Tag Archives: tim farron

Tim Farron MP

Tim Farron’s New Year Message: 2016 can be a year of hope and opportunity

By Tim Farron MP | Fri 1st January 2016 - 6:00 am

The New Year is a time to look forward and it is as important for us as a party to set ourselves new goals and ambitions as it is as individuals.

I am determined that the Liberal Democrats face the new year with a new sense of purpose, a new drive and a sense of ambition.

David Cameron and Jeremy Corbyn both lead parties that are fundamentally divided. Whether it is over Europe, like the Conservatives, or their leader, like Labour, both the government and the official opposition are at war with themselves.

This obsession with their own internal problems is bad for politics and bad for Britain.

For the Conservatives, David Cameron and George Osborne are more and more obsessed with appeasing their backbenchers, resulting in policies that are punishing people that are trying to provide for themselves and their families. To make things worse, they are taking a wrecking ball to public services, particularly local government.

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The Voice

“Chancellor has key questions to answer on flooding”- Farron

By The Voice | Wed 30th December 2015 - 10:27 am

York flooding 2Tim Farron has written to George Osborne to ask him to provide additional funds to help repair flood-hit infrastructure. He also had some fairly pithy comments about David Cameron’s visit to the north, inviting him to do more than parade around in wellies.

He said:

The Government’s approach to flood defences is short-sighted.

In 2012 I said more funding was needed to deal with the torrential rain and ‘freak’ weather that was becoming more prevalent.

In the years since I have repeated that call and do so again today. We need to urgently review every shelved flood defence scheme.

The Prime Minister pulling on his wellies, wading through some water for a photo op and doing a couple of interviews doe not make people believe he is doing enough.

He needs to show he cares about the North by following up his words with deeds.

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Caron Lindsay

Farron stands up for families on low incomes facing cuts in Universal Credits

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 30th December 2015 - 8:48 am

Tim Farron has challenged Conservative and Labour parliamentarians to join with the Liberal Democrats to overturn the Government’s proposed cuts to Universal Credit. These are almost identical to the cuts to tax credits which the Chancellor reversed in his Autumn Statement. It is surely only logical that the changes to Universal Credit should also be reversed.

The Party is to put an amendment repealing those changes. It will be discussed as part of the Committee stage on the Welfare Reform and Work Bill in the New Year.

Tim Farron said:

The first big political battle of 2016 is already looming.

The Liberal Democrats worked hard to stop Tax Credit cuts and we won’t let the Government bring it in through the back door.

The Prime Minister and Chancellor claim they want to make work pay, but cuts to Universal Credit will mean people pocket less of what they earn.

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The Voice

Tim Farron on why he supported air strikes – and other things

By The Voice | Mon 28th December 2015 - 2:09 pm

 

Yesterday the Independent on Sunday published an interview with Tim Farron under the headline ‘Lib Dem leader on why he went against his party over Syrian air strikes‘.

Tim Farron has argued that the Liberal Democrats are “not a pacifist party”, following grassroots criticism of his decision to back Syrian air-strikes – a move opposed by two-thirds of members.

The Independent on Sunday can reveal that the Lib Dem leader was rebuked at a meeting of a senior party committee this month for failing to consult properly on the controversial vote.

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Caron Lindsay

Farron slams Fallon’s human rights comments: “We do not win by joining terrorists in the gutter”

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 27th December 2015 - 8:31 am

Strong words from Tim Farron, but the occasion warranted them.

The Tories’ cavalier attitude to our human rights laws has long been a worry. Now that they are in power on their own, unmoderated by Liberal Democrats, it’s a problem. Those human rights laws protect all of us from the abuse of power by governments, local authorities and anyone else with significant influence over our lives. Look at this 50 page document for professionals dealing with older people and you’ll see the huge array of protections that our parents and grandparents have.

The Tories would dearly love to get rid of these protections so they try to do it by arguing that they make troops less effective. The Telegraph reports the Defence Secretary Michael Fallon as saying:

We don’t need these ambulance-chasing British law firms,” he told The Sunday Telegraph. “It is not only extremely expensive but it inhibits the operational effectiveness of our troops because they start to worry about whether they will end up in a court or not.

This is nonsense for many, many reasons. Apart from anything else, being seen to be upholding the highest standards of human rights is a very, very good thing for our international reputation. It’s also not as if individual soldiers end up in court. That’s deliberately worded to make it sound like individual troops are going to end up in the dock under human rights legislation when in fact it’s the Ministry of Defence who would be sued in a civil court. Basically, Fallon doesn’t want to spend the money defending human rights cases. We need to be careful of that kind of logic. Elections are quite expensive things as well but they are a critical and essential part of our democracy. I’m very happy to pay for all citizens to have their human rights protected. The actual cost to each of us will be so tiny as to be inconsequential and is well worth paying. 

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Caron Lindsay

Tim’s top tunes: How many have you heard of?

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 24th December 2015 - 10:25 am

Tim Farron features tomorrow in a Christmas Day Lakeland Radio broadcast. Between 12pm and 3pm tomorrow, the pre-recorded show will air and Tim will count down his top 40 tunes.

Cumbria Live has the story:

There will be no Slade or Wham Christmas hits with Westmorland and Lonsdale MP Tim Farron picking the music – instead there will be songs from the Sex Pistols, The Clash and X Ray Specs.

The show will feature on Lakeland Radio on Christmas Day with a selection of Tim Farron’s favourite hits from across the years including Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now by The Smiths which might be viewed as an unusual festive tune.

It is well known that Tim and I move in very different musical circles. One of us is the essence of all that is cool. One of us loves everything trashy, cheesy and camp. It’s therefore hardly surprising that I have only heard of a handful of his choices.

Here is his list in full. How many have you heard of?

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Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron: Nobody is above the law, including armed police

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 20th December 2015 - 5:57 pm

There’s a disturbing article on the front page of today’s Sunday Times (£) which reports that David Cameron is going to make it easier for Police using firearms to avoid prosecution.

The prime minister stepped in after police chiefs warned that the fight against terrorism is being compromised because firearms officers risk prosecution if they pull the trigger.

Cameron ordered a review of the law after a national security council meeting last week at which police chiefs demanded greater political and legal backing for those charged with protecting the public from a Paris-style massacre in Britain.

Senior government sources say the prime minister is prepared to change the law in the new year to make it harder to drag police officers through the courts if they shoot to kill.

The thing is, I’m not aware of Police being dragged through the courts for firearms offences at all. If that were happening, it might be necessary. Police are rarely prosecuted for things that they do on duty as it is.

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The Voice

Farron: Tackling inequality is my mission for 2016

By The Voice | Sun 20th December 2015 - 8:55 am

Tim Farron says that his mission for 2016 is to raise inequality up the political agenda. In a special Christmas message for the Mirror, he says:

From my family, to yours I want to wish readers of the Sunday Mirror a happy, joyous and restful Christmas.

My primary mission politically in 2016 is to raise the issue of inequality up the political agenda.

No-one should go hungry or homeless in Britain. We must have a national crusade to end this scandal. Once and for all.

We have the mission but we must also have the will power to do it.

The values of Christmas – charity, togetherness and compassion must be taken forward and I am committed to doing that.

He also reveals some of what he will be doing over the Festive Season:

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Caron Lindsay

End of Term Report: Tim Farron

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 17th December 2015 - 9:30 pm

It’s five months since Tim Farron’s first full day as leader. As the political term comes to an end, how has he done in the role so far? What has he done well, and where is there room for improvement? Be warned, this is a long one. You might want to get a cup of tea and a biscuit.

First, let’s look at the highlights:

Those amazing speeches

That first one, just after his election. Have you embraced your diagnosis yet?

And then that emotional debut Conference speech with that impassioned section where he called out David Cameron for his failure to help refugees:

One of the reasons I supported him for leader was because of the heartfelt way he articulated our values:

We have a hell of a mountain to climb at the moment. It’s going to take a lot of work. It’s going to take a leader who’s zingy, persistent, gutsy, noisy and awkward who can articulate a liberalism that’s relevant, practical, optimistic and joyful. Tim Farron fits that bill as close to perfectly as it gets.

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Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron tops the leaders’ popularity poll

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 17th December 2015 - 8:33 pm

IPSOS-MORI have released their monthly Political Monitor and it has a double dose of good news for the Liberal Democrats.

This is probably the month in which Tim Farron has had the most exposure since his election as leader. His speech in the Syria debate was highly commended and he’s been on both Have I Got News for You and Russell Howard’s Good News. The fact that he’s ended up as the most popular leader in Britain speaks for itself. Before we all get too excited. his rating is only -7, compared to Cameron’s -14 Corbyn’s -15 and Farage’s -15, but he has a lot of don’t knows, 45%, to win over.

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The Voice

Tim Farron: Government should hang its head in shame over fracking in national parks

By The Voice | Wed 16th December 2015 - 6:51 pm

Tim Farron has reacted to the Commons vote which enabled tracking under national parks in England. His constituency has two national parks.

He said:

The Government today relaxed the rules on fracking around and under National Parks and other protected sites. The Government used a parliamentary wheeze to pass the change with no parliamentary debate.

Last week the Government signed up to a landmark climate change deal and is now abandoning those pledges to create a market for another fossil fuel.

Our National Parks and areas of Scientific Interest are now at risk and the Government should hang its head in shame.”

It is disgraceful that the government are ploughing ahead with fracking at the same time as scrapping the Carbon Capture and Storage scheme which is important for mitigating against climate change.

He was on Radio 4’s PM programme this evening. You can listen here at around 8.35 minutes in.

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Newspuppy

Tim Farron and his Christmas cards

By Newspuppy | Wed 16th December 2015 - 2:15 pm

The press have been commenting on the various leaders’ and parties’ Christmas cards.

The Independent was pretty scathing about all of them apart from Tim Farron’s, with a headline “All of the political leaders’ Christmas cards are rubbish (apart from Tim Farron’s). ”

His card is this one, designed by 11 year old Ami Woodburn from a school in Tim’s constituency.

Tim Farron's sleigh Christmas card 2015

 

This is where the mystery really begins, though, because the Guardian shows a different card for Tim:

Tim Farron's penguin christmas card 2015

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Caron Lindsay

Farron calls for flood protection for small businesses and much more in Commons speech

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 16th December 2015 - 9:32 am

Tim Farron has rightly been preoccupied with helping his constituents with the aftermath of the terrible flooding which has hit his Cumbria constituency. His most recent initiative is to ask the Government to extend the Flood Re scheme, which will give insurance protection to home-owners in areas at risk from flooding, to small businesses from April next year.

He cites 125,000 businesses which have either been refused cover completely or quoted an unaffordable price for insurance.

Tim said:

As devastating as the floods have been for home owners here in Cumbria, it has been equally catastrophic for the small businesses which are the backbone of our local economy.

With the impact of climate change this isn’t going to be the last time communities are hit by flooding and it will become more and more difficult for small businesses to get affordable insurance.

The Government needs to get serious about the situation we are in and extend the Flood Re scheme to small businesses, before even more see their businesses devastated by the financial cost of flooding.

Tim won praise from the Federation of Small Businesses yesterday for making the point that Cumbria’s businesses were open and looking for custom:

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Mary Reid

LibLink: Tim Farron on LGBT rights

By Mary Reid | Mon 14th December 2015 - 8:59 am

 

As ever the Liberal Democrats are ahead of other parties when it comes to LGBT equality.

That is a quote from an article by Tim Farron in the Huffington Post titled The Tories Are Trailing Behind on Transgender Rights. 

In this post Tim argues that we still have some way to go but that public attitudes have noticably shifted in a positive direction. He refers to this poll in which 68% of respondents “say a person who was born male but has transitioned to become female should be housed in a women’s prison”.

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Newspuppy

A disturbing fundraising suggestion

By Newspuppy | Sat 12th December 2015 - 10:12 pm

A conversation made me wince as I browsed Tim Farron’s Twitter feed this evening.

Let me say this first, though. If you want to help people affected by the flooding in Cumbria – and we’ve seen some utterly heartbreaking scenes of devastation and people losing everything – please donate to the Cumbria Community’s South Lakelond Flood Recovery appeal.

Back to Tim, who has been energetically working to help those affected. One constituent asked Tim if he might take rather drastic action to raise money.

Innocently, Tim asked for more information…

So she told him:

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Paul Walter

Lib Dems welcome Paris climate agreement

By Paul Walter | Sat 12th December 2015 - 6:54 pm

Commenting on the Paris Agreement Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron MP said :

The landmark agreement that has been reached in Paris must be welcomed as a vital step in combating climate change.

The Government must now urgently rethink its cuts to renewable energy which are undermining the achievements of Ed Davey and Liberal Democrats in the Coalition government in promoting green energy.

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Caron Lindsay

How Tim Farron and Willie Rennie are helping constituents cope with crisis

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 10th December 2015 - 1:05 pm

Posted by Tim Farron on Sunday, 6 December 2015

Willie Rennie and Tim Farron have seen the areas they represent in Parliament hit by catastrophe and challenging circumstances. In Cumbria, Storm Desmond and its aftermath has caused devastation that will take months to fully sort out. In Scotland, Willie Rennie’s constituents have been hit by the closure of the Forth Road Bridge and the loss of a route that takes 70,000 cars per day. It’s not expected to re-open until the New Year.

Both Willie and Tim do a phenomenal amount of work to stay in touch with the people they represent anyway, but I have been very impressed with the work that both of them are doing to help people affected by these events.

Willie’s Facebook page catalogues all the conversations and correspondence he’s had with the Transport Minister Derek Mackay. He wanted to make sure that he was properly reflecting people’s concerns and put together a survey so that they can tell him what’s going on.  Even before the end of the weekend, he had worked with the Minister to ensure that patients travelling from Fife for Chemo and Radiotherapy in Edinburgh were taken across the Bridge in ambulances rather than have to endure 11 mile tailbacks or take the huge risk of going on public transport, something that can be very dangerous if your immune system is compromised. He’s put a huge effort into keeping people informed. On a smaller scale, when he was MP, his Facebook page was the place here people looked to find out about school closures in that awful Winter of 2009. He is a hands-on representative who uses every method he can to find out what people need. You can see from his Facebook how he is working constructively with the Minister to get stuff done, putting forward his constituents’ suggestions and getting results.

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NewsHound

LibLink: Tim Farron: Give willing UK families a chance to foster refugee children

By NewsHound | Wed 9th December 2015 - 12:16 pm

Tim Farron has written for Politics Home to explain why he’s put forward a Bill to ensure that this country takes 3000 unaccompanied refugee children:

But tens and thousands of children travel alone. They are without parents or relatives, and have made their way to Europe in the toughest of circumstances.

It is this particularly vulnerable group which our bill aims to support. The bill would award of asylum-seeker status in the United Kingdom to certain unaccompanied children from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Eritrea displaced by conflict and present within the European Union

I know that there are enough families willing to foster an unaccompanied child. For example, Home for Good has registered 10,000 prospective adoptive families. Although they will not be ready to step up immediately, if the Government supports local authorities and agencies to provide the requisite training the UK will be well equipped to support these children.

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Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron introduces his Bill to help refugee children

By Caron Lindsay | Tue 8th December 2015 - 2:47 pm

Tim Farron has barely stopped talking about the need to help the refugees heeding from the war zones of Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and Eritrea towards Europe. His visits to Lesbos and Calais have affected him deeply and he is keen to press the Government to take 3000 unaccompanied children as the charity Save the Children thinks is necessary.

Today’s stage in his campaign involved lodging a Ten Minute Rule Bill. This is parliamentary device which enables back bench MPs to submit Private Members’ Bills. There is a ritual that involves standing at the bar of the house and a lot of stepping forward and bowing before you hand in the Bill. Tim looked pretty awkward doing this, but that’s probably a good thing. It is pretty silly.

Tim’s Asylum (Unaccompanied Children Displaced by Conflict): Ten Minute Rule Motion says:

That leave be given to bring in a Bill to make provision about the award of asylum-seeker status in the United Kingdom to certain unaccompanied children from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Eritrea displaced by conflict and present within the European Union; and for connected purposes.

Proposing the Bill, Tim said:

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Musings on the Aftermath

By Ed Thornley | Mon 7th December 2015 - 2:53 pm

Whether or not to extend British involvement across the “non-existent” border between Iraq and Syria was always going to be a divisive issue. There was no way around that. For a party such as ours, it promised to be particularly so. Not especially in Parliament, where we are now so few that nobody would notice except us. No, I mean divisive internally. Within hours of Tim’s announcement that he would support the strikes and ask our other MPs to as well, not only had my inbox exploded with Facebook notifications declaring it to be a stupid idea or that the …

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John Roffey

Tim Farron stranded in storm

By John Roffey | Mon 7th December 2015 - 1:26 pm

 

It was reported on the BBC News at Ten on Saturday night that Tim Farron had been stranded in his car with four children in the stormy weather conditions, in Cumbria with (presumably) a telephone interview with Tim.

I wonder if, while waiting to be picked up, he reflected on the report from Keswick – that the town had launched an appeal for one million pounds to help with the clear up operation that will now be required in the town. If he did he might have recalled that each of the bombing missions now being carried out on Syria, that he had voted for on Wednesday, had been costed by Sky at a little more than this amount.

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John Marriott

The crisis in the Middle East – Is this the ‘end of the beginning’?

By John Marriott | Mon 7th December 2015 - 9:00 am

 

As the tide of war turned in 1942 following the second battle of El Alamein, Winston Churchill spoke about “the end of the beginning” of the fight back against fascist oppression. I have to confess that these words went through my mind as I sat through many hours of TV parliamentary debate last Wednesday on whether or not to bomb Daesh in Syria. For those who are cynical about the goings on at Westminster, this was an occasion that illustrated perfectly how important our parliamentary democracy really is.

There were some cracking speeches on both sides. Tim Farron rose in my estimation with his contribution, as did Margaret Beckett and Alan Johnson and, as for Hilary Benn, could this be the end of the beginning of his march to the leadership of his party? I noticed that one critic claimed it was short on facts; but there are times when “fight them on the breaches” carries more emotional and symbolic weight than the practicality of fighting on sand. I just  wonder whether the reaction to his speech had anything to do with the shoring up of Labour’s majority in the Oldham by-election.

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NewsHound

Tim Farron stranded amid flooding in Cumbria

By NewsHound | Sun 6th December 2015 - 10:30 am

The Lancashire Evening Post reports:

Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron was among those stranded as Storm Desmond brought havoc to Cumbria.

Mr Farron was driving through his Westmorland and Lonsdale constituency with four children in the car when he got stuck on a heavily flooded back road.

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Paul Walter

Syrian air strikes decision – stirrings of unhappiness in the party

By Paul Walter | Sun 6th December 2015 - 9:08 am

The Independent on Sunday has pulled together a good number of quotes from party members who are not happy about the decision this week to support air strikes in Syria.

The report quotes Federal Policy Committee member Gareth Epps, who has written a critical piece on the Liberator blog entitled: “Is there any longer a point to the Liberal Democrats?”. The blog post includes this:

It seems Liberal Democrat MPs have learned nothing of the mistakes of action in Iraq and more recently Libya; nothing of their mistakes from the Coalition Parliament; and have understood nothing of the gaping chasm in opinion between them and the party members that have worked hard to get them elected. The reaction of those members – many of whom didn’t receive a single email from the party on how it would approach the issue – is of utter dismay.

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Paul Walter

Tim Farron is on Murnaghan on Sky News this morning, starting at 10 o’clock

By Paul Walter | Sun 6th December 2015 - 8:30 am

Tim Farron will be appearing live on Murnaghan on Sky News this morning. The programme starts at 10 o’clock and continues until noon. No doubt the vote on the Syrian air strikes will come up in conversation.

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Caron Lindsay

Watch “the wonderful Tim Farron” on Russell Howard’s Good News

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 4th December 2015 - 10:25 am

Tim Farron Russell Howard's Good NewsIt has been a pretty stressful few weeks to be a Lib Dem, let’s be honest. It’s good, then, that there is something to cheer us up. Tim Farron went on Russell Howard’s Good News last night and came over really well – funny, decent and showing all signs of getting what actually matters to people.

I’m not going to spoil it for you, because you need to watch it yourself. I will just make an observation that he probably never expected to be asked, way back in the 90s when he was speaking at Conference (clip shown) to be on national television being asked if he’d ever had a sexual encounter with a pig. He repeated his answer made when that story came out – that he had never been so glad to be a vegetarian.

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Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron on Russell Howard’s Good News tonight

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 3rd December 2015 - 5:02 pm

Tim Farron & Paul Merton on HIGNFY

Fresh from his success on Have I got news for you last week, Tim Farron will be on Russell Howard’s Good News on BBC2 at 10 pm tonight.

No doubt he’ll be talking about his reasons behind the Syria vote. It’ll be interesting to see how the generally young audience think of what he has to say.

In the meantime, if you are bored and looking for something to do, you might want to contact Oldham HQ and help Jane Brophy. She has been a fantastic by-election candidate and her team have put together a marvellous campaign which has helped train lots of new members. Get in touch here and I’m sure they’ll give you some knocking up to do by phone. Good numbers of people have travelled to Oldham in the last few weeks to get the feel of a by-election. I’m quite gutted that I didn’t get to go. Let’s hope that the result she gets today shows some progress.

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Caron Lindsay

Mixed emotions after Syria vote

By Caron Lindsay | Thu 3rd December 2015 - 8:39 am

Yesterday was a very strange day, full of mixed emotions for me. I had instinctively felt from the start of all of this that the case for extending air strikes into Syria had not been made and, although I came very close, I could never get to a place where I felt the risks to people on the ground outweighed the potential benefits. Had I been a Liberal Democrat MP, I would have voted against. I watched a huge chunk of the debate and it was, at times, difficult to see my feelings being expressed by members of other parties.

This wasn’t like the coalition years, though. On more than a handful of occasions, I sat through parliamentary debates with gritted teeth, often feeling apoplectic because I could not understand why on earth we had even entertained the idea of voting for, say, secret courts or some of the more brutal elements of welfare reform. Yesterday, though, I could totally understand and empathise with our leader’s stance, driven as it was by the best of liberal, humanitarian and internationalist motivations. He made an absolute cracker of a speech, delivered with passion and confidence. If you haven’t seen it, watch this extract:

Here is my response in the House of Commons earlier today, on the decision to take action on ISIL in Syria

Posted by Tim Farron on Wednesday, 2 December 2015

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Caron Lindsay

Tim Farron speaks in Syria debate: We’ll be learning wrong lessons from history if we don’t stand with refugees & eradicate Daesh

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 2nd December 2015 - 5:13 pm

Here is Tim Farron’s speech in full from today’s debate on Syria from Hansard:

As has been mentioned already, the spectre of the 2003 Iraq war hangs over the debate in this House and in the whole country. In 2003, the late and very great Charles Kennedy led the opposition to the Iraq war and he did so proudly. That was a counterproductive and illegal war, and Daesh is a consequence of the foolish decision taken then. Charles Kennedy was also right, however, in calling, in the 1990s, for military intervention in Bosnia to end a genocide there. I am proud of Charles on both counts.

My instincts, like those of others, are always to be anti-war and anti-conflict. In many cases, the automatic instinct will be that we should react straightaway and go straight in. Others will say that under no terms, and not in my name, should there ever be intervention. It is right to look at this through the prism of what is humanitarian, what is internationalist, what is liberal, what is right and what will be effective. I set out five principles that I have put to the Prime Minister. I will not go into all of them here, with the time I have available, but they are available on the website and people can go and have a look at them. My very clear sense is that any reasonable person would judge them to have been broadly met.

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Caron Lindsay

Liberal Democrat MPs explain Syria vote

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 2nd December 2015 - 1:25 pm

We heard from Nick Clegg on Sky News last night and Tim Farron has written and talked about why he’s decided to support Syrian airstrkes.

Other MPs have been explaining their thinking. As we find them, we’ll put them up on this post.It’s going to be a bit of a marathon read, but worth having all the rationale in one place.

Alistair Carmichael

You will have seen it reported in the press and media this morning that Liberal Democrat MPs will support the motion in the House of Commons today to extend to areas of Syria our current military involvement against ISIL/Da’esh in Iraq. I want to explain why, after lengthy discussion and deliberation, we have reached this decision and why I will support it.

Decisions of this sort are never easy and this has been the most difficult one that I have ever known. I certainly do not share David Cameron’s reported view that those who oppose intervention are “terrorist sympathisers”. This is an issue on which we have all had to come to our own conclusions and for many of us it has been an enormously difficult process. I know no one, inside parliament or not, who has approached this from anything other than a position of good faith and I respect completely those who have reached a different conclusion from mine.

By comparison the decision to oppose war in Iraq was simple by comparison – it was clearly illegal and it was difficult to identify what the British interest in intervention was.

Recognising that some of the problems we are dealing with today have their roots in that disastrous misadventure, we should be quite clear about why this is a different conflict with different issues.

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