Tag Archives: workplace

Ben Andrew

Lib Dems: The party of wellbeing?

By Ben Andrew | Tue 11th August 2020 - 11:15 am

Lib Dem leadership elections often bring up the same criticisms of the party:

  1. People don’t know what we stand for.
  2. We aren’t radical enough.
  3. We need to advance a “core voter” strategy based on values, not just on being “hard working local people”.

I agree with all of these criticisms, but get weary when they are repeated ad infinitum without solutions. Both Davey and Moran talk about the importance of building a distinctive liberal message without saying what this distinctive liberal message should be. What I’m seeing from both candidates is a list of reasonable policy ideas which aren’t meaningfully linked (except by the vague claim that they are “liberal” or “evidenced-based”).

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged , , and | 9 Comments
David Warren

We need to seriously address the issues of work

By David Warren | Wed 15th January 2020 - 4:00 pm

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Back in 1980 I entered the world of full-time employment as a sixteen year-old school leaver. Relatively secure jobs, with pensions and other benefits (in my case luncheon vouchers), were the norm. Thirteen million people were in trade unions.

But the Thatcher revolution was just beginning. It involved targeting those unions which the self-styled Iron Lady said had become too powerful. As a clerical assistant in the Civil Service, I ended up being involved in one of the initial battles when the government refused to implement the recommendations of an independent pay review body. We went on strike and lost. Others followed, notably the printers and miners, who also lost.

The industrial landscape was being redrawn and times they were changing. After my stint in the Civil Service, I spent 25 years in Royal Mail, where I lived through a heavily unionised workforce grudgingly accepting erosion of pay and hard-won working conditions. For those in non-union workplaces it was usually worse, particularly where jobs were privatised.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged | 35 Comments
Kirsten Johnson

Jo Swinson introduces Private Member’s Bill on parental leave

By Kirsten Johnson | Thu 7th June 2018 - 9:00 am

Well done to Lib Dem Deputy Leader Jo Swinson on introducing her Parental Leave and Pay Arrangements Private Member’s Bill yesterday in the Commons. Here she is talking about it:

This bill would require firms which employ more than 250 people to publish their data on parental leave and pay arrangements. As reported in the BBC

Ms Swinson said more than 54,000 women a year lose their jobs because of pregnancy and maternity discrimination, while fathers were worried about taking shared parental leave because of the negative effect on their careers.

Well done Jo on leading the charge! If enacted, this will greatly help parents and prospective parents up and down the country get the support they need from their workplaces.

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Posted in News | Also tagged , , and | 4 Comments
Jeremy Hazlehurst

Workers’ Councils – one way to take back control of our economy

By Jeremy Hazlehurst | Wed 27th July 2016 - 11:59 am

When Theresa May suggested that businesses ought to set up workers’ councils, she was said by many commentators to be moving to the centre ground, perhaps to hoover up centrist voters put off by Labour’s leftwards drift. Whatever the political motivations, it is an extremely interesting idea. Is it one that liberals should support? Absolutely, because it can help people take back control — in a meaningful way.

A lesson from the EU referendum was that many people are dissatisfied with the economic system. The slogan “Take Back Control” was vague to the point of meaninglessness, but psychologically potent for people …

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Recent Comments

  • Hywel
    This is a valid strategy. But it does take a toll on the activists who do it and they may not realise that until quite some time later........
  • Margaret
    @David - selecting the candidate isn't the same as starting the campaign. I understand there has been local activity for some time....
  • Alan Jelfs
    Runcorn? We should be gearing up for Hampstead which is winnable....
  • Nonconformistradical
    "We need politicians to stop attacking tax as some kind of evil and constantly promising to reduce it and instead recognise in the words of JK Galbraith ‘that...
  • David
    In the past we would have been out there delivering leaflets as soon as the Labour fists began to fly. Why has this not happened? Anyone could see this was a re...