Tag Archives: Danny Alexander

Alex Foster

Coalition ahoy

By Alex Foster | Tue 11th May 2010 - 11:57 pm

News trickling in that the Conservatives have offered the Liberal Democrats a coalition. The Lib Dem parliamentary party and Federal Executives, without whom a coalition cannot be ratified, are currently meeting to consider it.

There’s even talk of an emergency Special Conference this weekend which will mean conference representatives across the country pricking their ears up.

But the rolling news media are considering it a done deal already.

Amongst the headlines are that Nick Clegg will serve as Deputy Prime Minister, Danny Alexander as Secretary of State for Scotland, along with three other Lib Dems in the cabinet and a further …

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Posted in General Election | Also tagged , , , and | 98 Comments
Mark Pack

Liberal Democrat manifesto by numbers

By Mark Pack | Wed 14th April 2010 - 9:35 am

The Liberal Democrat manifesto by numbers:

  • 9 different formats for the manifesto (hard copy, video, on screen, iPhone app etc.)
  • 6 photos of Nick Clegg
  • 5 pages of index
  • 4 pages of detailed costsing
  • 4 steps to a fairer Britain
  • 3 photos of Vince Cable
  • 0 mentions of chocolate
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Posted in General Election and Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged , , , , and | 7 Comments
Mark Pack

Conservative manifesto: the Liberal Democrat reaction

By Mark Pack | Tue 13th April 2010 - 7:41 pm

Here’s the party’s line:

The Conservative manifesto is a blueprint for fake change. It is a depressing and dishonest con with a massive spending black hole at its centre, threatening an inevitable hike in VAT.

In the attached document, we detail where the Conservatives have failed to justify their promises, and why they should not be trusted with the keys to No. 10.

Commenting, Nick Clegg’s Chief of Staff, Danny Alexander said:

“The truth is that you cannot trust the Conservatives. David Cameron simply believes it is his turn to take over in the same way the two old parties have taken turns for

…

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Stephen Tall

Lib Dems on Labour’s manifesto: “Every Labour manifesto since 1997 has been full of promises they have broken”

By Stephen Tall | Mon 12th April 2010 - 3:20 pm

Here’s Lib Dem manifesto author Danny Alexander’s first take on the launch of Labour’s manifesto:

Every Labour manifesto since 1997 has been full of promises they have broken. They simply can’t be trusted to do a single thing they say. The tax system is less fair than when Labour came to power. The only party that is committed to making Britain fairer is the Liberal Democrats.”

And to support Danny’s comments, the party has today issued a report card self-explanatorily titled Labour’s Broken Promises comparing Labour’s 2001 manifesto pledges with the reality almost a decade on. Here’s what it says:

    1. Long-term economic stability – FAILED
    • Britain has suffered the longest and deepest recession since the 1930s.
    • 1.3 million jobs have been lost since the beginning of the recession.
    • Britain’s deficit for the 2010-11 financial year stands at £167bn.
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Posted in General Election | Also tagged | 2 Comments
Stephen Tall

Gordon Brown’s election pledge: I will not make the tax system fairer

By Stephen Tall | Wed 7th April 2010 - 7:25 pm

Gordon Brown has today announced one of his election pledges: Labour has no plans to make our tax system fairer. Or has he put it: Labour will hold the basic income tax rate at 20 pence in the pound.

Lib Dems, too, are committed to keeping the basic rate of income tax at 20p. But, unlike Labour, the party would make a priority of lifting the personal tax allowance to £10,000, ensuring millions of low-earners and pensioners will stop paying taxes altogether.

As Danny Alexander emphasised in an article for Left Foot Forward last week, this would cut …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 3 Comments
NewsHound

LibLink: Danny Alexander on the party’s tax policies

By NewsHound | Mon 29th March 2010 - 7:28 pm

A while back, Left Foot Forward ran a piece attacking the party’s tax policies for not being progressive. That results in many responses around the place defending the party’s policy and today Left Foot Forward runs a piece from Danny Alexander defending the party’s policy:

As the person responsible for drafting the Liberal Democrat manifesto I wanted to respond to the report on our proposal to raise the income tax threshold to £10,000 – paid for by closing loopholes that unfairly benefit the best off, a new mansion tax, a crack down on tax avoidance and

…

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Mark Pack

Why Vote … – the other books reviewed

By Mark Pack | Mon 22nd March 2010 - 11:15 am

I’ve already reviewed two of the titles in the new seven book series from biteback: Why Vote Liberal Democrat and Why Vote. But what to make of the other fives titles – covers Labour, Conservative, Green, SNP and Plaid? (Although a UKIP book was also publicised, it never got published as UKIP failed to produce the necessary copy.)

Both the Labour and Conservative books are ‘unofficial’ in the sense that they are by prominent party members, but ones who have no official role in the party’s policy or campaigning decisions – Rachel Reeves, Labour …

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Posted in Books | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , and | 1 Comment
Stephen Tall

Daily View 2×2: 15 March 2010

By Stephen Tall | Mon 15th March 2010 - 10:15 am

Happy Monday morning, everyone, and welcome to the Ides of March edition of the Daily View. (I hope David Cameron is watching his back: the Tories don’t do loyalty).

Alongside the assasination of Julius Caesar today marks the anniversary of the first Test cricket match between England and Australia (1877); the registration of the first internet domain name, symbolics.com, 25 years ago; and the 70th birthday of Frank Dobson. O frabjous day!

2 Must-Read Blog Posts

What are other Liberal Democrat bloggers saying? Here are two posts that have caught the eye from the Liberal Democrat Blogs aggregator:

…

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Posted in Conference and Daily View | Also tagged , and | 1 Comment
Alex Foster

Lib Dems and the #debill

By Alex Foster | Sun 14th March 2010 - 11:58 am

I don’t want to be excessively partisan, but for the second time this weekend at conference, I’m getting a really good feeling about the Liberal Democrats.

The first was when we heard that a senior, experienced MEP thought our party was the best way forward.

But the second has been our response to the Digital Economy Bill and a huge online campaign from internet activists within the party and of no party.

Yes, it’s true that our team in the Lords invited the anger of the online activist fraternity. A lot of resentment has been brewing about the Digital Economy Bill as a …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 6 Comments
Mark Pack

Digital Economy Bill debate: what’s set to happen tomorrow?

By Mark Pack | Sat 13th March 2010 - 7:21 pm

The story so far:

  • Emergency motion on the Digital Economy Bill submitted (see full text on Bridget Fox’s blog)
  • Federal Conference Committee treat it fairly generously – as emergency motions do not normally get into the territory of drawing up significant new party policy (because, by their nature, the wording is only published at the last moment and so people have little time to debate over it, draw up alternatives etc.).
  • There are two emergency motions but only a slot to debate one of them – so conference voted this morning on which to debate tomorrow. Digital Economy Bill motion wins that

…

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Posted in Conference and Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged | 3 Comments
Mark Pack

“If you want change, vote for the only party that will bring about change”

By Mark Pack | Sat 13th March 2010 - 11:24 am

That was the message of Danny Alexander’s speech to the Liberal Democrat spring conference this morning. Change – but not just any sort of change:

Two ideas will dominate this election campaign: change and fairness. Only one party is arguing at this election for both fairness and change: the Liberal Democrats.

Change: because business as usual is not the answer to the economic, political, and environmental crises that we face.

Fairness: because too many people in our society are still held back because of the circumstances of their birth, their sex or their parent’s bank balance.

He repeated a now often said promise to …

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Mark Pack

Danny Alexander commits party to seeking further changes to Digital Economy Bill

By Mark Pack | Sat 13th March 2010 - 9:34 am

Speaking at the Liberal Democrat spring conference this morning, Danny Alexander MP (Vice Chair of the Federal Policy Committee and chair of the party’s General Election Manifesto Group) said the party will seek to make further changes to the Digital Economy Bill when it comes to the Commons.

The Bill, currently passing through the Lords, has been the subject of much debate (such as here and here) and yesterday Liberal Democrat peers announced plans to table further amendments to the bill.

This morning Danny Alexander committed the party to supporting further changes to the Digital Economy Bill, saying:

There is

…

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Posted in Conference and Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged | 18 Comments
Mark Pack

Why vote Liberal Democrat? Book review

By Mark Pack | Sun 7th March 2010 - 7:00 pm

If you go to Amazon searching for “Why vote Liberal Democrat?”, edited by Danny Alexander and just published  by Biteback, you may be surprised to find yourself being presented instead with a book of the same title from 1997, written by William Wallace. The new book is misfiled by Amazon under the title “Why vote Lib Dem?” but actually the 1997 volume provides an interesting contrast with the 2010 version.

The 2010 book is one of a series, covering also Labour, Conservatives, SNP, Plaid and the Greens. All the others are single person authored books (with the exception of …

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Posted in Books, General Election and Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , and | 19 Comments
Baroness Ros Scott

Ros Scott writes … Party President’s report to members, January ’10

By Baroness Ros Scott | Tue 2nd February 2010 - 8:15 pm

In the two months since my last report, the election campaign has started in all but name.

After a phenomenal amount of work by the manifesto team – led by Danny Alexander, the party’s policy unit headed by Christian Moon, and the Federal Policy Committee – we have now established the broad outlines of our campaign:

  • Reform of the tax system to create a fairer base,
  • introducing the pupil premium to give all children a fairer start in life,
  • creating sustainable housing and jobs and
  • political reform to bring in a fairer voting system, and

…

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Posted in Op-eds and Party Presidency | Also tagged , , , , , , , , , and | 1 Comment
Mark Pack

General election manifesto update

By Mark Pack | Thu 21st January 2010 - 12:20 pm

In the three months since I last blogged at length about the Liberal Democrat general election manifesto process, Danny Alexander (chair of the Manifesto Working Group) has won widespread praise for restoring a sense of peace, sense and order after the events around the party’s autumn conference.

On the two major flash points – mansion tax and tuition fees – hostilities have ceased and proposals been modified to win widespread support within the party. Tuition fees are still due to be scrapped, but over a longer timescale, and mansions are still due to be taxed, but with a narrower definition …

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Posted in General Election and Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged , and | 5 Comments
Mark Pack

The inside story of how the Lib Dem general election manifesto will be drawn up

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th October 2009 - 12:20 pm

The debates and disputes around the Liberal Democrats’ Bournemouth conference give a taste of what is likely to be a tricky process of drawing up the party’s manifesto for the next general election.

Formally, there is a three part process to that manifesto: the manifesto working group chaired by Danny Alexander will present work to the Shadow Cabinet which will then in turn (quite possibly amended) go to the Federal Policy Committee (FPC).

How will this process work and who will the key people be in drawing up the manifesto?

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Posted in Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged , , , , , , , and | 10 Comments
Mark Pack

David Cameron’s speech: Danny Alexander responds

By Mark Pack | Thu 8th October 2009 - 10:35 pm

Here’s what Danny has to say (and interesting to note that he’s being deployed as the Lib Dem person to attack the other parties, not Nick Clegg or Vince Cable):

This speech demonstrates the huge gulf between the sunny rhetoric of David Cameron and the grim reality of Tory policy.

The Tories claim to be honest on spending, but their proposals barely scratch the surface.

They claim they can fix the country’s finances, but their plans are economically illiterate. Cutting spending now would plunge us back into recession.

They claim to care about the poorest, but will only slash taxes for millionaires.

They expect to have the keys to Downing Street handed to them, but at a time of crisis they have the wrong solutions and the wrong priorities.

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Posted in News | Also tagged | 9 Comments
Stephen Tall

Gordon’s speech – Danny Alexander responds (and so do I) #lab09

By Stephen Tall | Tue 29th September 2009 - 6:50 pm

Gordon Brown delivered his speech to the Labour Party’s conference in Brighton today – you can read it in full here, or watch it here.

For the Lib Dems, Nick Clegg’s chief-of-staff Danny Alexander has issued the following response:

Gordon Brown’s speech showed just how tired and bereft of new thinking the Labour Party is. His new announcements were a hotchpotch of the ineffective and the ill-thought through, rehashed press releases, copied ideas and humiliating U-turns.

“The fact is Gordon Brown has presided over a huge and widening gap between the richest and the poorest, he has failed a generation

…

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Posted in News | Also tagged and | 4 Comments
Danny Alexander MP

The Tories are not a progressive party

By Danny Alexander MP | Fri 18th September 2009 - 8:56 pm

It’s little wonder Eric Pickles is trying to persuade Liberal Democrats to vote for him; we’ve been winning council seats off the Conservatives in his constituency and he’s obviously rattled.

The Tory Chairman says liberal democracy is “part of the Conservative family”, but I’m certain I’m no part of his family. His flawed view of history is matched only by his arrogance in assuming that he’s got the General Election in the bag and can now order people to vote for him.

Let’s remember, the Conservatives are the party that opposed social welfare in 1909 and the creation of the NHS forty …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 6 Comments
Alex Foster

David’s paucity of ambition

By Alex Foster | Tue 8th September 2009 - 2:06 pm

David Cameron is talking this lunchtime, the news tells us, of his plans to reform Parliament by removing subsidised meals and shaving 5% off the pay of ministers.

Danny Alexander MP, Chief of Staff to the Leader of the Liberal Democrats is a) unimpressed and b) unfamiliar with the concept of run-on sentences:

There is a good argument to be made for cutting the cost of politics, the Liberal Democrats have proposed reducing the number of MPs by 150, but if the Conservatives seriously hope to convince people they are fit to govern it is time they stopped dodging

…

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , and | 12 Comments
Helen Duffett

Liberal Democrat General Election Team announced

By Helen Duffett | Wed 5th August 2009 - 3:27 pm

Nick Clegg has announced today the team that will advise him on strategy, resources and communications, as well as the planning and delivery of the Lib Dems’ General Election strategy.

From the Liberal Democrats’ website:

Nick Clegg said:

“I am delighted to announce the team that will lead the planning and delivery of our General Election campaign.

“I have asked John Sharkey, my adviser on Strategic Communications and the former MD of Saatchi’s, to Chair the Campaign, supported by Andrew Stunell MP as Vice Chair.

“John’s extensive experience managing major communications businesses combined with Andrew’s campaigning expertise will be a formidable combination steering the

…

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Posted in General Election and News | Also tagged , , , , and | 31 Comments
James Graham

Where drinking meets thinking…

By James Graham | Thu 15th January 2009 - 2:02 pm

The Liberal Democrats have recently kickstarted the process for its next general election manifesto – which might be needed at any time between June 2009 and May 2010. Chaired by Danny Alexander MP, the process kicks off formally this weekend with a one day conference taking place at the London School of Economics.

2009 marks the centenary of the People’s Budget and the 101st anniversary of the Pensions Act (effectively the birth of the welfare state). With this in mind, the team behind Reinventing the State, a series of essays published in 2007  are keen …

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Posted in Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged and | 11 Comments
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