to operate.
Some private schools are commercial businesses. However most are charities, who devote 100% of their resources to providing education and do not make profits for any owners. They serve everyone who will pay the fees and whose children are able to pass the entrance exams for those which are selective.
The Labour Government is free to tax such schools if it wishes, but I think it is not a good policy. While all my children were privately educated, I have no financial stake in the issue as their education is long over.
This article says everything I have been thinking over the last Year. What this Party needs to prosper Is Ideology, the worked out development of Policy from our Liberal & Social Democratic Values. We have to move away from Our traditional Strength as a loose alliance of Hard-Working Independents.
Our present opportunism isn’t even a good thing tactically, we can easily lose Votes to Labour or The Greens as well as to a Tory recovery.
Ben Wood makes a very persuasive case and Mohammed Amin is incorrect to state that most private schools are charities. The actual split is nearer to 50/50.
Detailed research by the independent Institute for Fiscal Studies claims that removing the tax breaks on private schools would only push three to seven per cent into the state system (contrary to the somewhat exaggerated claims of some Lib Dem M.P.’s). Even taking this into account what this would cost (some £100m to £300m) would save the taxpayer £1.3bn to £1.5bn overall.
Ben Wood correctly points out “the perils when and if the Tory dragon reawakens in the Blue Wall” – and that Lib Dem “success is built on perilously (and deceptively) shallow electoral foundations”.
If today’s Liberalism fails to be radical, then it doesn’t amount to much.
Reform seem to be aiming for the future re young men who seem to not have a lot in society.They have a clear aim. The young are the future and the party should be selling the young what they need ,housing .jobs a place in society a CONCRETE identity linking it to family concerns .Turn them away from discontent and uncertainty to a future.
@Paul Barker “This article says everything I have been thinking over the last Year.”
I completely agree!
I’ve only recently started revisiting this site, having lost interest over the course of 2024 as becoming “a new vehicle for disaffected Centre-right voters”, or at least “disaffected Tories”, appeared to be the party’s overarching theme, with a socioeconomic bias that reinforced a geographic one.
Perhaps it’s still early days as a more significant parliamentary opposition, but this article, with its private school and farming inheritance tax examples, gives me the impression that the direction of travel has not changed. 🙁
I agree. I don’t think we should be opposing Labour’s measures just for the sake of it. It makes us look shallow and opportunistic and probably doesn’t do us much good in the long run anyway. It’s much better to cultivate an image of being caring and pragmatic while keeping vague on specifics.
The author makes the same mistake as Labour and the IFS in failing to look behind the headline statistics on farms. Half of the holdings are basically lifestyle farms owned by people with no need to make a living from farming. Often just a single small field attached to a farmhouse. My own farm is at the lowest end of viability producing a single living of about 25k per year from farming, yet capital employed is around £4m. There is no way my heirs could find £600k in inheritance tax, however long the payment period. Labour has, in trying to remove one distortion, introduced an even bigger one. In future capital intensive businesses such as farming and forestry will only be possible by large corporate entities that are not troubled by the inevitability of death.
We cannot simply oppose for oppositions sake, if we do we end just looking like a ‘Tory lite’ party. We’ve opposed inheritance tax for a small number of wealthy farmers (or indeed landowners using farms as a ‘tax efficient’ investment). We’ve also opposed the rise in capped bus fares, the winter fuel allowance and now VAT on private school fees for the 6% of the school population that attend them.
At the same time we are demanding investment in the NHS, Education, and in the Care system, so where IS the money going to come from? As a child I was always told that “you can’t have the penny and the bun” yet that seems to be what we are trying to offer!
One of the reasons for the increasing disillusion with the party politics system is that the false expectation that the UK can have Scandinavian levels of public services alongside an American level of taxation keeps being peddled by political parties. Unlike Norway the UK frittered away the windfall that was north sea oil on tax cuts for the rich and unemployment benefit for the poor in the 1980s. we haven’t learnt from that folly.
30 years ago Paddy Ashdown was prepared to face this with his pledge to put a penny on the basic rate of income tax to mend our then broken education system. We need this sort of boldness again and we need to be honest with voters about what we want to achieve and how it would be paid for.
Kropotkin or Clegg? Not a tough contest is it Ben? Love this!
So start writing in detail about how to redefine social liberalism in the face of current challenges. Organise some seminars in the margins of campaigning, and/or a meeting at the forthcoming conference. Don’t leave it all to the leadership! What we need is a vigorous and well-informed debate within the party – particularly among its younger and newer members (I say this as an older and very long-term member).
More “Kropotkin than Clegg”
Given Kropotkin was proponent of anarchist communism it is not hard to understand why Ben Wood is worrying about what Liberalism is.
Private property rights and the rule of law are core elements of liberalism. Neither is consistent with anarchist communism.
@Phillip Bennion
I think that the farm IHT should be phased in, with mitigating allowances for elderly farmers passing on to direct descendants, progressively up to the seven year limit.
However, if the changes work as intended, with farmland no longer over-priced due to the high demand from individuals simply wanting an IHT-exempt asset, the value of your farm should decrease below the IHT threshold, maybe in the 500K-1 million range, which seems a much more reasonable return on the asset value.
How would you feel about being IHT exempt, but your farm having lost 75% of its ‘book’ value, given that it will make absolutely no impact on actual farming?
Personally , and following JS Mill, I am wary of having my children (or any children) educated by the state given the state’s tendency to insist that citizens are there for its benefit and not the other way around. (Mill acknowledged of course that the state may need to pay for education).
Couple that with the state’s failure to deliver an adequate education (I admit I have very high standards of what is adequate) in far too many cases means I understand why so many parents (including me) stump up for private school fees.
@TristanWard. Kropotkin was not a communist, he was an anarchist. He did not believe that the state (or the party) could provide what society needed and focussed on the role of the individual and people coming together voluntarily. For a serious attempt to show what anarchism might look like in practice I recommend ‘The Dispossessed’ by Ursula LeGuin. In some ways anarchism is akin to Liberalism, which whilst it does see a clear role for the state, also believes in individual freedom and maximum decentralisation. Anarchism and communism are poles apart and you do Kropotkin a disservice to suggest otherwise.
As to a choice between Kropotkin and Clegg? Clegg nearly destroyed our party with his attachment to auterity and orthodox economics. I doubt very much if Kropotkin could have been worse.
@PhilBenion. If your farm is worth £4 million, then once you factor in all IHT allowances, IHT would be payable on around £1million. The proposed tax is 20% over 10 years, around £20,000 per year. Difficult, I accept, but not the catastrophe that some disingenuous people are making out. Anyone else with that sort of estate value would be paying £400,000 in one fell swoop with no reduced rate and no 10 years to pay. Hardly a level playing field in my opinion.
“Opportunism”. We only had the General Election in July. The Labour Party were being opportunistic in that campaign by claiming that they would not end IHT relief for agricultural property. The time the Liberal Democrats were opportunistic was in the 2010 campaign by promising to abolish tuition fees. We all recall how that broken promise was used as a stick to beat the Liberal Democrats. No politician should be opportunistic. However not being opportunistic is a counsel of perfection for politicians everywhere.
I think there are two issues with VAT on private school fees. Firstly, parents who pay for private schools are already in effect paying twice: Once through their taxes for state education (which they then don’t use, saving the Government money), and then again for the schools their children actually go to. Do we really want to add to those charges?
Secondly, one of the benefits of taxing sales (such as with VAT) ought to be that we can charge differential rates in order to disfavour things that are bad for society (like cigarettes and alcohol) and favour things that are generally good for society – and I’d think education definitely counts as a good. That suggests that rather than seeking to impose VAT on private schools, we should be looking to make education more generally exempt from VAT.
@Mick Taylor
“The proposed tax is 20% over 10 years, around £20,000 per year. ”
Assuming no sale, that £20k a year has to come out of taxed income. You have over looked what Phillip has said about the income his farm produces – £25K a year (presumably after reinvesting as necessary.
I am a former farmer and now a solicitor specialising in rural and agricultural property (I’m not a tax specialist but I have working knowledge of INT). Phillip’s figures for income from his capital are entirely realistic; and you appear to be suggesting that if his farm is to be kept and farmed as a single unit, whoever inherits it lives off £5,000 a year for 10 years assuming no income from anywhere else.
Labour’s justification for its IHT reforms are to prevent the likes of Dyson and Clarkeson from buying land as an IHT shelter. It MAY have that effect though given the IHT rate is still way better than most other IHT shelters available it probably won’t work. The collateral damage to small farms (as demonstrated by Phillip’s example) is huge.
I agree with Ben.
William: Ben is at the forefront of doing exactly what you ask – wait for the forthcoming book he’s editing and see what you think. Publication date: late February.
I’m in favour of political opportunism as long as it is founded in firm and clear principles which are relevant to today’s world – unlike UK political parties which are fighting the battles of the 1950s.
@Mick Taylor
I didn’t say Kropotkin was a communist. I said he was a “proponent of anarchist communism”.
Which, for what it is worth, is what Wikipedia says.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Kropotkin
The original article deplores political opportunism, and suggests Lib Dm MPs are indulging in it by opposing Labour’s IHT reforms and imposirtion of VAT in private shol fees.
I’m not sure this is right.
I last looked at Lib Dem policy on IHT reform in the run up to the 2019 election. The policy paper I found then advocated significant reform of IHT to tax receivers of gifts rather than taxing the deceased person’s overall estate. In brief, each person has a tax free allowance with all gifts over that amount taxed at the IHT rate. that is diminished by gifts made to that person over that person’s life time. The policy paper retained an inheritance tax relief for agricultural property. So no opportunism there.
I am not aware of any policy or manifesto commitment that proposed imposition of VAT on fees, though I am prepared to be proved wrong on that. But Ed Davey was asked before the election this and said he was opposed to VAT on school fees. So no opportunism there either, and entirely consistent with Liberal principle given what Mill thought about state education as I referred to earlier.
Here’s what we were saying (rightly in my view) about school fees back in 2023. No opportunism there: https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/liberal-democrats-oppose-labour-vat-plan-private-schools-dividing-line-parties-2646926?srsltid=AfmBOopH85VeFRXnYnKQiAKEqwjPwjctvenO2bEclbqc9ONnQi6I_HLo
Wow – four political philosophers – Mill, Kroptokin, Rawls and Clegg referred to in a single article !!! As Nick Clegg discovered in 2010 and Keir Starmer is discovering now the more you promise not to charge for things or tax things before an election the more you are forced into bad choices after an election if you should be “lucky” enough to gain power. By 2029 applying VAT at the standard rate of 20% to private school tuition fees will be an established part of our national life. How could a Liberal Democrat manifesto find a way of removing this tax? I suspect that saying, for example, that we would add four pence to price of a litre of petrol to fund the lifting of the “education tax” would be a hard sell on the doorstep. I predict that by 2029 any tax rises we believe we could get away with and all the savings we could possibly identify in Labour’s inefficient public spending will have far more pressing calls on them – hospitals, sewage treatment and energy security being just three.
The question was – what are the LDs for? IMO we should be the party of the rule of law, which is the essence of liberal democracy. We now have the time and resources to develop policies which address the 3 main threats to that – (1) Putin and his allies; (2) the near collapse of the criminal justice system; and (3) ( because of its incendiary effect in the hands of demagogues) uncontrolled immigration. We need to move on to these urgent and fundamental issues while continuing to champion the NHS and social care, and our environmental agenda.
@ Tristan Ward ” I am wary of having my children (or any children) educated by the state given the state’s tendency to insist that citizens are there for its benefit and not the other way around”.
Well, I have to confess amazement at this comment. Children are not educated by the state, Mr Ward. They are educated by teachers…… qualified human beings….. some of whom are employed by local authorities, some by Academies, but all registered as qualified and all accountable for the quality and standards of their work to line managers, their employers and to Ofsted (by Government inspection).
As for John Stuart Mill, you may have missed it, but state education was introduced by a Gladstonian Liberal Ministry in 1870. J.S.M. was a supporter of this. Instead of Wikipedia, I would refer you to Elisabete Mendes Silva, and her standard work, “John Stuart Mill on Education and Progress”.
“John Stuart Mill on Education and Progress”, Elisabete Mendes Silva
Abstract……… “John Stuart Mill, a supporter of state provision of popular and secular education at a national scale in Victorian England, believed education was a means to foster human mind development, accounting also for the future progress of mankind. Unlike other utilitarian thinkers, like Jeremy Bentham, John Stuart Mill believed that the state, in specific circumstances, should supervise education, therefore guaranteeing its quality and not only quantity.
Yes. The Lib Dems have become a Janus Party – Facing both ways. There is a lot of detailed social-liberal centre-left word-play, designed to keep the activists on board without hitting the headlines. However, what the voters rightly think the party really stands for is what its leaders make their campaigning priorities which will hit the headlines. So, harmless knockabout stuff, a few free hits at obvious targets such as water companies, and some opportunistic jibes at Labour’s most obvious mistakes. We were promised “constructive opposition”. We haven’t seen much of that.
There is always a political niche for a centrist opportunist party which is happy to switch from left to right and back again, blindly following the voters in search of popularity. The German Free Democrats have long made the niche their own. Until 2008, the Lib Dems largely resisted the Janus temptation and maintained a consistent centre-left philosophy. Then along came Paul Marshall’s cheque-book and Nick Clegg’s right-wing coup. Though Clegg has long gone, the Lib Dems have never recovered.
As someone who first joined the Liberal Party way back in 1961, what I have observed since 2006 leads me to agree that David Allen’s diagnosis is correct.
Let’s speak up, and demand to be heard. I don’t fear what we will say, just the public not hearing from us. Newsnight on BBC 1 last night was an example of what shouldn’t happen – debate including Left, Right and the Greens, no place for us.
I want our leadership now to be looking out for the new MPs who are driven to speak through a fervent desire to express the best of Liberal Democracy, and encourage them to speak out. They might at present be held back by fairness, giving everybody a turn, just as we want a dozen good policies at once. But we don’t believe in conformity. For the great principles we hold, and the best policies passed by Conference, we need the best speakers to speak out. What about the increasing hardship of this winter for the poorest among us? What about paying for better services by further taxes on capitalists not the ordinary workers? Why don’t we speak out for the owners of small businesses and against the threat of layoffs and lower wages there?
Poverty, the increasing cost of living, the hardships of the ill and disabled living at home on inadequate benefits. There are so many causes crying out for our party to support them. It’s time to be shouting.
@TristanWard. Anarchism is the polar opposite of communism. Communism believes that the state should do almost everything, whilst anarchism rejects the state in almost its entirety. Kropotkin was not a communist nor can his views be described as anarchist communism, whatever is writen in Wikipedia. I have no doubt that whoever described Kropotkin as an anarchist communist was American and there anyoneyone vaguely against capitalism is called a communist. [Trump called Harris a communist!]
To return to the original Kropotkin V Clegg. There is a balance to be struck between state action and anarchy. Clegg was certainly on the wrong side of the argument.
@ David Raw
I am indeed not familiar with Elisabete Mendes Silva’s work, but I have gone back to my copy of On Liberty, where, in Chapter 5, Mill and Taylor say “a general state education is a mere contrivance for moulding people to be exactly like one another; and as the mould in which it casts them is that which pleases the predominant power in the government ……it establishes a despotism over the mind…..”
Mill and Taylor go on to say “An education established and controlled by the state should only exist, if it exists at all, as one among many competing experiments, carried on for the purpose of example and stimulus to keep the others up to a certain standard of excellence”.
You are right about teachers of course (though your reference to their being overseen by “line managers” and the state inspectorate makes my point to an extent). The legendary Mark “The Bear” Stephenson gave me and my class at Winchester On Liberty to read, along with the Communist Manifesto and Two Treatises on Government. Would the “line mangers” approve? Who cares?
David Allen has already expressed a lot of comments I would wholheartedly agree with.
The debates on philospohy have been interesting, but the original post talked about opportunitsm. I don’t think it is helpful to say “don’t call us opportunistic – look at them, they’re much worse!”
The core issue in any democracy is how you spend money on what the public wants, and where you get that money from. (Many people seem to think you can spend money without raising it, which is the source of the current crisis in France).
We should not be afraid to tackle the hedge fund billionaires and tax avoiders who are making themselves richer and richer, while ordinary people suffer endless cost of living crises. We should also recognised the fact that half the tax havens in the world are British dependencies and territories, so they could and should be tackled by those we elect. I believe this would be popular both with voters and the rest of the world, and it could raise billions to mend our broken pubic services.
@Richard “I suspect that saying, for example, that we would add four pence to price of a litre of petrol to fund the lifting of the “education tax” would be a hard sell on the doorstep”
That’s a very interesting point.
Does the party’s opposition to VAT on private school fees reflect a core principle and mean that they would want to reverse it at the next election (I mean the VAT, not the principle, but then again … who knows? 😉 ), or is it simply opportunistic opposition to something they know will not be stopped but hope that the party’s position will be remembered by target voters who agree with it and forgotten by everyone else?
@ Tristan Ward I’m not sure whether Mark “The Bear” Stephenson also pointed out to you that not everybody can afford to become a Wykehamist, Tristan, although I’m sure the experience had a profound and lasting affect on you.
I understand Winchester’s current fees to be :
Boarding pupils : £49,152 per year for 2023/24 and £51,855 per year for 2024/25
Day pupils : £36,369 per year for 2023/24 and £38,367 per year for 2024/25
I’m sure the sort of people that can fund those sort of amounts could afford a tad bit more to assist the finances of the rest of their country. My sort of liberalism cherishes a more democratic and equal society with a bit less undeserved effortless superiority.
@Mick Taylor
From Kropotkin’s “The Conquest of Bread (1892):
“It is high time for the worker to assert his right to the common inheritance and enter into possession of it”. (The last sentence of Chapter 2)
Or again, also in Chapter 2: ” This cannot be done by Acts of Parliament, but only by taking immediate and effective possession of all that is necessary to ensure the well being of all.”
Strong strains of communism there.
And to top it all Chapter 3 of The Conquest of Bread” is headed “Anarchist Communism”.
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=9gcjKNPcFGsC&newbks=0&printsec=frontcover&pg=PA1&hl=en&source=newbks_fb&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=false
I’m sorry, I’m pretty unimpressed. The original article claims the Lib Dems in Parliament have been opportunist in opposing Labour reforms to agricultural property relief when (if I recall correctly – I am ready to be proved wrong) our own policies for inheritance tax reform before the 2019 election prosed maintaining an agricultural property relief. As to tax on private school fees, the party’s opposition had been clearly signalled by the party in 2023 and later; while On Liberty itself – presented to the party’s president when s/he assumes office – makes the case for separated of education separated from government.
We have to do better than this.
Just the schools fees issue. Similar to the Winter Fuel Tax this too is going to Judicial Review, what happens if the applications succeed?
Our role as opposition is to challenge the government of the day to do better, so it becomes inevitable that the nature of that opposition will change along with the government, but that’s not an excuse for brazen populism.
The two examples raised present an opportunity for us to think about what we really want to achieve, and present an alternative to both Labour and the Conservatives that satisfies that criteria.
The farming and IHT one is more complex and been discussed elsewhere, but in brief – I like that Labour wants to close the loophole and target the genuinely wealthy landowners, but their approach is far too crude and impedes our ability to work with farmers to make progress on land management. We need to be clear that while we don’t like the current plans, that a better focused alternative is desirable.
Education is good for the individual, but private education that bakes in inequalities is not good for society. The biggest harms coming from the very expensive schools, serving parents who like that the cost is prohibitive to most. A better approach would be to introduce a tax-free threshold for school fees that is linked to state spending on pupils of that age, and consider increasing the rate of tax at certain higher thresholds. The less expensive schools are least affected, with fewer knock-on effects for state schools, and give wealthy families a reason to take an interest in how much the state is spending on education.
Tristan Ward refers to ‘On Liberty’ always being presented to the incoming President of the Liberal Democrats on assuming office. Yes, indeed, but ‘On Liberty’ was published in 1859…… eleven years later, in 1870, The Liberal Government introduced State Education – so, Tristan, symbolism and reality are not the same thing.
I’m afraid there was a mean illiberal streak in Utilitarianism, and we’ve moved on a bit since then.
Thanks everyone for your extensive comments. I wasn’t expecting the Kropotkin remark to take off as it did! Just to be clear I’m not an anarcho-Communist. I’m a Radical Liberal, but I do think there’s much to be learnt from Kropotkin about how to build a decentralised, democratic and humane society. Do I agree with everything he ever wrote? No. Do I feel compelled to agree with everything Mill ever wrote? No. I take my right as a liberal to weigh the wisdom and opinions I find carefully and come to my own conclusion. I think Mill would be happy with this interrogative approach (much happier than simply borrowing his opinions). I think he would be horrified at the idea that ‘On Liberty’ is held up as a sacred text. In fairness to Mill, he changed his opinions over time, as we all do. What mattered most to Mill was ‘experiments in living’, expanding human diversity, spontaneity and initiative. Tools and answers for achieving these goals will vary over time.
Returning to the themes of the article, I certainly don’t expect my party to adopt fixed positions, refusing pragmatism and agility. I certainly don’t expect my Party to always reflect my personal preferences. But I remain worried by what David Allen called ‘the Janus-faced’ politics we are presenting. One can of course defend the individual postures perhaps (noting that they have been held for some time) but what general impression are we giving? Do we look like a party that knows what it’s principles are and how to apply them? Or do we look like a party that is trying desperately to please clients (angry farmers [translate large landowners], parents who send their kids to private schools, pensioners). Are we prepared to say ‘no’ to anyone? Are there some things some people want that are absolutely incompatible with our principles?
The seed of this article began last year, when Munira Wilson tabled an Early Day Motion in Parliament to delay the expansion of ULEZ. She said said it was being ‘rushed through’. The plans had been in the pipeline for years, and it was LibDem policy to support low-emissions zones, including in London. We appeared to be facing in different directions. I understand that Munira has been under pressure from locals who opposed the plan, but what about our policies? I think this is the danger of framing oneself as ‘a local champion’. You become part of a fluid localist party, as opposed to a distinctly ‘liberal party’. One may agree or disagree with the positions I’ve highlighted, but I remain concerned that we haven’t got a firm enough anchor. There’s too much fuzziness (and an eagerness from the leadership to bend, self-edit and duck difficult choices). The fact that other parties are also doing that doesn’t give me much comfort.
@Ben Wood,
The expansion of ULEZ from the centre of London to the North and South Circular Roads was done with two years’ notice and then delayed by about 9 months from the original operational date. In contrast, the timescale for the extension to the boundaries of Greater London was much shorter and Khan refused to consider any delay. The scrappage scheme offered was inadequate and has now ceased. It is not a good look when Party Members criticise our MPs for advocating something that was also London Liberal Democrats policy (you just have to look at what Caroline Pidgeon said about Khan’s 2023-24 budget).
“The plans had been in the pipeline for years”
That may be so – but it could be that local cirumstances have changed in some areas and a review of the proposed future ULEZ boundaries might be appropriate.
Ben doesn’t know us well enough if he didn’t know Kropotkin would set us all off! During the merger in 1988 a favourite SDP insult was that Liberal Party members were a bunch of anarchists. Alexander Herzen is much more fun than Kropotkin but he’s perhaps not so easily boiled down to bullet points for the A’Level Politics syllabus.
Someone said earlier that the foundation of Liberalism is individual property but Locke for example has an interesting take on what is held in common and leaving “as much and as good” for others.
@Tristan Ward “As to tax on private school fees, the party’s opposition had been clearly signalled by the party in 2023 and later”
But in 2019, Layla Moran, the party’s spokesperson for education at the time, wrote, “Worst still, the government subsidises this imbalance. Around half of England’s private schools are charities. Parents do not pay VAT on fees whilst the schools are exempt from corporation tax and receive a large business rates discount.” (https://www.pepf.co.uk/opinion/layla-moran/).
With regards to VAT on private school fees, it is interesting that Lib Dems are aligned with the Tories and Reform, and all three parties seem to have the highest proportion of MPs who were privately educated!
Ooops! Forgot to provide link for “Educational backgrounds of the new House
of Commons”: https://www.suttontrust.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Parliamentary-Privilege-2024-1.pdf
@RuthClark, I’m always happy to keep a comments section lively! Having spent time with some old Liberals, I have discovered that I’m not alone in my admiration for Kropotkin. You find a strain of this radicalism in Jo Grimond of course, with his focus on worker-ownership and ‘Socialism without the state’.
@Ben Wood: Absolutely spot on when you say, “Are we prepared to say ‘no’ to anyone?”. You can’t do principled politics if you’re trying to please everyone all the time.
@David Raw: “I’m sure the sort of people that can fund those sort of amounts could afford a tad bit more to assist the finances of the rest of their country” Sounds to me a bit like “Oh you have more money than me. Let’s take it off you” And “with a bit less undeserved effortless superiority“… what makes you think people who can afford to pay those fees haven’t legitimately earned their money?
@ Ben Wood As a Grimond supporting West Yorkshireman who first joined the party back in 1961, and worked at Party HQ between 1963-65, I’d like to say, “Well done, Ben”. Good to see a bit of radicalism still flourishes in Leeds.
@ Simon R, “what makes you think people who can afford to pay those fees haven’t legitimately earned their money?”. I didn’t say anything like that, and I don’t think that, Simon, so please don’t infer that I did.
@ Peter Watson, interesting your link reveals 31% of the present Lib Dem M.P.’s are privately educated…….. though given the vast majority represent the comfy Home Counties and are vulnerable to the inevitable Tory recovery down there, not too much of a surprise.
@Peter Watson: Charities generally don’t pay corporation tax because corporation tax is paid on profits and charities are not allowed to make profits! They have to plough any cash surplus back into their charitable activities. So there’s actually nothing underhand about private schools that are registered charities not paying corporation tax. As I understand it the 80% business rate relief is something that likewise applies to all charities, it’s not a special opt-out for private schools that have charitable status.
@Simon R “Charities generally don’t pay corporation tax ”
Indeed. Though I think that charity status for private schools is something else that should be reviewed, but that’s a whole other can of worms!
Re: private schools, charity status and vat.
Following the principles I have been working to with a local charity it is very simple: the school needs to provide a charitable service whereby it provides education (for free) to a disadvantaged group, for example children in the care system, and thus are funded by donations, legacies and grants. However, as soon as someone turns up and wants the charity to provide a service for them, ie. The education of their child, that is a service with a specified deliverable, and thus VAT should be applied to the fees.
The only question is, given how the NHS and local government seem to be turning grants into service contracts particularly with respect to social, mental health and wellbeing service provision, what proportion of a charity’s activities should be charitable. This is important as I am aware of several local charities that effectively would cease to exist without the Local authority and health trust contracts.
Interesting to consider the charging of VAT on private school fees and why the Lib Dem MPs opposed it. It’s also questionable why so many these private (so called, public) schools discriminate against that half of the population which happens to be female.
Eton College (fees £ 16,666 per term), alumni include several former Prime Ministers and Cabinet Ministers, and a few Liberal Party Leaders, does not and will not admit girls. Likewise, Harrow (Winston Churchill) is a boarding school for boys only aged 13–18
Tonbridge School is a boarding and day school for boys. St Paul’s School is a traditional boys’ school as are Radley and Sherborne.
City of London School (Asquith an alumni) is a day school for boys aged 10–18, as was Nottingham High (Sir Edward Davey.) until 2015. In all there are nearly 200 boys’ only schools in the UK, across England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.
As for Winchester (in the news for all the wrong reasons), they recently decided to allow day girls into the sixth form, but not elsewhere.
A preparation for real life ? One must question.
Back in 2020, the Guardian reported that, “Rishi Sunak and his wife, Akshata Murthy, have donated more than £100,000 to his old school, Winchester college.
If they donated this from their own funds, and depending on how much UK tax they had paid, the school could claim an extra £25,000 in gift aid from HMRC, and Sunak and Murthy could claim back the difference between the basic rate and their higher rate of tax. Charitable schools also benefit from a minimum 80% rebate on business rates in England – Scotland recently changed its law and now charges schools the full amount”.
I went to an all boys public school and from 11-18 did so on a local authority scholarship. [Later abolished by a Labour Government] To be fair to my Alma Mater, it is now 3-18 and fully coed and with a substantial number of ethnic minority students and a married homosexual head teacher. I believe it operates as a charity and does have an extensive scholarship programme for disadvantaged pupils.
I have no objection in principle to VAT on fees or an end to business rates tax relief, but I suppose the issue for me is whether such schools are being singled out for punitive treatment just because they are outside the state system.
I do know that my old school does provide an excellent education to its pupils, better, I suspect, than many state schools and certainly in smaller classes.
My instinct tells me that it is only if schooling offered by the state is at least equal in quality to that provided in the private sector will will see any decline in so-called public schools.
As a former teacher, I have grave doubts that in far too many cases government funded education is as good as that in the private sector.
What is our party’s policy to tackle this very real problem?
If we are to flouish as a political party we need to avoid these either – or characterisations. Sometimes we will want to support a more egalitarian policy position. At other times we will want to support the free market and all the inequality that follows. That does not prevent our overall philosophy being left of centre taken in the whole.
Thanks Peter. I agree that we should seek to avoid simplistic political binaries (and of course we have to balance our principles against one another other). But the example you offer is suggestive of deep incoherence. If sometimes we support greater equality and at other times greater inequality (poverty) aren’t we just a swerving car? Perhaps I’ve misunderstood what you’re getting at, and apologies if so.
Isn’t it the case that this party (and the Liberalism it represents) opposes avoidable inequality and wants a greater dispersion of wealth and power? That doesn’t mean veering between markets and egalitarian policies. Its about creating a regulative and institutional framework that makes market outcomes less unjust, while harassing markets to improve the community. Of course at the level of principle, some positions are either or—in the sense that some positions are mutually incompatible. And that’s not a problem to acknowledge. Doing so keeps politics and parties honest.