There’s always a debate as to the extent that politicians’ family should be fair game for media coverage. There seems to be a general consensus that their children should be off-limits. Mind you, that didn’t stop Caroline Spelman’s 17-year-old son being pitched into the national limelight recently. (However, in that case there appear to be justifiable reasons for coverage).
Over the last week, we have seen a number of stories concerning UK politicians’ fathers and wives (or, more correctly, wife).
Nick Clegg faced Andrew Neil on the Sunday Politics, and set out his views on a range of issues — including the row over some Tory MPs’ wish to ditch their Coalition Agreement pledge on Lords reform, George Osborne’s controversial budget, Cornish Lib Dems’ ‘pasty tax’-opposing leaflet, and that Michael Brown donation. Here’s the full 15-minute interview:
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
There’s no prize at stake – just the opportunity to prove you’re wittier than any other LDV reader…
Here is Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg cooking up a treat with Welsh Lib Dem leader Kirsty Williams. What do you think might be being said or thought by or about them?
Nick Clegg joined James Naughtie yesterday in the Today studio, for the programme’s first of a series of interviews with the party leaders before the elections on 3 May.
Clegg talked about the budget, the compromises of coalition and Lib Dem electoral prospects, among other things.
You can listen to the interview in full over on the Today website here, or read a transcript of the interview below.
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.
It was an amazing coincidence that Lady Warsi’s interview on BBC2’s Newsnight spoke so lamentably about the state of the coalition the evening before YouGov put the Tories 11 points behind Labour. The Conservative Party chairman without hesitation accused us of being immature and failing to accept collective responsibility within the coalition.
Patrick Wintour’s article in yesterday’s Guardian highlights the despicable manner in which Lady Warsi, as a cabinet member showed no loyalty to her coalition partners by putting the boot in as soon as the going got tough and the Tories started struggling in the opinion polls.
Mark Pack has posted excerpts here from Nick Clegg’s interview in the Independent today — but it’s worth highlighting also the conclusion of the paper’s leading article today assessing the Lib Dems’ contribution during the first two years of Coalition Government:
There remains much to criticise this Government for, and The Independent on Sunday disagrees with its policy on tax and spending, higher education, the NHS and much else besides. But there was no possible government after the last election that could have delivered all that this newspaper wanted. The effective choice was between a Conservative minority government and
“Every parent wants their child to do better than they did, and every parent wants their child to fulfil their potential,” he said.
State intervention to teach children as young as two will form the centrepiece of his “obsession” which will see childcare made the coalition’s highest priority social policy. Next month he will make a major announcement on his “passion” for shared parental leave and for extending the rights of flexible working.
There’s no prize at stake – just the opportunity to prove you’re wittier than any other LDV reader…
Here is Tory Chancellor George Osborne flanked by the two Lib Dem members of the ‘Quad’, Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander. What do you think might be being said or thought by or about them?
Yesterday Nick Clegg set out the Government’s agenda on energy efficiency and the role of a green economy in delivering growth. Important announcements on energy efficiency, tackling fuel poverty and helping consumers find the best tariffs all caught the media’s attention. But for me the real story is that the Liberal Democrats remain the champions of plans to build a green economy.
Nick was right to attack those who say that there is a zero sum game between economic growth and protecting the environment. As the Liberal Democrats have argued for decades, it isn’t about choosing – the two go …
News 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’?
Though you wouldn’t guess it from the headline or the story, what Nick Clegg was actually saying was simple enough: he thinks MPs as public servants should have to be transparent about their financial affairs, but he doesn’t think their family members, as private citizens, should have to publish details of their salaries and any other wealth. Which seems fair enough to me.
But then the Telegraph has a proven track record when it comes to having a pop at the Lib …
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 …
Nick Clegg has been promoting his new deal with the six biggest energy companies which will mean that every consumer will receive a statement every year telling them if they’d be better off on a different tariff and how to change things. It’s part of what seems to be a strategy to debunk the idea put about by George Osborne and the Tory right that you can’t be green and have a growing economy at the same time. It makes sense that if we use our resources carefully, costs come down and that benefits everybody, business, consumer and the environment. …
Liberal Democrat leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has just been on BBC Breakfast talking about the deal that the Government has reached with energy companies which will save many households £100 a year on their bills. Under the plan, consumers would be written to annually and told if a different tariff would save them money.
Nick explained that seven out of ten households were paying too much because they were on the wrong tariff and this idea would save them money. He acknowledged that this alone would not solve all the problems in the energy market but he said …
Nick Clegg has “no objection in principle” to publishing his tax return, aides said yesterday, after senior politicians scrambled to respond to calls for greater US-style openness from public figures.
After the four main candidates for London’s mayoral elections revealed their personal tax affairs, the Chancellor, George Osborne, yesterday said he was “very happy” for his own details to be published. The disclosures from Boris Johnson, Ken Livingstone, Brian Paddick and Jenny Jones were seen as a turning point, with some warning that they were succumbing to the “Americanisation” of British politics.
The Scotsman proudly announces that the Liberal Democrats are taking their Federal Conference to Glasgow in autumn 2013.
Glasgow is in line for a £12 million boost as the Liberal Democrats announced they will hold next year’s autumn party conference in the city.
It will be the first time Scotland has hosted a national Lib Dem conference for over a decade and the event will also be the largest conference to be held in the city since 2004, with around 7,000 delegates expected to attend from across the UK.
The event is in September 2013 at the Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre
Nick Clegg, Ed Davey and Naomi Colvin of Occupy will be among the speakers at the Social Liberal Forum (SLF) conference on Saturday 14th July.
You can now register through the Social Liberal Forum website. Last year’s conference sold out so do book your place soon.
The theme for our conference is “Intergenerational Justice”. Since the economic crisis that began in 2007, we now have a young generation that will be poorer than its parents; this is unprecedented in British history since the last world war. At the same time the older generation will have to retire at a later …
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.
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 …
It’s been a tumultuous week in the political world. So let’s have a look at how the three main party leaders led from the front in statesmanlike fashion…
This is such sad news. I knew David for years and he was widely loved and admired in the party. He was a gentle and patient man with great integrity and an impressive career in journalism.
I will always remember him for his great sense of humour at the most difficult or challenging times. He will be hugely missed by all of us in the party and our thoughts are with his family.
From Ming Campbell:
David Walter was a professional to his fingertips. He was universally respected and admired by his fellow journalists and held in great affection by the Liberal
Let’s remember the words of David Cameron two years ago:
… there is another big issue that we can no longer ignore. It is the next big scandal waiting to happen. It’s an issue that crosses party lines and has tainted our politics for too long, an issue that exposes the far-too-cosy relationship between politics, government, business and money. I’m talking about lobbying – and we all know how it works. The lunches, the hospitality, the quiet word in your ear, the ex-ministers and ex-advisors for hire, helping big business find the right way to get its way. In this party, we believe in competition, not cronyism. We believe in market economics, not crony capitalism. So we must be the party that sorts all this out.
The Institution of Gas Engineers & Managers (IGEM) exhibited at the Liberal Democrats Spring 2012 Conference, which took place at The Sage centre in Gateshead from 9th – 11th March 2012.
It is the first time IGEM has exhibited at a political party’s conference and it gave the organisation a chance to raise its profile with senior Liberal Democrats holding key posts in the Coalition Government. IGEM met Deputy Prime Minister and Leader of the Liberal Democrats Nick Clegg, Vince Cable (Business Secretary), Danny Alexander (Chief Secretary to the Treasury) and Ed Davey (Energy Secretary).
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
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.
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 …
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.
David Allen Tristan,
You're right in the sense that you didn't specifically call for PFI. But you did say "if you can persuade private money to provide the funding on t...
David Garlick Touted as bringing power to people.
Power brought down from Govt sounds good but power still not reaching the lowest possible levels in our Communities....
Tristan Ward @ David Allen
"PFI won’t help stop the planet burning"
Who said anything about PFI - I didn't.
The private money that is building (not enough) house...
Joey Vimsante I think the EU and UK needs to support not for profit, social media platforms that put the interest of the public, vulnerable people, young people, and nation a...
Nick Baird With regard to client-side image scanning, the danger of mission creep are real, but I have other concerns. One is whether this is truly a practical and effecti...
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Brechtian television: Leo McKern in Galileo (1964)
Good news on political donations?
Conference booked
Are Labour going to cross another red line?
David Allen 
David Garlick 
Tristan Ward 
Joey Vimsante 
Nick Baird 