Fresh back from Lesvos, Tim Farron will be on the Political Slot on Channel 4 tonight arguing that the UK must do more to help with the refugee crisis. It’s on after Channel 4 News at 7.55pm.
The photo above is a screenshot from the video below which shows Tim (in the light blue short and grey trousers) helping refugees ashore in Lesvos.
* Paul Walter is a Liberal Democrat activist and member of the Liberal Democrat Voice team. He blogs at Liberal Burblings.
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9 Comments
Thanks Paul. Your pre-notifications of appearances by Tim are very useful.
I thought Tim was excellent – and unashamedly Liberal.
I agree Tony. We should follow exactly the same path on all important issues and rebuild core support for the party of social justice Liberalism.
There is a good deal of natural overlap between Social Liberal Democracy and ordinary decent common-ground British values such as freedom, fairness, justice, community, compassion etc.
It is great to see Tim occupying that natural and coherent Liberal Democrat territory rather than attempting to position us on some shifting and managed centre ground – which may, or may not, be liberal – as the likes of Tony Blair have so clearly demonstrated.
The Liberal Democrats exist to build a Liberal society not a Centrist one.
@Stephen Hesketh what is this “Social Liberal Democracy” of which you speak? I’m not sure many people would recognise it.
I prefer to deal in plain old fashioned Liberalism; something which has a history going back many years, and responds to the British values of freedom from interference, tolerance, fair play, etc.
TCO29th Oct ’15 – 9:43am
“@Stephen Hesketh what is this “Social Liberal Democracy” of which you speak? I’m not sure many people would recognise it.
I prefer to deal in plain old fashioned Liberalism; something which has a history going back many years, and responds to the British values of freedom from interference, tolerance, fair play, etc.”
OK TCO, simple straight forward question – Do you understand the difference between classical and social liberalism?
@Stephen Hesketh “OK TCO, simple straight forward question – Do you understand the difference between classical and social liberalism?”
Yes. Social liberalism bolts on to classical liberalism. However social liberalism doesn’t work without personal, political and economic liberalism.
@TCO If you don’t like Social Liberal Democracy how about social justice Liberalism?
You will have to forgive me for crediting you with an understanding of the difference between the Classical and Social branches of Liberalism.
Judging by your posts on LDV, you are probably some sort of mix between classical Liberal and Centrist – hence your adherence to ‘old fashioned’ Liberalism rather than to its more radical and egalitarian 20th and 21st century social justice Liberal (Democratic) cousin supported by the vast majority of mainstream Liberal Democrats.
Shame Tim did not also go to Cyprus to visit the UN guarded border between The Greek and Turkish halves of the divided country – the only example of two NATO allies ever going to war with each other – but the reason Greece was fast tracked into the EU. Nor visit Akrotiri, the huge British base from which we monitor the Middle East for NATO, where the first refugees ever to land directly on British sovereign soil arrived only last week. This stunt is playing to the crowd of Liberal members but not speaking to the major issue of the day – the future of our EU membership, nor reaching out to the voters we need to win back. Classic case of the urgent and easy over-riding the important and difficult.
@Stephen Hesketh “@TCO If you don’t like Social Liberal Democracy how about social justice Liberalism?”
Why not just Liberalism? it doesn’t need unnecessary appendages – if you’re explaining, you’re losing.
“You will have to forgive me for crediting you with an understanding of the difference between the Classical and Social branches of Liberalism.”
“Freedom from” vs “freedom to”.
“Judging by your posts on LDV, you are probably some sort of mix between classical Liberal and Centrist – hence your adherence to ‘old fashioned’ Liberalism”
No, I’m just a Liberal, but my Liberalism isn’t restricted to one narrow area which, of itself, doesn’t work.
“[I]t[‘]s more radical and egalitarian”
I suspect your egalitarianism means “equality of outcome”, which doesn’t square with any definition of Liberalism I’ve ever come across.
“20th and 21st century social justice Liberal (Democratic) cousin supported by the vast majority of mainstream Liberal Democrats”
And your evidence for this is? Just because you claim your left-wing views equate to mainstream Liberalism and are supported by the majority of party members, that doesn’t make it true.