Liz Leffman

A way forward for the English Party

By Liz Leffman | Thu 14th December 2017 - 11:55 am

Since late 2016, the English Party has been reviewing its structure and governance. This was initiated following the consultation conducted by the Federal Party following the 2015 General Election, which revealed some considerable criticism of the English Party for a lack of transparency and accountability.

The English Party established the English Review Group towards the end of 2016, with members drawn from each of the 11 English Regions. This is chaired by Sally Symington, who has not previously been a member of any of the English Party committees. She was recommended for her common-sense approach, her fresh eye, and her experience …

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Posted in News and Party policy and internal matters | Tagged , and | 10 Comments
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Catherine Bearder

Brexit Resolution: statement from Catherine Bearder MEP

By Catherine Bearder | Thu 14th December 2017 - 10:15 am

Yesterday the European Parliament voted in favour of a Resolution to allow Brexit talks to progress to the next stage.

Both the Commission and Parliament have now recommended to the European Council that progress has been made in the three key areas: on citizens’ rights, Northern Ireland and the financial settlement.

This Resolution is the last piece in the puzzle to allowing the Brexit talks to progress to the next stage.

It effectively moves the UK one step further away from a disastrous “no deal” situation which would risk thousands

…

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Posted in Europe / International and Europe Referendum | Tagged , and | 2 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Lib Dems GAIN another Council seat

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 14th December 2017 - 8:30 am

Wednesday by-elections may be rare and weird but they are very welcome when they result in a Lib Dem GAIN.

Paul Follows took the Waverley, Surrey seat of Godalming Central an Ockford. We didn’t even stand a candidate there in 2015. We had a reasonable record there, pulling in 400-500 wards in previous years but this is a very good leap forward for us.

…

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Posted in News | 16 Comments
The Voice

Vince to argue for single market and customs union on visit to Ireland

By The Voice | Thu 14th December 2017 - 6:58 am

Our Vince is off to Ireland tomorrow, where he’ll meet leading Irish politicians to discuss Brexit.
Vince will be discussing the implications of the end of the first phase of Brexit negotiations, set to be approved by EU leaders, which failed to find a long-term solution to the Irish border issue.

He said:

The Conservative government has so far botched Brexit, and amongst the people who stand to be most affected are those living on the island of Ireland.

Even after the ‘divorce settlement’ and the agreement to proceed with trade talks, it isstill unclear how a hard border will be averted.

Audiences in Britain, Northern Ireland and Ireland are being told different things. Many of the achievements of the Good Friday Agreement have been put at risk as a result.

The unnecessary decision by the Conservatives to leave the Single Market and Customs Union was not mandated by the EU referendum. It is a miscalculation that will harm commerce between our countries.

Those economic ties are much stronger than is generally realised, given the Republic is the fifth biggest customer for UK exports and we are the second biggest market for Irish exports. 6,000 vehicles cross the border between Ireland and Northern Ireland every day.

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Posted in News | Tagged , and | 6 Comments
The Voice

WATCH: Christine Jardine explain why the British people must have a final say on the Brexit deal

By The Voice | Wed 13th December 2017 - 9:58 pm

Earlier today, Christine Jardine told Sky News why the Liberal Democrats support the people having the final say on the Brexit deal. The things the Leave campaign dismissed as scaremongering are now happening and people need to have the chance to say if this is what they wanted:

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Caron Lindsay

A rare bright spot in the Brexit nightmare

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 13th December 2017 - 7:55 pm

There have been precious few bright moments since the Brexit nightmare started. In fact, I can’t really remember any that didn’t involve being at an anti Brexit protest with other pro-Europeans.

I seriously didn’t expect the Government to lose tonight.  I thought that Tory rebels would express concern but ultimately line up behind Theresa May and David Davis. I felt it was more likely given that May is on the up at the moment. Maybe I was wrong, though. It’s probably easier to rebel on a good day than inflict what may be a fatal act on a government that you support.

I’d got in from work just as the vote was being called and the commentary was all about people thought to be certain Tory rebels now abstaining. My heart sank. But then when the tellers lined up, the opposition side started cheering. A tight vote had gone the right way.

The Government lost by 4 votes. 309 people backed Dominic Grieve’s amendment, 305, including Labour MPs like Kate Hoey and Frank Field, voted with the Government.

My reservation is that there is very little point in Parliament having a meaningful vote if Jeremy Corbyn simply lines up his people to support the Tories in implementing a really unpleasant and painful brexit. Labour did what it was supposed to do tonight, but every time it’s had the chance to do something it says it believes in, like back the single market,  its MPs sit on their hands.

Will they do the right thing as the issues kicked so deftly into the long grass have to be confronted and resolved? Who knows? At least they have the chance, I suppose.

And what of the Lib Dem reaction to the Government defeat? Tom Brake used some novel phrase we’ve never heard before about taking back control:

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 12 Comments
Caron Lindsay

So what’s on your Christmas reading list?

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 13th December 2017 - 11:55 am

It’s that time of year when we hope that our nearest and dearest know us well enough to get us the books we want for Christmas. There is nothing nicer than spending the Christmas holidays snuggled up on the sofa with a nice pile of books that you don’t usually get the time to read.

My husband has been pointed firmly in the direction of the new Nigella book. Anything with a recipe for a chocolate and amaretto cake in it will definitely have pride of place in my Christmas reading pile. He also knows not really to bother buying me politics books because I will have bought them for myself throughout the year and failed to find time to read them.  Here are some I am looking forward to reading over the holidays:

I’m already a fair bit of the way through Hillary Rodham Clinton’s What Happened. I also have the audio book of Hillary reading. With every page there’s a huge pang of what might have been. I’ve been a huge fan of Hillary’s for half my life and I think she would have made a brilliant President. She would have done so much for young people and particularly women and girls in the most difficult places on earth to be female. Her book is candid and terrifying and it even has a chapter on love and kindness which aren’t qualities often associated with modern politics. They are always there in abundance as there are good people in all parties, but they don’t get much coverage.

Iain Dale’s Biteback Publishing is very annoyingly having a “everything at half price” sale until 31st December. Here is a selection of the Lib Dem books you might wish to buy.

 

David Laws’ second book on the Coalition, his diaries as he wrote them, is another interesting take on those years in Government. It’s not so neatly organised and very much in the moment.  He even included those entires which show him in an unexpectedly poor light. I’ve been an admirer of David’s ever since I realised that, despite being a bit too right wing for me on the economy, he was in favour of banning smacking. However, his rather bitter attacks on decent Lib Dem activists like Linda Jack are the polar opposite of endearing.  I’ll save that one for a day I’m angry anyway.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 8 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Laura Gordon steps up her campaign for Sheffield Hallam

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 13th December 2017 - 10:25 am

It’s only a few weeks since Laura Gordon was selected as Lib Dem Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for the marginal seat of Sheffield Hallam but already she is making her mark.

In June, Nick Clegg was defeated by the controversial Jared O’Mara who has failed to do the job he was elected to do.

Laura is effectively having to behave like an MP to fill the vacuum. In a wide-rangingi interview with the Sheffield Star, she talked about what she is doing to help local people:

She is helping people with casework, ‘taking up issues’ for Hallam constituents with councillors and the Lib Dem parliamentary team. “I feel this is something we can usefully do,” Laura says.

At the moment Jared O’Mara is not holding surgeries, so somebody needs to be looking at those casework issues. “He hasn’t voted since the 18th of October, it’s on the public record. He’s the only MP elected in 2017 who hasn’t made his maiden speech yet. It kind of speaks for itself, really.

She also talked about the guy Jared beat and what a loss he is to Parliament:

A lot of people have commented on that as I’ve been going around talking to people. Lots of people have said ‘I was helped by Nick’, often with things that we might think of as quite small, like getting a road fixed and campaigning on school buses or crossings. “He was very willing to get engaged on local issues, as well as doing all this work on the national level. I’ve got big shoes to fill but I’m going to do my best to fill them.

She and her husband settled in Sheffield five years ago:

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Posted in News | Tagged and | 8 Comments

Vince speaks at launch of All Party Parliamentary Group on Land Value Capture

By Joe Bourke | Wed 13th December 2017 - 8:55 am

Sir Vince Cable opened the proceedings by emphasising the importance of approaching this fiscal reform in a way that was not “tribal or sectarian”. They valued the fact that representatives of four political parties had agreed to form the Group – Liberal Democrats, Conservative, Green and Labour. He noted the idea, in different forms, has been around seemingly forever” but that “very little in reality has happened.” The message was “for goodness sake let’s do something that takes this forward. Let’s have a practical route map”.

Vince noted that the proposal for land value taxation was supported by “a long history of economic reasoning that wants to base taxation on land.” He referred to the report chaired by Nobel laureate Sir James Mirrlees which had argued for “shifting the tax base in this direction on standard economic grounds as well as the practicality of this approach”. But there was also “the social justice point of view: inequalities of wealth, underlying which were land values”.

Vince stressed the problems associated with property development, including distortions in the planning system, the issue of who captures land values, and how to finance infrastructure. He pointed out that an obvious approach to funding was “to look at the appreciation of land value”.

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Posted in News | Tagged and | 26 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Vince: Labour should be ashamed

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 12th December 2017 - 10:44 pm

Over the past few days, Liberal Democrats have been challenging Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour party to back our amendment to the EU Withdrawal Bill which would keep us in the single market which is so important for jobs and prosperity.

We are at this singularly unlucky point in time where we have a reckless and incompetent government leading us towards a potentially terrible Brexit. It doesn’t know what it wants as ministers say different things. You have both Gove and Davis undermining the deal before the ink is dry. It does nothing for the reputation of our country.

You would think …

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , , , and | 55 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Good news from Jo Swinson

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 12th December 2017 - 7:02 pm

Lovely to see some good news on Twitter today:

The new baby will be their second child. Their son Andrew was born in December 2013 and made history 7 months later when he became the first baby to go through the Commons voting lobby in the arms of his father.

Many congratulations to Jo, Duncan and Andrew.

Jo, of course, has a keen interest in protecting women from bad employment practice during and after pregnancy. Until she …

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Posted in News | 1 Comment
Joe Otten

Cable calls on chancellor to write to BoE governor

By Joe Otten | Tue 12th December 2017 - 11:11 am

With inflation now standing at a 6 year high of 3.1%, Vince Cable has called on the chancellor to write to the governor of the Bank of England with an explanation.

This would be a reversal of the usual mechanism where the Bank of England has a duty to explain to the government why its Monetary Policy Committee has not prevented high inflation with appropriate movement of the base rate.

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Posted in News | 41 Comments
The Voice

Vince Cable’s message for Hanukkah

By The Voice | Tue 12th December 2017 - 7:00 am

Here is Vince Cable’s message for Hanukkah.

As we usher in the long, dark nights of winter, so begins the Jewish festival of lights. Hanukkah is a celebration of one of the greatest miracles in the Jewish history and for more than two millennia, Jews everywhere have celebrated the wonder of the lamp that miraculously burned for 8 days.

The story of Hanukkah is a story of faith and hope even in the most difficult of circumstances. It is also a reminder of the strength and resilience of the Jewish community; a strength we continue to see, even today, in the continued fight against anti-Semitism, hate and discrimination.

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Posted in News | Tagged and | 4 Comments
Mark Valladares

11 December – a deal is a deal, or isn’t a deal. Where’s Schrödinger when you need him?

By Mark Valladares | Mon 11th December 2017 - 11:59 pm

How many David Davis’s are there? After all, you never seem to get the same answer from him if you ask him the same question more than once, so it stands to reason that there might be more than one. And how angry will one wing or other of the Conservative Party be when they find out what the actual answer is?

But enough of Brexit, it’s time for tonight’s musical interlude. We haven’t had any suggestions, so what have I got for you tonight?

Confusion seems to be the order of the day, so here’s something from the Beatles…

Enjoy, and I’ll …

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Posted in News | 6 Comments
NewsHound

LibLink: Norman Lamb on the Government’s Industrial Strategy

By NewsHound | Mon 11th December 2017 - 9:27 pm

Following the Government’s publication of its industrial strategy, Norman Lamb, who chairs the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee, has let his feelings be known.

In a balanced and thoughtful piece, Norman places the proposals within the context of risks due to Brexit, and a potential funding gap whilst the economy recovers. He also notes that the investment has to be spread around the co7ntry more evenly;

We also need to make sure that this investment is dispersed around the country, promoting excellence in research in lower-income regions. Research in science and

…

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Posted in LibLink | Tagged and | 4 Comments
Paul Walter

How the Samaritans helped me and how they can help you

By Paul Walter | Mon 11th December 2017 - 12:31 pm

In the last two years, I have been helped twice by the Samaritans. The first time was when I had a number of personal, family and work issues piling up. I felt as though everything was getting on top of me, and that if I wasn’t careful, I would end up feeling worse. As usual my family were a great support to me. But I just felt I wanted to reach out to another human being, unconnected with the situations, to share what I was going through.

I emailed [email protected] . Emailing seemed the best thing for me in that situation. I just wanted to share my issues with another human. – To know some other person was reading my thoughts. It was an insurance policy to an extent. I hoped, and my hope turned out to be fulfilled, that emailing “Jo” would help put a limit on my feelings of being somewhat overwhelmed by life at that time. Jo wrote back and was very sympathetic. Jo helped focus my thoughts. Jo read and understood what I was saying, and acted as a “shoulder to cry on”. A safety valve. Jo promised to be there if I needed to share more. Things gradually sorted themselves out. But it was good to know that I had “Jo” on the end of an email in case I needed more support – to let off steam, set out my thoughts, whatever…

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 12 Comments
Paul Walter

Money to support young people who want to see a parliamentary by-election campaign at first hand

By Paul Walter | Mon 11th December 2017 - 10:55 am

I thought that might get your attention…!

It’s eighteen months since the death of David Rendel, former Liberal Democrat MP for Newbury from 1993 to 2005. His untimely demise was obviously a cruel blow for his family. In Newbury, we also miss him dreadfully in the Liberal Democrats. We lost a great friend. I lost a great friend. I miss his humility, his enormous wisdom, his integrity, his selflessness, his sense of humour, his encouraging smile, his endless energy and passion for liberalism.

Fortunately, shortly before his death, when asked if there was anything that the local Lib Dems could do in his memory, he expressed his wish. David was a great by-election afficianado. Indeed, he himself swept to victory in Newbury in 1993 in one of the most famous Liberal Democrat by-election victories in history. David was also a passionate mentor to many young people in politics. In his last months he said that he would like there to be some sort of fund in his name which enables young people who are interested in politics (and he specified that these young people would not necessarily be Lib Dem members, but perhaps broadly share our values) to be able to go to a parliamentary by-election and immerse themselves for several weeks in the campaign – getting involved in the campaigning. He particularly wanted such a fund to benefit those young people who, without such financial support, might not otherwise be able to travel to and stay at a by-election location.

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Posted in Party policy and internal matters | Tagged and | 2 Comments
Mark Valladares

This week in the Lords: 11-15 December – probing away on Brexit…

By Mark Valladares | Mon 11th December 2017 - 9:05 am

Yes, we’re back, with our regular preview of the week in the upper chamber, following last week’s absence. Apologies to those of you who take an interest in the more elegant end of the Palace of Westminster. No time to hang about though…

The very first item of business after prayers on Monday is an oral question from Robin Teverson, whose will be seeking a Government view on whether UK citizens will be able their EU citizenship post-Brexit should they wish. Whilst this was originally an idea of Luxembourg MEP Charles Goerens, it …

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Posted in News and Parliament | Tagged | 4 Comments
Mark Valladares

Welcome to my day: 11 December – it’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas…

By Mark Valladares | Mon 11th December 2017 - 7:59 am

As Britain recovers from the chaos that a few inches of snow wrought yesterday, today is brought to you from Creeting St Peter, my small but perfectly formed Suffolk village. We’ve had an inch or so here, mostly yesterday morning, but whilst there’s broadband, there’s hope, I’m told.

Talking of chaos, it seems like Government ministers have spent the weekend queuing up to sabotage Theresa May’s deal with the European Union. One does wonder about the wisdom of publicly talking about how and when the deal might be reneged upon, and with the …

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Posted in Site news | 5 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Top of the Blogs: The Lib Dem Golden Dozen #498

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 10th December 2017 - 9:01 pm

Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 498th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere … Featuring the five most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (3-9 December, 2017), together with a hand-picked seven you might otherwise have missed.

Don’t forget: you can 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:

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Posted in Best of the blogs | 1 Comment
Caron Lindsay

The Mail on Sunday and Nigel Farage in one day? Vince takes the fight to the right

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 10th December 2017 - 5:52 pm

I certainly didn’t think I’d ever be embedding Nigel Farage’s LBC show on this site, but the first 20 minutes of today’s is well worth watching because our Vince is on there.

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NewsHound

Clegg criticises May on Brexit, talks about defeat and the Westminster culture that enables bullying and harassment

By NewsHound | Sun 10th December 2017 - 11:00 am

Nick Clegg gets loads of column inches this weekend.

He has a long interview with Camilla Cavendish in today’s Sunday Times magazine (£). They discuss Brexit, Parliament, sexual harassment and his son’s Blood Cancer.

He describes the serendipitous series of events that meant that he took Antonio to the GP:

To this day, I don’t know what possessed me to take him to the GP. It was those early days in September, you know, when you have to get kids ready for school. Miriam had to work very heavily that week, so I was at home most of the time, helping to do the preparatory things, buying clothes for the new term — and Antonio said he had this thing. We had an afternoon, so I thought, ‘Why don’t I just take him, and he’ll stop going on about it.’ ”

This was quite out of character, he says. “Normally, I’m quite brutal. My Dutch mum regarded going to doctors and hospitals as something one should avoid at all costs.

Thankfully, Antonio is now well on the mend.

Nick spoke about what he’s up to now he’s out of Parliament. He’s taken up drumming and tried (unsuccessfully) to learn to surf.

The interview was conducted just around the time that sexual harassment hit the headlines. Nick slammed the culture at Westminster which created the environment for this abuse:

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Caron Lindsay

Budget drama in Scotland – Willie Rennie wants “an education focus as never before”

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 10th December 2017 - 8:47 am

The Scottish Government unveils its budget this Thursday. The SNP mislaid their majority in Holyrood in the elections last year so there could be a bit of drama between now and February when the Finance Bill is finalised.

The last time a Budget fell was in 2009 when the Greens, to everyone’s surprise, voted against. A couple of weeks later, to nobody’s surprise, they voted for it but hadn’t extracted anything of consequence from the Government.

When John Swinney was Finance Minister, he used to engage pretty well with the other parties. Willie Rennie was able to get things like free school meals, tens of thousands of college places and nursery education for 2 years olds put in. However, now that we have started beating the SNP pretty comprehensively, the atmosphere has turned a bit nasty.

New Finance Minister Derek Mackay is playing games with crucial inter-island ferry services in Orkney and Shetland, both represented by Liberal Democrat MSPs. Various SNP Ministers have been giving the very strong impression that they would help the Islands Councils with the cost of these ferries without which some remote communities simply could not survive.

Now, however, they are inferring that it’ll only go in the Budget if the Lib Dems promise to vote for it. That sort of posturing doesn’t play well in those communities. The issue was debated in Parliament last week during a Lib Dem opposition day and the Transport Minister Humza Yousaf made a pretty blatant threat.

There is a window of opportunity for Liberal Democrat members of the Scottish Parliament. Either they can engage positively in the budget, have a discussion about this important issue and side with their constituents, or they can play party politics.

I mean, we’d brought the issue to the floor of the Parliament, which was discussing it at that time and made its view plain by passing the Lib Dem motion. If SNP ministers fail to honour Parliament’s wishes, that is a pretty serious thing. 

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The Voice

Another poll shows support for referendum on Brexit deal

By The Voice | Sat 9th December 2017 - 10:08 pm

A poll carried out for the Left Foot Forward blog showed a clear majority in favour of another vote on the outcome of the Brexit negotiations if there were no deal. This is the second time in a week that there has been a majority for the people to have the final say on the deal.

Our policy of a referendum on the deal is not one that every Liberal Democrat warms to. It won the day in the Conference debate this year but there are those Lib Dems who think that we should actually go further and be …

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Posted in News | Tagged , and | 14 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Vince Cable calls for all BAME shortlists to tackle Parliament’s lack of diversity

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 9th December 2017 - 6:15 pm

Speaking to an audience of 4000 people at the Grand Mawlid Conference in Birmingham today, Vince Cable called for all BAME shortlists to tackle the lack of diversity in Parliament.  Currently, the law only allows exclusive shortlists for women and disabled people and the party elected MPs in both categories this year. Stephen Lloyd was selected from an all disabled shortlist in Eastbourne and Christine Jardine was selected on an all-women shortlist in Edinburgh West.

Vince said:

There remains a serious lack of diversity in Parliament.

There are just 51 BAME MPs. Despite being a record total, they represent only 7.9% of all

…

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Lorenzo Cherin

For liberal, independent voices

By Lorenzo Cherin | Sat 9th December 2017 - 3:35 pm

This is a liberal site, a place for discussion amongst liberals, and those who are supporters or members of the Liberal Democrats. But it is an independent site, and welcomes those with different views , as long as there is respect.

On the most important decision and issue for many, currently, it is the moment for liberal and independent voices.

The decision and display of and by Martin Schulz, the leader of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, to push for, as a declaration of intent for coalition, ” a united States of Europe ” has changed the nature of this debate for Liberals and any of an independent disposition. He goes so far as to , more than imply, but to encourage those states who do not agree to leave the EU. This attitude and all that goes with it, spells the destruction of the EU as it is, and changes the naysayers of Brexit, and those who voted Remain, myself included, to reconsider.

I am no Europhile. Nor am I a Eurosceptic. I am a Europragmatist. I have, as one of part Italian and Irish origin, a view,  in no way as sentimental, in favour of the EU project. It is  in my view, a project. It is not, nor should it be a state, super, or not. We cannot be supporters of individuals and nations, of localism in our Liberalism, and back the creation of a superstate, a continent as a country, a Leviathan.

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Posted in News | Tagged , and | 45 Comments
ALDC

ALDC’s by-election report – 7 December 2017

By ALDC | Sat 9th December 2017 - 8:51 am

A quieter night this week, with only 2 by-elections held across the country, but still room for a successful night with another gain from the Tories, making it 8 gains in 6 weeks since the start of November.

 
North Devon DC, Newport – Lib Dem gain from Conservative
 
LD Caroline Leaver 390
Con 373
Grn 159
Lab 83
Once again we find ourselves congratulating the team in North Devon as they pick up another seat off the Conservatives with Caroline Leaver the new councillor. Our successes in North Devon have wiped out the Conservatives-led majority on the council and continue the pleasing trend of results in our former strongholds.
Enfield LB, Enfield Highway – Labour hold
 
Lab 1619
Con 620
Grn 79
UKIP 0 ]
BNP 0 ]
No Lib Dem candidate as Labour comfortably hold this seat in North London. As well as UKIP’s ongoing slide into irrelevance (for the last month they have stood candidates in less than 1 in 4 of the contests, a far worse statistic than the appalling vote shares they’re getting) it is interesting to note that the Greens have fallen in the both the contests here too, something which has been happening pretty consistently since the general election.
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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 5 Comments
Caron Lindsay

LibLink: Nick Clegg: Skeleton Brexit deal risks leaving Parliament in the dark

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 8th December 2017 - 2:55 pm

It’s been a good week for Nick Clegg. he won Best non fiction book by a parliamentarian for his How to Stop Brexit book in the Parliamentary Book Awards. We won’t mention the fact that he sadly wasn’t a parliamentarian when he wrote it. You don’t have to be – former MPs are eligible. He was quite pleased:

Writing in the FT Nick points out the dangers of the current direction of travel in the EU negotiations. With Brexiteers just wanting to get out and not caring about the consequences, they will be happy if there is only a basic outline deal on the table for MPs to vote on this time next year.

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Caron Lindsay

Layla Moran’s favourite film may well surprise you…..

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 8th December 2017 - 1:29 pm

Layla Moran is one of 17 new MPs in 2017 to give an interview to the Huffington Post about her life and what makes her tick. She talks about her childhood in places as diverse as famine-hit 1980s Ethiopia, Brussels and Jerusalem.

She talks about what sparked her interest in politics and distracted her from her first love of science.

I did a Masters degree in comparative education in 2007. That’s what really politicised me. I got very angry about the fact that having a had a background in countries that are genuinely poor, why in this country do we still have

…

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Richard Pym

The Liberal Democrats are now the natural party for business

By Richard Pym | Fri 8th December 2017 - 11:54 am

On Thursday, in the City of London, Vince Cable launched the Liberal Democrat Business and Entrepreneurs Network.   This network is in response to the growing interest of business leaders in joining up with the Liberal Democrats.  

The overwhelming issue the new members raise is Brexit.

Whilst the Government had a mandate from the electorate to leave the EU they adopted an“ultra-Brexit” approach apparently driven by local Tory constituencies, not by economic logic.   That alarms many business people, but it also alarms young people whose future is being stolen.

The average age of a Conservative Party member is reported as 71 with the younger members deserting and we believe the Liberal Democrats now with 100,000 members is the larger party.

The only established national party campaigning for an exit from Brexit is the Liberal Democrats and the party’s demand for a referendum on the final terms is attractive now that the British public can see clearly that they will not get what they were promised in the referendumcampaign.

There is a global economic upturn and the eurozone is recovering fast.  Yet, the recent UK budget showed how the British economy is slowing and the consequent adverse effects on the public sector deficit.     Britain limps along in the relegation zone, a low growth economy in a sea of prosperity.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 13 Comments
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