Liberal Democrat Voice

Harris and Huhne question legality of Labour’s ‘meow meow’ ban

By The Voice | Thu 1st April 2010 - 11:25 am

With just a fortnight until the Government’s mephedrone ban comes into effect, Lib Dem MPs Chris Huhne and Evan Harris have challenged the legality of the move (though the party has supported the ban itself). Today’s Guardian reports:

Dr Evan Harris, the Liberal Democrat MP for Oxford West and Abingdon, said the six resignations from the government’s advisory council on the misuse of drugs had left it inquorate and legally unable to issue formal advice to the home secretary. He also questioned how a decision to ban mephedrone without first publishing the council’s report on its potential harms complied with

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Posted in News | Tagged chris huhne, drugs, evan harris and mephedrone | 9 Comments

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Lib Dems launch ‘Enterprise in a fair society’ plans to boost business

By The Voice | Thu 1st April 2010 - 11:00 am

Want to know what the Lib Dems will do to boost the enterprise culture here in the UK? Well, Nick Clegg and shadow business secretary John Thurso this week launched their programme in keeping with the party’s campaign emphasis on fairness, Enterprise in a fair society.

Here’s the party’s news release announcing the programe …

The proposals include:

…

Posted in News | Tagged business, enterprise, john thurso and nick clegg | 2 Comments

Howard Dean backs Nick Clegg as next PM

By Stephen Tall | Thu 1st April 2010 - 10:30 am

And no, this is not an April Fool joke, for those of a mischievous mindset – the former Democratic Presidential hopeful and former chairman of the Democratic National Committee has publicly stated he thinks the Lib Dems could win the election. Here’s how the BBC reports it:

Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg could be the surprise winner of the UK’s general election, former US presidential candidate Howard Dean has said. Mr Dean praised Mr Clegg as a “young, dynamic leader”. And he said he could be the big winner from Britain’s first televised election debates, capitalising on disillusion with the

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Posted in News | Tagged howard dean and nick clegg | 4 Comments

Daily View 2×2:

By Alex Foster | Thu 1st April 2010 - 6:55 am

Welcome to Daily View on this auspicious date, which in most Western cultures is considered a day of pranking and merriment. Of course we at LDV have no truck with such levity, and everything we write today is the honest truth.

Happy birthday to Gmail – 6 today!

2 Big Stories

Hadron Collider II planned for Circle Line

The Independent reports:

London Underground is in talks with the European Organisation for Nuclear Research (Cern) about the possibility of using the 23km tunnel of the Circle Line to house a new type of particle accelerator similar to the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva.

One immediate benefit for passengers will be air-conditioning, installed to cool the huge superconducting electromagnets needed. Win-win!

Posted in Daily View | Tagged air-conditioning, anger, hadron collider, physical agression and votematch | Leave a comment

TonyBlair4Labour: who are the secret owners behind the site?

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 10:21 pm

Tony Blair’s new campaign website to support Labour has an extremely complicated ownership trail behind it that ends in secrecy – but his office has declined to explain why or provide details.

A few days ago TonyBlair4Labour.org was launched, bringing to us the shock news that Tony Blair wants people to vote Labour. (Actually, it is interesting is that Gordon Brown’s star has fallen so far that now being associated with Tony Blair is viewed as a positive by Labour. At the last general election photos of Tony Blair were frequently all over Liberal Democrat leaflets and often completely absent …

Posted in News | Tagged gordon brown and tony blair | 5 Comments

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Labservative: the party hits the streets to find out what the public thinks

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 9:34 pm

“This is a man. This is a street. Let’s talk Labservative.” More Alan Partridge than your usual Party Political Broadcast fare:

Posted in General Election, Humour and Online politics | Tagged labservative | 7 Comments

Conservative candidate troubles in London

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 9:26 pm

Dave Hill has the news from Croydon regarding Andrew Pelling:

“Croydon Central seat promises to be one of the most open and unpredictable in the country,” says Croydon Today, in response to the decision of the sitting MP to contest the constituency again. Andrew Pelling, also a former London Assembly member, snook home as a Tory in 2005 but in 2007 had the parliamentary whip withdrawn following his arrest after his wife alleged assault. No charges were ever brought, but at the end of that year Pelling declared that he would not seek re-election.

Well, now that he’s confirmed persistent rumours that he would change

…

Posted in News | Tagged andrew pelling, bertha joseph, conservative party, croydon central and john detre | 1 Comment

Tories cry “foul” at Lib Dems’ fair hearing

By Helen Duffett | Wed 31st March 2010 - 4:51 pm

More complaints about the Liberal Democrats and media bias – but this time it’s the Conservatives worried that when Liberal Democrats get equal billing, people like what they see.

From the Times:

The Conservatives complained to the programme makers three times during Monday night’s television debate between the candidates for Chancellor, accusing them of skewing coverage in favour of Vince Cable.

At one point during the Channel 4 Ask the Chancellors programme senior Tories phoned the hotline to the production staff claiming that the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman was receiving too much applause.

Yesterday the Conservatives warned broadcasters not to give the Liberal Democrats an easy ride in the leaders’ TV debates.

Although many were happy with the performance of George Osborne, the Shadow Chancellor, senior Conservatives, including David Cameron, were irritated by the way Mr Cable was able to present himself as a referee between two opponents rather than facing pressure over his own policy positions.

We’ve covered before the familiar problem of media bias against the Liberal Democrats, and explained how you can help.

So what happens when a Liberal Democrat does get an equal chance?

Posted in News | Tagged alistair darling, channel 4, george osborne and vince cable | 10 Comments

Tackling climate change debates via YouTube

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 2:50 pm

Peter Hadfield, formerly of the New Scientist, has taken to YouTube to tackle climate change sceptics as he recently explained on the Guardian’s Environment Blog:

After questioning and listening to hundreds of climate change “sceptics,” I have found that not all are conspiracy theorists or religious fundamentalists. Many are keen to learn about the science of climate change, but they have been learning about it from rather dubious sources.

So two years ago I began a series of videos on YouTube to explain the science, and rebut urban myths that spin round the internet and end up on the opinion pages of the Daily Express and the Wall Street Journal. The result has been astonishing. My channel, Potholer54, now has over 27,000 subscribers. The videos have been mirrored by others all over the internet, and several university lecturers have asked if they can use it in their environmental science classes. Most importantly, former sceptics tell me the videos have changed their minds about the reality of climate change.

That success, however, comes at a price. It means looking at the science – not scary and unrealistic images of submerged cities. It means accepting the fact that Al Gore is not always right, and he should not be defended when he’s wrong. It means acknowledging that while sceptics like Christopher Monckton and Martin Durkin fabricate a lot of their facts, many environmental activists tend to exaggerate theirs.

You can read the full piece here or view his YouTube channel here. But here’s his film addressing the claim that climate change is natural and always happens:

Posted in News | Tagged al gore, christopher monckton, climate change, martin durkin and peter hadfield | 2 Comments

Sour grapes, Guido?

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 1:25 pm

Alas, poor Guido Fawkes. Blogger Paul Staines has posted so often, and with such utter certainty, claiming that there’s something dodgy about Sarah Teather’s expense claims that he seems just a mite reluctant to admit, “I was wrong”.

Which is why you won’t find him reporting today that Sarah Teather has been cleared by the Electoral Commission, instead insinuating that Sarah got off on a technicality.

For the benefit, therefore, of Paul and his readers, here’s what the Electoral Commission said following their review of the case:

… following the inquiries made during this stage, we have satisfied that

…

Posted in News | Tagged guido fawkes, john lyon, paul staines and sarah teather | 16 Comments

Campaign survey: mediocre news for democracy, good news for the Lib Dems

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 11:50 am

The results are in from a survey carried out by Brunel University into how much campaigning the public has been on the receiving end of.

The mediocre news as far as democracy is concerned is that 27% of the electorate say they were contacted by at least one of the three main political parties during February (by phone, letter, leaflet, email etc.). Coming just before a general election that 27% figure is not great, even if you factor in that some people do seem to forget they has been contacted and also that other parties have been campaigning too. It’s much …

Posted in General Election | Tagged brunel university | 1 Comment

Forget hung parliaments. This is the general election result which is truly scary.

By Stephen Tall | Wed 31st March 2010 - 11:45 am

For the last month the opinion polls have been suggesting a hung parliament is the most likely outcome of the forthcoming general election. This has spooked some of those “pin-striped Scargills”, who would much rather their Tory friends were able to start slashing public spending without the restraining need to build consensus ahead of what will be inevitably painful cuts.

It’s an odd argument: in previous serious crises, whether war or depression, most people in Britan have recognised the need for petty tribal differences to be set to one side. After all, we are supposed to be all in this together.

But in the last day or so, there seems to have been a slight upswing in support for the Tories on the back of Alistair Darling’s third budget. It’s far too early to say yet that it’s a real trend, but still – it looks more likely this week than it did last week that the Tories will sneak back in with a slim majority.

And that’s the result that should worry everybody.

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged electoral reform | 14 Comments

Daily View 2×2: 31 March 2010

By Iain Roberts | Wed 31st March 2010 - 11:15 am

2 Stories

What your web browser says about you

I was hoping for a horoscope-style “IE6 users are traditional, steady and make long-lasting friendships” style piece to rubbish, but this is a more interesting review of the state of the browser market.

The key to the future of browsers may not be on desktops at all, but on mobile devices. In the next five years, in the view of many experts, more people will be connecting to their internet via their smartphones and tablets than via their desktops or laptops. This will doubtless break Microsoft’s stranglehold, but it’s not necessarily beneficial to browser diversity: most mobile devices come with default browsers

Posted in Daily View | 1 Comment

What’s up with Nick Griffin’s expense claims?

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 10:50 am

Lib Dem MEP Chris Davies has spotted some rather odd entries in Nick Griffin’s expense claims from the European Parliament. Nick Griffin had previously stalled on publishing his expenses but now he’s given in to the pressure there are some distinct oddities:

a) Nick Griffin claims to have donated £5,575.91 to a fund that has only declared income of £4560.65.

b) Nick Griffin has previously said he employs three members of staff, one of whom is shared with another MEP. However the expense claims list eight people, give no names and only one of their job titles matches previous public statements about …

Posted in News | Tagged bnp, chris davies, european parliament and nick griffin | 2 Comments

Open Election Data project: sensible local election data on the way?

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 9:40 am

It’s good to see the Open Election Data project starting to take off. The issue is very simple: lots of people make use, or would make use, of local election data but it’s usually a real pig to get hold of details.

At the moment, there are annual books – but they’re on paper, expensive and take several months to appear. There are summaries from the likes of the BBC – an excellent public service, but the more local and detailed the data you need the more rapidly you find the limitations. There are also local council websites – but …

Posted in News and Online politics | Tagged open elections data project | Leave a comment

Labour falls silent over accusations of lies

By Mark Pack | Wed 31st March 2010 - 8:55 am

Adam Bienkov has the story:

Yesterday was the start of the local elections campaign here in London and the fight is already getting dirty.

One such scrap is taking place in ultra marginal Waltham Forest where the Lib Dems are furious at “Labour’s lies” about police numbers.

Labour leaflets claim that the Lib Dems “want to cut the number of police in Waltham Forest” whilst being “in cahoots with Tory mayor Boris plans to cut police numbers.”

The Lib Dems deny this, pointing to their fervent opposition to Boris’s police cuts on the London Asssembly.

The piece goes on to provide more evidence from …

Posted in London | Tagged adam bienkov, boris johnson, labour party and waltham forest | 4 Comments

Paul Burstow: Liberal Democrats won’t support the Digital Economy Bill

By Helen Duffett | Tue 30th March 2010 - 9:44 pm

The Liberal Democrats have now withdrawn their support for the Digital Economy Bill, in a revision of the original plan to vote against certain elements in the “washup” (the last-minute rush to pass laws without debate or detailed scrutiny at the end of a Parliament).

Paul Burstow, Liberal Democrat Chief Whip announced on Twitter earlier today:

I have told the Govt we won’t support the Digital Economy Bill as drafted. There is not enough time for MPs to examine it in detail.

The Guardian takes up the story:

Posted in News and Parliament | Tagged digital economy bill and paul burstow | 5 Comments

FT’s Philip Stephens attacks “sainted” Vince – here’s my reply

By Stephen Tall | Tue 30th March 2010 - 9:25 pm

From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Date: 30 March, 2010
Subject: ‘Honest Vince’ yes; fast and loose no

Dear Philip,

Thank you for your article in today’s FT, Now ‘Honest Vince’ plays fast and loose. It was very much a column of two halves, the first praising Lib Dem shadow chancellor Vince Cable, the second seeking to bury him.

I’m guessing the source for most of your attacks on the Lib Dems’ pledge to cut taxes by lifting the personal allowance to £10,000 was the Fabian Society’s recent hatchet-job, published via Left Foot Forward. A number of Lib Dem bloggers took its tendentious claims

…

Posted in News | Tagged philip stephens and vince cable | 3 Comments

Ask the Chancellors: your LDV reader

By Stephen Tall | Tue 30th March 2010 - 8:55 pm

Did you watch Ask the Chancellors last night, with the Lib Dems’ Vince Cable centre stage?

If you didn’t … then you can watch it in full via the Channel 4 website, or some of Vince’s best bits via Lib Dem Voice’s YouTube channel.

If you did … then we’ve assembled all the Lib Dem blogosphere reaction in one handy-to-skim-and-click post so that you can catch up with all the post-match analysis.

Posted in Best of the blogs | 5 Comments

Sarah Teather cleared, mystery of forged letters remains

By Mark Pack | Tue 30th March 2010 - 7:40 pm

The Parliamentary Standards Commissioner has cleared Sarah Teather of allegations that she broke Parliamentary expense rules. You may remember those claims being enthusiastically hawked around by Tory Bear and others as if they were copper-bottomed fact; actually their claims were more like a rusty colander.

As the local newspaper reports of the Commissioner:

He discontinued the inquiry because he had no grounds for believing that claims Ms Teather made from parliamentary funds for her office provided support to the cost of the Lib Dem party…

Brent Liberal Democrats said the party contributed over and above its usage of the office, as approved by

…

Posted in News | Tagged brent central, dawn butler, featured, sarah teather and tory bear | 19 Comments

Labservative.com: reaction so far

By Mark Pack | Tue 30th March 2010 - 7:14 pm

Earlier today Stephen covered the launch of www.labservative.com saying,

The Labservative pitch is clear enough: Labour and the Tories are way too similar, and neither is capable of producing change. It’s a familiar enough Lib Dem campaign charge. It’s a pleasantly unfamiliar position for the party to be making the point in a wittily Web 2.0 way. Well done, Cowley Street!

The site is already doing very well at garnering coverage – and positive coverage no less (did someone mutter CashGordon?):

Lib Dems target ‘Labservatives’ with guerilla advertising campaign – The Guardian
The Lib Dems have launched quite an effective site

…

Posted in General Election, Humour and Online politics | Tagged labservative | 21 Comments

Opinon: Wolf at the door – and about time too!

By Ed Randall | Tue 30th March 2010 - 5:45 pm

In his piece entitled “Back to the Future”. Martin Wolf of the Financial Times hits most nails on the head. He also sets a challenge for those who want to do more than occupy the green benches to the right of the Speaker’s chair.

He believes that Labour and Conservative politicians have simply turned their backs on the need to fashion and campaign for economic and social policies that equip the UK to meet the challenges of the decade ahead. The formula for economic growth that emerged under Thatcher, which was inherited and uncritically maintained by Blair and Brown, relied …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged andrew haldane and martin wolf | 1 Comment

LDVideo: Vince Cable’s best bits from Ask The Chancellors

By Helen Duffett | Tue 30th March 2010 - 4:45 pm

Welcome to this latest LDVideo instalment, highlighting video clips from last night’s Ask The Chancellors debate on Channel 4.

Vince not only speaks the most sense but provokes the best reaction from the audience, getting more rounds of applause and even warm laughter.

On bank bonuses:

available on YouTube here.

I warned of the recession:

Posted in News | Tagged alistair darling, channel 4, george osborne, vince cable and YouTube | 2 Comments

Lib Dems launch Labservative.com

By Stephen Tall | Tue 30th March 2010 - 4:10 pm

Lib Dems still reeling from Vince Cable’s debate victory in Ask the Chancellors, have another reason to be reeling today … the party has launched a subversive multimedia viral ad campaign – www.labservative.com – and it’s a 24-carat success.

The Labservative pitch is clear enough: Labour and the Tories are way too similar, and neither is capable of producing change. It’s a familiar enough Lib Dem campaign charge. It’s a pleasantly unfamiliar position for the party to be making the point in a wittily Web 2.0 way. Well done, Cowley Street!

Here’s the video:

Posted in General Election, Humour and Online politics | Tagged labservative | 7 Comments

Crowd sourcing: the political future or a load of hype?

By Mark Pack | Tue 30th March 2010 - 3:20 pm

Rory Cellan-Jones has written one of the best posts I’ve read this year on the internet and political campaigning – i.e. it takes the impact of the internet seriously but doesn’t swallow all the hype. He starts:

Are the political parties now too impoverished – or just too bone idle – to do the basic work of research and campaigning by themselves? Or do they really believe in the wisdom of crowds?  I ask because both Labour and the Conservatives appear to have caught the crowdsourcing bug.

The rest of the article is a good piece of analysis, not taking Tory and …

Posted in Online politics | Tagged ACT and rory cellan-jones | Leave a comment

Opinion: After the Crash – Re-inventing the Left in Britain

By Richard S. Grayson and Jonathan Rutherford | Tue 30th March 2010 - 2:45 pm

Jonathan Rutherford and Richard S. Grayson are the editors of a new book, After the Crash Re-inventing the Left in Britain, available to download as an e-book here. Here they write about why they think all progressive voters need to join together to defeat neo-liberalism in all walks of life.

The election approaches and Britain begins the long haul out of deep recession. In such a crisis, one would expect an alternative to neo-liberalism to be riding high in the polls. Instead, the party which is ahead, the Conservative Party, offers no alternative. The Labour leadership differ only by degrees. …

Posted in Books and Op-eds | 2 Comments

In Vince Cable We Trust

By Philip Sheldrake | Tue 30th March 2010 - 11:50 am

A pretty obvious statement to make on this site, “In Vince Cable We Trust”, but it’s also the name for a new campaign established by a small group of marketing, communications and technology professionals with the single stated aim of making Vince Cable the next Chancellor of the Exchequer.

The group is apolitical. In fact, despite being the leader of this merry band, I have voted for all three main parties at some point in my life. But with all government departments’ policy making being strangled by the emptiness of the public purse, the role of Chancellor of the Exchequer will …

Posted in Online politics and Op-eds | Tagged featured and vince cable | 12 Comments

Glenda Jackson: Labour’s worst ever transport minister?

By Mark Pack | Tue 30th March 2010 - 10:20 am

Current Secretary of Sate for Transport, Lord Adonis rightly gets praise from across the political spectrum. Although there’s by no means cross-party agreement on some transport issues (think Heathrow for a start), Adonis is generally respected even when he is disagreed with. Whilst he has an extremely strong claim to have been the best Labour transport minister since 1997, some of the competition for that accolade is not exactly stiff.

Indeed, the publication a few days ago of another cross-party Select Committee report into the failings of part-privatisation on the London Underground reminds me of just how bad Labour MP Glenda …

Posted in London | Tagged ed davey, ed fordham, glenda jackson, hampstead and kilburn, london underground, lord adonis, louise ellman and tfl | 5 Comments

Ask the Chancellors: the post-match analysis

By Stephen Tall | Tue 30th March 2010 - 9:29 am

Let’s start off with the sentence you’d expect me to write: Vince Cable won last night’s Channel 4 Ask the Chancellors debate. There, I’ve said it.

Of course, it’s not just me saying it. It’s also The Guardian (“Vince Cable draws first blood”), the Telegraph (both Ben Brogan and Janet Daley), New Statesman (“Cable triumphs”), Channel 4 (Cable “man of the match”), Financial Times, Spectator and Independent (“Cable comes out on top”). And I’ve probably missed a few others.

Vince Cable

Vince started off with two big advantages, and two big disadvantages.

First, the advantages: he understands the economy, and how to convey a message to voters, like no other British politician. He looks the part – a very reasonable, persuasive bank manager – but he can also twist the knife with a turn of phrase that leaves its victim sprawling and the audience smiling.

The second advantage was a much simpler one: he was stood in the middle of the set, and – as a tall man – was able to dominate the proceedings, by turns interrogator, at other times umpire. But always in control.

Now to the disadvantages.

Posted in Op-eds | 11 Comments

Daily View 2×2: 30 March 2010

By Sara Bedford | Tue 30th March 2010 - 9:21 am

Today just 2250 years ago, the first sighting of what we now know as Halley’s Comet was recorded Eric Clapton becomes eligible to draw his pension, whilst it’s also ‘Happy Birthday’ to fellow sexagenarians Robbie Coltrane (60), Eddie Jordan (62) and Mervyn King (63).

Once this day in 1978, the Conservative Party announced it had recruited advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi to revamp its image and get its political message across ahead of the General Election. Politicians both within the opposition and in Prime Minister Jim Callaghan’s government criticised the Tory stance, describing it as ‘frivolous’.

Fourteen years later we saw John Major climb onto his soapbox to urge voters in Cheltenham to elect John Taylor as their MP – a mission which resulted in the election of Lib Dem Nigel Jones.

Posted in Daily View and News | Tagged duncan stott, eddie jordan, eric clapton, halley's comet, james callaghan, john major, mary reid, mervyn king, robbie coltrance and tony blair | 3 Comments

Op-eds

Why I won’t Wayve goodbye to Black Cabs? (Christian de Vartavan)
Keep the earnings link: don’t repeat the mistakes of the 80s (Chris Perry)
Where have we heard this one before? Labour and electoral reform (Jack Meredith)
A national care service – questions for Burnham (and us) (Ruth Bright)
Opportunity at the heart of our vision in local government (Callum Robertson)

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Vince Cable writes: Drill, baby, drill…or not

Lib Dems must do better on Burnham

Britain should be proud, but never afraid of the stranger

Lib Dem Women: Amplifying women’s voices at Conference

Harris and Huhne question legality of Labour’s ‘meow meow’ ban

Lib Dems launch ‘Enterprise in a fair society’ plans to boost business

Howard Dean backs Nick Clegg as next PM

Daily View 2×2:

2 Big Stories

TonyBlair4Labour: who are the secret owners behind the site?

Labservative: the party hits the streets to find out what the public thinks

Conservative candidate troubles in London

Tories cry “foul” at Lib Dems’ fair hearing

Tackling climate change debates via YouTube

Sour grapes, Guido?

Campaign survey: mediocre news for democracy, good news for the Lib Dems

Forget hung parliaments. This is the general election result which is truly scary.

Daily View 2×2: 31 March 2010

2 Stories

What’s up with Nick Griffin’s expense claims?

Open Election Data project: sensible local election data on the way?

Labour falls silent over accusations of lies

Paul Burstow: Liberal Democrats won’t support the Digital Economy Bill

FT’s Philip Stephens attacks “sainted” Vince – here’s my reply

Ask the Chancellors: your LDV reader

Sarah Teather cleared, mystery of forged letters remains

Labservative.com: reaction so far

Opinon: Wolf at the door – and about time too!

LDVideo: Vince Cable’s best bits from Ask The Chancellors

Lib Dems launch Labservative.com

Crowd sourcing: the political future or a load of hype?

Opinion: After the Crash – Re-inventing the Left in Britain

In Vince Cable We Trust

Glenda Jackson: Labour’s worst ever transport minister?

Ask the Chancellors: the post-match analysis

Vince Cable

Daily View 2×2: 30 March 2010

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