John Pugh

John Pugh writes: Our vision for Education

By John Pugh | Mon 28th March 2016 - 4:16 pm

Teacher In Classroom

In 2010 Michael Gove, acting before the ink was dry on the Coalition agreement, rushed the Academies Bill through Parliament. Governors were free to turn their school into an Academy Trust, without canvassing parental or local opinion . This being a little high-handed, I moved an amendment during the Commons debate requiring school governors to consult parents – particularly important  as the government were pressing on with this radical change during the school holidays.

Gaining the support of Ed Balls, then Labour party Education spokesman, I pushed it to the vote and divided the House. We lost as most of my colleagues voted against and the Whips angrily  informed me that trying to amend government legislation, however crass, was not how coalition in the Commons was meant to work. Now in 2016 we have even school governors sidelined as the Academy bandwagon, courtesy of the Tories smashes through every barrier.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 19 Comments
Advert
Mary Reid

Deadline for responses to second consultation on the governance review

By Mary Reid | Mon 28th March 2016 - 3:33 pm

You should have received an email from Sal Brinton last week inviting you to give your views on the consultation paper on the governance review. The deadline is TODAY!! So if the weather is keeping you at home you could do worse than spend a few minutes reading the consultation document and sending in your views on it.

You do need to click on the button on the email that you received, so we can’t direct you to the survey from here.

The feedback at this, the second stage of consultation, will help to determine the proposals which will be put to …

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | 1 Comment
John Grout

The #LibDemFightback: things to look for on May 5th

By John Grout | Mon 28th March 2016 - 2:03 pm

Eastleigh HQ leaflets

I’ve never been one for negativity.  I’m all for realism, however stark – provided that one is permitted to also consider how to change one’s circumstances if the current ones are dire.  This is one of the many reasons why the Lib Dems attracted me as a party – evidence-based policy, and a ‘well, let’s fix it’ attitude to tackling problems, offering solutions and alternatives instead of simply complaining.

The membership surge after last May’s elections, and the ensuing #LibDemFightback have been extremely heartening.  Outside the comfort zones of the Liberal Democrat community, the evidence for that fightback is there, but the new reality we face is that it is much harder to make ourselves heard than it was before last May.

So, I thought I’d try some evidence-gathering myself from council by-elections; you can see what I found here.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 7 Comments
Jonathan Ferguson

A longer read for the holiday weekend: The tangled path ahead for Liberal Democrat pacifists and non-Interventionists

By Jonathan Ferguson | Mon 28th March 2016 - 11:15 am

Lib Dem pacifists and non-interventionists will no doubt have had difficult adjusting to the decision to assist the government in supporting the coalition that is currently intervening in Syria and Iraq. Here, I will provide a few simple suggestions for how we can keep to our principles, but also avoid irresponsibly divisive behaviour.

  1. No Irresponsible Dissent

    2. Disagreeing with the decisions a party makes is perfectly reasonable. And criticism, per se, is not inadmissible. But criticism of one’s own party is not the same as criticism of individuals and organizations outside one’s own in-groups. Even if party loyalty is not an absolute, it is certainly a very weighty consideration.
    As with so many matters pertaining to liberalism, the true test of loyalty is not the issues where most members agree, but the issues where there is a fundamental split on an issue of grave ethical importance. The true test for us is for grassroots and top level Lib Dems to maintain unity, even when it is genuinely heartbreakingly painful to go on.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 13 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Willie Rennie’s week – a whirlwind start to the campaign featuring children, animals and the other party leaders

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 27th March 2016 - 4:55 pm

You can tell there’s an election on. This week, Willie Rennie has painted Easter eggs, sung songs with children at a nursery, visited a farmers’ market and fed seals.

Here’s a look at a whirlwind week in Scotland. Some of it is quite funny.

Monday

Willie was supposed to be going to Amazon in Dunfermline to discuss working practices and pay with employees. At the last minute, Amazon cancelled the meeting. Undeterred, Willie went anyway and recorded this video outside the depot:

Locked outToday, I was supposed to visit Amazon in Dunfermline.At the last minute, they cancelled the visit, because they were too embarrassed to let me see conditions in the center – and too embarrassed by the wages they pay their staff.Big companies like Amazon, that receive government grants, should pay their staff the living wage.That’s why we will never pay government grants to companies that don’t pay the living wageAgree? Add your name here: scotlibdems.org.uk/livingwage

Posted by Willie Rennie on Monday, 21 March 2016

Tuesday

He was on Scotland 2016 to talk about the SNP’s tax plans, or lack of them. In short, they say they can raise £1.2 billion without anyone paying any more tax. That seems to defy the laws of any sort of finance.

Last night I was on Scotland 2016 talking about the SNP’s tax plans and challenged John Swinney’s claims over what this would mean for public services. The truth is that their plans will not raise an extra penny to invest in schools and deliver the transformation in education that we need.

Posted by Willie Rennie on Wednesday, 23 March 2016

Wednesday

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 3 Comments
Advert
NewsHound

LibLink: Paddy Ashdown: Brexit would help those who seek to undermine UK security

By NewsHound | Sun 27th March 2016 - 3:25 pm

Paddy Ashdown has made his voice heard in the row over whether being in the EU helps or hinders national security. It will come as no surprise to anyone that he thinks it helps.

First the broad principle:

My answer is clear. This, more than ever, is the time to stand with our friends in Belgium and across Europe. We must not allow the butchers of ISIS to divide us, and we must give short shrift, too, to those who want to use these attacks to divide our societies. This is no time for division. It is a time to understand why as Europeans we should stand together with our friends in Belgium in their suffering and resist both the racists and extremists of jihad, and the racists and extremists in our midst in their attempts to divide us. Our unity in Europe makes us safer, not weaker. Our solidarity is our best defense. Our pan-European institutions provide us with the means to diminish these threats; they do not, as some foolishly claim, make them worse.

And then the specifies:

Continue reading »
Posted in LibLink | Tagged | 5 Comments
The Voice

LDV’s Sunday Best: our 7 most-read articles this week

By The Voice | Sun 27th March 2016 - 1:55 pm

7 bestMany thanks to the 10,500 visitors who dropped by Lib Dem Voice this week. Here’s our 7 most-read posts…

The Nitty Gritty: Evidence of the #libdemfightback (20 comments) by John B Grout

David Laws on Marr: I want to expose how NHS chief was leant on to encourage debate on NHS funding (20 comments) by Caron Lindsay

David Laws’ “Coalition”: the Coverage (18 comments) by Nick Thornsby

Tom Brake MP writes…Do you support military intervention in Libya? (56 comments) by Tom Brake MP

How are you getting on with Tim Farron’s membership recruitment challenge? (17 comments) by Caron Lindsay)

We already have the Social Liberal Forum, so why do we need a Social Democratic Group? (33 comments) by George Kendall

Disability is nothing to hide, so let’s not act like it is (22 comments) by Henry Foulds

 

 

 

Continue reading »
Posted in Site news | 6 Comments
NewsHound

LibLink: Nick Clegg: The five big fat lies being perpetuated by Brexit’s Project Fib

By NewsHound | Sun 27th March 2016 - 12:24 pm

Nick Clegg’s Standard column this week concentrated on the European Referendum, as I suspect many of them will in the next few months. He sought to smash 5 key themes of the Leavers’ rhetoric.

The first is the claim that our membership of the EU costs us £55 million a day, a figure repeatedly used by Farage, Johnson and others. It’s a total con. As the fact-checkers at InFacts have found, in 2015 the net cost was in fact £17 million a day, or around 30p per person. For that entry fee we then get all the benefits that our access to the world’s largest single market brings, which the CBI has estimated to be worth £3,000 to every British household. So every man, woman and child materially benefits many times more than what we pay in.

The second is that, when it comes to trade, the EU needs us more than we need it. At a debate I took part in last week, this was the very first point made by Tory minister Andrea Leadsom. Again, totally bogus. Our exports to the rest of the EU represent around 12 per cent of our GDP but the EU’s exports to us are just three per cent of its GDP. Neither side will want a trade war but we should be under no illusion that the EU would have the much stronger hand to play in any negotiations if we left.

The third is that fewer than 750,000 Brits live elsewhere in Europe, far fewer than the number of EU nationals who live in the UK, a fib that Farage used against me in that same debate. But his figure is complete baloney. The Government’s own estimates a few years ago suggested around 2.2 million British people were living at least part of the year elsewhere, which is only slightly less than the 2.3 million EU citizens estimated to be living in the UK. The right to live and work across the EU is a two-way street.

Continue reading »
Posted in LibLink | 31 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron’s Easter Message

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 27th March 2016 - 10:42 am

Here is Tim Farron’s Easter message:

TIm's Easter Message

Wishing you a very happy Easter from my family and everyone at the Liberal Democrats. Here's my Easter message >

Posted by Tim Farron on Sunday, 27 March 2016

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | 3 Comments
Jonathan Coulter

Lib Dems and the Middle-East: are we prepared to address the obvious?

By Jonathan Coulter | Sat 26th March 2016 - 6:22 pm

I am a “Newbie-Oldbie” and joined the Party after the 2015 elections. With a lifelong interest in international relations and career with much overseas work, I particularly wanted to find out where the Party stood on Middle Eastern affairs.

I decided to attend the York conference which had interesting fringe meetings dealing with both Israel/Palestine and Syria. What really struck was the contrast between the two cases. The Israeli/Palestinian conflict is a relatively straightforward clash between a settler-colonial movement and indigenous people, but that of Syria is really complicated, with many moving parts­:

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 41 Comments
William Dyer

Can the Lib Dems learn from the Church?

By William Dyer | Sat 26th March 2016 - 1:25 pm

One of the obligatory truths of being a university student is that you become nocturnal. Staying awake until the small hours of the morning and rising just in time to get to your next lecture, even if that lecture is in the afternoon. It was on one of these nocturnal sessions that led me to watch ‘The Battle for Christianity’, written and presented by Professor Robert Beckford currently Professor in theology at Canterbury Christ Church University. This documentary took a look at where the heartbeat of Christianity is today, debunking the myth that church is still uniformly done to the keys of an organ.

As a practicing Christian, I have often perched myself on an uncomfortable pew, listened to the preacher, sat back and thought to myself, ‘the church and the Lib Dems are incredibly similar.’ This thought has occurred to me far too many times for me not to share it. Using ‘The Battle for Christianity’ and my own experience within the Liberal Democrats, I will seek to explain how to church has changed over my (relatively short) lifetime and what the Lib Dems can learn from this.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 22 Comments
Lord William Wallace

Lord William Wallace writes… Fighting both the local elections and the EU referendum

By Lord William Wallace | Sat 26th March 2016 - 11:45 am

Whether we like it or not, the European Referendum campaign is already under way, threading in and out of the May elections. UKIP is hoping to make gains in the Welsh Assembly, and will be standing candidates in many local elections across England. Competing Leave campaigns fill the pages of the Mail and the Telegraph every day; leaflets are beginning to drop through letter boxes. LibDem activists who protest at the ‘distraction’ that the referendum campaign presents to local campaigning between now and May forget that voters don’t think about local and national politics in sharply-differentiated compartments. They also ignore the extent to which Conservative and UKIP candidates will be using nationalist and anti-EU themes in their pre-May campaigning.

Immigration is an issue that affects voters’ choices in local as well as national elections. Attitudes to asylum-seekers, and how far they should be welcomed into local communities, shape voting intentions. Internationally-minded people, generously-inclined towards outsiders and non-citizens, are likely to be natural Liberals – and potential members and activists. I recall canvassing on a former Council estate in Hull in 2004, with a Washington journalist who had asked to come with me to pick up attitudes towards the US after the Iraq invasion. The first person who opened his door to us started with complaining about cars parked on the grass verges; but 2 minutes later he had reached Iraq and how strongly opposed he was to British intervention alongside the Americans – without any prompting to move away from local issues.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 11 Comments
Keith Porteous Wood

A longer read for the weekend: Tributes to Lord Eric Avebury

By Keith Porteous Wood | Sat 26th March 2016 - 10:05 am

Eric Reginald Lubbock, Fourth Baron Avebury, died last month aged 87. The House of Lords held a memorial meeting for Lord Avebury last Tuesday, 22nd March. Here are some recollections of the meeting, and a personal note, from Keith Porteous Wood, who was Lord Avebury’s honorary researcher the last 15 years. For his role over the abolition of the blasphemy law, Eric was co-awarded Secularist of the Year by the National Secular Society of which he was an Honorary Associate, and of which Keith Porteous Wood is Executive Director.

Relatives, parliamentarians, friends and other admirers of Lord Avebury gathered to pay their respects at a meeting led by Baroness Hussein-Ece. The meeting was convened at the request of Rubab Mehdi Rizvi, chairperson of International Imam Hussain Council of which Eric was a patron and trustee. The family will be arranging a memorial meeting on 30 June.

Eric’s eldest son, Lyulph, now the fifth Baron, made clear that he had not followed the family tradition of being a politician. Six of the eight past family members who had been had been parliamentarians were Liberal or LibDem.

John William, Eric’s youngest son, spoke movingly of his Father and gave a spectacularly long list of Eric’s many campaigns, but even this proved incomplete as speaker after speaker added yet another worthy feat.

My strongest impression of the meeting was the number of people who said that Eric had made them feel “really special”. One who said this amused everyone by saying that she had almost felt jealous on discovering how many other people she had to share this with.

Continue reading »
Posted in Something for the Weekend | Tagged and | 4 Comments
The Voice

WATCH: Willie Rennie in last night’s Scottish leaders’ debate

By The Voice | Fri 25th March 2016 - 6:30 pm

Last night, the  day that Scotland could have been declaring independence and have been facing a very uncertain future, the leaders of 6 political parties debated the issues of the Scottish election. You can see Willie Rennie’s contributions here.

Watch him outline his vision for a transformative investment in education to give kids the best chance in life and boost the economy by ensuring that we have the skills we need for the future.

The First Leader’s debateLast night,was the first #LeadersDebate of the Scottish Parliament election. Just incase you missed it, here are some of the highlights from last night’s debate, including our plans for education, Scotland’s new tax powers and what I’d say to President Trump:

The First Leader's debate

Last night,was the first #LeadersDebate of the Scottish Parliament election. Just incase you missed it, here are some of the highlights from last night's debate, including our plans for education, Scotland's new tax powers and what I'd say to President Trump:

Posted by Willie Rennie on Friday, 25 March 2016

If you want to watch the whole debate, you an do so  via the magic of iPlayer.

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | Leave a comment
ALDC

ALDC’s by-election report – 24 March 2016

By ALDC | Fri 25th March 2016 - 2:23 pm

ALDC Master Logo (for screen)Another fairly quiet week on the by-election front saw just three principal by-elections – two in Allerdale in Cumbria and one in Kettering in Northamptonshire.

Allerdale on the west Cumbrian coast sadly saw no Liberal Democrat candidates in either of the two vacancies, all the more disappointing given we achieved 21% of the vote in the Dalton ward when it was fought last year. Dalton saw an Independent candidate take the ward from the Conservatives, who dropped to third and continue their poor run of council by-election results this year (they are now on -6 seats so far this year and with a 63% defence rate, although they have contested every seat). What was interesting in this result was that neither the winning party nor the runners-up (Labour) fought this ward last time. If you’re thinking this makes Allerdale sound like a council area in need of a severe injection of some democracy, then you are probably right, given the other vacancy in the Moss Bay ward in the town of Workington saw a competition between Labour and UKIP when last time all three Labour councillors were returned unopposed. Labour comfortably held on to the seat and leaves them on +1 in by-elections so far this year and with a 100% record of defending their seats (we are on +2 with an 86% defence rate).

Well done to Mel Gosliga, Chris Nelson and the team in Kettering in Northamptonshire who stood a candidate in the St. Peter’s ward within Kettering town itself. Despite garnering just 28 votes it puts the party on the map in the town, gave those 28 Lib Dem voters a chance to express their genuine political beliefs, and gives us a baseline to work from that we wouldn’t know without putting up a candidate. There is absolutely no reason why we couldn’t start to pick up councillors in Kettering, given the strength we have in towns not so dissimilar nearby such as the county town of Northampton and just down the railway line in Market Harborough. It just takes a keen team and some hardwork to make it happen, (although we appreciate the word ‘just’ does underestimate the hardwork somewhat). This by-election may be the start of that in Kettering.

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | 4 Comments
John Marriott

EU Referendum: Are you still undecided?

By John Marriott | Fri 25th March 2016 - 12:55 pm

Those wishing to stay in the EU will point to the economic benefits of membership of what is still the world’s largest single market in an increasingly dangerous world and the unnecessary risks of our coming out, while those opposed to continued membership will cite the need to take back sovereignty ceded gradually to Brussels over the past forty years and to regain control of our borders. Their view is that then we could strike deals with the rest of the world and have a much more money to spend as we would not be paying into the EU coffers.

Neither side of the argument is in any way watertight. The ‘Common Market’ which some of us voted to remain in over forty years ago was very different from what we have created today. There are serious questions about the democratic deficit and whether it is still fit for purpose. Despite delivering prosperity and a certain degree of stability for over half a century there are some serious question marks over its its long term future. The Euro has hardly been a massive success and the EU GDP is currently shrinking. Probably the single biggest crisis for us all both in and out of the EU is how it will deal with migration from the Middle East and Africa, which currently shows no sign of abating.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 45 Comments
Steve Walpole

Fighting the war and peace in Libya

By Steve Walpole | Fri 25th March 2016 - 11:25 am

MP Tom Brake asked for input on whether we should support a war to defeat Da’esh in Libya. I would support such a war but with these provisos.

First, we must have an unequivocal resolution from the UN Security Council supporting any such action. The paltry effort which usually emanates from the council is not enough. Then the UN in general must put its money where its mouth is, both in gold and in its personnel. Here I do not mean just the usual suspects – the US, Canada, the UK, other european countries and a few from further afield but as many countries as is possible to convince to do so. We cannot do it without the support of the Arab League, the African Union and countries like Russia, Pakistan and others We must also have invitation and confidence from the Libyan government.

Second, in order to properly play our part and still be able to defend ourselves adequately, we have to take our Armed Forces establishment to the levels of before the coalition. The equipment we supply to our troops must be correct for first the war fighting and then afterwards the peacekeeping. We have to learn from our experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq. In Afghanistan, Urgent Operational Requirement notices were used to replace equipment which was failing our troops, or to fill a need existing equipment didn’t cover. This must not happen in Libya, our troops must have the best equipment on offerWe also have to have the willpower to keep the necessary troops in theatre to stop the debacle of our time in Helmand, when we were unable to hold the ground we patrolled and so took unnecessary casualties.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 14 Comments
Antony Hook

Easter Reading for Potential Parliamentary Candidates (and their friends)

By Antony Hook | Fri 25th March 2016 - 9:55 am

Easter bunny reading

One of the things I do in the party that I very much enjoy is giving training, usually at the party conference, to people who are interested in being a parliamentary candidate.

Having been a candidate for Westminster and the European Parliament, my view is you cannot get enough training and I attend many sessions as a participant too. My colleague on the Federal Executive, Ramesh Dewan, who is also a highly successful businessman, is fond of saying “a champion trains everyday.”

A lot of good training sessions end with suggestions for further reading.  Here are my suggestions for what you could read over the Easter holidays.  All of these are available from well known booksellers online or on the High Street.

Continue reading »
Posted in News | 2 Comments
George Kendall

We already have the Social Liberal Forum, so why do we need a Social Democrat group?

By George Kendall | Fri 25th March 2016 - 8:55 am

The Social Democrat Group has been formed to work with social democrats outside the party, to build links with them, and encourage some to join the Liberal Democrats.

As I handed out leaflets to promote our fringe meeting in York (see here for a recording) , I was asked why we needed another group when we already had the Social Liberal Forum (SLF). A year ago, I’d have agreed a new group wasn’t needed but the situation has changed.

When the party merged in 1988, there was a lot of controversy about the party’s name. It was vital the party move on from that debate, so many former members of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) agreed that the short name become the Liberal Democrats. I feared this might mean we would eventually be called Liberals, and the SDP heritage forgotten, but I believed it was necessary.

Sure enough, increasingly, we have been called Liberals. I haven’t liked it, but when there were so many other serious issues to grapple with, it didn’t seem a fight worth having.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 89 Comments
The Voice

Ogmore and Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough by-elections set for May 5th

By The Voice | Thu 24th March 2016 - 6:56 pm

In news that will surprise nobody, Labour today moved the writ for the Ogmore and Sheffield Brightside & Hillsborough by-elections. It is defending the two seats following the resignation of Huw Irranca-Davies to stand for the Welsh Assembly and the death of Harry Harpham.

This news comes on the day a very welcome poll puts us at 10%, just 1% behind UKIP:

One poll is nothing to get too excited about, but, combined with the trends in local by-elections, it is an encouraging sign. There are certainly worse ways to kick off election season. The fieldwork was conducted in the aftermath of the budget, and may suggest that people are starting to see how much we reined the Tories in when we were in Government.

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged , , , and | 4 Comments

Federal Policy Committee meeting report

By Geoff Payne | Thu 24th March 2016 - 4:10 pm

This report concerns the meeting of the FPC that took place on 23rd March 2016. This was not the best-attended meeting of the cycle but there were some very interesting discussions nonetheless.

Consultation Session on Liberty and Security Working Group Paper

Brian Paddick attended to offer the committee an opportunity to comment on the consultation paper that was taken to Spring Conference by his working group. The consultation session at Spring Conference was standing room only and there were a number of views expressed in that meeting.

Brian explained that the Investigatory Powers Bill is starting its committee session in the Commons shortly. The committee was delighted to hear that the chair is to be Nadine Dorries MP.

Members of the committee made a number of points in response to the consultation. There were comments surrounding the rushed nature of the legislation, the need to keep the rhetoric on the proposed powers proportionate to the threat, the issues in relation to bulk retention and the privacy implications thereof. There were also comments about the need to ensure that legal professional privilege is inviolable,that there should be proper judicial oversight with submissions potentially being made by special advocates for the other side and the need to ensure that there are no hidden ‘back doors’ into encrypted data. Others made comments about identifying those things that we disagree with and those things where there is a debate to be had about the detail, for example judges versus minsters issuing authorisations. Others queried the effectiveness of the measures and made the point that the provisions may have a disproportionate effect on minority communities.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 5 Comments
Nick T

LDVideo: “A new, more rational approach is desperately needed” – Norman Lamb introduces his cannabis bill

By Nick T | Thu 24th March 2016 - 2:56 pm

Norman Lamb yesterday introduced his ten minute rule bill calling for the legalisation of and implementation of a regulated market for cannabis. You can view the bill and follow its progress here. It will move to second reading on 22 April.

And here is Norman’s Commons speech from yesterday:

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | 10 Comments
Eden Watkins

Minority Rule: The power dynamic of social liberalism

By Eden Watkins | Thu 24th March 2016 - 1:27 pm

A few weeks ago now I started using a different name. First, I told my close friends and family about the change, then mentioned it in passing to acquaintances who asked how to address me, then I changed my Facebook, Twitter, email adress, all of my public facing profiles and simply began to expect people to use it as if it was the name I was baptised with. Yet curiously, even the most classically liberal of my classical liberal friends tolerated this action. Without consulting them, I made a decision about how they would use language, informed them of my choice and simply expected them to obey. Why did they accept this blatant disregard for their liberty to refer to me however they wish?

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | 5 Comments
Caron Lindsay

Sal Brinton on the change of attitude needed so that disabled people can start to live their lives

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 24th March 2016 - 12:26 pm

Sal Brinton was part of the House of Lords Committee which produced today’s report which reviewed the impact of the Equality Act 2010 on disabled people. Its conclusions were pretty damning. It’s worth setting out in full the five major themes that they identified:

First, in planning services and buildings, despite the fact that for twenty years the law has required anticipatory reasonable adjustment, the needs of disabled people still tend to be an afterthought. It is time to reverse this. We are all living longer, and medical advances are keeping us alive where in earlier years it would have failed to do so, but not necessarily in good health. We should from the outset plan for the inevitability of disability in everyone as they get older, as well as for those who suffer accidents and for all those other disabled people who are the subject of our inquiry.

Our second theme, closely related to the first, is the need to be proactive, rather than reactive or process driven. Many of those involved—Government departments, local authorities, the NHS, schools, courts, businesses, all of us—wait for problems to arise before, at best, attempting to remedy them. We should be planning so that disabled people can as far as possible avoid facing the problems in the first place.

Continue reading »
Posted in News and Op-eds | Tagged , , and | 3 Comments
Nick T

David Laws’s ‘Coalition’ – the coverage

By Nick T | Thu 24th March 2016 - 11:00 am

David Laws CoalitionDavid Laws’s account of his and our party’s time in government, Coalition, was published earlier this week by Biteback, having been serialised in the Mail on Sunday.

Keep an eye out for a review here on LDV soon, but in the meantime here’s a round-up of what others have been saying.

The BBC have put together this film featuring former Lib Dem advisers Polly Mackenzie and Phil Reilly, and David was on The Andrew Marr Show on Sunday.

Continue reading »
Posted in News | Tagged and | 23 Comments
Alex Hardiman

Could “blockchain” technology transform public sector budgets?

By Alex Hardiman | Thu 24th March 2016 - 8:59 am

Surprisingly, perhaps the most interesting policy proposal in the race for Mayor of London has come from George Galloway, the controversial Respect candidate. Galloway’s economic guru, Max Keiser, has set out plans in a white paper and campaign video to place the entire mayoral budget on a blockchain. The policy has yet to attract much coverage but the idea could feasibly garner support from both the left and the libertarian right, and suggests an interesting direction for liberals at all levels of government.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | 8 Comments
Tom Brake

Tom Brake MP writes: Do you support military intervention in Libya?

By Tom Brake | Wed 23rd March 2016 - 6:55 pm

Libya is in crisis. After the removal of the brutal dictator Muammar Gaddafi in 2011, Libya has unfortunately disintegrated into a state in little more than name, without the stability and leadership of any government. The country is being held back and fragmented through tribal infighting and most worryingly Daesh has established strongholds around Libya, including the cities of Sirte and Sabratha and even in areas surrounding Benghazi.

It is reported that the vast majority of Daesh fighters based in Libya are not Libyan nationals and the movement does not have roots within the country. Daesh is deeply unpopular with Libyan citizens and they have struggled to motivate and indoctrinate Libyan citizens.

The American military are currently conducting airstrikes on Daesh targets within Libya. The Secretary of State for Defence has personally authorised the use of RAF Lakenheath to allow these airstrikes to be launched from within the United Kingdom. The UK Government has been coy on what role, if any, our military will take to support the US military in their fight against Daesh in Libya, however the likelihood of the UK Government committing to military intervention in Libya is increasing.

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 68 Comments
John Marriott

The Government finally “nationalises” all our schools

By John Marriott | Wed 23rd March 2016 - 5:05 pm

So the government has finally decided to nationalise our nation’s schools. At least we now know where we stand. So, if an academy fails under the new system, the buck goes straight to the Secretary of State and not, as now, to the Local Education Authority (which, I assume will simply disappear).

When are we going to stop messing about with education? We are dealing with human beings, not building motor cars, for goodness sake. I note that the current secretary, like most of her cabinet colleagues, was educated privately. In the independent sector, business acumen and PR are part of the DNA of its member schools. “Sell yourself or go under”- and a few actually do!

Some have you may be aware of the goings on at an academy chain in Lincoln where the former Executive Head and his Director of Finance recently went on trial and, to many local people’s amazement, were acquitted.  Only this week it was announced that another secondary academy, the one I taught at for 23 years, is having to face redundancies because of some of its grants being cut. Now it is planned also to remove parent representatives from governing bodies, what chance will the local community have to influence their schools?

Continue reading »
Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 32 Comments
Antony Hook

EURef: Charles Kennedy’s speech on Europe

By Antony Hook | Wed 23rd March 2016 - 4:02 pm

Earlier today, in a post publicising the Lib Dem Europe Policy Paper I mentioned Charles Kennedy’s speech in the Europe debate at the party conference, Glasgow, Autumn 2013.

You can watch the speech here:

Continue reading »
Posted in News | 1 Comment
NewsHound

Katy Gordon compares Lib Dem & SNP tax plans: “SNP fiddle at margins, Lib Dems choose to make Scotland great again”

By NewsHound | Wed 23rd March 2016 - 2:58 pm

Katy GordonYesterday the SNP revealed their tax plans for Scotland. They were, to be honest, the plans of a Government that’s cosy with being the Establishment, not of an insurgent movement wanting to bring change.  You’d have thought, after all their moaning about the 50p rat being reduced to 45p, that they’d have put it straight back up but, no. Having said that you could argue that we could have done the same thing given that we were forced into it by the Tories in coalition in exchange for the raising of the tax threshold for the lowest paid. However, in our defence, our Scottish plans for a zero rate for the lowest paid will involve tax rises for the richest.

The SNP plans not to raise the higher rate tax threshold – but that’s it. Other than that they will keep tax rates where they are. They wanted powers but when they are given them, they choose to tinker around the edges rather than use them for good. The cuts they have lumped on local authorities make their assertion that they are anti austerity sound hollow.

Over at the Scottish Lib Dems’ website, Katy Gordon, our lead candidate for the West of Scotland,  has given her analysis of the SNP’s proposals compared to ours. 

Continue reading »
Posted in LibLink | Tagged , and | 5 Comments
Advert

Recent Comments

  • Jonathan Brown
    @George - me too. I know that not everyone is happy about this, but it's perfectly reasonable policy and I think all care is being taken to try to reassure thos...
  • George Thomas
    It follows the position of what I believe is a majority of UK population of supporting Israel but being against these unlawful settlements. Maybe not brave in t...
  • David Le Grice
    I don't get your point. Starmer's problem was that he had no charisma or any broader understanding of how to be popular. Boris Johnson managed to deliver the ...
  • expats
    Dr Ruvi ZIEGLER 11th Sep '26 - 10:44am You ref..."These measures are a direct response to continuous shifts in policy in Israel over many years which have deep...
  • Jonathan Brown
    @Andy Daer - there is certainly a LOT I haven't addressed in my article, and am not going to address here, if only for lack of time and space. But a few points....