Tag Archives: featured

Mark Pack

How much chocolate can you put on a gingerbread man before he becomes standard-rated for VAT?

By Mark Pack | Mon 30th April 2012 - 8:25 am

You may not have considered this question before, so I’ll give you a little time to ponder it.

So, got your answer?

Here’s the official one from HMRC: standard-rate VAT applies to “Gingerbread men decorated with chocolate unless this amounts to no more than a couple of dots for eyes”.

But, but, but… what if the eyes are not chocolate and instead the gingerbread man has a couple of chocolate buttons instead? And what if, hurtling dangerously out of the 19th century, the gingerbread man is actually a gingerbread …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , and | 30 Comments
Mark Pack

The Interception of Communications Commissioner has failed

By Mark Pack | Fri 27th April 2012 - 10:25 am

I’ve been reading through all the annual reports issues by the Interception of Communications Commissioner since the passage of Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000. He is meant to make sure that the powers granted to public bodies under RIPA to intercept our communications are being used correctly.

The annual reports are not a pretty read, especially when set against a modicum of knowledge about the outside world during the years the reports cover. Consider the following.

1. No scrutiny of the costs system

First, under RIPA there is provision for the government to pay communication service providers costs for meeting the …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , and | 2 Comments
Mark Pack

Barry Norman on life as film critic and a liberal

By Mark Pack | Thu 26th April 2012 - 10:25 am

For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested parties, Lib Dem Voice will be running a selection of his write-ups of interviews from over the years. The first is with broadcaster, writer and Liberal Democrat, Barry Norman from 2003.

For British cinemagoers Barry Norman is the personification of film. For twenty-six years, with only a brief break in ‘81/’82 when he fronted ‘Omnibus’ for the BBC, he was the authentic voice …

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Stephen Tall

I would have sacked Vince Cable for standing up to Murdoch – what Ed Miliband said 16 months ago

By Stephen Tall | Tue 24th April 2012 - 3:53 pm

Ed Miliband The SunJeremy Hunt is in hot water today following the revelations at the Leveson Inquiry of the closeness of his relationship with the Murdochs during their attempted takeover of BSkyB.

The culture secretary was handed quasi-judicial responsibility for handling the deal after Lib Dem business secretary Vince Cable was snared by the Telegraph declaring war on the Murdoch empire before it became fashionable.

According to the Guardian, the Labour party ‘is likely to demand an urgent Commons statement from Hunt to set out the nature of …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , , and | 47 Comments
Stephen Tall

Psst! Whatever you do, don’t tell the Tories democratic reform is in their own best interests

By Stephen Tall | Mon 23rd April 2012 - 10:45 am

A few weeks ago I wrote an article for Conservative Home offering some unsolicited advice to David Cameron’s party. I argued that a party that had achieved electoral success in the 1980s by appealing to the classless entrepreneurialism of aspirant ‘Middle England’ had once again become established in the electorate’s eyes as the party of established wealth and privilege. If the Tories want to regain the voters they have lost, they need to take drastic action to counter that view.

Reform of the House of Lords was one policy area I said the Tories should seek to make their …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , and | 9 Comments
Stephen Tall

The past month shows this Government urgently needs a Coalition 2.0 Agreement

By Stephen Tall | Sun 22nd April 2012 - 2:10 pm

We’re fast approaching the two-year mark of this first post-war Coalition Government, and I think it’s fair to say the strains are starting to show. It is inevitable there will be tensions when two parties — with different traditions, values, expectations — come together to try and govern a country at a time of economic torpor.

Until now, a lid has more or less been kept on the inter-party warfare, not least thanks to the determinedly tight-knit fastness of the dual leadership of Messrs Clegg and Cameron. But that lid is now starting to shake as the pressure builds within and between both parties.

Coalition: making friends of enemies, and enemies of friends

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , and | 30 Comments
Stephen Tall

The Tories’ and Labour’s collective tax omnishambles

By Stephen Tall | Wed 18th April 2012 - 8:55 pm

Labour is against reducing the 50p top-rate tax to 45p for those earning more than £150,000. What could be clearer? As it happens, quite a lot could be clearer.

First, the omnishambles…

Given how widely predicted George Osborne’s decision to reduce the top-rate was you would have thought Labour would have anticipated it and worked out their line. They failed to — as Mark Pack noted here, Labour’s Shadow Business Secretary Chuka Umunna contradicted himself within 24 hours, while Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls declined to declare his hand.

When Labour did …

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Stephen Tall

Avant le déluge: If you want to follow the French presidential elections…

By Stephen Tall | Sun 15th April 2012 - 10:25 am

The UK is approximately 3687 miles from the United States of America, and separated by an ocean. The UK is approximately 22 miles away from France, and separated by a channel.

Yet there has already been more coverage expended on the race for the Republican nomination than there has been on the battle to become President of France. The White House trumps the Élysée Palace every time in the mind of the media even though France is closer and the result is more likely to impact directly on the UK.

However, …

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Posted in Europe / International | Also tagged , , and | 7 Comments
Mark Pack

Winston Churchill: Tory or Liberal?

By Mark Pack | Sat 14th April 2012 - 11:50 am

Winston Churchill“I am an English Liberal. I hate the Tory Party, their men, their words and their methods.” So said Winston Churchill in 1903.

As a Liberal, Churchill held high government office and, along with Lloyd George, was regarded as one of the driving forces of Asquith’s reforming administration. Was Liberalism his true political ideology? Or should we judge his position from his re-ratting in 1924 and his long association and later leadership of the Conservatives?

Those were the questions posed in the latest Liberal Democrat History Group meeting, held at the party’s spring conference. In case you were not at conference, or were there but not able to make it into the standing room only venue!, you can now watch the meeting online:

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Posted in Lib Dem TV | Also tagged and | 15 Comments
Lynne Featherstone

Lynne Featherstone writes… Banning, or rather not banning, crosses at work

By Lynne Featherstone | Fri 13th April 2012 - 9:50 am

Home Office minister Lynne Featherstone writes a monthly column for one of her local newspapers. Here is the latest one, looking at the legal action over people wearing crosses at work.

I was walking down Crescent Road in my constituency the other day when a woman came up to me and said something to the effect of, ‘I think you are a fantastic MP – but I am so upset that you are banning people from wearing the cross’.

So – from the mischievous misinformation from the pages of our print …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged | 28 Comments
Stephen Tall

A question for the Coalition: Would Lib Dems and Tories support the Charity Tax if Labour had proposed it?

By Stephen Tall | Fri 13th April 2012 - 8:05 am

One of the aspects of the furore over the Coalition’s Charity Tax that has struck me is that charity is a more divisive issue than I’d realised.

Those of us who work in the charity sector probably take for granted that our organisations provide a public good, that the aggregated generosity of donors and the endeavours of staff make for a better society. That’s probably a majority view among the wider public, but it clearly isn’t a universal attitude.

Look at the reader comments on major news …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , and | 23 Comments
Mark Pack

Free schools: what should the party’s policy be in 2015?

By Mark Pack | Thu 12th April 2012 - 11:25 am

An empty classroomNews that the National Autistic Society is planning to set up a free school highlights an impending policy dilemma. Currently, the party’s policy is officially one of opposition to free schools. However if, by the time of the 2015 general election, free schools started by popular and worthy organisations such as the National Autistic Society are up and running, would it be either sensible education policy or practical politics simply to say, ‘we don’t like free schools; they have got to go’?

A different option would be …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 59 Comments
Stephen Tall

Labour’s not-so-very-local election broadcast shows how unimportant local decision-making is to Ed Miliband’s party

By Stephen Tall | Wed 11th April 2012 - 7:58 pm

Tonight’s Labour local election broadcast, starring telly’s very own Lord (Robert) Winston, climaxes with the rallying cry:

On Thursday May 3rd, vote NHS, vote Labour

Exactly how voting Labour then will help the NHS isn’t explored — not surprisingly, because it won’t. There’s a reason these elections are called local elections, after all.

Before highlighting Labour’s misleading tactics I thought I should first check out the Lib Dem record on fighting local elections. I have to say I was expecting to find comparable examples, times when the party leadership had called …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , , , and | 23 Comments
Mark Pack

Campaign Corner: Good luck

By Mark Pack | Mon 9th April 2012 - 3:50 pm

Thank you to everyone who has read, commented on or contributed ideas for the Campaign Corner series over the last 25 weeks. With this final post, it’ll have been going for six months and now, with people in full flight campaigning for May’s elections, is a good moment to bring it to an end.

If you are putting some of that advice to the test in May, and especially if you’re a Liberal Democrat!, best of luck and I hope it helps.

(If you’re not a Liberal Democrat by all means do follow the main themes of the advice: the public hate …

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Stephen Tall

Mary Ann Sieghart socks it to Quentin Letts for his “witheringly misogynistic” assault on Lynne Featherstone

By Stephen Tall | Mon 9th April 2012 - 1:55 pm

I try as hard as possible not to link to the Daily Mail — it’s my small and admittedly token gesture not to encourage them. And Quentin Letts is the Mail at its most unpleasantly execrable, slavering to stick his pen-knife into anyone he cares to disdain, especially if they’re female or have a funny accent or some other personal tic to pick on.

Last week, he laid into Lib Dem equalities minister Lynne Featherstone. It was classic play-the-woman-I’ve-got-no-balls Letts:

Though aged 60 (and counting), she teeters up to the Despatch Box in high heels, grinning girlishly at the Opposition benches before

…

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 21 Comments
The Voice

Tim Farron replies to Lib Dem members’ letter: “Britain must be more liberal and free as a result of Liberal Democrats in power, not less”

By The Voice | Fri 6th April 2012 - 6:00 pm

Earlier this afternoon, Lib Dem Voice published An open letter to Lib Dem party president, Tim Farron: Concerns over our liberal identity and mission in government following recent suggestions the government would seek to increase the authorities’ web surveillance powers. Signed by more than 150 Lib Dem members (with many more adding their names in the comments thread) it urged the party’s ministers “to heed our call – block these illiberal proposals and lead the charge for reform of RIPA to ensure our citizens enjoy the fair, free and open society we seek to build and safeguard.”

Tim Farron has sent us this response:

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Posted in News | Also tagged and | 32 Comments
Stephen Tall

Time for Nick Clegg and the Coalition to see sense and stop the ‘Charity Tax’

By Stephen Tall | Wed 4th April 2012 - 9:15 am

This year’s budget was, in general, a good one for Lib Dems. Most notably, the party’s number one priority of taking more low-paid workers out of tax was fast-tracked, while the controversies, and specifically the cut in the 50p top-rate at a time when pensioners’ tax allowances are being frozen, have hit their Tory backers’ support in the polls.

However, there is one lesser noticed and malign Budget change, the ‘Charity Tax’ — a cap on tax relief which threatens to cost the charitable sector hundreds of millions of pounds — which has not attracted mainstream media attention. That needs to change if the Coalition is to be talked down from a policy with Lib Dem fingerprints on it, and which will undermine philanthropic giving at a time when it is needed more than ever during the public funding squeeze.

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Mark Pack

The wheels are coming off the online monitoring bandwagon (UPDATED)

By Mark Pack | Tue 3rd April 2012 - 8:58 pm

Item one: A letter tomorrow in The Guardian from 15 Liberal Democrat MPs setting out their opposition to illiberal monitoring plans.

Item two: More Conservative MPs joining with David Davis in speaking out against widespread online monitoring, such as Jacob Rees-Mogg.

Item three: The Times reporting, Cameron forced to retreat on snooping powers .

Item four: a subtle, but significant, choice of words by Nick Clegg in a media interview this lunchtime presaging a major change of course from the story given to the Sunday Times at the weekend. Clegg signalled (as does The Times report) that the Queen’s Speech will not include a Bill …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , , and | 19 Comments
Mark Pack

Campaign Corner: How do we recruit more members?

By Mark Pack | Mon 2nd April 2012 - 3:20 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: How do we recruit more members?

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Posted in Campaign Corner | 7 Comments
Mark Pack

Gurkha: The true story of a campaign for justice by Peter Carroll

By Mark Pack | Fri 30th March 2012 - 4:05 pm

The Gurkha Justice campaign, seeking to give those who had served in the British army the right to settle in Britain afterwards, is a classic and heartwarming story of how a small number of people can bring justice and joy to many.

For many years Gurkhas and others had raised the injustice of ex-soldiers being told ‘thank you for your bravery, now go and live elsewhere’. It was, however, only when Peter Carroll got involved that an effective campaign really started to take shape and then took off after a chance remark from a passing member of the public tipped him off to Joanna Lumley’s potential backing.

As Peter Carroll puts it in this account of the campaign:

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Stephen Tall

Bradford West by-election: 5 initial thoughts on an astonishing result

By Stephen Tall | Fri 30th March 2012 - 9:45 am

Here are some inital reflections on George Galloway’s stunning by-election win in Bradford West…

Devastating for Labour…

It is not simply the fact that Labour lost a seat they’ve held at every election since 1974. It is not simply the fact that they’ve become the first opposition party since William Hague’s Tories at Romsey 12 years ago to lose a by-election. It is not simply the fact that Labour must have thought they’d enjoyed a good fortnight in which the Tories have been given a good pasting. It is not simply the fact that this by-election suggests Labour’s current national lead …

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Posted in Op-eds and Parliamentary by-elections | Also tagged , and | 53 Comments
Mark Pack

The curious case of Ian Liddell-Grainger and the personal data

By Mark Pack | Thu 29th March 2012 - 8:50 am

The website for Ian Liddell-Grainger, Conservative MP for Bridgwater, is probably the only website for a British Parliamentary to be blessed with a prominent animated cat on its front page. It invites you to click on a link to read Mogg-the-Blog, where a rather darker set of content awaits than the amateurish layout and intensive wall of block capitals on the website’s front page.

In the blog, or rather to give it the full title Mogg-the-Blog, is a series of posts documenting the falling out between Ian Liddell-Grainger and a member of the public. An MP and a member of …

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Posted in News | Also tagged | 15 Comments
Mark Pack

Some thought-provoking reminders of our liberal history

By Mark Pack | Wed 28th March 2012 - 10:25 am

Alex Wilcock and I penned this list of six things* to remember for Liberal Democrat News, the party’s weekly newspaper:

Paddy Ashdown once admitted to under-estimating the importance of a party’s history: “A political party is about more than plans and priorities and policies… It also has a heart and a history and a soul”.

Yet there is no “history of the party” training session for the keen Conference representative nor history briefings for new members. So here are six snippets from the party’s history to entertain, elucidate and illustrate our heart and soul in ways that should still strike a note today.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged and | 17 Comments
Stephen Tall

In defence of Tim Farron: 3 liberal reasons to stick up for him

By Stephen Tall | Tue 27th March 2012 - 11:50 am

Lib Dem party president Tim Farron has caused something of a storm within the party by co-signing a letter in his capacity as Vice Chair of the ‘Christians in Parliament’ group urging the Advertising Standards Authority to withdraw their ruling “that the Healing On The Streets ministry in Bath are no longer able to claim, in their advertising, that God can heal people from medical conditions.” The controversy is easy to understand, as it pits two tenets of liberalism against each other: free speech and rational scepticism.

Personally, I am very happy to defend Tim Farron’s stance. Here’s three …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged and | 85 Comments
Mark Pack

Campaign Corner: How can we talk more policy?

By Mark Pack | Mon 26th March 2012 - 4:24 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: A strange question perhaps, but we seem to spend all the time in my local party talking about campaigning and never about policy. Maybe that didn’t matter in opposition, but it certainly matters in government! How can we get a better balance?

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Posted in Campaign Corner | Also tagged | 2 Comments
Stephen Tall

6 essential steps to help clean up the reputation of British politics

By Stephen Tall | Mon 26th March 2012 - 9:15 am

We’ve been here before: many times, under many different governments. The latest addition to the lexicon of big money politics scandals is Peter Cruddas’s crude cash-for-access fundraising, with influence on government policy touted for £250,000 a pop. Under Labour, we witnessed the Bernie Ecclestone affair, as well as the cash-for-honours scandal.

To date this shared complicity — the “all parties are as bad as each other” mentality — has served only the interests of senior politicians in justifying the continuing scandal of how big money talks …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , and | 31 Comments
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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Posted in Op-eds | 28 Comments
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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Posted in News | 4 Comments
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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Posted in Campaign Corner | 3 Comments
Stephen Tall

Time for the Lib Dems to blow the final whistle on national wage settlements

By Stephen Tall | Sun 18th March 2012 - 2:25 pm

It’s over 50 years since the campaign by Jimmy Hill, then chairman of the Professional Footballers’ Association, successfully scrapped the maximum wage which operated throughout the football league until 1961. Some probably lament the commercialisation of the game which it set in motion. But the idea that individuals should have a ceiling placed on their wage-earning potential by the authorities seems quaintly absurd today.

Except in the public sector. If you’re paid by the government — if, for example, you work in schools, colleges and universities, or the civil service and local government — then your wages are defined by national pay rates determined by Whitehall and trade union negotiations. It doesn’t matter which part of the country you work, you operate within that centrally-set national pay framework. It is as quaint and as absurd as the wage rules of football were half a century ago.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , and | 97 Comments
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