After the mild controversy about the PM’s Christmas Message, and Jeremy Corbyn’s lack of one, I wondered what a Lib Dem PM’s Christmas Message might look like. This is what I came up with:
Britain is a country of many nations, of many cultures and of many faiths. But I do believe that as we celebrate Christmas, a deep-lying common faith that unites us all rises to the fore. It is a faith that unites Christians and Muslims, Sikhs and Hindus, Theists and Atheists. It is a faith in us. A faith in our capacity to build a national community here, on this island nation we call home, in which we all belong, and of which we can all take immense pride.
As one year turns to the next, my government will continue to work tirelessly to help you build that Britain. We shall approach the New Year with the same belief as we have the previous; that by empowering individuals to fulfil their greatest hopes and dreams, we can leave behind the Britain where our freedom to be who we ought to be is shackled by poverty, ignorance or conformity. We pledge to work for all those who celebrate Christmas this year with tears of frustration in their eyes, for whom our system is not working. To all those families celebrating Christmas in temporary housing, or those sleepless parents who’ve worried if their low pay check would stretch far enough this month, or those who have been bullied this year for the person that they were born to be, we are in your corner, we pledge to be your government.
But the challenges we face are not limited to our shores, and in a world where the forces of chaos and of division wage war against tolerance and freedom everywhere, Britain must be a beacon of hope in a darkening world. I wish I could tell you another story, of the onward march of liberty throughout the world. But instead I must emphasise that our national mandate, to take a nation dividing itself along imaginary lines and turn it into a community of equals, is of the most unimaginable importance. But we cannot do that without hope.
So at this Christmas time, I urge Britons of all persuasions to find hope in the morals and values of the Christmas story. I believe that we can all, regardless of whether you do identify with the Christian faith or, like myself, do not, benefit at this uncertain moment in human history from taking heed of the humane morals of Jesus Christ, of searching for the love within ourselves and using that as our driving force towards a world of peace. And beyond the morals, we should take inspiration from the wider story of Christmas, that of a divine child born in a manger in Bethlehem, who would face the darkness in his world from his first day to his last, and never falter in seeking and cultivating the goodness in all humanity, with the purpose of building a world fit for the divine.
Merry Christmas to all.
* Guy Russo was the Parliamentary Candidate in Enfield North at the General Election and is an Ex-President of the Queen Mary University of London Liberal Democrats.
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12 Comments
Do you often imagine yourself being PM, Guy? 😉
But seriously thanks for a great read which concisely summaries what liberalism is all about.
Thank you Thomas 🙂 And don’t we all? 😉 Merry Christmas
Merry Christmas to you too 😀
Keep at it, Thomas. One day you could be the bearer of this message in reality. In the meantime, a very happy Christmas to you and a productive, compassionate New Year.
Oh dear! Too long in the tooth tobe trusted! My comment should read GUY. Please forgive an old man’s careless reading!
Well done Guy. I wrote something in similar vein (but I had our Lib Dem hero looking back as foreign secretary rather than PM) but it did not find favour with LDV. I had better stick to writing acceptable stuff about babies and women candidates!
If we’re writing a Christmas message from a LibDem PM it would probably begin…”Looking back on this year of 2525….
Anyway, a very merry Christmas for 2015 and hopes for 2016
Best piece I’ve seen on LDV for a long while. Well done Guy.
Lovely piece, Guy, well said.
Guy Russo | Thu 24th December 2015 – 1:57 pm Please be very careful with language if you want to be inclusive.
“on this island nation we call home” and “my government will continue to work tirelessly to help you build that Britain.” will be read by some as expressing opinions about Ireland, Northern Ireland and Scottish nationality.
Dream of a time when an Irish President could be elected using the Single Transferable Vote from three candidates, visit Northern Ireland and meet the Sinn Fein Prsident, be invited to have tea with the Queen, visit Buckingham Palace, suggest a return visit to the Republic of Ireland by the Queen, be accepted and see it happen, despite the previous assassination of the Queen’s uncle in the Republic during a fishing holiday.
Fantasy? It has happened. The President was the charming Mary Robinson, a human rights lawyer, not to be confused with Peter Robinson of Northern Ireland’s DUP.
Try the song, relevant to both, but with opposite meanings.
https://uk.search.yahoo.com/yhs/search?hspart=avg&hsimp=yhs-fh_lsonsw&type=ff.43.vs.hp.04-01.gb.avg._.0915av¶m1=rVNNb9wgEP0rvZibLb5szIGDdzeuKrVVlW6SY4QB77qqPwpeJ_33HbzadtVIVVRFsuAxPIaZ97DprEpEs9tWNZM1TwtcbVN-I-t0g0WdVkIwySqck0okwiLTT3AAS5LrBVlFOKeMEywYxhjZoKr79-i7Hg7KDagHZitFzm1hNZecC2M1I6UlnJaNc05inOLCON6agskSM00dywFSmpOSlMyWTnJclqaRKN77NJ_Q5FXr0aJ4RrIio5Kj7cl7N8xf9MHd3X5Ux3meEqYT2sLX_wxOe3PM9HLIzNhDaAJegPmyEabnhLVrYwmz59YSWvyARe-B2Pix6YYwDgBhPMBe0HCDPU4AY7OAHewW_ZrhzVqGjGbNmNBcbF7lEBB3cGyBQ7_1gbUNEABrIgQEmXNak3ydKI6gIRhWrCJinXIGoeoT8CcfW_Kx6cFemob-H7WJGpBY5GzWIptIXwsGnyIrCoO-Or84_2Gn9hua7j_v04f6BjN061oHtvmLY-FflkV__k-Jt7fk2vArXc243gQ1zw0MMfL3i_ojZQxH3VMs07MNGPRnGtRnOmr_wsEXul69QtRNqiwykouMAZ-WaAzqoRvs-BTe3Xdh1qhRdeddOz6jBv4clmFknNr7k0Pfwhn8Ag2¶m2=browser_homepage¶m3=ff.43.vs.hp.04-01.gb.avg._.0915av&p=mrs+robinson+song
At an Alliance conference one year during John Alderdice’s leadership we were visited by a member of Fianna Fail whose candidate for the Irish Presidency had been defeated by Mary Robinson. She had been nominated by two parties. She had needed two opponents in order to get the second preference votes of one of them, which did happen.
The FF man said rather sourly that “You can be on 50% in the polls and lose.”
The electorate did not want a President who was too friendly to Charles Haughey.
This is what the Single Transferable Vote does, it empowers the voters.
Enid Lakeman was in our local party and campaigned constantly for UK electoral reform. Suddenly the FF man warmed.
Enid had brought an entire team from the Electoral Reform Society to contest a referendum which was intended to abolish STV. She campaigned and won.
Liberal Party leader Jo Grimond wrote in “Memoirs” (page 212)
“Miss Enid Lakeman was conducting her expert and tireless campaign for Proportional Representation” (No, she was not, it was STV).
“Her method was to chip in with definite proposals when a problem arose which PR could solve. She wrote clear, concise and well argued letters to the papers about national elections, local elections, the dilemma of allowing for different views in a Party without disrupting it.
Continued over at least a quarter of a century it was a remarkable performance.”