Tag Archives: tom mcnally

Welcome to my day: 20 February 2023 – a transport of delight and a birthday greeting…

For those of you who don’t have the joy of living in the countryside, you will be aware of the existence of large boxes on wheels which pass up and down roads near you, stopping regularly to pick up and drop off complete strangers. Buses are relatively rare in my neck of the woods, however, so journeys need to be planned more thoroughly.

And that’s how I spent my Saturday, using the temporary £2 fare to travel from Bury St Edmunds to Lincoln, using five buses and travelling via Thetford, Kings Lynn, Spalding and Skegness. And yes, it took more than …

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From your Lords correspondent… the Government falls foul of Lord Judge…

As noted earlier, a change to the format, in that I’ll be looking back at the highlights of the last week in the Lords and briefly pointing out the likely big issues in the week ahead. I may not get it all right…

As the noble lord, Lord Greaves, is watching, we’ll start with last week’s major Government defeat on the Sanctions and Anti-Money Laundering Bill, over the issue of ‘Henry VIII powers’. Lord Judge, from the cross-benches, and the former Chief Justice of England and Wales, was ‘disappointed’ to see the Government again attempt to gain the power to create …

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A progressive alliance for decency in the news media defeats the Government in the Lords

In writing my preview of last week’s events in the Lords, I rather glossed over the debate on the Data Protection Bill on Wednesday. That will rather teach me to do more research, as it turned out that there was to be an attempt to set up a new Leveson-style inquiry into the nefarious activities of some of our news outlets…

As the noble Lord Greaves pointed out last week, Wednesday saw the Government defeated on a vote to require them to set up and inquiry into issues arising from data protection breaches …

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Julian Huppert MP: Another promise kept – Nick Clegg announces more than doubling of young offenders’ education time

If people are to be in jail, one of our priorities is to make sure that when they leave prison, they won’t come back. We realise that the best way to do this isn’t about draconian sentencing; it’s about providing people with skills. That’s why in our 2010 manifesto we said that we’d increase the number of hours prisoners spend in education and training.

Today, we’ve achieved another goal – Nick Clegg has announced that through a new system of Secure Colleges, young offenders will see the time they spend in education more than doubled.

This really matters. At any one time …

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++ Lib Dem deputy leader Simon Hughes replaces Lord McNally as Justice Minister

Simon HughesNews just in:

Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader Simon Hughes has replaced Lord (Tom) McNally as the Liberal Democrat Minister of State for Justice.

Lord McNally has been appointed as the new Chair of the Youth Justice Board, a post which he will take up in mid-March 2014. Simon Hughes will take over as Justice Minister with immediate effect.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Leader and Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg said:

“Tom McNally has been a fantastic minister who has pushed through a Liberal agenda in the Ministry of Justice. He will now bring the same

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Jim Wallace new leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords

Lord Wallace of Tankerness was today elected as the new leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords.

The former Deputy First Minister of Scotland replaces Tom McNally, who stepped down earlier this month after nine years at the helm.

Lord Wallace was the only candidate to have put his name forward when nominations for the leadership contest closed at 12pm today.

Lord Wallace said:

It is a great privilege as well as an exciting challenge to have been elected as Leader of the Liberal Democrat peers.

As someone who has already led a parliamentary group in coalition

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Tom McNally to stand down as Leader of the Lib Dem Lords

Tom McNally has today written to Dick Newby (Lib Dem Deputy Chief Whip) to say that he intends to stand down as Leader of the Lib Dem group in the House of Lords.

Lord McNally’s letter is as follows:

1 October 2013
Dear Dick,

I will shortly be coming to the end of my ninth year as Leader of the Liberal Democrats in the House of Lords. Before that I served as deputy to Shirley Williams for three years. It seems to me that now would be an ideal time for the Group to select a new leader to serve out

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Lord McNally writes…David Miranda and the reform of Schedule 7

Being a Lib Dem Minister in Government has both its pleasures and its downsides. One of the downsides is that if anything hits the headlines concerning civil liberties there are some in the Party who instantly assume that Lib Dem ministers have been passive and quiescent whilst human rights are trampled under foot. The case of David Miranda, and more broadly what we are doing regarding the use of the Schedule 7 powers which were used to detain him at Heathrow is a good case in point.

I’ve read with interest the views of a wide range of Liberal Democrats, both …

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Lord (Tom) McNally writes: The year ahead for Liberal Democrat Lords

LAST week I had the delight, honour and privilege to open the second day of the debate on the Queen’s Speech in the Lords –at four days long, practically the debating equivalent of test cricket.

As I told the House, I have never hidden the reality that, in the present economic climate, the Coalition Government has had to make hard decisions and tough choices to achieve an economic recovery underpinned by fairness. But I believe that in our first three years we have made the tough decisions necessary.

A new parliamentary year is beginning, however, and a new raft of legislation is …

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Lord Newby writes… Pick a Peer

Almost a year ago, I laid down a challenge to the Liberal Democrat group in the House of Lords – probably the largest group of Liberal Democrats in any legislature in the world.

I felt strongly that we needed to do more to work with constituency parties to tell the story of how we are influencing legislation and debate on a daily basis, both to members and to wider groups.

So it was with that in mind that I set the group the target of making 1,000 constituency visits between now and the General Election. And today I can report with some …

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