Stephen Tall

Budget 2012 verdict: my pick of the top 9 stand-out issues

By Stephen Tall | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 3:55 pm

Here are my personal pick of the top 9 points from this year’s Budget…

1. A definite Lib Dem win on raising the income tax threshold

Raising the income tax threshold — indeed, the biggest ever uplift, to £9,205 — is undoubtedly a big win for the Lib Dems. It’s two months since Nick Clegg made the unusual move of publicly calling on the Coalition to move “further and faster” on taking more of the lowest-paid out of tax, the number one Lib Dem manifesto priority at the last general election. Evidence from the first ‘snap’ budget poll shows 92% …

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Sara Bedford

Labour’s hypocrisy on the ‘Granny Tax’

By Sara Bedford | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 3:09 pm

The response from Labour and the tabloids to yesterday’s Budget have majored on the patronisingly termed ‘Granny Tax’.

However Ed Balls and colleagues must be delighted that so far everyone seems to have missed that the last Government froze the Age Allowance between 2009-11 – or as Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury Rachel Reeves would term it Labour imposed ‘an enormous stealth tax for older people’.

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Nick T

Budget 2012: A strategic and substantive victory for the Lib Dems

By Nick T | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 2:56 pm

The big substantive Liberal Democrat wins that yesterday’s budget contained will be familiar to regular readers by now. However, I think it’s worth highlighting once again just how big a deal the increase in the personal allowance announced yesterday is. A rise of £1100 is unprecedented, and means that those earning the minimum wage and working full time will have seen their income tax bills halved because of the Liberal Democrats.

Before Nick Clegg intervened publicly back in February to call for the threshold to be raised faster than previously anticipated, the working assumption was that it would be raised by …

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Mark Valladares

Changing the way Liberal Democrats develop policy – some thoughts from the country

By Mark Valladares | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 12:58 pm

Nearly two years into the Coalition, and with the Health and Social Care Bill now on its way to Buckingham Palace for Royal Assent, now seems a good time to reflect on the future of ideas within the Party.

There will be those who will wonder why a self-confessed bureaucrat, not known for a yen for policy wonkery, would be worrying about such things. And I guess that they would have a point. But from a process perspective, I suggest that the way that we make policy is now flawed.

At the moment, the hub through which virtually all policy passes is …

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Paul Walter

DPMQs: Trading attacks, squalidity and the long grass commission

By Paul Walter | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 11:54 am

Another Deputy Prime Minister’s Questions and another set of traded attacks. Harriet Harman has a go about the 50p tax rate and tax credit cuts. Nick Clegg lobs back this salvo:

Next month, this Government will take more than 1 million people on low pay out of paying income tax altogether. Next month, we will deliver the largest cash increase in the state pension ever. There will be no more of Labour’s 75p pension insults. Next month, thousands of children from disadvantaged backgrounds will receive an uplift

…

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Caron Lindsay

My Bob and the Granny Tax

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 10:57 am

My dear husband is not a Granny. And he’d better not be a Grandad for a very long time to come, given that our daughter is not yet a teenager. He is of an age to be affected by the so called “Granny Tax” eventually.

Now, you might, if you wish, feel a bit of sympathy for poor Bob. It must feel sometimes like George Osborne has pulled his name out of a hat and decided just to chip away at his income.

First he decided that in the year Bob reaches 65, the State Pension age will go up to 66 …

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NewsHound

Tax controversy and flash cars – that’s life in the modern Labour Party

By NewsHound | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 10:25 am

We’ve heard lots about Labour mayoral candidate “Red Ken” Livingstone’s tax affairs recently, as this Telegraph article reports.

Then we have Labour leader Ed Miliband turn up in a Rolls Royce to a football match. Leaving aside the clear communications ineptitude about his diary for that day, it’s not the best look for the leader of a party which claims to be all about social justice.

Especially when he has such a strong record of standing up to rich and powerful media moguls whose operations are under investigation at the moment. 

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Mark Pack

“Budget 2012: new tycoon tax in victory for Nick Clegg”

By Mark Pack | Thu 22nd March 2012 - 9:11 am

“Budget 2012: new tycoon tax in victory for Nick Clegg” – so reports the Daily Telegraph:

In a significant victory for the Liberal Democrats, the Chancellor effectively introduced a 25 per cent minimum rate of tax in the Budget.

Under the changes, he will limit how much people offset their tax bills by investing in businesses or donating to charity.

Anyone seeking to claim more than £50,000 of tax relief in any one year will have a cap set at 25 per cent of their income from 2013.

Accountants said this means the wealthiest will have to pay at least 25 per cent of their income in tax. Although the highest rate of income tax is 50 per cent, reducing to 45 per cent next year, some wealthy people reduce their bills to almost nothing using different reliefs available from HM Revenue and Customs.

The introduction of this major change to the tax system is one of the main reasons why, as I wrote yesterday, if you are on more than £150,000, you will pay an extra £1,300 a year in tax on average as a result of this Budget.

As for what Labour would do on the 50p rate they seem to be flip and flopping with each new interview – sometimes saying they would reintroduce it if they had the chance tomorrow/next week, and sometimes not.

For more on the Budget see a couple of the media interviews I did yesterday – first on the News Channel and then on Radio 4:

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Caron Lindsay

What Lib Dem bloggers are saying about the Budget

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 21st March 2012 - 9:42 pm

I thought I’d do a quick roundup of what Liberal Democrat bloggers have been saying about today’s Budget. I suspect there will be more tomorrow.

Stephen Williams MP was probably always going to be supportive but he has an extra reason – and it’s all to do with Wallace and Gromit:

The Budget also had some good news for Bristol.  You wouldn’t expect Wallace and Gromit to feature in a budget.  But the Chancellor mentioned them in his speech as he is proposing an extension of film tax credits to made for tv films.  I met with Aardman Animations a few

…

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Ben Norman

The Independent View: Budget lifts a million people out of Income Tax

By Ben Norman | Wed 21st March 2012 - 7:33 pm

The news that the UK’s February borrowing figures were the worst on record did not exactly provide the Budget mood music the Chancellor was hoping for. Then again, the stark reminder that the UK is living well beyond its means serves to buttress his arguments about the need to control spending. There is no money to spend, and even with the current deficit-cutting fervour from Number 11 the UK remains at the whim of global bond markets.

So how did George do? The stamp-duty increase on homes worth more than £2 million is eminently sensible, but must be accompanied by the …

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Posted in Op-eds and The Independent View | Tagged , and | 21 Comments
Joe Bourke

Opinion: Jobs and the economy must feature in Brian Paddick’s mayoral campaign

By Joe Bourke | Wed 21st March 2012 - 3:55 pm

Last weekend, in common with many Team London activists, I was out delivering literature for the upcoming mayoral election.

In a recent Ipsos MORI poll, commissioned by BBC London, some 59% of respondents cited jobs; growth and the economy as the most important issues that Londoners say will help them decide who to vote for in the upcoming mayoral election. This chimes with my own experience of feedback on the doorstep.

Tackling crime (49%), improving public transport (38%) and building cheap homes (37%) were the other top issues.

During the 2008 election, our candidate Brian Paddick, polled a little less than 10% of …

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Caron Lindsay

Nick Clegg tells Lib Dem Members: This is a Budget for the many, not the few

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 21st March 2012 - 2:38 pm

Deputy Prime Minister and Liberal Democrat party Leader e-mailed Party members this afternoon to tell them that today’s Budget puts us within “touching distance” of our goal to raise the tax thre

We can be proud that the biggest tax cuts in today’s Budget go to millions of working families.
As a result of this Budget, someone working a full week on minimum wage will see their income tax bill cut by over 50% compared to under Labour.

Increasing the personal allowance to £9,205 takes us within touching distance of our number one manifesto pledge – ensuring no one pays any tax …

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Danny Alexander MP

Danny Alexander MP writes… Liberal Democrat budget victory for “further faster” tax campaign

By Danny Alexander MP | Wed 21st March 2012 - 1:35 pm

Over 20 million working people will be better off next year after Liberal Democrats in the Coalition Government delivered the biggest ever increase in the income tax personal allowance in the Budget.

The increase of £1,100 is worth £220 to 21 million working people – taking the total income tax cut for working people delivered over 3 years by the coalition to nearly £550 a year. Two million people will pay no income tax at all. By going ‘further and faster’ as Nick Clegg promised, we’re getting real help to millions of hard-pressed people at a time when they need …

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Opinion: All Liberal Democrats must campaign for a Federal UK

By Ross Finnie | Wed 21st March 2012 - 11:53 am

I have always supported Home Rule, involving a new constitutional settlement giving equal status to England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland and thereafter each nation would promote what each considered to be the most appropriate governance arrangements within a federal state. For Scotland that meant not just the establishment of a Scottish Parliament but the transfer of the maximum amount of legislative, administrative and financial powers consonant with being a nation within a federal state.

Like most Scottish Liberals, I supported the Party’s policy position as set out in Jenny Robinson’s 1976 pamphlet: Scottish Self-Government. I was one of the overwhelming …

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Michael Moore

Michael Moore MP’s Westminster Notes

By Michael Moore | Wed 21st March 2012 - 10:55 am

Secretary of State for Scotland Michael Moore MP writes a weekly column for newspapers in his constituency. Here’s the latest edition.

The Economy

 The economy remains the most important concern for people in my constituency and last week’s employment figures were a reminder of the challenging economic climate and that getting people into work is the UK Government’s first priority for Scotland.

We are doing all we can to get people working by laying the foundations for more sustainable growth and creating the conditions for businesses to invest in good quality jobs. By reducing corporation tax and making tough decisions on public spending …

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Caron Lindsay

Liblink: Duncan Brack on how to get green policies implemented in Government

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 21st March 2012 - 9:28 am

Until recently, Duncan Brack was Chris Huhne’s Special Adviser in the Department of Energy and Climate Change. He has written for the Green Alliance blog about the challenges of putting green policies into practice. As well as insight into the practical realities of Government, he has some interesting points to make about the importance of policy making within political parties and how it might need to change in the future:

The coalition agreement hammered out by Liberal Democrat and Conservative negotiators over five days of talks in May 2010 (with details added over the following two weeks) became, at least in

…

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Caron Lindsay

Willie Rennie showcases Scottish Liberal Democrat Councillors’ work on housing, jobs and schools

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 21st March 2012 - 8:55 am

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie recently travelled round Scotland to showcase the achievements of Scottish Liberal Democrat Councillors. Says Willie:

If you want someone to stand up for jobs and housing, schools and the environment and you want someone who will focus on your community, then the Liberal Democrats are for you. We get results.

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Tom Brooks

The Independent View: Taxing decisions – the debate between tax credits and tax allowances

By Tom Brooks | Tue 20th March 2012 - 6:55 pm

As debate ahead of the Budget rages on about the merits of tax allowances and tax credits, a CentreForum report published this week provides new, detailed analysis of both.

The media has focused on the plight of the ‘squeezed middle’, Ed Miliband wants to help the “squeezed middle” and Nick Clegg is concerned for “alarm clock Britain”. But ‘Taxing decisions: the debate between tax credits and personal allowances’ uses modelling to illustrate the implications of tax allowances more rigorously and objectively than the day-to-day analysis of Fleet Street or Westminster.

The report’s authors, Thomas Brooks and Chris Nicholson of CentreForum, and …

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Caron Lindsay

Ken Livingstone definitely needs an accountant if he can’t count to five

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 20th March 2012 - 3:57 pm

Remember last week at PMQs, Nick Clegg commented on Ken Livingstone’s rather complex tax affairs:

It is worth dwelling for a minute on the explanation provided by Ken Livingstone for his exotic tax arrangements. I quote from an interview that he gave just this weekend:

“I get loads of money, all from different sources, and I give it to an accountant and they manage it”.

That is modern socialism for you.

Well, no wonder the Labour mayoral candidate needs an accountant if he can’t even cope with numbers less than the number of fingers on one hand, as this leaflet, spotted at Lib …

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Helen Duffett

Brendan Jameson, Lib Dem leader of South Lakeland District Council, passes away

By Helen Duffett | Tue 20th March 2012 - 2:13 pm

The Westmorland Gazette has the sad news:

Deputy Prime Minister and Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg has led tributes to South Lakeland District Council leader Brendan Jameson who died suddenly aged 66.

Coun Jameson, who was also a Cumbria County and Kendal Town councillor, is believed to have died in the early hours of Monday morning after a heart attack.

Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, said: “I met Brendan many times as leader of South Lakeland District Council. He was always a true fighter on behalf of his community, making sure they were heard by Government.

“The last time I was in Kendal

…

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Mark Pack

Electoral Commission warns government over refusal to provide election freepost to Police Commissioner candidates

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th March 2012 - 12:55 pm

In the run-up to the first London Mayor election in 2000 there was a fierce stand-off between the House of Lords and the then Labour government over whether there would be a ‘freepost election address’ for the contest. This service, used for elections such as to the House of Commons and the European Parliament, provides for the free delivery of one leaflet from each candidate to each voter, providing a basic minimum level of communication to the public about the contest.

During the stand-off, the late Conrad Russell led an effective rebellion invoking rarely used Lords procedures. I remember talking to two senior peers, one Tory and one Lib Dem, as he walked down the corridor in the distance. “That’s the man the government is scared of,” one said to the other, and rightly so as the dispute threatened to derail the whole contest.

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Mark Pack

What are Britain’s millionaires actually like? Or why we should get them umbrellas

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th March 2012 - 11:25 am

With questions of taxing the richest in the news in the run-up to the Budget, some of the findings from Skandia’s latest survey of millionaires (carried out for the wealth  management industry) are of much wider interest.

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Bill le Breton

Opinion: Brand values

By Bill le Breton | Tue 20th March 2012 - 10:33 am

There have been a couple of posts recently on where campaigning ideas should come from and whether those campaigns can be directed centrally, first from Scott Hill and then from Robin McGhee And another, which I refuse to link to because it does not appear to publish comments, mocked us for our backwardness in brand management.

Campaigning and not policy is the life blood of Liberal Democrat politics. A policy however right or valuable is inanimate. A campaign establishes connections and energizes movement. That is perhaps why you cannot chose for Liberal Democrats THE campaign they should be waging in March in 2012 or in any other month for that matter. That was the lesson I learnt when an acting Chief Executive of ALDC in the late 1980s.

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David Hall-Matthews

Opinion: Why the UK should keep its promises on international aid

By David Hall-Matthews | Tue 20th March 2012 - 9:22 am

The best use of aid for International Development has been a controversial topic recently, with rows over the need for aid to India spilling onto the front pages – many of them spectacularly ill-informed on both sides. That issue is complex – but at least you can rely on Liberal Democrats to think about it carefully. In 2010, I chaired a policy working group on international Development, which argued that the UK should focus on supporting good governance, sovereignty and accountability to the poor, so that countries could move away from aid dependency. As India has all of those, we argued that aid to India could stop now. However, with more people living below the poverty line in India than the whole of Africa, the counter-argument is also strong. In the end an amendment from House of Commons International Development Select Committee Chair Malcolm Bruce, calling for aid to continue for now, was supported by conference.

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Judith Jolly

Baroness Judith Jolly writes: Why Lib Dem peers have supported an amended Health and Social Care Bill

By Judith Jolly | Tue 20th March 2012 - 7:50 am

Twenty five days of debate in the chamber of the House of Lords have now concluded on the Health and Social Care Bill. Our health team in the Lords has been involved in numerous meetings, events and correspondence discussing the Bill over the last eighteen months. We made it plain throughout the process that we could not have voted for the Bill without significant series changes that Liberal Democrats and professional organisations demanded. We believe that great care is now needed over how it is implemented in order to avoid the dangers of which many have warned and in order to restore the confidence of professionals in the NHS.

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NewsHound

House of Lords approves Health and Social Care Bill – Lord Owen is the last redoubt

By NewsHound | Mon 19th March 2012 - 10:04 pm

From PoliticsHome:

The controversial Health and Social Care Bill has been passed in the House of Lords, with a ditch attempt by Labour peers to delay its progress voted down 269 to 174.

The approval from the Upper Chamber comes after the Speaker earlier granted Labour an emergency debate in the House of Commons on the Risk Register of the NHS reforms.

This afternoon Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary Andy Burnham argued that MPs should have the opportunity to debate the Government’s ongoing refusal to publish the register.

Also this afternoon, the

…

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NewsHound

‘Quad’ finalises Budget details

By NewsHound | Mon 19th March 2012 - 6:20 pm

PoliticsHome reports:

The Prime Minister and Chancellor have held final meetings with Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Treasury Chief Secretary Danny Alexander to finalise the Budget.

Footage of the meeting of the ‘quad’ was released this afternoon amid reports that the Chancellor will scrap the 50p top rate of tax from next year and replace it with a new 45p rate.

George Osborne hopes the new rate, which will take effect from April 2013, will raise more money and encourage

…

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NewsHound

LibLink: Mark Pack – I was wrong about the Budget

By NewsHound | Mon 19th March 2012 - 5:50 pm

Writing over on his work blog, Lib Dem Voice’s Mark Pack withdraws one Budget prediction and offers us three others instead:

Cunning negotiating strategy or basic mistake? Whatever the view you have of the tax motion at Liberal Democrat conference and Stephen Williams’s speech moving it, my interpretation of it was wrong.

Far from signalling the determination of the party’s leadership to see the 50p tax rate remain, it was in fact a sideshow and the rate will go. A kind interpretation is that standing by the 50p rate so publicly was part of a negotiating strategy to extract greater concessions

…

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Mark Pack

Campaign Corner: How can we run our committee meetings better?

By Mark Pack | Mon 19th March 2012 - 3:50 pm

The Campaign Corner series looks to give three tips about commonly asked campaign issues. Do get in touch if you have any questions you would like to suggest.

Today’s Campaign Corner question: Ouch. Ouch. Ouch. Why yes, I’ve just come out of a local party campaign team meeting. Many hours, no decisions. Please help!

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Claire Tyler

Baroness Claire Tyler writes… Shining a spotlight on health inequalities

By Claire Tyler | Mon 19th March 2012 - 1:53 pm

Today is Third Reading in the Lords of the Health and Social Care Bill. That this is one of the longest, most complex and contentious piece of legislation of this Parliamentary session barely needs restating. That it is unloved in many quarters is a statement of the obvious. And of course you only have to read the many articles and threads on Lib Dem Voice about the Bill to know that views still vary widely on whether it is necessary to address the fundamental challenges faced by the NHS.

Having been a member of the Lib Dem team in the Lords – working alongside far more experienced colleagues than I – I do know that the Bill has improved out of all recognition from the Bill we received from the Commons. Of course it does not bear the hallmarks of a Bill that has come from a Lib Dem stable – because it didn’t – but that is the nature of coalition government. And whilst I fully recognise that some in the party would rather part 3 of the Bill dealing with competition didn’t exist, I think it’s necessary.

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Recent Comments

  • Meral Hussein-Ece
    A good article which highlights the problem with conference. It’s increasingly unaffordable for many, who are excluded from policy development. John is righ...
  • Chris Caswill
    John Kelly makes two important points. Party Conference is clearly over managed, and membership democracy is the regrettable victim. Time for a change. Second...
  • sean worrell
    I completely agree. The issue isn’t simply whether every member technically has the same vote. It’s whether everyone has a realistic opportunity to particip...
  • Peter Davies
    "we might as well go all-in and rejoin the EU" Everyone who opposes this already believes this is our position. Let's give those who agree with us a clear m...
  • David Warren
    This and Roderick Lynch's recent article regarding federal conference are music to my ears. We pride ourselves on being a party where members decide policy b...