From today’s Guardian:
Philip Hammond, the defence secretary, will reignite the argument over Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent on Monday when he announces a further multimillion-pound contract for a new generation of nuclear missile submarines, making it clear he plans to press ahead with a Trident replacement.
I’m Libby, I’m local – to Demsbury and Libbyshire at least – and I wasn’t going to be a Lib Dem. I guess I have to blame that on Melissa, a dyed in the wool Conservative who I occasionally drink a half-bucket of Pinot Grigio with.
I’ve always stuck my head above the parapet rather than lay low. In the last couple of years, friends have suggested I become politically active. I have been listening to local voices, voices that are mostly ignored – voices that I could help get heard. Of late, I find more
Welcome to the Golden Dozen, and our 297th 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 (21-27 October, 2012), 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:
Here’s a round-up of stories we haven’t had time to cover on the site this past few days…
Nick Clegg insists on speaking Dutch at Cabinet Office meeting (Telegraph)
Nick Clegg, who speaks five languages fluently, chose to conduct a recent meeting at the Cabinet Office with Herman Van Rompuy, the European Council president, entirely in Dutch. Did the Deputy Prime Minister, whose mother is from the Netherlands, do so to outfox a Downing Street official whom David Cameron had allegedly sent to spy on their conversation? “Nick enjoys being able to talk Dutch,” the Liberal Democrat leader’s spokesman tells Mandrake.
…
We went to the Tate Modern recently. We saw early twentieth century art which explored ambiguous, disturbing images and dreams. Female sculptors depicted fantastical women as drinking vessels, or as Diabolo players entwined by their own diabolical game. The horror of war was a subject for art and contemplation, not just another brief film of routine carnage on the nightly news.
The mood was shattered by the eight-year-old whose T-shirt was loudly emblazoned with a twenty-first century slogan, “AWESOME!” It took me a while to work out just why this felt so incongruous. Being in an art gallery, I had time. Bear with me, please. The
Here’s a date for your diary… On 17th December, The Independent’s Steve Richards will bring his Rock ‘n Roll Politics to London for a Christmas special. Premiered at this year’s Edinburgh Festival, where it earned rave reviews, here’s how the show is billed:
Award winning BBC broadcaster and columnist, Steve Richards, takes you behind the scenes of British Politics and the media, the characters, the absurdities, the tragedies. Laugh and cry as you are taken on a whirlwind tour from Harold Wilson and David Bowie in the 1970s to David
…
Norwich Evening News reports the decision by one of the city’s Green councillors to resign from the council just five months after he was elected:
A Green city councillor has resigned little more than five months since he was elected – blaming the party’s “profoundly undemocratic” methods. David Rogers informed Norwich City Council of his decision yesterday, after expressing his dissatisfaction with how the Norwich branch of the party is run.
It’s really rather a good feeling being a Danish Brit nowadays. Repeated requests for jumper-knitting instructions are admittedly a drawback, but one I can live with. More interesting are daily questions about policy matters as practised Borgen style. (For those who’ve been living under a stone for the past several months, “Borgen” is short for Christiansborg, the Danish Parliament building as well as the title of the appointment-to-view Danish version of the West Wing).
The new LDV members’ survey is now live. So if you are one of the c.1,300 registered members of the Liberal Democrat Voice forum — and any paid-up party member is welcome to join — then you now have the opportunity to make your views known.
Questions we’re asking this month include:
…
Europe is rising up the political agenda. It’s an issue that could bring down David Cameron or break-up the coalition. Yet the Liberal Democrats are strangely silent. The EU didn’t appear on the Brighton conference agenda and we no longer have a Minister in the Foreign Office. We need to develop a vision for a liberal, democratic EU and get smart about fighting for it.
Here’s my four point plan:
The BBC is rightly in crisis over its handling of the Jimmy Savile case. But the mix of some journalists loving taking pot-shots at the BBC and the BBC’s own love of reporting itself (did you see the Newsnight piece on the Panorama episode about the Newsnight story?) means the BBC’s troubles has been over-shadowing the role of others.
The police, in particular.
One police force we now know investigate Jimmy Savile and their work at least got as far as serious consideration of whether or not there was enough evidence …
The Ham & High reports:
Auditors criticised the mortuary for its haywire record keeping, after a routine visit in May revealed oversights including not properly recording the locations of bodies.
The blunders were so serious the auditor immediately ordered Haringey Council – which runs the supposedly state-of-the-art facility, opened amid much fanfare in February 2009 – to make changes, including adding body storage locations to its database…
In March this year, Lyn Garner promised Haringey had reviewed its procedures and believed it had “as robust a set of arrangements in place as possible”.
But two months later auditors visiting the mortuary found:
- personal effects
…
It’s Saturday morning, so here are eight thought-provoking articles to stimulate your thinking juices…
Why don’t we trust politicians? – The BBC’s Nick Robinson takes politicians to task, doesn’t let the media off the hook either… while Labour’s Rachel Reeves mouths platitudes.
The BBC regains its honour – Nick Cohen links the Beeb’s problems with Newsnight and Jimmy Savile to the wider question of institutional trust: ‘We ought to be extending anti-managerialism into every private and public hierarchy.’
It’s Friday. It’s five o’clock. Here’s a fistful of lists that sum up the LDV week:
Our party’s energy policy is totally inadequate, consisting only of motherhood and apple pie statements in favour of efficiency and green policies. We went into the last election on the populist platform of no new nuclear power generation and no new coal power without carbon sequestration. Like the student fee policy, this has also proved predictably unsustainable. It was seriously irresponsible. Hence the familiar u-turn
The Liberal Democrats require a dynamic, highly organised and effective Chief Steward to organise and oversee the volunteer Stewards Team for Federal Conference. This all-year round volunteer post is of two years duration. As a volunteer post, it is not remunerated, but reasonable and agreed expenses are paid.
Working with the Conferences and Events Manager who is based at Headquarters, the Chief Steward will be responsible for the effective recruitment, involvement and development of volunteer stewards to help improve the experience and
There are those who suggest that what this country needs is less legislation and more management and proper scrutiny. Perhaps the House of Lords is taking this to heart, as the diary for the week is reflective of such a wish…
Monday sees the beginning of the Committee Stage of the Election Registration and Administration Bill, with Chris Rennard and Paul Tyler leading for the Liberal Democrats, and William Wallace responding on behalf of the Government.
Liberal Democrats will be looking to ensure that voter registration remains mandatory, as …
Another Lib Dem Conference, another set of exceptional debates on policing and justice. We agreed on greater accountability through an empowered IPCC; minimum standards for private contractors; and community sentences and restorative justice in place of ineffective, short-term prison sentences.
Our party has the most distinct strategy for crime reduction of any major party. It’s based on clear, liberal principles and, crucially, it’s based on the evidence staring us right in the face. At every Conference I’ve been to we raise the level of debate, and provide liberal solutions for policing and justice.
Rarely do these debates, and these policies, make it …
(Actually, it’s worse than that, for in addition Ed Balls’s claim that it’s only with hindsight that it’s clear there was a structural deficit doesn’t really stand up to scrutiny either.)
For many years, the Liberal Democrats have been calling for more consistent food labelling, most recently with our Autumn conference motion, ‘Good Food Shouldn’t Cost the Earth’.
That’s why I welcome the announcement that a new consistent system of ‘front of pack’ labelling will be up and running by summer 2013. It is a cautious welcome because the new system will be voluntary and the biggest challenge – getting all the food industry fully on board – still lies ahead. But, it is encouraging to
In the current “debate” over Europe, “loss of sovereignty”, and “power grabbing by the Commission” are the central themes… what an irony on the 20th anniversary of the single market – the key achievement of the EU which was spear-headed by a British Conservative European Commissioner, and cemented by a Conservative Government in 1992 under the Maastricht treaty.
Commissioner Arthur Cockfield in 1985 published a list of 300 recommendations needed to eliminate the barriers to real free trade within Europe, to make the (then) European Community more competitive and profitable for Member States.
Since 1992 the focus has been to “complete” this …
Do you eat cakes, chocolate bars, ready meals or chips from a take-away? Who doesn’t eat some occasionally? All those foods I mentioned and many others may contain high levels of compounds called trans-fats or trans-fatty acids.
The reason that trans-fats are important is because they cause much higher levels of heart disease – and yet we rarely hear about them. Trans-fats are an unnatural product of food processing. Vegetable oils are sometimes chemically treated by “hydrogenation” to give them a thicker consistency or they are purified at a high temperature. Food manufacturers do this to increase storage life …
Four months ago, just after the last set of quarterly figures published by the ONS showed a sharp contraction in the UK economy, I highlighted economist Hamish McRae’s very public assertion that the UK was in actual fact no longer in recession. Pointing to the second-highest rate of job creation ever in the private sector, combined with falling inflation, he declared: ‘pull all the other data together and the figures would be consistent with an economy growing at around 1 per cent a year’.
Here’s what he has to say about the latest quarterly growth figures of +1.0%, which …
I’m an unreserved coalition enthusiast.
The coalition means Lib Dems in government; something which, in turn, means the implementation of many Lib Dem policies, the likes of which I have campaigned and voted for over the years, believing said policies to be long overdue and beneficial for the country.
But, despite what our critics say, that doesn’t make me a Tory; and I have very little interest in seeing the Conservatives have an easy ride, in helping them implement their policies, or in keeping their members happy.
The embrace them closely strategy of the first coalition year now looks naive, and most Lib …
…
One of the reasons the behaviour of MPs in the House of Commons is often so appalling, baying and insulting in a way that if done by a school child in a classroom would have MPs lining up to demand tough action to restore decency to British life, is that the place is very small. Lots of people in a small space doesn’t usually bring out the best of behaviour, whether in MPs, commuters, sports fans or even tricycle riders.
But that’s only a partial excuse.
One month ago today Liberal Democrat members voted overwhelmingly against the government’s plans for secret courts contained in Part II of the Justice and Security Bill. The motion was passed unamended despite the efforts of party leaders who attempted to dilute the motion into an apology for unfair trials.
Reporting of the Bill has continued, none of it reassuring. During the debate I said I could not understand why our government would suggest this illiberal measure, unless it was due to pressure from the US government. Disturbingly it seems I was right as it was what David Anderson QC, the government’s …
This is John Kasich, Republican Governor of the state of Ohio, USA.
It is possible to argue, credibly (albeit amid much debate), that if Barack Obama wins re-election on November 6th, the first person he ought to thank is John Kasich.
Polls suggest that, despite the hyperventilated efforts of the Romney campaign to generate some “big mo” after the Denver debate, Obama is still ahead in vital Ohio.
Tuesday saw the publication of HMIP’s first report into the Cedars ‘pre-departure accommodation’.
For those of you who aren’t versed in UKBA jargon (few are), ‘pre-departure accommodation’ was established in December 2010 as part of our strategy to end Labour’s abhorrent policy of routinely detaining children for immigration purposes.
Under Labour, from 2005-2010, 7000 children who had committed no crime were detained.
Children were imprisoned in appalling conditions, including the now infamous Yarl’s Wood centre.
Detention was often for weeks and months. In one case, for 190 days. The policy was one of locking children up indefinitely – an atrocious course of …
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PM 
Peter Davies 
Mick Taylor 
Peter Wrigley 
Mary Reid 
