Michael Berwick-Gooding

An economic policy for 2022 and beyond.

By Michael Berwick-Gooding | Fri 8th December 2017 - 10:25 am

There are many reasons why our vote collapsed after five years of government but perhaps the most important was our ditching the economic policy of our 2010 manifesto, which included an economic stimulus in the first year of government, a promise to create jobs for those who needed them and implied that we would only reduce the deficit when the economic recovery was secured. What we actually did was reduce government spending straight away and took money out of the economy with a 2.5% increase in VAT. During the Coalition government the news reported that there was a double-dip recession (later upgraded). On our watch unemployment increased from 2.5 million in May 2010 to 2.71 million in November 2011. The highest percentage since November 1995 and the greatest number since August 1994. Even in May 2015 with 1.85 million unemployed we failed to provide a job for everyone who needed one.

The current economic consensus has given up on trying to achieve full employment and sees the NAIRU (non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment) as the lowest level possible. This is often seen as in the region of 5%. The last Labour government and the Conservative party accept the NAIRU but also want to make it difficult for those unemployed to claim their benefit as a means of saving money. As Liberals we value each and every person equally and don’t think less of a person because they have difficulties in finding work or meeting the bureaucratic conditions required for those wishing to receive out of work benefits. As Liberals we must have an economic policy to achieve full employment. We know from history that economic inequalities reduced the most between 1945 and 1979 when UK governments tried to achieve full employment. No Liberal Democrat should find it acceptable for there to be more than 1 million people unemployed in the UK.

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Tom Arms

Observations of an ex pat: Adventures in Israel

By Tom Arms | Fri 8th December 2017 - 9:55 am

A long time ago—back in 1977—I was invited to Israel as a guest of the Israeli government.

At the time I was the diplomatic correspondent of a large chain of British newspapers, and, despite the Balfour Declaration, the British press was not known for a pro-Israeli stance.

Their reporters seemed more attracted more to the wild open spaces and the vast starlit skies of Arabia than the Biblical lands.

I, however, am an American, and had absorbed a pro-Israeli stance through osmosis. The Arabs were in bed with the Reds and the plucky democratic Israelis had seen off repeated attempts to push them into the Med.

When I visited everyone was still arguing about the outcome of the 1967 War in which the Israelis managed to secure the rest of Jerusalem and, the West Bank of the Jordan and the Golan Heights in just six days. It was a triumph and the poster of the year in America was of a weedy-looking Hasidic Jew bursting out of a public phone box while tearing off his Black coat to reveal a superman costume.

But ten years later the world was demanding that Israel withdraw to its pre-1967 borders. No, said Israel. We need “defensible borders.” That was the diplomatic mantra: “defensible borders , defensible borders.”

I arrived in the heat of the summer but waiting for me was an air conditioned limousine, a driver and a young Israeli from the foreign ministry. I was his first diplomatic assignment.

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The Voice

Vince Cable: How long before Brexit deal ripped apart by Tory Brexiteer MPs?

By The Voice | Fri 8th December 2017 - 8:37 am

Vince Cable has given his first reaction to the initial Brexit deal announced this morning.

This agreement is welcome as it reduces the risk of a catastrophic No Deal Brexit. It also includes a role for the EU Court of Justice for eight years, a notable concession.

“But how long will this deal last before it is torn apart by Theresa May’s own MPs? And what will happen next, seeing as the Cabinet hasn’t even discussed yet what the final Brexit outcome should look like?

“There are still two opposing views in government, those who want a close arrangement with the EU and

…

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Caron Lindsay

Friday fun: Alex Cole-Hamilton, the snake and creepy crawlies and the Prime Minister of Spain

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 8th December 2017 - 8:04 am

To take our minds off the sound of things being kicked into the long grass in Brussels, here’s something to cheer you on a Friday morning. You really do need to watch the video because it will make you smile.

Some of you will be thinking What.On.Earth? Well, we have dug deeper and found where the actual footage is. As you probably know, Kezia Dugdale, Scotland’s former Labour leader, took part in ITV’s I’m a Celebrity. BBC Scotland’s current affairs programme Timeline made a slightly lower budget version of the programme and invited politicians from all parties to take part. Only two obliged. One of them was our Alex.

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Caron Lindsay

Did the Lib Dems GAIN that seat in Devon from the Tories?

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 7th December 2017 - 11:22 pm

The party had high hopes of gaining a seat in Devon from the Tories tonight.

So did we pull it off?

Nice one, Caroline Leaver and team.

Sadly we didn’t have a candidate in the only other principal by-election of the night, in Enfield which Labour won convincingly.

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The Voice

Vince Cable: Lib Dems are the natural party of business

By The Voice | Thu 7th December 2017 - 2:55 pm

This morning, Vince Cable launched the Lib Dem Business and Entrepreneurs’ Network. It already has 80 leading figures from the business community, including angel investor Andrew Dixon and Chair of Allied Irish Banks Richard Pym.

He explained why the Lib Dems were the natural party of business:

And showed how the Government is letting business down:

Vince added:

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Chris Park

Second Referendum? When was the first one?

By Chris Park | Thu 7th December 2017 - 1:30 pm

If there was a referendum asking voters to choose between continued membership of the EU under the current agreement, or with a settled deal between Britain and the EU after we’ve left, then I must have been on holiday when it took place!

On the 23rd of June 2016 there was a referendum and people voted for something – that much we know.

After a campaign that was described as having “glaring democratic deficiencies” by the Electoral Reform Society, people voted to leave the European Union.  They did so for a variety of reasons.  Some thought it would reduce immigration, others believed they would get more money for the NHS, and some did so based on vague and indefinable notions of sovereignty.

Everyone voted in good faith. It’s wrong to accuse Leave voters of not knowing what they were voting for, or not understanding what they were doing – everyone makes decisions based on how they interpret their own reality.

However nobody can possibly predict the consequences that will now ensue because of this decision.

A referendum on the final Brexit deal is essential.

This wouldn’t be a ‘second ‘referendum because there never was a first referendum on a negotiated deal.

In order for people to vote sensibly in a binary referendum then, surely – with an urgent appeal to common sense – you have to give them two options that can be directly compared and scrutinised against each other.  The 2016 vote failed to do this.  It was a campaign of sentiment not fact: a saga presented as zealous nationalism VS apocalyptic defeatism (‘Project Fear’), and zealous nationalism brought them out to princely turnout sum of 72.2% and won the day.

Brexit is likely but it is not inevitable.  Public opinion could change everything.

So far there is a growing trend where people think it was wrong to leave the EU. This is happening because as the negations proceed, it becomes apparent that untangling ourselves from the a union we’ve been a part of for decades is a lot more complicated than what was sold to us in the campaign.   

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The Voice

Wera Hobhouse argues for more social homes for rent

By The Voice | Thu 7th December 2017 - 11:55 am

99 families stand to lose the chance of a socially rented home in Wera Hobhouse’s Bath constituency after the Planning Minister failed to call in a planning decision. In what Wera described as “social cleaning”, these families will be forced out of the city.

In an adjournment debate last night, Wera took her argument directly to the Housing and Planning Minister. She outlined the direct consequences of the lack of social housing provision:

What about the 99 most vulnerable families, who will now simply be moved out of their home city of Bath? They cannot stay because there will be 99 fewer social homes for rent under the current plans. This sort of social cleansing is unacceptable and it gives the Government the reputation of being uncaring. The Minister will know that I requested him to call in the planning decision that reduced the number of social homes for rent by 99, but he refused to do so. The implication is that this reduction in social homes for rent is in line with Government policy, but on Monday the Secretary of State, in a quick reply, said it was not Government policy to reduce the number of social homes to rent. It cannot be both things in this specific instance, so what is the answer?

Wera outlined the scale of the problem. The number of houses being built for social rent is plummeting:

Government statistics show that nearly 40,000 social homes for rent were built in 2010-11, and the figure for 2016-17 was just 5,380. In the 2016-17 financial year, 12,383 council homes were sold under the right-to-buy scheme. Year in, year out, the number of social homes for rent is being reduced.

The human consequences are horrific:

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Caron Lindsay

Lords Committee: “Difficult to envisage a worse outcome than no deal”

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 7th December 2017 - 10:25 am

As the EU negotiations traverse this predictably tricky stage, the Usual Suspects appear on television blithely arguing that we should just walk away from the negotiations with the EU with no deal because it’ll all be fine, really.

Except anyone can see that that outcome is far from desirable.

The House of Lords European Union Committee has skewered any notion that “no deal” is anything other than a highly damaging option in a report published today. It also slams the Government for enshrining the date of withdrawal in the European Withdrawal Bill.

They also make the obvious point that it is not possible to reach a deal by the March 2019 deadline and so our membership of the EU should be extended to cover this.

We may not have much information from the Government in terms of the impact of Brexit on certain sectors in the economy, but we do have some pretty strong evidence in this report of what  a disaster a “no deal” scenario would be for the agri-food business, for the ports, for aviation, for the financial sector and it really isn’t pretty. Read through the evidence and wonder how anyone can actually go on telly and advocate it as an option.

The report’s conclusion is damning:

A complete ‘no deal’ outcome would be deeply damaging for the UK. It would bring UK-EU cooperation on matters vital to the national interest, such as counter-terrorism, police, justice and security matters, nuclear safeguards, data exchange and aviation, to a sudden halt. It would place the status of UK nationals in the EU, and EU nationals in the UK, in jeopardy, and would necessarily lead to the imposition of controls at the Irish land border.

The wider economic impact of an abrupt departure from the EU single market and customs union, and the adoption of WTO conditions for trade, would be felt across a range of sectors, including financial services, the agri-food sector, and aviation. It would have a particularly disruptive impact on cross-border supply chains. The short-term impact on trade in goods would also be grave: the UK’s ports would be overwhelmed by the requirement for customs and other checks. There is simply not enough time to provide the necessary capacity, IT systems, human resource and expertise to deal with such an outcome.

Vince Cable echoed the Report’s conclusions, saying that “no deal” would leave us “poorer, weaker and more isolated than at any time in modern history.”

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Rosina Robson

Bitter sweet: ALDE Congress in Amsterdam

By Rosina Robson | Thu 7th December 2017 - 8:44 am

I have mixed feelings as I come back from my third ALDE Congress (Alliance of Liberal and Democratic parties across Europe), this time in Amsterdam, one of the most liberal cities in the world. It’s energising to spend time with liberals from across Europe, and the largest Congress yet of 1500 people, knowing that we share values of openness, internationalism and environmentalism. Some countries are so liberal like the Netherlands and Finland, that they even have two liberal parties!

There was sad news that the UK representative on the ALDE party bureau, Baroness Ros Scott was not reelected to her position as Vice Chair. Colleagues from other parties like the FDP (Free Democratic Party) in Germany commiserated and said ALDE should look for ways to continue to collaborate with the UK. This is wise considering a sizeable proportion of the resolutions for voting and discussion by the congress were well-informed and well-drafted by the UK delegation on a range of issues from Iran and Myanmar to LGBT rights, and the Balfour Declaration.

The reoccurring theme in the conference debates focused on how we, as liberals, can combat populism and illiberal voices. Xavier Bettel, PM of Luxembourg (one of 5 liberal PMs in the EU and my favourite) said that we need to fight for our values every day. We should speak to the majority, engage with people who hold different views from us, talking about real issues that matter to people and think in dreams not fear.

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Andy Briggs

The consequences of ruling out post-election deals

By Andy Briggs | Wed 6th December 2017 - 2:42 pm

Back when the election was called, ruling out post-election deals with any other party seemed wise. The Tories were set to win a convincing majority, so we could promise tactical voters there would be no unforeseen consequences of a Lib Dem vote, safe in the knowledge that a hung parliament would not arise. What happened next is well documented; the Conservatives lost their majority and now have to rely on a confidence and supply deal with the DUP in order to remain in government.

This week we have seen the full extent of the DUP’s newfound power, as they hold Theresa May to ransom over her handling of Brexit negotiations. But could that, and perhaps should that, be us? At the very least, the parliamentary arithmetic adds up. Instead of being considered by many as an irrelevance, right now the Liberal Democrats could be the ones causing the government a headache; demanding membership of the single market and customs union, even potentially a referendum on the final deal, in return for our support. The extent to our influence would not be limited to Brexit, but would also include issues such as NHS funding, housing supply and public sector pay. Whilst it could be argued that the Conservatives would never agree to our demands, in truth we can never know, as we refused to even negotiate. Instead we left the Tories with the option of a deal with the DUP, a party so unpalatable that even backbench Tory MPs were horrified at the thought. When they’re not rallying against abortion or same-sex marriage the DUP are pressing for a version of Brexit so extreme that it puts the peace and prosperity of Northern Ireland at risk. It seems hard to argue that a Conservative/Lib Dem deal could have served the country’s interests much worse.

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Ben Andrew

Why didn’t they chant for the Greens?

By Ben Andrew | Wed 6th December 2017 - 1:19 pm

The Green Party is a great illustration of how much UK politics is shaped by First Past the Post. Corbyn supporters tell us that the country has been crying out for an anti-establishment, left-wing alternative for years. But the Greens have been pushing that message for decades. Yes they disagree on some policy areas, especially on Brexit, but Corbyn’s political ideology is pretty much identical to theirs.

The Greens got only 4% of the national vote in 2015 though. And the latest Britain Elects poll which has Labour at 45% has the Green Party at just 1%. Why will people support Jeremy Corbyn when they didn’t support the Greens?

The truth is that the Green Party, and other small parties like ourselves, face obstacles which Labour and the Tories don’t. They are trapped as an outsider in a two-party system, where their votes count for less, their message is muted, and they are seen as a wasted vote. We’ve come to accept this sort of thing as normal – but it makes a sham of our democracy. How can we justify a system which is so structurally biased, that two parties can give almost the exact same pitch to the people, and one is seen as a revolution, while the other is seen as an irrelevance? 

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Lord Bill Bradshaw

Lord Bill Bradshaw writes…A partnership railway can help secure enormous benefits for Britain

By Lord Bill Bradshaw | Wed 6th December 2017 - 11:51 am

It’s been a busy time for rail announcements, following on from the publication last week of the Government’s rail strategy, Connecting people: a strategic vision for rail, which itself was just a few weeks after the launch of a long-term plan, called In Partnership for Britain’s Prosperity, to change and improve Britain’s railway.

Working together, the partnership railway of the public and private sectors has committed to securing almost £85bn of additional economic benefits to the country. The plan contains four commitments which will see rail companies strengthen their economic contribution to the country, improve customers’ satisfaction, boost the communities it serves and create more and better jobs in rail.

I welcome this plan, because there is an urgent need to re‐state and define the railway, and the role it can play in meeting Britain’s transport needs. A recent report of the National Infrastructure Commission downplayed the potential of the railway and there is a need for the industry to fight back. We are not the industry of ‘Thomas the Tank Engine’ and the vintage steam engines which cast an image of a bygone age and dignified decline, nor are we in the image of the RMT who, while advancing bogus claims about safety, obstruct change to a thriving future with more, and better‐rewarded staff, who constantly say when asked that they enjoy working in the industry.

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Caron Lindsay

Your last chance to stock up on your Never going to give EU up merchandise

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 6th December 2017 - 10:04 am

I really, really wasn’t going to do it. I know it was a great idea for the party to run a design competition for some pre-Christmas merchandise, but I wasn’t actually going to buy any.

Then  I looked at my mug in the office that had seen better days and caved.

The party asked members to come up with a design to put on t-shirts, bags and mugs.  Out of 700 entries, whittled down to a shortlist of 3. I have to say that one of the reasons I was put off buying was because the shortlist wasn’t very diverse. The other reason was just the thought of Rick Astley.  I digress, however.  9000 members voted and the design you see above emerged victorious.

You can see the design as it appears on the said t-shirts, mugs and bags here.

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Suzanne Fletcher

Sanctuary in Parliament

By Suzanne Fletcher | Wed 6th December 2017 - 8:15 am

iving a voice to those with no voice that anyone in a position of power will listen to, is surely one of the key things we believe in as Liberal Democrats.

There was the opportunity for just this at Sanctuary in Parliament last week.

Asylum seekers and refugees from throughout the country were able to go to Parliament to meet with their MPs, and tell them of the impact on their lives of living in poverty, or being destitute, and not having the right to work.

I had gone, with a non-political hat, with a team from Tees Valley, including 2 people seeking asylum who are awaiting decisions, one asylum seeker who is destitute, 2 refugees.

The MPs had been invited to attend beforehand, and with a fair bit of chasing up nearly all of those from Tees Valley did.

Also four Lib Dem Peers, Brian Paddick, Roger Roberts (and his researcher Helen Byrne), Sally Hamwee and Shas Sheehan came along, and we met Sal Brinton there too.  Ed Davey sent his caseworker as he was unable to attend himself, and Layla Moran’s researcher came as she was unwell.

One of our delegates spoke from the platform with a very moving and beautifully delivered speech.  All met with the parliamentarians, and told their stories, specifically relating to the theme, and generally got involved.

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Ruth Bright

Snowflakes and Safe spaces

By Ruth Bright | Tue 5th December 2017 - 12:37 pm

What sensitive flowers they are! You cannot move these days for some commentator dismissing students (especially women and LGBT students) as lacking resilience and unable to cope with criticism, contrary views or even a bit of banter.

But would we really want to go back to the university culture of thirty or forty years ago – particularly for women? The revelation in Harriet Harman’ s biography “A Woman’s Work” that her tutor threatened to downgrade her degree if she did not sleep with him does not come as a big surprise to those of us who went to university a few decades ago.

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Paul Walter

Do we fancy jumping off a cliff like lemmings?……now let me see…..it’s a tough one…..

By Paul Walter | Tue 5th December 2017 - 10:00 am


PSM V11 D400 Lemmings in migration

I sympathise with Theresa May. She has a very difficult decision to make for the country.

The two options are:

Option 1: The Mass Lemming option

We are hold hands – that is all 65.64 million of us, minus two, and jump over a very high cliff into economic contraction/uncertainty and a return to ghastly sectarian murder in Northern Ireland. But the good news is that the press will love it and John Redwood and Jacob Rees-Mogg (the minus two) will be at the bottom of the cliff to catch us.

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David Gray

My proposal for a successful Brexit

By David Gray | Tue 5th December 2017 - 8:31 am

Having voted courageously to take back control of our nation and regain our sovereignty, it has been incredibly frustrating to see our elected representatives over-complicating the process of Brexit and not putting Britain’s interests first. I have heard much from Theresa May and her team about how difficult it all is; less about the opportunities that Brexit presents for us as a nation. So let’s break down the stumbling blocks one by one, and look at how the governement should be approaching them.

Firstly, the Irish question. The Leave campaign always stressed that there was no need for a hard border in Ireland. I can see why there are some issues to be resolved here, but no one wants border checks, which is why I would propose an agreement that goods can be brought from Ireland into the UK, or vice versa, without any restrictions. Of course, as Ireland already has an agreement with the EU, this would automatically mean that there would be no need for customs checks for going in an out of any other EU country, thus reducing red tape and showing that, despite Brexit, Britain is open for business!

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Mark Valladares

4 December – perhaps even our friends in Europe think that it’s farewell…

By Mark Valladares | Mon 4th December 2017 - 11:59 pm

Well, it’s the end of another day of Brexit chaos. Who rules our country, one might ask, the Conservatives or the Democratic Unionists, all ten of them? Stay tuned for tomorrow’s episode of “Sorry, we haven’t a clue”, starring Theresa May and the Conservative Party…

The problem is that our former partners are increasingly convinced that, whilst our Government is probably crazy, they are intent on following this through. What Europe wants now is to end this, so as to be able to move on with its long term agenda.

Unfortunately, there wasn’t time to write this week’s preview of the week …

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Mark Valladares

@ALDEParty Congress: Days 2 and 3 – the end, in more ways than one…

By Mark Valladares | Mon 4th December 2017 - 11:48 pm

The count had taken place, the results were known. All that was left was to announce them, and that was the point where Congress went wrong for the Liberal Democrats.

In a shock result, Ros Scott was unsuccessful in her quest to be re-elected. It was an outcome that nobody had expected, with the exception of the candidate herself, leaving the ALDE Party Bureau without a British member for the first time in living memory.

Jonathan Fryer, blogging after the event, suggested that;

…it looks as if Brexit was a factor, for which Theresa

…

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Posted in Europe / International | Tagged | 3 Comments
Tom Burgess

Lost Leaders. Get me outta here!

By Tom Burgess | Mon 4th December 2017 - 4:45 pm

I had hoped that Theresa May would be a “good” Prime Minister – she used to be my MP so have met her on a few occasions. But she fell under the same spell as her predecessor David Cameron, she did not listen to the voters, she gambled and lost. She said;

the Government I lead will be driven not by the interests of the rich and powerful, but by the interests of ordinary, working class people

Yet she never followed through, never put forward a strategy for achieving this, she had many chances to do this, but nothing. The party manifesto …

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Ian MacFadyen

Forget a second referendum!

By Ian MacFadyen | Mon 4th December 2017 - 12:43 pm

For the UK to remain in EU, a second EU referendum on the terms of Brexit is a false goal. It implies Liberal Democrats will oppose the terms when they are known, whatever they are. We risk being accused of wanting the worst outcome for our country, to justify our opposition.

Actually, the terms don’t matter. Most Brexiteers, especially in government, just want to leave, without terms, a divorce bill or a transition, in order to end immigration and continental entanglements.

Calling for a second referendum, assumes Remain could win. The lamentable Remain campaign in the 2016 referendum and the …

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John Pugh

Regional Branding: the path to recovery

By John Pugh | Mon 4th December 2017 - 8:15 am

Christmas looks a little more cheerful for the Lib Dems after a string of November council by-election results but so far as national opinion polls go we are bumping along the bottom.

Given such data, it would be unsafe to draw the conclusion that are resolute anti-Brexit stance is paying dividends. It may well do so when some turn of events demonstrates to the vast swathes of voters that Brexit was a catastrophic economic and political mistake, but no-one just now is holding their breath. There may well come that Iraq moment when the party’s wisdom is demonstrably vindicated but …

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Mark Valladares

Welcome to my day – 4 December 2017: do those clogs come in black?

By Mark Valladares | Mon 4th December 2017 - 7:34 am

Liberal Democrat Voice comes to you this morning from Amsterdam, at the end of a weekend in which it became clear that Europe is preparing to move on with, or more probably without, the United Kingdom.

So, what have we got for you today? We’ll kick the day off with some thoughts from John Pugh on regional liberalism as a means to rebuilding our presence in local and national government.

My usual preview of the week in the Lords will follow, and we’ll have news of the elections for the ALDE Party Bureau, which …

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Mark Valladares

@ALDEParty Congress – Day 2: preparing for a manifesto you may never use…

By Mark Valladares | Sun 3rd December 2017 - 10:51 pm

It was a foggy morning in Amsterdam, dark and damp, the sort of day that makes you want to just pull the covers back over you and go back to sleep. But it was also election day, and with our own candidate in the field, sleep wasn’t an option.

The Congress agenda was dominated by a number of plenary sessions, on the future of European internet policy, on mobility, on the future of work and on agriculture policy, all of which might be seen as laying the groundwork for developing the manifesto.

In truth, …

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Caron Lindsay

Top of the Blogs: The Lib Dem Golden Dozen #497

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 3rd December 2017 - 9:15 pm

Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 497th 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 (26 November – 2 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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Caron Lindsay

It’s not always so easy to get your American partner in to the UK

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 3rd December 2017 - 12:20 pm

You would probably have a heart of stone not to feel pleased for Harry and Meghan. They are clearly two well-suited people who are very happy together.

While I’m delighted for them, I’m also very conscious that their experience is very different to that of many who try to live in this country with their partner from abroad and I want that to change.

I want this country to be a place that recognises that the world is much smaller than it used to be. It’s much easier to fall in love with someone from another country than it used to be. Mind you, one of my closest friends met her husband nearly 30 years ago at Victoria Falls when they were travelling around the world in opposite directions. They now live happily in Scotland and he is a British citizen and got to that state without too much hassle.

It can be very difficult to be allowed to live with your British spouse. A few years ago, party member Holly Matthies, who comes from the States, went through all kinds of traumas trying to get a British visa to join her husband Andrew. She wrote for this site about the toll it took on her mental health.

That first time I flew to the UK, my feckless answers to the questions I was asked — I’d just had to drop out of university due to poor mental health, so I was met with suspicion because they weren’t sure I had any reason to go back home — led to even more questions, and having to wait while the whole next planeful of new arrivals were processed, and then more questions. My partner, who was waiting to meet me, was found and asked questions to see if his answers matched mine. My checked luggage was fetched and searched. Eventually the border guards had to admit there was no reason to prevent me from entering the UK, but they seemed almost disappointed by that fact.

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NewsHound

Which new Lib Dem MP has “made biggest mark”

By NewsHound | Sun 3rd December 2017 - 10:26 am

The iNews has been looking at some of the 2017 intake of MPs and have identified those who – for good reasons and not so good – have come to prominence.

One of ours gets a well-deserved mention:

Liberal Democrat high command expects great things of Layla Moran, rewarding her for capturing Oxford West and Abingdon by appointing her education spokeswoman. The former teacher and assured TV performer, is already being talked about as a future leader.

Here she is leading a debate on period poverty this week in Westminster.

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Caron Lindsay

Christine Jardine stands up for WASPI women

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 3rd December 2017 - 8:55 am

Women born in the 1950s face an unexpected wait of the best part of a decade before they can get their State Pension. When they started their working lives they would have expected to be able to retire at 60. Now they have to wait until they are 67. The principle of the age going up and being equal with men is not in question. That women have had such a steep and disproportionate rise without being properly informed by the Government is an issue that needs to be addressed.

These women were at the sharp end of the gender pay gap for their working lives so any occupational pension they have is likely to be less than a man in the same job. Now they are being disadvantaged in their retirement years too.

Liberal Democrat MPs Christine Jardine and Stephen Lloyd are co-sponsors of a Bill that aims to look at ways of putting this right. It’s due to get its second reading early next year.

In a Commons debate this week, Christine explained the impact of the changes on the 6000 women affected in her constituency and pointed out that failure to get this right may mean that MPs may have their retirement dates chosen for them earlier than they expected.

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Paul Walter

The Damian Green alleged web misuse case – the employer should investigate and take whatever actions they deem appropriate

By Paul Walter | Sat 2nd December 2017 - 9:25 pm


Embed from Getty Images

I may be reverting into my sandals here, but I can’t see why Damian Green should be sacked – unless his employer investigates his case (regarding alleged web misuse) and deems a dismissal is appropriate.

We’re assured (by, oddly enough, retired Detective Lewis – I can imagine John Thaw saying “LEWIS!” as I write) that there is no chance that Mr Green has broken the law. The pornography allegedly found on his computer may or may not have got there due to his actions – Mr Green strongly denies any wrong-doing. But the alleged images were, apparently, not illegal, and not even extreme. The case was years ago and the result of a contested search of parliamentary premises. The current controversy seems to be a battle of retired police officers. Retired Chief Constable Sir Peter Fahy says unrelated non-criminal events uncovered by enquiries would normally be kept confidential with no action taken.

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