Liberal Democrat Voice

Many women still unsympathetic about rape

By Iain Roberts | Mon 15th February 2010 - 9:10 am

A survey of a thousand men and women in London reveals that most women asked believe that the victim of rape is sometimes at least partly to blame.

Almost three-quarters of women said if a rape victim got into bed with the assailant before an attack they should accept some responsibility.

One-third blamed victims who had dressed provocatively or gone back to the attacker’s house for a drink.

More than half of those of both sexes questioned said there were some circumstances when a rape victim should accept responsibility for an attack.

These figures are nothing new. A 2005 survey found …

Posted in News | Tagged crime | 14 Comments

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Conservatives get the numbers wrong – again

By The Voice | Mon 15th February 2010 - 8:20 am

Getting the numbers wrong seems to be becoming a habit among Conservatives.

First we had those dodgy crime statistics, with the Conservatives claiming wrongly that violent crime had massively increased over the last decade.

Today we discover the Conservatives have inflated tenfold the number of girls getting pregnant in deprived communities. What’s a tenfold increase between friends?

As the Guardian reports:

The Conservatives launched the attack document, called Labour’s Two Nations, to try to show the rise in inequalities under the current government. It claimed – three times – that women under 18 are “three times more likely

…

Posted in News | Tagged conservative party, david cameron and ed balls | 3 Comments

Clegg to rule out any form of Lib Dem coalition

By Stephen Tall | Sun 14th February 2010 - 10:25 pm

The Guardian has the story:

The Liberal Democrats are planning to rule out forming a coalition government with either the Conservatives or Labour if Nick Clegg holds the balance of power in a hung parliament after the general election. … senior Lib Dems are making clear that Clegg has no interest in taking cabinet posts and would focus instead on winning support for four key Lib Dem demands.

Clegg would be prepared to throw a lifeline to the Conservatives or Labour by allowing either party to pass a Queen’s speech if the aspiring government makes concessions in the four areas, described

…

Posted in News | Tagged hung parliament and nick clegg | 33 Comments

Top of the Blogs: The Golden Dozen #156

By Stephen Tall | Sun 14th February 2010 - 7:25 pm

Welcome to the Golden Dozen, as we enter our (scary, but true) fourth year … Yes, this is the 156th of our weekly round-ups from the Lib Dem blogosphere, featuring the seven most popular stories according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (7th – 13th February 2010), together with a hand-picked quintet, usually courtesy of LibDig, you might otherwise have missed.

Don’t forget, by the way, you can now sign up to receive the Golden Dozen direct to your email inbox – just click here – ensuring you never miss out on the best of Lib Dem blogging.

As ever, let’s start with the most popular post, and work our way down:

Posted in Best of the blogs | 5 Comments

78% of party members say Lib Dems on “the right track”

By Stephen Tall | Sun 14th February 2010 - 6:20 pm

At the start of the week, Lib Dem Voice invited the members of our private discussion forum (open to all Lib Dem members) inviting them to take part in a survey, conducted via Liberty Research, asking a number of questions about the party and the current state of British politics. Many thanks to the 200 of you who completed it; we’ve been publishing the results on LDV over the last few days.

Today we look at one of the questions LDV has asked a number of times in our members’ surveys: Do you think, as a whole, …

Posted in LDV Members poll | 1 Comment

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Book review: Saving the European Union

By Mark Pack | Sun 14th February 2010 - 4:50 pm

Andrew Duff’s book Saving the European Union: The logic of the Lisbon Treaty, written early in 2009, has an endearingly open comment about his own political views compared with those of his colleagues:

My party, the UK Liberal Democrats, and group, the Alliance for Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE), have been amazingly tolerant of finding a militant federalist in their midst.

Although an enthusiast for a closer European Union, Andrew Duff recognises the need for pro-Europeans to make their case and starts with the roots of the EU in the ruins of post-1945 Europe. He quotes Winston Churchill saying:

Posted in Books and Europe / International | Tagged andrew duff, european union, lisbon treaty and winston churchill | 2 Comments

Make your mind up, Dave – should peers’ tax affairs be private or not?

By Iain Roberts | Sun 14th February 2010 - 4:16 pm

Confusion reigns in the Conservative Party over whether or not MPs’ and Peers’ tax affairs should be private.

Back in December, Cameron said

If you want to be in the Houses of Parliament… you need to be, or be treated as, a full UK taxpayer. We would pass that law if we get elected… as rapidly as we could.

Now we have Eric Pickles saying

Lord Aschcroft is entitled to his privacy.

and George Osborne saying

We live in a country where people are entitled to a private relationship with the Inland Revenue.

So which is it?

Are MPs and peers entitled …

Posted in News | Tagged david cameron, eric pickles, george osborne and lord ashcroft | 5 Comments

What do Colin Firth, Kate Winslett, Andrew Motion & Brian Eno have in common?

By Iain Roberts | Sun 14th February 2010 - 2:28 pm

According to today’s Observer, and blogged by Paul Walter, the Lib Dems are doing surprisingly well in the celebrity supporter stakes.

For Labour, long time backer J K Rowling (who surely could match the Ashcroft money and hardly notice it had gone, if the mood took her) is joined by David Tennant. He must be a worry for Labour – Tennant’s support may lose Gordon the Dalek vote his only-slighty-too-authoritarian government seem to have spent the last 13 years attracting.

The Conservatives meanwhile have Carol Vorderman, Kirstie Allsopp* and Trevor ‘bong’ MacDonald. Older readers will remember Carol …

Posted in General Election | Tagged andrew motion, brian eno, carol vorderman, chris martin, coldplay, colin firth, daleks, david tennant, j k rowling, john cleese, kate winslet, razorlight and the kinks | 4 Comments

Lib Dem members say ‘No’ (just) to holding in/out EU referendum in next Parliament

By Stephen Tall | Sun 14th February 2010 - 12:25 pm

Back in December, it became clear that the party had yet to decide whether the Lib Dem general election manifesto would promise to hold …

Posted in Europe / International and LDV Members poll | Tagged European referendum and european union | 7 Comments

Foie gras? Pah! Here’s what real (French)men ate

By Iain Roberts | Sun 14th February 2010 - 11:01 am

Today’s literary delicacy, served up for your pleasure, is an account by Edward Stourton of the (now banned) French dish of ortolans.

These tiny songbirds are pretty little things, with greenish heads, yellow throats and brown and black striped backs. They must be captured alive and then left for a month to gorge themselves on grapes and figs in a dark box (some connoisseurs prefer to blind them altogether); once they have swollen themselves to a grotesque size they are drowned in Armagnac, roasted and eaten whole, bones, feathers and all. Tradition dictates that the diners should cover their

…

Posted in News | Tagged history and The way we were | 6 Comments

Conservative Party accused of smear campaign against Edward McMillan-Scott

By Mark Pack | Sun 14th February 2010 - 10:20 am

The New Statesman reported this week:

In a furious letter sent to Conservative MPs in Westminster, and leaked to the New Statesman, Edward McMillan-Scott describes the decision to allow Michal Kaminski to become the Tories’ new group leader in the EU as “disastrous” and says that his own expulsion for opposing the move was designed “to divert attention from political misjudgements” …

Perhaps most controversially, McMillan-Scott accuses Tory high command of a “smear campaign” against him. In a footnote to the letter entitled “ten killer points”, he makes a series of extraordinary claims including: …

– “A smear campaign was launched against

…

Posted in News | Tagged conservative party, edward mcmillan-scott and michal kaminski | Leave a comment

Vince writes on why security checks have gone too far

By NewsHound | Sun 14th February 2010 - 9:44 am

Writing in the Mail on Sunday, Vince Cable argues that the State should pull back on the obsessive checking in its attempts to wrap us all in cotton wool and stop the all bad things happening.

The endless checking is costly for the individuals, an unnecessary intrusion and a vast waste of resources at a time when public services are squeezed. Sunday schools and voluntary groups such as the Scouts have difficulty recruiting new leaders, one reason being the problems of adults being alone with children.

The Government has backed down from some checks. But the checking machine grinds on. Common

…

Posted in LibLink | Tagged vince cable | 1 Comment

Daily View 2×2: 14 February 2010, featuring news from India and the easiest delivery round ever

By Mark Pack | Sun 14th February 2010 - 9:00 am

It’s Sunday. It’s 9am on the day when in 1984 Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean won gold at the Winter Olympics in Sarajevo. You want to see the easiest leaflet delivery in the world, don’t you? But first, the news and blogs.

2 Must-Read Blog Posts

What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here’s are two posts that have caught the eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:

Paperchase and Copywrong: James Graham’s take on the Paperchase copyright story
Women Can’t Jump – Need for Gender Balance: Stephen Glenn on sexism and the Olympics

Spotted any other great posts in the last day from blogs that aren’t on the aggregator? Do post up a comment sharing them with us all.

2 Big Stories

You probably know the news from the UK. So here’s the news from India.
Blast breaks lull – Foreigners among bakery bomb victims

Posted in Daily View | Tagged india, olympics, pakistan and paperchase | Leave a comment

What Lib Dem members think of … Chilcot, John Terry, and the recession

By Stephen Tall | Sat 13th February 2010 - 5:50 pm

At the start of the week, Lib Dem Voice invited the members of our private discussion forum (open to all Lib Dem members) inviting them to take part in a survey, conducted via Liberty Research, asking a number of questions about the party and the current state of British politics. Many thanks to the 200 of you who completed it; we’re publishing the results on LDV over the next few days.

LDV asked: Do you think the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war will result in a ‘whitewash’?

You told us:

25% – Yes it will
19%

…

Posted in LDV Members poll | 1 Comment

Majority of Lib Dem members expect party to make general election gains

By Stephen Tall | Sat 13th February 2010 - 3:20 pm

At the start of the week, Lib Dem Voice invited the members of our private discussion forum (open to all Lib Dem members) inviting them to take part in a survey, conducted via Liberty Research, asking a number of questions about the party and the current state of British politics. Many thanks to the 200 of you who completed it; we’re publishing the results on LDV over the next few days.

We asked party members what their expectations of how the Lib Dems will perform at the coming general election:

Thinking of the next general election, what do

…

Posted in LDV Members poll | 5 Comments

Are these the three most fanciable Lib Dem MPs?

By Stephen Tall | Sat 13th February 2010 - 1:30 pm

According to the Sky News Blog, three Lib Dem MPs are among the most fanciable of the 2005-2010 Parliament. They are:

Posted in News | Tagged julia goldsworthy, lynne featherstone and nick clegg | 14 Comments

Should election voting switch to weekends?

By Mark Pack | Sat 13th February 2010 - 12:37 pm

Last year I speculated that weekend voting may be the next trend in efforts to raise turnout:

Weekend voting has been discussed for a long time. Back in 1991, for example, the all-party Hansard Society’s report Agenda for Change discussed moving voting to a Sunday and highlighted that the Society of Local Authority Chief Exeuctives (SOLACE) backed this idea. Similarly, in 1997, the Home Affairs Select Committee recommended that weekend voting should be tested out.

Partly as a result of this, the system of election pilots that was then put in motion by the 1999 Home Office Working Party on Electoral

…

Posted in Election law | Tagged chris rennard and weekend voting | 8 Comments

Election Appeal: Help re-elect Willie Rennie – DONATE to his campaign TODAY

By Stephen Tall | Sat 13th February 2010 - 10:50 am

Over the next five weeks, Lib Dem Voice is going to be asking all our Lib Dem-supporting readers to consider making a donation to support five candidates standing for the party at the imminent general election.

We know many of you will already be donating to the national party and/or your local party. We know not everyone will be able to afford to make a donation. But we hope that as many of you as are able will spare whatever spare cash you can to support the Lib Dem candidates we will be profiling in the coming weeks.

Posted in General Election | Tagged dunfermline & west fife, featured, ldv election appeal and willie rennie | 6 Comments

The Saturday Debate: Equality of opportunity just isn’t enough

By Stephen Tall | Sat 13th February 2010 - 7:45 am

Here’s your starter for ten as we experiment with a new Saturday slot posing a view for debate:

Belief in equality is, as the preamble to the Lib Dems’ constitutions states, one of the fundamental values of the party. But, as with all values, equality can mean different things to different people.

There has long been tension between liberals who believe the role of government is to aim for equality of opportunity for everyone, and liberals who believe government must promote equality of outcomes. The former will tend to stress the importance of education as the chief means by which individuals …

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged poverty, redistribution, tax, tax credits and weekend debate | 63 Comments

Clegg sacks Jenny Tonge

By The Voice | Fri 12th February 2010 - 9:35 pm

The BBC has the report:

The Liberal Democrat leader has sacked his health spokeswoman in the House of Lords after comments she made about alleged organ trafficking in Haiti.

Jenny Tonge told the Jewish Chronicle there should be an inquiry into claims that Israeli troops sent there after the earthquake were trafficking organs.

Nick Clegg said the comments were “wrong, distasteful and provocative” and dismissed her from her post.

He said she apologised “unreservedly” for any offence she had caused.

Full story here.

Posted in News | Tagged jenny tonge and nick clegg | 75 Comments

Clegg on torture allegations: this goes “to the very top of Government”

By The Voice | Fri 12th February 2010 - 8:34 pm

As The Guardian reports:

The political storm over allegations of MI5 complicity in torture escalated tonight after Alan Johnson, the home secretary, accused the media of publishing “groundless accusations” and commentators of spreading “ludicrous lies” about the Security Service.

As defence lawyers prepared to challenge the government’s success in suppressing severe criticism of MI5 officers made by one of Britain’s most senior judges, the Liberal Democrat leader, Nick Clegg, pointed the finger at the “very top of government” saying senior ministers had probably known about claims of Britain’s involvement in torture but failed to take action to stop it.

Here’s Nick’s statement …

Posted in News | Tagged alan johnson, binyam mohamed, mi5 and nick clegg | 1 Comment

The LDV Friday Five: 12 February 2010

By Helen Duffett | Fri 12th February 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 most-read stories on LDV this week

1. What happened to the 19 Conservative MPs who voted to keep MPs’ expenses secret? (8) by Mark Pack.
2. +++ Exclusive general election prediction: too close to call (8) by Mark Pack.
3. The 14 non-Lib Dem MPs who backed the Single Transferable Vote (9) by Stephen Tall.
4. FT: Tories face “tough battle” to oust Chris Huhne in Eastleigh (5) by Stephen Tall.
5. How can we sell the Single Transferable Vote to the public? (19) …

Posted in Friday Five | Leave a comment

Boris and Wolf: The two best arguments in favour of a hung parliament

By Stephen Tall | Fri 12th February 2010 - 2:30 pm

Two articles by broadsheet columnists on the prospect of a hung parliament bookended this week. In their contrasting ways, both made a convincing pitch for the attractions of neither Labour nor Tories ending up with an overall majority at the next general election.

First up is Martin Wolf from the Financial Times, writing today that Britain can love hung parliaments:

The bogeyman of a hung parliament is being used to terrify British voters. What is needed, it is argued, is a government with a strong majority, to rescue the UK from the threat of national bankruptcy. This is nonsense. The UK

…

Posted in Op-eds | Tagged boris johnson, david cameron, gordon brown, hung parliament, martin wolf, nick clegg and vince cable | 8 Comments

My rock solid election prediction

By Mark Pack | Fri 12th February 2010 - 1:20 pm

There will be more photographs of Gordon Brown in Liberal Democrat election leaflets than in Labour election leaflets.

Posted in General Election | Tagged gordon brown | 12 Comments

Hung parliament – 63% of Lib Dem members back equidistance from Labour and Tories

By Stephen Tall | Fri 12th February 2010 - 11:45 am

Ah, the question the media loves, and Lib Dems hate: just who would the party back if there were a hung parliament?

Now we’ve asked this question before in an attempt to get the media to understand the position of Lib Dem members (despite the wilful attempts of BBC2’s The Daily Politics to mislead viewers with flawed polls). But we’re going to try it again to see if this time the media will listen to what LDV’s sample of Lib Dem members actually think about what the party should do in the event of a hung parliament.

Some 200 members …

Posted in LDV Members poll | Tagged hung parliament | 11 Comments

How is Parliament doing at catching up with the existence of YouTube?

By Mark Pack | Fri 12th February 2010 - 10:20 am

We’ve covered before the campaign by Jo Swinson and others to change the antiquated Parliamentary rules which ban MPs (and in theory other people too) from placing footage from Parliament on YouTube.

Here’s the latest from Jo Swinson about the campaign (via an update sent to fans of the campaign on Facebook):

Posted in Online politics and Parliament | Tagged Jo Swinson and YouTube | 2 Comments

Good news for Jason Zadrozny as Geoff Hoon quits in Ashfield

By Mark Pack | Fri 12th February 2010 - 9:50 am

One of the more dramatic areas of Liberal Democrat advance against Labour in the last few years has been in Ashfield, where Jason Zadrozny is fighting to gain the seat from Labour.

His campaign has received a boost with the news that Labour MP Geoff Hoon is standing down at the general election, a decision made so late in the day that it will deprive the new Labour candidate of much time to establish themselves against Jason’s record of campaigning over the years.

The BBC reports:

The Labour MP, who tried to organise a vote on Gordon Brown’s leadership last month, also

…

Posted in News | Tagged ashfield, geoff hoon and jason zadrozny | 5 Comments

Daily View 2×2: 12 February 2010

By Helen Duffett | Fri 12th February 2010 - 7:00 am

Friday already! And only twelve Action Weekends away from the General Election (we’re guessing)…

2 Must-Read Blog Posts

What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here are two posts that caught my eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:

Electoral marathon

Emma Bagley is pacing (and bracing) herself for the next twelve weeks.

Another one bites the dust

Andy Crick of Wit and Wisdom changes gear (and blog) for the campaign ahead.

Posted in Daily View | Tagged andy crick, david hanson, emma bagley, energy bill and national dna database | Leave a comment

Sky’s general election coverage will boost social media campaigning

By Mark Pack | Thu 11th February 2010 - 11:10 pm

Candidates who make extensive use of social media will receive a boost to their election campaigns, courtesy of Sky News’s plans to feature such material in a set of special constituency pages being created for the election.

Each constituency will have its own page and those pages will pull in feeds from candidates. Sky is asking for information on candidate blogs, Facebook fan pages and Twitter accounts, In addition, Sky will also pull in photos from Flickr and films from YouTube if they are tagged with the names of both the constituency and the candidate. (Let’s hope Sky are remember to …

Posted in General Election and Online politics | Tagged sky news | 3 Comments

Liberal Democrats launch green jobs manifesto pledge

By Mark Pack | Thu 11th February 2010 - 9:28 pm

Earlier today Nick Clegg today launched another plank of the party’s green economic policies for the general election, pledging to create 57,000 jobs by investing £400 million in upgrading disused shipyards so that they can produce off-shore wind turbines.

It’s a triple win: boost the economy, help parts of the country which have been hit the hardest and improve Britian’s environmental record.

The party’s news release explains some of the details:

Current plans to expand wind farms in the North and Irish seas could see every one of the 6,400 turbines needed brought in from abroad, as there are currently no turbine manufacturers in the UK.

British ports are ideally located to host turbine manufacturers due to their proximity to the off-shore wind farms; however, they are currently unable to invest due to the lack of appropriate docks with suitable space.

The proposals to invest in physical infrastructure to support a greener economy also include a pledge to invest £100million in training and testing facilities, including at universities with specialist engineering research facilities such as Loughborough, Durham and Newcastle.

Nick Clegg told Left Foot Forward: