Tag Archives: susan kramer

Alex Foster

Final details for our Fringe tomorrow

By Alex Foster | Sat 18th September 2010 - 3:20 pm

Many many thanks to Lib Dem Voice editor Helen Duffett for organising our major fringe event tomorrow. She’s been hunting around the country for the best talent to speak to us, and has overcome many seemingly insurmountable obstacles to bring a stellar event to the conference.

Hall 1B is a lovely room with a giant set of seats sitting on an enormous turntable, for reasons that will probably become clear if you come and see the fringe.

Without further ado, our speaker lineup is:

Evan Harris
Susan Kramer
Will Straw

The title is:

Fairer? For Whom?

As will all our fringe events, we are planning …

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Posted in Conference and Events | Also tagged and | 1 Comment
Mark Pack

Who will be the Liberal Democrat candidate for London Mayor?

By Mark Pack | Mon 6th September 2010 - 10:26 am

Yesterday London Region chair Jonathan Fryer outlined the timetable for selecting the party’s London Assembly and Mayor candidates. But who will be in the running to be the Liberal Democrat candidate for Mayor of London?

As previously covered, Lembit Opik has publicly declared his intention to go for the selection. Regular readers of this site will have seen how controversial that is amongst many Liberal Democrat members (along with other commenters on this site). He has some keen fans along with many ardent critics. The number of fans of his Mayor selection bid page on Facebook has moved up only …

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Posted in London and Selection news | Also tagged , and | 38 Comments
Stephen Tall

LDV Saturday caption competition: “Kramer vs Zac” edition

By Stephen Tall | Sat 31st July 2010 - 1:45 pm

There’s no prize at stake – just the opportunity to prove you’re wittier than any other LDV reader …


(Image courtesy: FromPlay.com).

Here’s former Lib Dem MP for Richmond Park Susan Kramer with her Tory successor Zac Goldsmith. What do you think they might have been saying or thinking about each other?

The winner of our most recent caption competition, the “Jeremy Browne passes the hat” edition – according to The Voice’s judging panel of one – was this one by Andrea Gill.

Got a photo of a prominent Lib Dem …

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Posted in Caption Comp | Also tagged and | 21 Comments
Stephen Tall

Channel 4 News: Zac Goldsmith has “questions to answer” about election spending

By Stephen Tall | Thu 15th July 2010 - 6:40 pm

Channel 4 News will tonight broadcast the results of an investigation which it claims show Conservative MP for Richmond Park, Zac Goldsmith, has serious questions to answer about the accuracy of his election expenses.

The total allowable expenses for the campaign for all candidates was £11,003. Zac’s official returns show he spent 98% of his limit, just £220 below the limit. Channel 4 News questions whether on three specific items – his spending on political signs, personalised jackets and campaign leaflets – Zac’s claims would have been higher if he had complied with both the letter and the spirit of …

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Posted in News | Also tagged and | 17 Comments
Stephen Tall

3 to see: Lib Dem #GE2010 campaign coverage

By Stephen Tall | Thu 8th April 2010 - 10:00 am

Pushed for time, but want to keep up-to-date with how the campaign’s going? Here are today’s must-reads ….

Nick Clegg launching Scottish Lib Dem election campaign (BBC)

It will be almost like old times for the Lib Dems, with former leader Charles Kennedy joining Nick Clegg to launch the Lib Dems’ Scottish campaign – as CK himself tweeted earlier today. Here’s how the BBC reports it:

Mr Clegg will get the Scottish campaign under way in Glasgow along with Scottish Lib Dem leader Tavish Scott and senior party figures, including Charles Kennedy.

The party – Scotland’s second biggest in Westminster terms –

…

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Posted in General Election | Also tagged , , , , , and | 1 Comment
Helen Duffett

Daily View 2×2: 26 March 2010

By Helen Duffett | Fri 26th March 2010 - 10:52 am

Time flies – Friday already! And is it really 29 years to the day that the Gang of Four launched a new political party: the Social Democrats?

Roy Jenkins said at the launch:

We want to get away from the politics of our dated dogmatism and class confrontation. We want to release the energies of people who are fed up with the old slanging match.

Watch the video of the launch here.

2 Big Stories

Digital economy bill to be pushed through parliament next month

The controversial digital economy bill will be pushed through in the “wash-up” leading up to an election, after the government confirmed that it will receive its second reading in the Commons on 6 April – the same day that Gordon Brown is expected to seek Parliament’s dissolution.

Harriet Harman, the leader of the house, said today that the bill will get its second reading. But when questioned by Labour MPs Neil Gerrard and Tom Watson about the lack of time given to debate over controversial issues in the bill, she said only that “ministers are aware” of the strong feelings that the proposed legislation has engendered.

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Posted in Daily View | Also tagged , , , , , and | 1 Comment
Stephen Tall

What does £10,000 mean to you? To Zac Goldsmith it’s a “very marginal tax benefit”

By Stephen Tall | Thu 3rd December 2009 - 12:20 pm

Under pressure from a deeply unhappy David Cameron, the Tories’ ‘trustafarian millionaire’ candidate for Richmond Park, Zac Goldsmith, has at long last pledged to end his non-dom status with immediate effect – his original plan, before the row sparked by the original Sunday Times revelations, was to become a full UK taxpayer next year.

But you’ve got to love this ‘man of the people’ quote from his spokesman, who, when asked how much the change in tax status would cost Mr Goldsmith, replied:

The benefits were very marginal. I don’t know if it is £10 or £10,000.”

Hat-tip: the Evening Standard’s …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , and | 7 Comments
Stephen Tall

Vince’s revamped Mansion Tax gets ‘twumbs-up’ from Susan Kramer

By Stephen Tall | Mon 30th November 2009 - 3:05 pm

Ever since the Lib Dems shadow chancellor Vince Cable launched his proposed Mansion Tax on an unsuspecting world in September, there has been a suspicion that neighbouring Richmond Lib Dem MP Susan Kramer – who faces a tough battle against trustafarian Tory Zac Goldsmith – was, how shall we put this?, a little less than enamoured of the proposal that those living in houses worth £1m would be taxed more.

In a BBC interview, Susan declined the opportunity to support the tax as originally proposed, while the Hounslow Chronicle summed it up bluntly, and I suspect accurately: …

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Posted in Party policy and internal matters | Also tagged and | 21 Comments
Mark Pack

Five of the seven top seats for graduate population have LibDem MPs

By Mark Pack | Fri 16th October 2009 - 12:20 pm

A new analysis of how many graduates there are living in each Westmister Parliamentary constituency shows that five of the seven seats with the highest proportion of graduates amongst their working age population have Liberal Democrat MPs.

The figures, from the University and College Union, show that overall 29% of the working population have degrees with Susan Kramer’s Richmond Park constituency topping the list at 63.61%.

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Posted in News | Also tagged | 4 Comments
Alex Foster

Unpleasant Tory campaign vignettes

By Alex Foster | Fri 21st August 2009 - 10:16 am

This week in the Guardian’s diary column Esther Addley is standing in for Hugh Muir, and she’s chosen a book of the week, True Blue: Strange Tales from a Tory Nation, by Chris Horrie and David Matthews.

Very unpleasant trends are emerging in two vignettes that paint Tory activists as racist and anti-Semitic. Who knew?

The first scene takes us to Richmond:

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Posted in Books | Also tagged , , , and | 9 Comments
Stephen Tall

Are the Tories set for Heathrow expansion U-turn?

By Stephen Tall | Wed 22nd July 2009 - 2:35 pm

Here’s what Tory frontbencher Geoffrey Clifton-Brown, shadow minister for trade and devlopment, has to say about the third runway at Heathrow:

This is a very difficult and controversial issue. Although I voted to oppose the third runway, I am fully aware of the potential damage this might do to Britain’s international air travel. … So I expect this is an issue that will need to be revisited after the election.”

Local Lib Dem MP for Richmond Susan Kramer – who stepped down from the party’s shadow cabninet to focus her energies on the campaign against Heathrow’s expansion – has been quick …

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Posted in News | Also tagged and | 2 Comments
Alix Mortimer

More Lib Dem saints #MPexpenses

By Alix Mortimer | Wed 20th May 2009 - 10:31 am

The Telegraph continues its series of saintly MPs and three more Lib Dems are included.

Tom Brake, Susan Kramer and Ed Davey are all Greater London MPs with columns of zeroes next to their ACA claims, even though they are strictly speaking entitled to them. They join Sarah Teather, Lynne Featherstone and David Howarth who have already featured in the series.

Here’s an interesting thing: will Vince Cable be included in this holy parade? He too is a Greater London MP who doesn’t claim the ACA he is entitled to. I seem to recall

…

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , and | 9 Comments
Stephen Tall

Labour backs Heathrow expansion – Norman and Susan lead Lib Dem opposition campaign

By Stephen Tall | Thu 29th January 2009 - 9:31 am

As BBC News reports:

The government has won a vote over plans for Heathrow’s third runway – but saw its majority cut to just 19. … The Lib Dems supported the but the ministers argue scrapping the plans would seriously damage the economy. More than 50 Labour MPs had previously expressed concerns about the plans in other Commons motions but only 28 of them voted for the Conservative motion on Wednesday.

It’s an all-too familiar scenario – Labour MPs queue up to sign Early Day Motions criticising their own party, then use their threat to withold support as bartering chips. All of which would be commendable if they didn’t then cash their chits for ridiculously small concessions, such as ‘a pledge to initially cap flights on the new runway’ .

Lib Dem shadow secretary of state for transport Norman Baker, and local Richmond MP Susan Kramer were among those leading the campaign against the Heathrow expansion. Extracts from their Commons speeches below, with links to the full Hansard transcripts, follow:

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Posted in News and Parliament | Also tagged and | Leave a comment
Mark Pack

British politics and the internet: why I disagree with Seth Reznik

By Mark Pack | Fri 23rd January 2009 - 2:48 pm

Blue State Digital (BSD), one of the key firms behind Barack Obama’s campaign, is certainly an impressive outfit which gets the internet. But that makes all the more surprising the piece published today on The Guardian website by Seth Reznik about British politics and uses of the internet.

Let’s take a few quotes:

Ken Livingstone, despite his disappointing loss, was one who learnt those lessons. Working with BSD, his campaign set out a range of ways in which barriers to involvement could be torn down. Instead of hiding activist events behind password-protected firewalls, any Londoner could find information about ways to …

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Posted in London and Online politics | Also tagged and | 5 Comments
Benjamin Mathis

Opinion: Opposition is only half the fight – we must spell out our plan for Heathrow

By Benjamin Mathis | Mon 19th January 2009 - 2:23 pm

What follows is very much not dissent in the ranks or any kind of support for a third runway at Heathrow – if for no other reason than I don’t want to give John McDonnell any excuse to start wielding the Mace again. I fully support and agree with the Lib Dem campaign being ably led by Susan Kramer and Norman Baker against blighting south-west London and surrounding areas with yet more noise, pollution and congestion.

But the Government has now announced its decision on a new runway and Terminal 6 and, while I hope we will be able to …

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , , , and | 4 Comments
The Voice

15th Lib Dem MP signs up to ‘Airplot’ battle against Heathrow expansion

By The Voice | Sat 17th January 2009 - 11:46 am

Yesterday LDV reported the Parliamentary speeches of Norman Baker and Susan Kramer opposing the Labour Government’s planned expansion of Heathrow airport.

And today we can note that Richard Younger-Ross has become the 15th Lib Dem MP to become a ‘beneficial owner’ of a plot of land on the site of the proposed third runway at Heathrow airport, a Greenpeace move aimed at holding up the scheme in planning red-tape. As Susan says on the Greenpeace website,

At every stage the Government has ignored public opinion and shamelessly ignored the grave environmental risk of expanding Heathrow. At every stage, residents

…

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Stephen Tall

Baker & Kramer lead Lib Dem opposition to Heathrow expansion

By Stephen Tall | Fri 16th January 2009 - 9:40 am

Yesterday Labour’s transport secretary Geoff Hoon announced to the House of Commons that the Government was giving the go-ahead to the expansion of Heathrow airport.

The Tories are officially opposing the new third runway, though there are many splits in their ranks, from shadow cabinet members and Tory MPs, to Tory bloggers, to Oliver Dowden, their Director of Political Operations.

Lib Dem opposition is wholehearted, embracing both those who believe the Heathrow business case is fundamentally flawed, as well as those who point to the environmental destruction that will result. Lib Dem shadow transport secretary Norman Baker and Susan – who’s leading the party’s campaign against the expansion – both responded to Mr Hoon’s Commons statement yesterday. The Hansard transcripts of their comments follows:

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Posted in News | Also tagged , and | 2 Comments
Helen Duffett

Conservatives at odds over Heathrow third runway

By Helen Duffett | Sat 29th November 2008 - 10:11 am

Do the Conservatives oppose a third runway at Heathrow, or not?

Iain Dale has this:

There is growing disquiet among Tory MPs, and the Shadow Cabinet, about Theresa Villiers witchhunt against BAA. The Shadow Transport Secretary issued a press release yesterday headlined PROMISES FROM BAA CAN’T BE TRUSTED. The release went on to accuse BAA of breaking all its promises on a third runway.

“BAA are right to admit that they have lost the trust of Parliamentarians and local communities over the third runway. However today’s letter is just the next in a long line of promises which may have

…

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Posted in News | Also tagged , and | 1 Comment
The Voice

>> Full details of Lib Dem mini-reshuffle

By The Voice | Mon 18th December 2006 - 3:36 pm

IN: Lynne Featherstone joins the Shadow Cabinet

Norman Lamb, formerly Chief of Staff to Menzies Campbell, takes on the role of Shadow Health Secretary.

Ed Davey becomes the Leader’s new Chief of Staff, which will be alongside his present role as Chair of Campaigns and Communications.

The DTI portfolio is taken on by Susan Kramer, who passes on the International Development portfolio to Lynne Featherstone, who joins the Shadow Cabinet for the first time.

Steve Webb was promoted to Chair of the Election manifesto team in October. He remains in the Shadow Cabinet.

The rest of the …

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , , and | 7 Comments
The Voice

Vote now: Should the Lib Dems next London Mayoral candidate be an MP?

By The Voice | Wed 22nd November 2006 - 2:09 pm

City HallIn 2000 Susan Kramer (not an MP at the time) was crushed by Ken Livingstone. 2004 saw Simon Hughes MP receive the same treatment.

The latest Lib Dem Voice poll asks whether the party should front one of its growing band of London area MPs (Susan Kramer, Simon Hughes, Ed Davey, Paul Burstow, Tom Brake, Lynne Featherstone, Sarah Teather, Vince Cable) or use the opportunity to promote a grass-roots campaigner / peer / councillor / random other.

Please vote, and if you feel so inclined, do give your reason in the comments box …

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Posted in London and Voice polls | Also tagged | 8 Comments
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