One of the questions that ambitious politicians often struggle to answer safely is, “Do you want to be leader of your party / Prime Minister?” Answer ‘yes’ in some form and journalists will line up to write stories about party splits, pending leadership challenges and the like. Answer ‘no’ and many will not believe you – whilst also quietly filing away the answer to quote back at the politician at an embarrassing later date.
The Bigger Book of Boris (an expanded version of the earlier Little Book of Boris) shows Boris Johnson’s political skill with humour in his answer to this question. …
Any Conservative, including Iain Dale who attends the Liberal Democrat conference, remarks how impressed they are with the mere fact the conference is where party members openly and robustly confer on policy. The exhibition stands at the Liberal Democrat conference include dozens of party groups as well as the recent deluge of large companies and organisations desperate to suck up to the party they’ve proudly ignored until now. The agenda for conference is focused on policy papers with speeches for and against where the party leadership will frequently get involved in the
In what has become a regular of party conference season, the Daily Telegraph has published a list of the 50 most influential Liberal Democrats assembled by “Iain Dale, Brian Brivati and a team of Liberal Democrat insiders”:
As one MP put it, the year has been “about the rise of the left”. Confidence in the party outside Westminster has grown even as polling numbers remained minimal. Liberal Democrats seem to have discovered that even in government the world does not end if you disagree. And this has given rise to a new breed of rebel, personified in Tim Fallon, Lib
Iain Dale returns to his evening show on London’s LBC radio tonight with a Lib Dem special. First up is a live Q & A with deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, followed by interviews with a whole host of prominent Lib Dems, including three of the four London Mayoral hopefuls as well as deputy leader Simon Hughes.
6-7pm Live Q & A with LibDem leader Nick Clegg
7-7.30pm Interview with Nick Clegg (tbc)
7.30-8pm Reaction to Clegg with Lord Oakeshott, Susan Kramer & Jo Phillips
8-9pm Meet the LibDem London Mayoral Candidates – Brian Paddick, Brian
When LibDem MPs return to Westminster this week they could be forgiven for having a collective panic attack. In their 22 year history they have never had such an onslaught of the political heebie-jeebies as they experienced at the hands of 12 million grumpy voters this week.
Cleggmania has turned into Cleggophobia. Every policy Nick Clegg touches now is seen to be toxic.
Westminster pundits are already writing him off as a political busted flush. But then again, these are the very same commentators who didn’t see the SNP landslide coming in Scotland. They are the same people who predicted the Tories …
By Stephen Tall
| Tue 21st September 2010 - 4:58 pm
Yesterday we reported the Telegraph’s list of numbers 26 to 50 in their annual list of ‘influential Lib Dems’, as devised by Iain Dale, Brian Brivati “with the help of a panel of senior Lib Dems”. Today we find out who they placed top of the pile…
The least surprising news is that Nick Clegg reclaims his place as the Number 1 most influential Lib Dem. Indeed it shows the limit of such lists that last year he was mischievously relegated to the runners-up spot, behind Vince Cable — of course no one could have predicted ‘Cleggmania’ at that stage, …
By Stephen Tall
| Mon 20th September 2010 - 7:55 pm
Iain Dale and Brian Brivati have once again compiled for the Telegraph the list of 50 most influential Lib Dems, and today saw the publication of part one, covering numbers 26 to 50.
At 50 is leader of the Welsh Lib Dems, Kirsty Williams; while propping up today’s list — just outside the top 25 — is Nick Clegg’s special advisor, Richard Reeves, the former head of think-tank Demos. There are a number of new entries, many of them MPs who now find themselves government ministers, including Andrew Stunell (28), Nick Harvey (32), David Heath (33), Tim Farron (34), Lord …
By Stephen Tall
| Mon 6th September 2010 - 6:32 pm
It’s two months since Total Politics asked blog-readers to vote for their Top 10 favourite blogs in their annual survey promoted here on LDV, as well as at LabourList and Iain Dale’s Diary. More than 2,200 people voted, and here is the full list of the Top 75 Lib Dem blogs according to the voters of Total Politics:
That’s a shame because there’s a sensible debate to be had – with Lib Dems being the first to admit that the Alternative Vote system isn’t the best of all possible options, though most would rate it as a great improvement on what we have now.
Dale writes
There’s a reason only one other country in the world uses AV. It’s a half way house. It tries to be a PR equivalent of the First Past the Post system, but in reality
When Iain Dale asked if Lib Dem Voice would once again co-sponsor Total Politics’ Best Blog Poll 2010, he also set me some homework: to write c.1,500 words on ‘the State of the LibDem blogosphere’ by the end of the month. As you will see from the date, my deadline is fast approaching.
I’ve got a few ideas of what I intend to write, but I’d greatly appreciate the assistence of Lib Dem Voice readers – as well as Lib Dem bloggers – to ensure my analysis is suitably rounded and informed. I’ve come up with seven questions I …
Iain Dale is rather keen to make it clear why he sees nothing wrong with accepting paranoid Euroscepticism at face value. Here’s his piece on the wild rumours that the EU hopes to ban selling eggs by the dozen.
I was looking at some of the comments in response to his post, and I don’t think they’re being fair to Iain. Just because he could have looked at a packet of eggs in his fridge and found the information in question is already on the packaging hardly means we should expect such extensive research from him before posting.
It’s that time of year again, when Total Politics asks you to vote for your Top 10 favourite blogs. This is the fifth year of the poll. The votes will be compiled and included in the forthcoming book, the Total Politics Guide to Blogging 2010-11, which will be published in September. For the second year running, the poll is being promoted/sponsored by LabourList, LibDemVoice and Iain Dale’s Diary.
The rules are simple.
1. You must vote for your ten favourite blogs and ranks …
The Yoosk website recently put together a panel of bloggers to answer questions about the impact of the internet, and social media in particular, on British politics. Alongside Iain Dale, Alex Smith and James Evans I answered a range of questions:
Iain Dale quite rightly has queried why the prospect of Labour finishing third in the popular share of the vote isn’t a big story being talked about in the media.
But actually Iain is too kind to Labour.
Because the voting abyss Labour is teetering on the edge of is more than simply coming third. More than simply doing worse than Michael Foot. It’s on the verge of its worst share of the vote since 1918.
In 1983 Labour scored 28.3% and in 1918 it was 22.2%. (Both of these are figures for Great Britain, i.e. excluding Northern Ireland, as that’s the …
Now the dust is starting to settle after the first debate, who are the winners and losers – aside from the party leaders?
Winner – liberalism
Loser – hostility to foreigners
Praising some aspects of immigration, talking about no like-for-like replacement of Trident, pledging to scrap tuition fees, promising to cut taxes for most by raising taxes for the very rich – Nick Clegg won the debate not by abandoning policies for some mushy middle ground, but by sticking to core liberal beliefs. Those beliefs were carefully wrapped in language and arguments designed to be appeal to a wide audience – but …
I’ve been amused to see the rush-to-rubbish Vince Cable today among some right-wing bloggers following his appearance on BBC1’s The Politics Show.
Iain Dale (but of course) was first up to tweet: “Well done Jon Sopel for finally exposing Vince Cable as the overrated flipflopper that he is.” He was soon followed by ConservativeHome’s Tim Montgomerie, and Wall Street Journal’s Iain Martin, who has a pet-obsession with Vince’s popularity.
Having missed the show at lunchtime, I sat down nervously to catch up on iPlayer (Vince’s inteview begins about 3 minutes in) fully expecting him to be eviscerated by Jon Sopel.
In fact, what I watched was a robust interview in which Vince more than held his own, and made the key points that (1) the Labservatives have consistently opposed Lib Dem attempts to clean up our politics, and (2) the Tories need to explain how they’re going to fund their various tax-cuts if not through raising VAT.
Why have the Tories got it in for Vince?
Which left me wondering: what got Iain, Tim and Iain so excited that they dashed into the twitblogosphere to try and swing the media narrative against Vince? (Besides the inevitable election-time partisan point-scoring, that is).
Yes, it’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for: David Cameron’s bewildered, stumbling, confused, squirming, befuddled, painful TV interview with broadcaster Martin Popplewell is now available to view on YouTube – over 17,000 people have watched it to date.
The Tory blogger Iain Dale loyally attempted to gloss over Mr Cameron’s dire performance, desperately claiming “I think the inherent problem with the interview was that Cameron didn’t know if he was giving a print interview or a film interview”. Sure thing, Iain – I can see exactly how the confusion arose. After all which senior politician hasn’t wondered, when being interviewed two metres away from a three-person camera crew, “Is this being filmed?”
And Paul Staines’ right-wing Guido Fawkes blog decided to ignore it altogether. Quite right, Paul: much better to devote yourself to your forlorn campaign to persuade people Vince Cable doesn’t understand economics. Good luck with that one – I think your crusade has a way to go.
For those who haven’t yet seen it, then, here is the footage of David Cameron going into meltdown in front of the TV cameras:
Labour MP Tom Harris, bless him, is clearly feeling a little bit insecure, as the Lib Dems enjoy a successful conference with a spring in their step and the full glare of the media spotlight. Tom’s blog is a good, fun read – but like his Tory equivalent Iain Dale, he has a bit of a tribal blind spot when it comes to the Lib Dems.
Here’s what Tom has to say about Lib Dem shadow schools secretary David Laws declining to take the media bait asking whether the party would back Labour or the Tories in the …
If you’ve read Iain’s post about Anna Arrowsmith “The LibDem Candidate Who Supports Labour” there’s one little detail you won’t have seen. The shocking piece of text saying that Anna Arrrowsmith supports Labour is … six years old. Yes verily, it’s shocking news that the party has selected as a candidate someone who was a Labour supporter six years ago 🙂
Slightly out of character (!), Iain Dale initially missed a chance to put the boot into Labour in his recent post about Labour’s leaflet printing arrangements. Iain went (at first) for the “this could mean we’re about to have a snap election” line, and only really getting to the real story in a subsequent update.
That’s because what the email about Labour’s leaflet arrangements really tells us is that lots of Labour candidates had finalised key parts of their general election artwork, but now Labour is getting a new slogan and they are having to redo their artwork. In other …
By Stephen Tall
| Mon 14th December 2009 - 9:30 am
Mornin’ all, welcome to Monday, and to the beginning of the last full working week before Christmas. What other things happened on this day in history, you ask? Well, 54 years ago, Hugh Gaitskell was elected leader of the Labour party, succeeding Clement Attlee, and six years ago Saddam Hussein was captured. But enough of the past, and on to the present …
2 Must-Read Blog-Posts
A couple of weeks ago, Iain Dale was casually dismissing the revelations that trustafarian Tory millionaire candidate Zac Goldsmith has been avoiding tax by registering for non-dom status: “lots of sanctimonious guff,” he told …
By Stephen Tall
| Tue 8th December 2009 - 12:20 pm
One of the first publications from Iain Dale’s new Biteback publishing imprint dedicated to political books, The Total Politics Guide to the 2010 General Election (Eds, Greg Callus and Iain Dale) weighs in at just under 300 pages divided into two (unequal) sections: the first is a series of 14 articles examining different aspects of the coming election; the second non-half comprises over 200 pages of regional and constuency profiles. As you might guess, this is a for-geeks-only book. But, then, if you’re reading this review that label probably applies.
The Lib Dems’ deputy leader Vince Cable is the cover star of the December issue of Total Politics, trailing a feature interview with the Tory blogger we all love to name-check, Iain Dale. Here’s a taster:
Do you see the Liberal Democrats as a centre-left party?
No, I don’t use that description. I know some of my colleagues have in the past. There are some areas where we are, to use the jargon, centre-left progressive. A redistributive approach to taxation is obviously one of them, but there are other respects in which we are genuinely liberal, which puts us on the other
Tory blogger Iain Dale should perhaps have paused before clicking ‘publish’ on his latest – highly inaccurate – post, How Very Illiberal of a LibDem Mayor. Those few seconds’ hesitation would have been sufficient for him to do a quick Google and find out what he was about to write was nonsense.
In his article, Iain recycled a Metro report to allege that Watford Borough Council (run by elected Lib Dem mayor Dorothy Thornhill) has “barred from public playgrounds in parks. Instead, they are forced to wait outside the railings whilst council-employed “play facilitators” assist the children.”
Rapid criticism of Public Accounts Committee reports from Quentin Davies (defence minister) and David Lammy (higher education minister) have resulted in the Treasury issuing a memo warning that such behaviour can result in ministers being censured.
As the November edition of Public Servant reports:
An attack by two ministers on parliamentary reports revealing waste and incompetence in their departments has provoked the Treasury to warn that ministers will face public censure if they make immediate statements to the media on future reports.
Statements by defence minister Quentin Davies and higher education minister David Lammy have led to a new Whitehall member to accounting
Labour’s Hain threatens BBC with legal action over BNP invitation
Labour’s Welsh secretary Peter Hain makes a bid for the media spotlight today by arguing that the BBC could face legal action over this Thursday’s edition of Question Time, due to feature an appearance by BNP leader Nick Griffin MEP:
… in his letter , Mr Hain … said the decision should be reconsidered in light of a legal case about ethnic restrictions on the BNP’s membership rules. The party has agreed to amend its constitution after the Equalities and Human Rights Commission sought an injunction, claiming the BNP was breaking the Race Relations Act by restricting membership to “indigenous Caucasian” people.
Predictions that the next general election will be the one in which the internet will make a huge impact have regularly come and gone. Post-Obama ready yourself for another such clutch of predictions, but underneath this punditry froth the internet has got on with quietly shifting the way politics works. It’s been more at the unglamorous organisational end (imagine trying to organise a campaign without email) than at the eye-catching systems-shattering dramatic end beloved of pundits, but it’s been a major change nonetheless.
Following in the footsteps of email, blogging has also established a firm place in the logistics of politics, even if its impact on the overall style and conduct of politics is less clear and less dramatic. Blogs have become a key news medium for people involved in or significantly interested in politics, they have become a key part of the flow of news to and from journalists and for some MPs and candidates they reach local audiences large enough to be a significant factor in their election efforts.
If we have to have a Cameron government, then I would much prefer an Iain Dale or a Dominic Grieve as Home Secretary than Chris Grayling. (All are, naturally, a disappointment compared to Home Secretary Huhne under PM Clegg!)
The Lib Dem blogosphere has a bit of a love-hate relationship with arch Tory blogger Iain Dale.
Some regard him as little more than a self-promoting tribal propagandist who plays a clever game of appearing impartial when it suits him. Others believe him to be a nice fella for a Tory, who spreads round a lot of blogging link-love, and maintains a prolific, usually entertaining blog, which through hard work and determination has brought him mainstream celebrity. My view? As a Lib Dem I think there’s a bit of truth in both verdicts (though, truthfully, I incline more towards the latter).
By Stephen Tall
| Tue 29th September 2009 - 9:40 am
I made clear my view on Sunday that the BBC’s Andrew Marr was bang out-of-order to ask Gordon Brown whether he uses prescription drugs seemingly on the basis of nothing more than Internet rumour:
… in making it an issue on the basis of no evidence, Andrew Marr and the BBC have done a real disservice to serious political reporting.
I stand by my assessment. However, I also pointed out that, at the time of writing, no-one from the right-wing blogosphere had taken Mr Marr to task. It’s only fair, therefore, to note that Tory MP Nadine Dorries yesterday broke ranks with the fellow members of her tribe to post a stinging denunciation:
Peter Wrigley @Jana: The definition I like is taken from an article by Timothy Garton Ash in the Guardian way back in the 2000s: "Liberalism properly understood (is) a quest...
Roland Another limitation is the ability to take a hire car on a ferry; I initially thought it was this restriction Alistair was going to comment upon, given the wide ...
Ian Sanderson (RM3) Hire car companies do have some bizarre restrictions, often related to individual companies and airports. Among them is various age restrictions for seniors. I ...
Katharine Pindar Excellent to read this from Southwark Liberal Democrats. I am proposing a motion for September Conference calling for Emergency action to be taken for sufficien...
John Armah Victor, it is great to hear of Liberal Democrats ambitious for a diverse, resilient, house building sector.With Andy Burnham a keen proponent of devolution isn'...
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Family: Scene Through the Eye of a Lens
Brexit: The Uncivil War - the TV drama with Benedict Cumberbatch
A power vacuum?
I am liberal, woke and proud of it. We should all accept such descriptions with pride
Peter Wrigley 
Roland 
Ian Sanderson (RM3) 
Katharine Pindar 
John Armah 