Newsmoggie

Rose Garden love in “sick inducing” but necessary says Julia Goldsworthy

By Newsmoggie | Mon 17th March 2014 - 4:15 pm

julia-goldsworthyIn an interview in yesterday’s Independent on Sunday, Julia Goldsworthy, former MP  for Falmouth and Camborne and ex Special Adviser to Danny Alexander, had this to say about the Rose Garden love-in on the day the Coalition was formed:

I sat at home watching Nick and David in their first press conference in the Rose Garden. I think probably for a lot of political activists it was quite sick-inducing, but it was absolutely necessary because of the economy and national interest. Coalition was a fairly new thing to get our heads around. It was fairly important to demonstrate that this was a relationship that could work. It was fairly important to ham it up at the start, to show that this was something that was going to last.

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Stephen Tall

Democratic Audit on the “scandal” of the poor value taxpayers get for the £800m spent on elections in the UK

By Stephen Tall | Mon 17th March 2014 - 2:45 pm

Ballot paperDemocratic Audit, an independent research organisation based at the London School of Economics, this week published a report, Engaging young voters with enhanced election information. The title may not be the most exciting ever, but the report itself is worth a read. (You can download it here.)

The executive summary from the report’s authors, Patrick Dunleavy and Richard Berry, sets out the current problem as they see it:

Current arrangements in the UK only give very poor, fragmented and old-fashioned feedback to voters about what effect their participation has had, and what election outcomes were.

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Posted in What do the academics say? | Tagged , , , and | 15 Comments
NewsHound

Vince Cable: I don’t understand why bankers need to earn a million quid a year

By NewsHound | Mon 17th March 2014 - 1:26 pm

Vince Cable speaking York Europe Jobs Some rights reserved by Liberal DemocratsIn an interview for the Observer magazine’s “This much I know” feature, Vince Cable has shared his life lessons.

He shares his incredulity that anyone needs a salary/bonus of over £1 million to live on:

I don’t understand why people need a million quid a year. I’ve asked one or two of the more sympathetic bankers to explain it to me. The response has been: “It’s not that I need the money, it is because others get it so I should, too.”

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Posted in News | Tagged and | 37 Comments

Norman Lamb MP, Baroness Liz Barker and Paul Burstow write…Care Bill builds better, stronger, more liberal care system

By Norman Lamb, Liz Barker and Paul Burstow | Mon 17th March 2014 - 11:52 am

Care in the home Some rights reserved by British Red CrossLast week, historic legislation on social care was debated for the final time in the Commons. It has been an exhaustive – and at times exhausting – process, and one of the most inclusive and consultative pieces of legislation ever. We worked with people across the political spectrum to get this right – as ever, a true Lib Dem hallmark.

Starting back in 2010 when Paul Burstow in the Department of Health published a new vision for social care, we have at every stage worked to engage, reach out, and listen to as many stakeholders as possible.

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Gareth Wilson

Opinion: A fair tax revolution: Our most important manifesto commitment

By Gareth Wilson | Mon 17th March 2014 - 10:28 am

Clegg fairer tax in tough times - Some rights reserved by Liberal DemocratsA highlight of last week’s Spring Conference for me was Friday’s consultative Q&A session on the next manifesto. Lots of great ideas were suggested, ranging from river based power generators in flood prone areas to encouraging home work to reduce traffic congestion and CO2 emissions.

What stuck with me was David Law’s appeal for ‘manifesto themes’. There were lots of good suggestions but the majority were small scale – great ideas but difficult to tie into a strong simple theme we can get across to voters.

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

Charles Kennedy: Pro UK campaign needs to be more positive

By Caron Lindsay | Mon 17th March 2014 - 9:35 am

Charles KennedyCharles Kennedy has made a welcome intervention in the debate on Scottish independence. As far as the Better Together campaign is concerned, he’s quite off message. I suspect Liberal Democrats will feel that his comments needed saying and deliver a much-needed kick up the backside to the pro-UK organisation.

I very rarely share Better Together social media stuff because it’s only rarely that I see something that my friends will actually appreciate. The campaign generally gives off an air of dourness that doesn’t even connect with its own activists. They might well have bought into the idea that negative campaigning is effective, and while the polls are still in their favour, they will see no reason to change.

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The Voice

Issan Ghazni encourages Europeans living in the UK to vote Lib Dem in May

By The Voice | Mon 17th March 2014 - 8:56 am

European Union flagLast month, East Midlands Euro Candidate Issan Ghazni wrote that the party should be encouraging EU citizens living in the UK to vote for us as the only positive pro European party:

People in the cafes told me they were fearful of the anti-immigration rhetoric of UKIP and the Tory Right, and many would enthusiastically support the Lib Dems if only we made contact with them.

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Caron Lindsay

Top of the Blogs: The Lib Dem Golden Dozen #368

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 16th March 2014 - 7:00 pm

Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 368th weekly round-up from the Lib Dem blogosphere … Featuring the seven most popular stories beyond Lib Dem Voice according to click-throughs from the Aggregator (9-15 March, 2014), together with a hand-picked quintet, normally courtesy of LibDig, 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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NewsHound

LibLink: Danny Alexander: Get real, Lord Lawson, it’s the low paid who need our help

By NewsHound | Sun 16th March 2014 - 4:35 pm

Danny Alexander by Paul WalterLinking to the Daily Mail usually brings me out in hives, but there are occasions when it’s ok. Danny Alexander taking down Lord Lawson for suggesting that further tax cuts should be focused on higher earners is one such case.

In today’s paper he starts by reminding people that it was a Liberal Democrat priority to cut taxes for the lowest earners. He missed a trick by reminding people where Tory hearts lay – an inheritance tax cut for the rich, but that’s by the by.

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The Voice

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

By The Voice | Sun 16th March 2014 - 2:45 pm

Many thanks to the 15,300 visitors who dropped by Lib Dem Voice this week. Here’s our 7 most-read posts…

17 policies on which Labour and the Lib Dems now agree (21 comments) by Stephen Tall

Nick Clegg’s speech to Spring Conference in full  (71 comments) by Stephen Tall

Five reasons why Liberal Democrats are leaving York in good spirits (30 comments) by Caron Lindsay

Opinion: My resignation from Federal Conference Committee (6 comments) by Kelly-Marie Blundell

By-election update: Lib Dems take two seats from Tories in Canterbury and Ludlow (21 comments) by ALDC

Suspicions of Lib-Labbery (44 comments) by Joe …

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NewsHound

LibLink: Tim Farron – We need to capitalise on our scientific excellence

By NewsHound | Sun 16th March 2014 - 1:15 pm

University of the West of England, laboratory, science. Some rights reserved by JiscTim Farron has been writing for the Adam Smith Institute – there’s a sentence we didn’t expect ever to write – about turning the UK’s universities into entrepreneurial hubs. The Lib Dem party president is familiar with the sector, having worked in higher education at Lancaster University before entering Parliament. Here’s an excerpt:

Britain has a historically poor record of turning our scientists into entrepreneurs. Too often we have favoured the image of the mad professor or boffin, absent-mindedly beavering away in their lab, oblivious to the wider world around them. We must root out this gross caricature and start talking about the scientists of the future, like Dr Judith Spitz, who as well as not being male and grey haired, jumped at the opportunity to take her skills in speech and language therapy into the corporate world to become Chief Information Officer of Verizon.

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Caron Lindsay

Just when you thought it was safe to like Stonewall…

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 16th March 2014 - 12:00 pm

mark and ros at equal marriage vigilThe relationship between Stonewall and the Liberal Democrats would be described, in Facebook terms, as “it’s complicated.” We might share many of the same goals, but it can all get a bit spiky between us from time to time.

The Observer reports that their former chief executive Ben Summerskill has attacked the Liberal Democrats for being opportunistic over equal marriage, not passing our policy before 2010. In fact, there was huge support within the party for equal marriage and earlier in 2010, the Scottish Party had passed its policy in support. The equal marriage campaign only really started in earnest a couple of years before that and Stonewall itself took a long time to support the measure.

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The Voice

Alistair Carmichael on Chris Huhne: he put the ‘T’ in Cancun

By The Voice | Sun 16th March 2014 - 11:18 am

Cancun, Mexico. Some rights reserved by Nicolas KarimHow, you might ask, did we fail to cover this story this week? In a speech to lobby journalists, Lib Dem chief whip turned Scottish secretary Alistair Carmichael regaled them with this story of the inner workings of the whips office, as the tuition fees vote neared:

‘One thing which I was thinking about recently was that Chris Huhne, in the interests of tackling climate change, had managed to be at some big summit in Cancun, so was not available to take part in the division on the day

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Jenny Willott

Jenny Willott writes… How Lib Dems are giving families choice through shared parental leave and flexible working

By Jenny Willott | Sun 16th March 2014 - 8:55 am

Parents and child - Some rights reserved by Ed YourtonAs a mother with two small children myself, I know how hard it can be to balance work and family life. And as a Lib Dem, I firmly believe in equal opportunities for all and tackling discrimination, whatever form it takes.

So I am really excited that with Lib Dems in Government, we are shaking up the status quo to make it easier for parents with young children to arrange their work/life balance however best suits them.

We need to challenge the old-fashioned …

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Stephen Tall

In the next month 13 seats will short-list their wannabe Lib Dem MPs

By Stephen Tall | Sat 15th March 2014 - 5:30 pm

Lib Dems winning hereHere’s the full list of selection contests in the coming month available for Lib Dems on the approved parliamentary candidates’ list, together with the closing date for applications. They include Bath, where Don Foster is standing down after 23 years, a seat which the party will be keen to defend. So far, of the six held Lib Dem seats where MPs are retiring, five have chosen women and one a man from an ethnic community (details here). What will happen in Bath?

The following seats have selections in progress and are currently advertising for candidates:

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Posted in Selection news | 4 Comments
Jim Wallace

A longer read for the weekend: “The Law’s the Law, for A’ That” – Legal Reflections on the Scottish Independence Referendum

By Jim Wallace | Sat 15th March 2014 - 2:00 pm

Piper outside Court of Judiciary Some rights reserved by @ B E L ™We’re grateful to the Lib Dem Lawyers’ Association for sending through to us the recent lecture given by Lord Wallace of Tankerness QC, Advocate General for Scotland and Leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords. He gave this year’s ’80 Club’ Lecture, posted below…

When I was appointed Advocate General for Scotland, following the formation of the Coalition Government in May 2010, a reporter from the Annandale Observer, the local newspaper which covers my native town of Annan, phoned to ask if I was the first Liberal Democrat ever to hold the post.

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The Voice

A longer listen for the weekend: Can liberalism be better advanced by Lib Dems or Tories?

By The Voice | Sat 15th March 2014 - 11:07 am

That was the topic up for debate at a fringe event a week ago at Spring Conference, hosted jointly by the Electoral Reform Society and Liberal Reform.

Lisa Smart, PPC for Hazel Grove, chaired the discussion, with Lib Dem MP Jeremy Browne, Conservative and Director of Bright Blue Ryan Shorthouse, and the ERS’s Nick Tyrone completing the panel.

As Jeremy indicates at the beginning of his remarks, he can answer the question shortly: the Lib Dems are the proper home for liberals. But fortunately for the audience he elaborated a little, including some challenges that he thinks the party has to meet if it is to remain at the liberal cutting edge.

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Stephen Tall

My 5 minutes defending Lib Dem honour against Bus Pass Elvis

By Stephen Tall | Sat 15th March 2014 - 10:34 am

“We’re interviewing Bus Pass Elvis – the guy who beat the Lib Dems in a council by-election last week – and wondered if you’d be free to come on and talk about whether it means the writing’s on the wall.” That was the enticing invitation from the BBC’s Daily Politics show – how could I refuse? You can see how I got on below.

It was a brief segment, so there were two points I didn’t get to make which I think are important and relevant.

First, what Bus Pass Elvis’s defeat of the Lib Dems in North Clifton ward in Nottingham shows is the extent to which the party’s support has been hit in non-target areas. The party didn’t contest the ward at all in 2011 but when it did in 2007 it attracted 7% of the vote. Seven years on, the Lib Dems got 2%.

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

Fancy paying for Stephen Gilbert MP to be chucked out of an aeroplane?

By The Voice | Sat 15th March 2014 - 8:47 am

steve gilbertOur MPs get up to all sorts of exploits to raise money for charities in their constituencies, ranging from the eccentric to the utterly crackers. We’ll leave you to judge for yourself where on that spectrum St Austell’s Stephen Gilbert is on. Jumping out of an aeroplane, voluntarily, is not for the faint-hearted.

Two weeks today, at Perranporth Airport, he’ll make a parachute jump to raise money for the Merlin MS Centre at Hewas Water, having been impressed by the support that they offer to local people on a recent visit. He said:

Following a recent visit to the centre in Hewas Water, I decided to do my bit and somehow agreed to jump out of a plane to raise money.

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ALDC

By-election update: Lib Dems take two seats from Tories in Canterbury and Ludlow

By ALDC | Fri 14th March 2014 - 8:34 pm

ALDC Master Logo (for screen)It has been a busy week for by-elections with ten in principal authorities and one parish council by-election reported to the Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors (ALDC).

The Liberal Democrats gained a seat from the Conservatives yesterday in Barnham Downs ward, Canterbury. Michael Sole was 52 votes ahead of his Conservative rival, taking 37.3%. It was a bad result for the Conservatives who lost 11.4% of the vote despite the Tory Council Leader living in the ward. UKIP took 18.15 to come third, Labour finished fourth with …

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Posted in Local government and News | Tagged , , , and | 31 Comments
Caron Lindsay

An evening with Alistair Darling and Jim Naughtie

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 14th March 2014 - 2:18 pm

st Andrews flag saltire scotland Some rights reserved by Fulla TIt was with very little enthusiasm that, full of the Liberal Democrat Conference cold, I headed to Glasgow to spend 90 minutes watching Jim Naughtie in conversation with Alistair Darling as part of a series of lectures ahead of the Scottish Independence Referendum organised by the Herald in partnership with the International Network of Street Papers. 

What motivated me off my sofa was the chance to see Darling in a proper chat. I think we get the best of him that way.

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Joe Otten

Suspicions of Lib-Labbery

By Joe Otten | Fri 14th March 2014 - 12:39 pm

lib lab Labour Liberal Democrat logo14 Areas that they now agree on screams the headline. The Daily Mail and (behind the paywall) The Times are reporting on the degree of policy convergence appearing between the Liberal Democrats and Labour.

While Tory strategists admit they struggle to envisage reaching agreement on plans for another five years of power-sharing with the Lib Dems, Labour now agrees with Nick Clegg’s party on a broad range of issues.

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Posted in Op-eds | 45 Comments
The Voice

Liblink: Nick Clegg on parental leave, school meals and childcare

By The Voice | Fri 14th March 2014 - 11:06 am

Parents and child - Some rights reserved by Ed YourtonWriting on mumsnet, Nick Clegg describes the Children and Families Act as kick-starting a revolution for a more family-friendly Britain.

Every dot and comma of the Bill puts into law measures that will transform outdated attitudes and systems in Britain. We want to give families like yours more freedom and flexibility to make the choices you want and ensure every child gets the best possible start in life.

So now, thanks to these changes, our parental leave system will no longer be built on the 1950s assumption that when a child is born, mum stays home while dad goes out to work.

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Posted in LibLink | 5 Comments
Stephen Tall

Tony Benn: an appreciation

By Stephen Tall | Fri 14th March 2014 - 9:59 am

imageSummer 1993. I’d just finished my GCSEs and so, like any other teenager, spent the next few weeks reading Tony Benn’s diaries from start to finish. They are an immense achievement, as was his life.

They had a pretty major impact on me: I joined the Labour Party aged 16.The effect wore off in time: I left Labour (in 1999), and the Labour Party left Tony Benn.

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Posted in News and Obituaries | Tagged and | 19 Comments
Joe Otten

RIP Tony Benn

By Joe Otten | Fri 14th March 2014 - 8:19 am

Tony BennAnthony Wedgwood Benn has died aged 88.

Tony championed many causes including nationalisation, unilateral nuclear disarmamemnt, leaving the common market, socialism, and democratic reform of the Labour Party. He renounced a peerage – changing the law in the process – in order to remain a member of Parliament. He left Parliament in 2001 “in order to spend more time in politics”, leaving his Chesterfield seat to be won by Liberal Democrat Paul Holmes.

One of the few not to be taken in by Ali G, Tony was a conviction politician, and an …

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Posted in News | 18 Comments
Stephen Tall

17 policies on which the Lib Dems and Labour now agree

By Stephen Tall | Fri 14th March 2014 - 7:28 am

Nick Clegg and Ed MilibandIt was a fiery Prime Minister’s Questions this week: with Nick Clegg standing in for David Cameron, Labour’s deputy leader Harriet Harman was joined by her backbenchers in hurling insults at the Lib Dem leader, which he returned with equal force.

It wasn’t edifying or enlightening. And it may not be a good guide to what could happen after May 2015 if the electoral arithmetic leaves Labour and the Lib Dems with little choice but to team up to form a Coalition government.

In fact, if …

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Posted in News | Tagged | 24 Comments
Stephen Tall

New poll: Voters credit low-earner tax-cuts to Lib Dems, Clegg’s ratings spike following Farage debate challenge

By Stephen Tall | Thu 13th March 2014 - 8:11 pm

Here’s a poll finding that will relieve Lib Dems and worry Tories – according to Ipsos-Mori more voters (45%) credit the Lib Dems with the Coalition’s tax-cuts than credit the Tories (33%):

tax cuts lib dme credit ipsos mori

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Posted in News and Polls | Tagged , , and | 31 Comments
Paul Burstow

Paul Burstow writes… Realising the potential of an ageing society

By Paul Burstow | Thu 13th March 2014 - 4:14 pm

Senior citizens dancing pensioners Some rights reserved by StevenM_61Last summer, Nick Clegg asked me to chair a working group looking at the issues of an ageing society and how Government should respond.

The UK population is living longer and today there are more people over the age of 65 in the UK than there are children under 15. This change is a direct consequence of public policy, of bearing down on preventable deaths. But an unsophisticated debate about the impact of ageing has portrayed this as a disaster. Our everyday language tends to stigmatise, portraying ageing as a threat and older people as burdens hogging resources and hoarding assets.

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Posted in Op-eds | 11 Comments
William Hobhouse

Opinion: Good co-ops, bad co-ops and the funding of the Labour Party

By William Hobhouse | Thu 13th March 2014 - 2:37 pm

imageWe Lib Dems do not need persuading of the merits of the Co-operative Movement. Founded in Rochdale in the 1840s, it continues to this day to provide an alternative model for business.

However, it cannot be said that there are many takers for this business approach. Apart from a good number of small co-operatives, there are two dominant players. The John Lewis Partnership, which is owned by its employees, and the Co-operative Group, owned by its members.

John Lewis is a success. It is often cited as an example for others. Not so the Co-operative Group which seems to go from one crisis to the next.

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The Voice

Jeremy Browne questions wisdom of ratchet effect on tax cuts while the deficit remains so high

By The Voice | Thu 13th March 2014 - 12:54 pm

Jeremy BrowneThe Huffington Post reports some interesting comments by Jeremy Browne, Lib Dem MP for Taunton Deane and former foreign and home office minister. Browne expresses reservations over campaigns to raise the threshold further as a method of seeking to attract credit for the policy, suggesting that the Lib Dems should do so by reminding voters of the substantial increase that has already taken place.

Here’s an excerpt from the piece:

A former Lib Dem minister has criticised Nick Clegg’s flagship policy of pushing to increase the amount of money people can earn before the pay income tax.

Jeremy Browne, who served as a coalition Foreign Office minister and Home Office minister, said the Lib Dems should be careful not to message to voters there was “money to splash around” given the size of the deficit.

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