Liberal Democrat Voice

Good luck to John Denham

By Mark Pack | Sun 23rd May 2010 - 3:08 pm

I’ve only heard John Denham speak in person once, but the time I did (earlier this month) it was immediately clear why he’s so often been rated by others as one of the better and more thoughtful Labour MPs.

So it’s good to see that he has become the new chair of Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform saying,

An AV referendum is on the agenda because of the work Labour electoral reformers have done. We have to make sure the Labour Party maintains its commitment to the AV referendum and to success in the referendum if and when it comes.

I much prefer …

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Opinion: The Tories are coming towards us

By Chris Jones | Sun 23rd May 2010 - 10:20 am

Martin Kettle recently wrote in the Guardian today of David Cameron:

The Tory leader is exploiting every opportunity the political situation presents him to drag his party rapidly towards the liberal centre. I believe in leading from the front, he said, and he is telling the truth. The many policy concessions to the Lib Dems, especially those which cauterise the Tory right’s pet issues like Europe, the Human Rights Act and inheritance tax only make sense in that light. The right’s indignation is eloquent proof of what is happening. The control grab over the backbench 1922 committee is the work of a

…

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged david cameron, gary younge and martin kettle | 34 Comments

The LDV Saturday caption competition – the rather belated “Clegg & Cameron love-in” edition

By Stephen Tall | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 5:45 pm

There’s no prize at stake – just the opportunity to prove you’re wittier than any other LDV reader …

(Photo via EPA/ANDY RAIN).

Here’s David Cameron with his boss, the deputy prime minister, Nick Clegg waving on the steps of Number 10 as they begin their task of leading the new coalition government. What do you reckon they might be thinking?

The winner of our most recent caption competition, the “Nick Clegg meets Tardis” edition – according to The Voice’s judging panel of one – …

Posted in Caption Comp | 24 Comments

Opinion: From out of nowhere – rape anonymity extension

By Karen Kruzycka | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 4:12 pm

The full Coalition agreement, published this week, contained the following commitment:

We will extend anonymity in rape cases to defendants.

(Section 20 “Justice”, page 24)

This issue wasn’t mentioned in either party’s manifesto; nor, I believe, during the election campaign. Neither was it something to which the previous Government aspired. It had been voted through at the Liberal Democrat annual conference in 2006, but allowed to lie dormant since. The Lords approved it as an amendment in 2003 but it went no further. As such, it’s a rather a bolt out of the blue.

In the not-too-distant past, there was no anonymity …

Posted in Op-eds | 26 Comments

The Internet election?

By Stephen Tall | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 2:30 pm

Cross-posted from Liberal Democrat News:

“This will be the first real internet election,” was the oft-repeated claim made in the run up to 2010’s national poll. So how did that claim stack up against the reality?

Some will point to the hype surrounding the leaders’ debates as evidence that television remains the dominant force. Ten million tuned into ITV on 15 April, and ‘Cleggmania’ gripped the nation for the next fortnight. Meanwhile, the principal gaffe of the campaign – Gordon Brown’s ‘Bigotgate’ – was captured not by a citizen journalist, but was an old-fashioned ‘hot-mike’ incident caught by Sky News.

Does this …

Posted in General Election, Online politics and Op-eds | 6 Comments

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Daily Mail slowly catching up with realities of coalition government

By Stephen Tall | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 1:10 pm

To mock the Daily Mail is, however satisfying and amusing, to largely miss the point: it is its own best self-parody. Today’s a case in point, as it dawns on the paper that a coalition government actually does mean the Lib Dems have some power. Devoid of irony, the Mail explodes with outrage:

Clegg’s power grab: Deputy PM will have even more influence than Mandelson did

Yes, that’s right: quite outrageously the leader of the party which won 23% of the national vote is set to have more power than an unelected peer. What is the country coming to?

If you can …

Posted in News | Tagged coalition and nick clegg | 11 Comments

Details of Cabinet Committees published

By Mark Pack | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 12:20 pm

The Cabinet Office website has details of all the Cabinet Committees and who sits on which.

What’s notable from the Liberal Democrat perspective is the depth of both Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander’s involvement in them. Danny sits on eight of the eleven committees whilst Nick is Chair, Co-Chair or Deputy Chair of five.

The role of Cabinet Committees has varied greatly over the years, but in a government where negotiating policy agreements is at the the heart of its day-to-day work, the committees will be more than just talking shops passing the time until the Prime Minister decides.

Posted in News | Tagged Danny Alexander and nick clegg | 2 Comments

Now would be a really good time for the Lib Dems to get some decent IT policy

By Iain Roberts | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 11:35 am

Under Major, Blair and Brown, the UK Government has followed a deliberate policy of running down its internal IT expertise and relying on external providers – mostly big companies like Capita and EDS – to provide IT expertise, systems and services.

The result, many argue, has been expensive IT that’s been very successful in maximising the profits of the consultants but rather less good at meeting the needs of the public sector or, for that matter, the public. Project after project has run massively over budget and time, with the companies responsible often seeming to be rewarded for their shortcomings.

So what’s …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged it policy | 3 Comments

Opinion: Let’s switch the P-word

By Kev O'Connor | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 10:20 am

As we start to prepare for a referendum on the Alternative Vote, two words are bothering me. They are Proportional Representation. These words massively simplify the possibilities of electoral reform and unfortunately cloud the issue.

Some talk about ‘Electoral Reform’, but this is far to vague for a referendum and I believe we need a new mantra. Not PR or ER, but PV. Preferential Voting.

This may sound like a tedious matter of semantics, but when it comes to elections and referenda, the structure of your rhetoric will determine the nature of the debate, and the eventual outcome. Switching the ‘P-word’ could …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged alternative vote and electoral reform | 39 Comments

What standards should Counting Officers have to meet?

By Mark Pack | Sat 22nd May 2010 - 9:20 am

The Electoral Commission is currently consulting on its draft performance standards for Counting Officers in Great Britain, which will supplement the existing standards for Electoral Registration Officers and Returning Officers. Counting Officers are the people who administer a referendum in a particular area, much like in the London Assembly and Mayor elections the borough returning officers administer the election in their area on behalf of the London Returning Officer.

Here is the response I’ve sent in:

Dear Lindsey Taber,

Thank you for the opportunity to comment on the draft performance standards for Counting Officers.

My comments are as follows:

Performance standard 1: Skills and knowledge …

Posted in Election law | Tagged electoral commission | 2 Comments

The LDV Friday Five: 21 May 2010

By Helen Duffett | Fri 21st May 2010 - 5:00 pm

It’s Friday. It’s five o’clock. Here’s a fistful of lists that sum up the LDV week:

5 top reader search returns to get to LDV

(excluding Liberal Democrat Voice or its variants)

Posted in Friday Five | 1 Comment

PollWatch: views of the coalition government and party leaders

By Stephen Tall | Fri 21st May 2010 - 3:30 pm

Two polls have been published this week offering some early sense of public perceptions of the Lib Dem / Conservative coalition government, and how they rate the party leaders.

Public views of the coalition government

Angus Reid discovered that, overall, 58% of the public strongly/moderately approve of the coalition, while 31% strongly/moderately disapprove – that’s a net +27% approval rating. Approval is, as you might expect, stronger in the south of England (+41%), weaker in the north of England (+14%) and marginally negative in Scotland (-2%).

This breaks down in party support as follows:

Conservative voters: 84% approve, 11% disapprove (net approval:

…

Posted in Polls | Tagged angus reid, coalition, nick clegg and yougov | 4 Comments

Opinion: Representation and politics

By Jane Manning | Fri 21st May 2010 - 3:20 pm

As an Asian member of the party I feel a strong need to speak up. The Diversity Agenda discourse on the question of ethnicity is heartening because it recognises that people like me ought to be represented and about time too. However, do I feel either not represented or under represented because of the lack of a non-pale face at the top? No, I don’t.

Why? Racial integration is a marvellous bridge. If representation is about sending a message of inclusion to a part of society that has been marginalised before then I don’t need a Brown face at the …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged asian, diversity, equalities, ethnicity and prejudice | 2 Comments

The elections and referendums for the next five years

By Iain Roberts | Fri 21st May 2010 - 2:20 pm

One side effect of a coalition government full of reforming zeal is lots of opportunities for the good people of Britain to troop down to their local polling station and make the appropriate mark on a ballot paper.

Here are the elections and referendums that look to me to be coming our way in the next few years – I may have missed some.

local elections as now (unitary, met, county, district, town, parish)
European election in 2014
referendum on AV for Westminster elections
elections for an alternative to the Infrastructure Planning Commission? Probably not, but the agreement says the new body will be “democratically

…

Posted in News | 19 Comments

Bright spots of the 2010 election result: growth in number of winnable seats

By Mark Pack | Fri 21st May 2010 - 1:20 pm

The small overall net loss of seats in this month’s general election understandably rather overshadowed the growth in the party’s share of the popular vote, which was up for the third general election in a row.

The seat total was hit by the party not getting the lucky breaks in very close contests. The party won five of these knife-edge results but lost ~~eleven~~twelve.

That gives a hint as to what was happening overall to the number of seats won or close to won. If you total up the number of seats the party has won or come within …

Posted in General Election | Tagged featured | 28 Comments

Opinion: Big Society + political activism = community politics

By Kelvin Macdonald Fraser | Fri 21st May 2010 - 12:20 pm

I’m sure I’m not the only Lib Dem struggling to come to terms with the realisation that there is life after going into coalition with the Conservatives. It may not be eternal life (even five years might be too much to hope for!), and it certainly isn’t paradise (the nation’s economic predicament has more of Armageddon about it than Nirvana) but life it most definitely is.

Despite already being subjected to obsessive scrutiny and outrageous cynicism from a surprisingly hostile media, and regardless of some premature and unhelpful ‘noises off’ from disillusioned tribalists in both parties, there is an …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged big society and david cameron | 10 Comments

Opinion: A useful analogy?

By Tom King | Fri 21st May 2010 - 11:20 am

Watery sunlight creeps through the gap between the plush curtains as you groggily open your eyes. A cappuccino rests on the bedside table, next to the designer spectacles which have become your trademark. Wearily, you begin to sit up, turning on the DAB radio as you sip the smoking tide. But in the dulcet tones of Evan Davis you begin to discern a disturbing development.

“In a shock move, the Football Association last night voted to open the selection of England’s final World Cup squad to the public through an instant referendum. Votes are likely to divide sharply down club lines …

Posted in Op-eds | 5 Comments

Top twenty tables from the election results: part 4

By Mark Pack | Fri 21st May 2010 - 10:20 am

Twenty largest Liberal Democrat majorities:

Orkney and Shetland 51.3
Ross, Skye and Lochaber 37.5
Sheffield Hallam 29.9
Bath 25.2
Westmorland and Lonsdale 23.8
Norfolk North 23.4
Yeovil 22.8
Fife North East 22.6
Ceredigion 21.8
Leeds North West 20.9
Bristol West 20.5
Twickenham 20.3
Bermondsey and Old Southwark 19.1
Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey 18.6
Caithness, Sutherland and East Ross 16.8
Lewes 15.3
Hazel Grove 15.2
Colchester 15.1
Thornbury and Yate 14.8
Gordon 13.8
Southport 13.8

(Actually that’s 21, but the bottom two are tied)

Twenty smallest Liberal Democrat majorities:

Solihull .3
Dorset Mid and Poole North .6
Norwich South .7
Bradford East .9
Wells 1.4
St Austell and Newquay 2.8
Brent Central 3.0
Somerton and Frome 3.0
Sutton and Cheam 3.3
St Ives 3.7
Manchester Withington 4.2
Burnley 4.3
Dunbartonshire East 4.6
Chippenham 4.7
Cheadle 6.2
Cornwall North 6.4
Eastbourne 6.6
Taunton Deane 6.9
Berwick-upon-Tweed 7.0
Eastleigh 7.2

Posted in General Election | 3 Comments

Inquiry into allegations of complicity with torture

By Mark Pack | Fri 21st May 2010 - 9:20 am

British spies accused of secretly colluding with the CIA and foreign governments in a plot that sees people tortured in foreign countries. Not only does it sound like the storyline of many a political thriller, take that story and place it in almost any post-war decade and you’d expect it to be a Conservative government doing the colluding and Labour MPs decrying the international conspiracy, with a campaigning left-wing journalist thrown in for good measure publishing scoops and demanding an independent judicial inquiry.

Except, of course, in the topsy turvey political days that we live it was a Labour government that …

Posted in News | Tagged david miliband and rendition | 16 Comments

What I’d do in Labour’s shoes

By Stephen Tall | Thu 20th May 2010 - 8:35 pm

There’s no reason for me to offer this advice; still less reason for Labour taking it. But here goes …

I wrote last week about the potential danger to Labour of adopting a tribally oppositional approach to the Lib Dem / Conservative coalition government, at least while it’s enjoying its honeymoon:

The public, generally speaking, likes to see politicians working together sensibly and rationally, rather than tearing each other to bits. The sheer novelty value of the coalition is going to intrigue voters, many of whom will be willing to give Clegg and Cameron a chance.

With a leadership contest to come,

…

Posted in Op-eds | 61 Comments

The Liberal Democrat special advisers

By Mark Pack | Thu 20th May 2010 - 6:07 pm

News I’ve picked up so far:

Danny Alexander (Secretary of State for Scotland) – Willie Rennie and Alison Suttie
Vince Cable (Business Secretary) – Will de Payer
Chris Huhne (Secretary of State for Climate Change) – Duncan Brack and Joel Kenrick
David Laws (Chief Secretary to the Treasury) – Katie Waring

Nick Clegg / Downing Street – Sean Kemp, Jonny Oates, Lena Pietsch and Chris Saunders

Posted in News | 16 Comments

Repealing “daft” laws won’t be so easy

By Iain Roberts | Thu 20th May 2010 - 3:35 pm

Labour created thousands of new criminal offences in its time in office. The new laws added to the statute books in each of the parliaments since 1997 dwarf anything from any previous parliament.

Did those laws transform our country into a utopian land? No. But it would be foolish to think that repealing some of that weight of law will be a simple task.

We might disagree with many of the laws. We might think they do more harm than good, or that they’re ineffective, or address a problem that doesn’t really exist, or are being applied in a way never envisaged. …

Posted in Op-eds | 23 Comments

Poor planning and restrictive laws prevented 1,200 from voting on 6 May

By Helen Duffett | Thu 20th May 2010 - 2:43 pm

The Electoral Commission has published its interim report into problems at polling stations on 6 May, when queues left voters unable to cast their votes before the 10pm deadline.

At least 1,200 people were still queuing at 27 polling stations in 16 constituencies at 10pm.

There were scenes of confusion as polling station queues and ballot paper shortages led to problems and protests in several cities. These included students in Sheffield trying to stop ballot boxes being removed, lock-ins in Birmingham, lock-outs in Newcastle and a sit-in in Hackney.

Following the polling day problems Jenny Watson, Chair of the Electoral Commission announced a review, saying,

There is a real need to look at our Victorian system and modernise it fit for a 21st-century democracy.

The Electoral Commission consulted Returning Officers, and appealed to voters to report any difficulties they had experienced on polling day.

Today’s report explains the roles, responsibilities and laws connected with providing and manging polling stations, the scale and nature of problems on 6 May and makes recommendations for change:

Posted in Election law and News | Tagged electoral commission | 5 Comments

Labour – Lib Dem coalition talks: where James Macintyre gets it wrong

By Mark Pack | Thu 20th May 2010 - 1:59 pm

Having seen trailed in advance the research being done for today’s piece on why Labour/Lib Dem talks broke down, I was intrigued as to what James Macintyre would dig up.

But reading his piece, it’s a big disappointment – because it makes a trio of misjudgements, all of which burnish Labour’s reputation.

Let’s take them one by one.

First, he claims that the vetoing of a private meeting between Vince Cable and Alistair Darling someone shows the Lib Dems weren’t serious about talking to Labour. Actually, no. What it shows is that the party remembers how Gordon Brown went for a series …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged david cameron, gordon brown, james macintyre and nick clegg | 23 Comments

What do I do with all these new members?

By Mark Pack | Thu 20th May 2010 - 1:20 pm

During the election campaign the flood of new helpers coming in to the party made me write a post, OMG! People want to help – what do I do?, which turned out to be rather popular. Now that the campaign is over, it’s important to keep those new helpers involved – and also to make the continuing flow of new members feel wanted and involved too.

Far more people have joined than have left the party since the coalition was announced, which is a promising sign for the future. There will though be some tough times ahead and a strong local …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged featured | 14 Comments

Opinion: Countdown to 2012 has already started

By Caroline Pidgeon | Thu 20th May 2010 - 12:20 pm

Harold Wilson’s phrase that a week is a long time in politics was never more true than the dramatic developments that took place last week.

The creation of a new Government, with Liberal Democrats at the heart of it and with so many of our policies built into the coalition agreement, has quite rightly dominated the media. I am sure these events will not easily be forgotten by many Liberal Democrats.

Against such as background it is far from surprising that changes that have taken place in town halls across London and at City Hall have not received a huge amount of …

Posted in Local government, London and Op-eds | Tagged dee doocey | 1 Comment

Opinion: And now for the next steps

By Simon Dodd | Thu 20th May 2010 - 11:20 am

It still seems strange to think of the Liberal Democrat party being part of the Government with Liberal Democrats sitting in the Cabinet. The announcement of the coalition with the Conservative party was a bitter sweet moment – at last, we were entering Government, but we were doing so with a party we have long fought against.

It is a fantastic achievement to see long cherished Liberal Democrat policies being part of the Government’s legislative programme. There is disappointment though that other policies are not part of that programme. We must ensure that we continue to fight for these aims, …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged alternative vote and electoral reform | 11 Comments

Top twenty tables from the election results: part 3

By Mark Pack | Thu 20th May 2010 - 10:20 am

Twenty largest swings from Labour to Liberal Democrats:

Redcar 21.8
Ashfield 17.2
Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney 16.9
Barnsley East 14.0
St Albans 13.9
Bosworth 13.8
Norfolk North West 13.4
Pontypridd 13.3
Maidstone and The Weald 12.9
Hemel Hempstead 12.5
Selby and Ainsty 12.4
Hull North 12.2
Wycombe 11.9
Canterbury 11.5
Chelmsford 11.3
Normanton, Pontefract and Castleford 11.2
Sedgefield 11.0
Northampton South 11.0
Brent Central 11.0
Wellingborough 10.8
Sheffield Brightside and Hills 10.8
Leeds North West 10.8

(Actually that’s 22, but the bottom three are all tied.)

Twenty largest swings from Liberal Democrats to Labour:

Edinburgh West -11.4
Orpington -9.5
Renfrewshire East -8.0
Paisley and Renfrewshire North -8.0
East Ham -8.0
Dunbartonshire West -7.9
Glenrothes -7.7
Paisley and Renfrewshire South -7.6
Blaenau Gwent -7.1
Bradford West -6.5
Caithness, Sutherland and East -6.4
Haltemprice and Howden -6.1
Fife North East -6.1
Stirling -6.0
Glasgow South -5.9
Garston and Halewood -5.7
Lanark and Hamilton East -5.6
East Lothian -5.5
Blackburn -5.5
Cumbernauld, Kilsyth and Kirkintilloch East -5.4

It’s notable that thirteen of these swings were in Scotland.

Posted in General Election | 6 Comments

The full coalition agreement

By Mark Pack | Thu 20th May 2010 - 9:46 am

The full coalition agreement document has just been published, covering a much wider range of policy areas than the initial document released previously. There’ll be plenty of commentary and analysis on this, but for the moment here is the full document for you to read:

Coalition Programme

Posted in News | 34 Comments

The differing approaches of the Lib Dem and Tory leaderships

By Stephen Tall | Thu 20th May 2010 - 9:45 am

The Guardian reports an interesting, and revealing, distinction between the respective leadership styles of the Lib Dems’ Nick Clegg and the Conservatives’ David Cameron.

The two party leaders gave a taste of their different styles of leadership yesterday as they consulted their parties . Clegg and his fellow Lib Dem ministers presented the document to a meeting of their parliamentary party last night where MPs and peers were taken through the document page by page.

Cameron used a meeting of the Tory parliamentary party to announce an immediate ballot to limit the power of backbench Tory MPs. In a move

…

Posted in News | Tagged david cameron, democracy and nick clegg | 2 Comments

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Public views of the coalition government

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