Caron Lindsay

Alex Cole-Hamilton responds to Humza Yousaf’s resignation

By Caron Lindsay | Mon 29th April 2024 - 2:15 pm

Humza Yousaf bowed to the inevitable this lunchtime. Knowing that he could not win the vote of no confidence due to take place this week, he announced his resignation as First Minister and leader of the SNP. He will stay on until his successor is chosen.

This should mean that there is no 28 day limit to when the SNP choose their next leader. The rules of the Scottish Parliament state that if there is no First Minister, the Parliament has 28 days to choose another and if they can’t agree, there’s an election. But if Humza stays on, as Nicola did, the SNP can take longer to run its leadership contest.

There’s a lot of talk about John Swinney, the former Deputy FM, standing. Potentially, Kate Forbes, who came within a whisker of winning last time, could stand as well. Swinney would have a decent chance of getting the support of a majority of MSPs – the Greens would probably either back him or abstain. His major challenge would be getting a budget through next February or March. Kate Forbes would be unlikely to get the support of the Greens, given her socially conservative views, so we could be looking at a Scottish Parliament election on or round 4th July if she were the new First Minister.

Alex Cole-Hamilton’s comments on Humza Yousaf’s resignation struck the right note between hammering the SNP Government for its many failings and also being dignified and respectful to the outgoing First Minister. This is in contrast to the rather distasteful gloating coming from the Tories.

Alex said:

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Vince Cable

Made in Britain

By Vince Cable | Mon 29th April 2024 - 12:30 pm

In a factory in rural Durham, the government’s commitment to ‘levelling up’ and to manufacturing industry is being tested to destruction. The Hitachi railway manufacturing plant, employing 700 and thousands more in the supply chain, is threatened with closure. Procrastination over HS2, lack of joined up planning for the railway industry and Covid’s negative effect on travel have, together, led to a three-year gap in the company’s order book. The Japanese owners cannot realistically be expected to mothball the plant for three years and so it will most likely close.

I got to visit the plant (along with Lib Dem candidates including Aidan King the prospective Mayor for the North East). I went the day after Keir Starmer had been on a well-publicised visit, making reassuring, if non-committal, comments about the future of the plant under Labour. For me, the visit had deeper significance. A decade ago, I had opened the plant: then, a tent in a muddy field. Attracting Hitachi to build trains in Britain was one of the successes of the Coalition’s Industrial Strategy and, until very recently, it seemed to be an inspired investment decision for Hitachi.

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Amanda Clark

Caring for carers: what next?

By Amanda Clark | Mon 29th April 2024 - 11:15 am

It’s been a pivotal month for us carers in which our dedication to our loved ones has made the headlines for various reasons,  good and bad.

The good news was that Liberal Democrat MP Wendy Chamberlain’s Carer’s Leave Act finally became law on 6th April.

This provides all carers in employment with a new statutory right to take five days of unpaid leave from work each year to fulfil their caring responsibilities. Wendy, herself, said she would have wanted this to be paid leave but the principle is now enshrined in law and at least doors have been opened. 

 It must come as some relief to many families that are balancing having to work and care in this cost-of-living crisis. 

Both my husband and I worked full time to pay the bills whilst we were bringing up our two kids in the South East. We are proud of them both: one neurotypical, artistic daughter and our son who has Autism and a Learning Disability. 

Archie, now 21, needs constant care and supervision. Even when he reached an age that most teenagers could self-administer paracetamol and have a duvet day, we would have to take it in turns to negotiate time off with our bosses to look after him.  My husband used up countless days of Annual Leave when he was sick or I had an INSET day. We also needed to pay for a childminder after school as his special needs transport would deliver him home by 4pm and neither of us could leave work by then. 

As if that wasn’t hard enough, at the age of 16 he developed Epilepsy.

The months after this crushing diagnosis were made of nightmares while the neurologist tried to balance his meds. Right in the middle of teaching a French lesson, I would get a call from his school saying he had fitted, injured himself and they had called the paramedics. Trying not to panic, I would rapidly set work for the class, inform a colleague I needed to leave immediately and try to stick to the speed limit as I drove the twenty miles down the motorway to my injured son. The worst was time when he gave himself a black eye as he collapsed, convulsing on to a urinal – poor thing!

My Head Teacher was always supportive in the various emergency scenarios that arose but there was always the expectation that I would make up the time at some point with extra cover or more duties. It also came with the guilt that my colleagues had to compensate for my absences. 

I was, though, lucky and can imagine that other employers and employees may be less sympathetic. I really hope that the Carer’s Leave Act will remove the onus on us to make up for lost work time and lead to more empathy with colleagues. Quite frankly, we carers have enough on our plates. 

This new law is hopefully a stepping stone to so much more that can be done for the 2.4 million unpaid carers in the UK who save the economy an estimated £164 billion. 

Carer’s Allowance- changing to Carer’s Support Payment in Scotland, is now a meagre £81.90 per week or £4,258.80 per annum. For those of us lucky enough to live north of the border we can add in the supplements we get in June and December and we get a grand total of £4,836. That’s an hourly rate of 49p in England and Wales and 55p in Scotland -if you consider most of us are on duty day and night.

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The Voice

Dr. Who? Poll finds half of Brits rarely or never see the same GP

By The Voice | Mon 29th April 2024 - 9:42 am
  • Government told “the family GP is a thing of the past” as GP crisis worsens
  • Older people most likely to never see the same GP despite warnings from health groups
  • Lib Dem Leader calls for over-70s and those with long-term health conditions to see the same GP for every appointment
  • New plans would cover around 19 million patients across the country, and be crucial for people with long-term care needs

New polling commissioned by the Liberal Democrats has led to the government being warned “the family GP is a thing of the past”, with people reporting to never see the same GP for every appointment.

Almost half (47%) of UK adults who have been to see their GP more than once in the last couple of years say they have rarely or never seen the same GP for every appointment. Of these, almost one in five (18%) say they have never seen the same GP in the past few years.

This number rises for those aged over 65, with a staggering quarter (27%) never seeing the same GP. This is despite research showing that seeing the same GP helps the elderly avoid hospital admissions and improves the quality of treatment.

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Mark Valladares

29 April 2024: Welcome to my day – reminiscences of the Doctor…

By Mark Valladares | Mon 29th April 2024 - 7:30 am

The news that Dr Dan Poulter, the now ex-Conservative MP for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich, has defected to Labour has come as a bit of a shock to many – and let’s face it, how on Earth could it have taken him so long to realise that the current Conservative leadership have no real interest in public services? – but I ought now to admit that the evidence was there as far back as 2010.

As the brand new MP for the constituency, elected that year, he came to the village as part of his “getting to know the patch” efforts – he was an “incomer” from Reigate and Banstead – and I had the opportunity to find out more about his politics. And, in truth, nothing he said then suggested that he would be any less at home in a Clegg-led Liberal Democrat party than in a Cameron-led Conservative Party.

What might have surprised me was that, with an obvious professional alternative – he’ll earn far more working for the NHS and, possibly, in private practice, than he ever would as an MP – he stuck it out in an increasingly alien Conservative Party. And not only that, he voted through a whole plethora of legislation that should surely have troubled him had he remained true to his supposed principles.

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John Grout

Liberal Democrats must push for recommendations of Fulford Report to be properly implemented

By John Grout | Sun 28th April 2024 - 1:00 pm

The report of Judge Coroner Sir Adrian Fulford was the conclusion of a long process that started well before the horrifying attack in Forbury Gardens in that warm summer after lockdown in 2020.

The attack rocked Reading and the communities around it hard; the report of the Judge Coroner should rock the country.  The process it concludes and summarises is a litany of failure after failure, from the clunking fist of state agencies such as the rotten Home Office right down to local, entirely understandable human failures on the ground which didn’t have good processes around them to stop them happening.

One thing that’s clear from the report is the siloed, hot-potato attitude of agency after agency, closing cases as they passed the attacker on to the next underfunded, constantly-fire-fighting agency so they could wash their hands of him.  Anyone who has worked in a complex organisation will recognise this classic symptom of chronic underfunding and toxic management.

Every time something like this happens, state bodies and agencies put out sombre statements of condolence, solidarity, and lessons being learned.  But as politicians trying to do the best for our communities, and particularly as Liberals, we need to demand better than this.

Every time something like this happens, equally, the same arguments are dusted off and wheeled out about better communication between organisations and agencies (obvious), better funding for them all (also obvious), and an inevitable increase in tough rhetoric about punishing this sort of thing, locking them up and throwing the key, giving ever more draconian powers to the police, and so on (depressing).

Our town will never be the same again after the events of 20th June, 2020.  So how do we make sure our response won’t be the same again either?

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Caron Lindsay

Cole-Hamilton to Humza Yousaf: Your actions have eroded any trust you had

By Caron Lindsay | Sun 28th April 2024 - 11:52 am

Scottish Lib Dem Leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has declined to help Scotland’s beleaguered First Minister Humza Yousaf.

We need to remember that Yousaf’s predicament is entirely of his own making. He would not be facing a confidence vote this week had he not unceremoniously handed the Greens their jotters and booted them out of the Government on Thursday this morning, just two days after saying they were worth their weight in gold.

Alex understandably responded to Yousaf’s invitation to talks by asking him how on earth he could expect anyone to trust a word he said, given the way he had acted.

He also then outlined a few of the biggest failures of the Scottish Government before saying that the best solution would be for the First Minister to resign and for there to be a Scottish election. Here’s the text of his letter in full:

 

Dear First Minister,

Thank you for your letter. Scottish Liberal Democrats have always believed in working together in the national interest and building consensus across all political traditions. Our history speaks to that and we will continue to do so in the change that is coming for Scotland. However, I have decided to decline your offer of talks at Bute House.

Successful minority administration must be rooted in compromise and a spirit of mutual trust with other parties. However, your actions this past week have eroded entirely any remaining trust that you enjoyed across the chamber. They suggest that rather than being motivated by the national interest, you are presently motivated only by your own self-interest and by political survival.

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Tom Arms

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 28th April 2024 - 10:05 am

United States of America

Here’s the problem facing the US Supreme Court: Should US presidents – in and out of office – have total or partial immunity from criminal prosecution for acts they committed while in the Oval Office?

Or does the failure to provide this blanket immunity expose past presidents to political vendettas by their successors or other political opponents?

Or would Donald Trump’s appeal for blanket immunity – in the words of Justice Elena Kagan – “turn the Oval Office into a sea of criminality.”

This week the Justices heard oral arguments from lawyers representing Trump on one side and Special Prosecutor Jack Smith on the other. The latter is attempting to bring the former president to trial for his role in the 6 January Capitol Hill riots.

The Justices will now go away and ponder the arguments and issue a decision several weeks from now. Court-watchers are split on what the decision is likely to be. Quite often one can determine the outcome from the questions the Justices ask. Not so, this time as the Justices are painfully aware of the impact of their decision on the actions of future presidents as well as those of Donald Jesus Trump.

Many observers think the Supreme Court will issue a split decision. This would please the Trump team as it would mean referral back to the lower courts and delay, delay, delay.

As the Justices ponder, they may consider the words of pamphleteer Thomas Paine, whose 1776 “Common Sense” had a major impact on the American War of Independence and the constitution which the Justices are sworn to protect. “Where,” wrote Paine, “is the King of America? In America the law is king. For as in absolute governments the King is law, so in free countries the law ought to be king; and there ought to be no other.”

United Kingdom and Rwanda

The British government has declared itself the final arbiter of reality. It has decreed that if it says that a country is safe then it is safe, regardless of whether it is or not.

Most everyone – except for the government of Rishi Sunak – agrees that Rwanda is not safe. Freedom House judges it as “not free”. Human Rights Watch says that protesting refugees have been fired on by Rwandan police. Others have simply disappeared. The Rwandan government is supporting the M23, a violent faction in the Democratic Republic of the Congo which has been accused of war crimes.

For all of these reasons – and others – the UK Supreme Court in November ruled that the Sunak’s plans to send asylum seekers to Rwanda was “unlawful” because Rwanda is not a safe country.

So the government passed a bill which decreed that Rwanda is safe and the UK Supreme Court cannot say otherwise if the UK government say it is. A clear blow to the traditional independence of the British judiciary and its much vaunted respect for the rule of law.

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David Gray

Ofsted reports shouldn’t be reduced to a single word

By David Gray | Sat 27th April 2024 - 12:15 pm

The government’s decision to ignore a cross party committee’s recommendation to abolish one-word Ofsted judgements is the wrong one.

The pressure that school leaders and teachers feel in relation to Ofsted inspectors is huge. And it is not just those two days in which the inspectors are physically in the school; the intensity of being on ‘red alert’ for an imminent inspection can be just as bad – if not worse – than the inspection itself, not least because that period of time can last months if not years. The tragic death of Ruth Perry was a dreadful yet timely reminder of the stress placed on school leaders, and while legislation made in response to a single specific incident is rarely good legislation, this is hardly a new issue.

For schools in areas where competition is high, the difference between ‘outstanding’ and ‘good’ can be perceived as huge in terms of attracting applications from prospective students. But in reality, the actual difference on the ground can be very little, if anything at all. One school leader told me that their school, which had been judged as outstanding for a number of years, was downgraded to ‘good’, despite receiving an outstanding grade on the majority of Ofsted’s criteria. The narrative of the actual report was almost unwaveringly positive and in many cases glowing. Of course, to the outside eye, the school had declined since its last inspection, when in reality it had maintained, if not improved on, its excellent standards. One of the sections in the report hailed the school’s highly impressive arts department, with plenty of extra-curricular drama and music opportunities on offer for the pupils. However, these do not fit particularly well into the rigidity of Ofsted’s marking criteria. Off the record, inspectors suggested that, had the school ‘played the game’ of chasing specific progress measures, they would probably have avoided being inspected and thus remained ‘outstanding’.

And here is the problem with the single-word judgements. It can only be based on very limited criteria, and this will rarely reflect the broad spectrum of curricular and extra-curricular options available at a school.

One of the main arguments put forward in favour of single-word judgements is that it makes things simpler for parents. This is debatable, but even if true, it is both patronising and misleading. Although not a parent myself, I know from speaking to those close to me who do have young children that schooling is one of their biggest priorities. It is something that parents think about before they even become parents. So to suggest that they may not have the time or inclination to read a few pages worth of information on local schools in the area is bizarre.

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Tom Arms

Observations of an Expat: War is Expensive

By Tom Arms | Sat 27th April 2024 - 10:01 am

The $61 billion in in military aid that the US Congress voted for Ukraine this week is in the nick of time. The Ukrainians were literally running out of bullets to hold back the Russian steamroller.

But war is expensive. How much bang can the Ukrainians get for their American bucks?

Let’s start with the workhorse of the battlefield – the humble 155 mm artillery shell and the Howitzers that fire them. For the past few months a steady stream of shells from North Korean and Russian munitions factories has meant that the Russians have been lobbing five times as many shells into the Ukrainian frontline than the Ukrainians have into the Russian.

It has been working. The Russians have gradually pushed forward all the way along the 620-mile front and have captured the town of Aadvika. But the release of the American aid means that the Ukrainians can now start firing back at an anticipated rate of 8,000 shells a day.

Each basic 155mm shell costs $3,000. The all-singing, all dancing precision-guided variety can set you back as much as $130,000 a shell. The Anglo-American built howitzer that fires them costs $4 million.

The howitzers have a range of up to 20 miles, which puts them near the front and in harm’s way. The popular HIMARS (the acronym for America’s High Mobility Artillery Rocket System) is deadly accurate up to 186 miles. This means its mobile launcher (cost $20 million each) can be fired from relative safety. But make each shot count. The missiles cost $434,000 each.

NATO has been reluctant to provide F-16 fighter jets (price $50 million plus approximately $4 million for each air-launched cruise missile). But the Americans have given the Ukrainians thousands of Avevex Phoenix ghost drones at $60,000 a drone. These can be used for reconnaissance or to carry a high explosive on suicide missions.

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Paul Walter

Postcard from Cheadle

By Paul Walter | Fri 26th April 2024 - 7:30 pm

(Above from left to right) Volunteer Colin Eldridge, PPC Tom Morrison and Councillor Mark Jones in Gatley’s Church Road yesterday.

This week I spent a couple of days helping our campaign in Cheadle.

It was great to get stuck in to delivering Focii in the streets of Greater Manchester.

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Charles Quinn

ALDC by-election Report 25th April

By Charles Quinn | Fri 26th April 2024 - 4:10 pm

The final 2 council by-elections of the 23/24 civic year took place this week.

In Scotland, there was a by-election on Angus Council in Arbroath West, Letham & Friockheim ward. Thank you to Sandra O’Shea for not only standing for the Liberal Democrats here but working hard to secure an increase in Lib Dem vote share and a healthy 333 votes. The by-election was caused by the resignation of an Independent councillor. With no Independent standing this time the Conservatives gained the seat.

Thank you once again to Sandra and the local Lib Dem team in Angus for working so hard and moving the Lib Dems forwards here.

Angus Council, Arbroath West, Letham & Friockheim
Conservative: 1682 (41.9%, +10.5%)
SNP: 1175 (29.3%, -6.9%)
Labour: 644 (16.1%, +9.6%)
Liberal Democrats (Sandra O’Shea): 333 (8.3%, +3.9%)
Green Party: 176 (4.4%, +1.1%)

In Wales, there was a by-election on Cardiff Council in Grangetown ward. Thank you to James Bear for flying the Lib Dem flag in this election and making sure Lib Dem voters had someone representing them on the ballot.

Labour held the seat with a reduced vote share.

Cardiff Council, Grangetown
Labour: 1470 (47.5%, -5.6%)
Plaid Cymru / Green: 573 (18.5%, -9.3%)
Conservative: 387 (12.5%, +3.5%)
Propel: 292 (9.4%, +6.2%)
Independent: 205 (6.6%, new)
Liberal Democrats (James Bear): 123 (4%, -0.9%)
Independent: 44 (1.4%, new)

A full summary of all results can be found on the ALDC by-elections page here.

Next week there are over 70 principal council by-elections that have been called to coincide with local election polling day. Some are ‘double vacancies’ in wards that have existing local election contests. ALDC will report the results of these by-elections in the week following the local election and results will be recorded on our by-election results webpage.

Good luck to everyone standing in a by-election or local election contest next week.

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George Cunningham

Christine Jardine fights for improved consular assistance for Brits abroad

By George Cunningham | Fri 26th April 2024 - 1:00 pm

Apologies – this post has been postponed

 

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Rob Parsons

The paradoxes of public health

By Rob Parsons | Fri 26th April 2024 - 12:48 pm

The promotion of public health is a liberal policy. It is an effective tool in the development of fairness and equality, it contributes notably to health and happiness (thereby reducing the need for, and the expense of, medical care; and reducing the cost to businesses of time off work), it enables people to have much more effective control over their own lives, and many of the activities associated with it resist financialisation, which is one reason why it is so unpopular in right wing circles.

It is also a wide ranging field. Healthy populations need good quality, warm, dry housing; good education; good food; good opportunities for both rest and exercise. On the other hand, reduction of social housing, the obsession with reducing education to league tables, corporate control over food prices and ingredients, the selling off of parks and playing fields, all contribute to reductions in public health.

Fundamentally, good public health reduces the impact of poverty, ignorance and conformity in people’s lives.

Public health requires a community based rather than an individualistic response. This again is a liberal value. While we champion the freedom of individuals, we also champion the notion that we live together in communities, and that we affect, and must support, each other. It is an effective sphere for government to do what we cannot do so well ourselves. It utilises “the power of government to change conditions that are constraining people’s freedom”.

As a country we allow the debate to be dominated by advocacy of a freedom that takes no responsibility, by far too much misinformation, and far too little information. (A very clear example at the moment is when both government and media notice that the number of people off sick has notably increased recently, and wonder why. Without ever mentioning Covid, which we know has severe long term consequences for many who have had it.) As a party we allow ourselves too often to be trapped within those terms rather than campaigning to change them.

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Lord William Wallace

Parliament’s second chamber – and the weakness of its first

By Lord William Wallace | Fri 26th April 2024 - 9:46 am

The House of Lords is indefensible in its current form of appointment patronage and bloated size.  Yet the failure of the Commons to check the way the executive governs or to ensure that Bills presented don’t become law until that make sense has made the current Lords, flawed as it is, essential to British democracy.  Yes, that’s deeply paradoxical: an appointed chamber standing up for democracy against ‘the elected House’.

We’ve just seen with the Rwanda Bill the Commons voting repeatedly to allow the government to declare that Rwanda ‘is a safe county’ without reference to evidence or changing circumstances.  Cross-benchers in the Lords, led by retired judges and distinguished lawyers, insisted that it is an offense against the rule of law to legislate that what we say is true whatever the evidence suggests.  On Monday the Lords, reluctantly, backed down, after sustained cross-party cooperation in resisting in which Liberal Democrats had played an active part.  30-40 Conservative peers had refused, in the more loosely-whipped Lords, to vote against amendments to what they accepted was an unworkable Bill.  But after the longest series of ‘ping pong’ exchanges that Parliament has seen for many years both crossbenchers and Labour accepted that the government had to prevail, and Liberal Democrats could do no more..

Parliamentary democracy is supposed to be about representative institutions (and courts) carefully limiting the power of the executive.  But the Commons provide almost no effective checks on executive power, as opposed to the theatre of staged confrontation that is Prime Minister’s Questions and major debates.  The size of the government payroll has steadily increased over recent decades.  Junior ministers have spread, moving from one post to another before they’ve finished learning their brief, to a point where most Lords ministers are now unpaid – since there’s a statutory limit on paid ministerial posts.  Parliamentary private secretaries were limited to senior Cabinet minister 50 years ago; they’ve proliferated, attracting ambitious MPs who hope that loyalty will bring promotion.  Trade envoys, deputy chairmen of the party, ‘tsars’ with allocated tasks, all subject to dismissal if they disobey the whip.  The Labour opposition maintains a shadow team almost as large, which means that in total almost a third of the Commons behave like front-benchers rather than concentrating on holding the government to account.

Worse than this, the government whips have adopted the practice of blocking MPs who are expert but potentially independent-minded from appointment to Bill committees.  The result is that government bills sail through the Commons at speed, often unamended and as often with significant sections unexamined due to ‘guillotines’ on time allocated.

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The Voice

Drama in Scotland – could there be a Holyrood election?

By The Voice | Thu 25th April 2024 - 8:35 pm

Who would have thought that Scottish voters could face two national elections this year – and the first one for the Scottish Parliament before the too-long awaited Westminster poll?

If First Minister Humza Yousaf is forced to resign in the next few days, if the SNP can’t agree on a successor, if the Parliament can’t agree on a new First Minister within 28 days, then Scottish voters could be going to the polls on 4th July.

The SNP has been sharing power with the Scottish Greens for the past two and a half years with Green Co-Conveners Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater holding ministerial office. This morning Humza Yousaf handed them their jotters in an early morning meeting before announcing to the world that he had decided that the SNP would be better off going it alone as a minority Government.

You have to wonder whether he had thought through the implications for his own future. It wasn’t difficult to imagine that someone would put up a motion of no confidence and equally predictable that the party that he had just unceremoniously booted out of Government would not find it in their hearts to support him.

As things stand, his best hope is a tied vote next week, relying on the casting vote of the Presiding Officer to save him. But even that can only be achieved by doing a deal with Ash Regan, his former leadership rival who went off and joined Alex Salmond’s socially conservative, populist Alba party. And even if he survives the vote, clinging to power by your fingernails is not the best way to lead your party into a UK General Election.

You have to wonder why he let that happen.

There are undoubtedly some in the SNP who have been wanting rid of Humza since he was elected.

Last year’s SNP leadership election was so close with Humza only just beating Kate Forbes. Deep divisions were exposed within the party. Now the SNP can take a fair amount of division. They are a very broad church. But the only thing they really care about is independence and when they are divided on how to achieve that, and the prospect of it ever happening is moving further and further away, they are going to implode.  It’s hard to think of anyone in their ranks who could come close to bringing them together.

Their Government is failing at pretty much everything, as Alex Cole-Hamilton said in no uncertain terms at First Minister’s Questions today.

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Adam Belcher

A smoking ban isn’t “unconservative” – but it is illiberal

By Adam Belcher | Thu 25th April 2024 - 12:57 pm

Oxford University Liberal Democrats graduate and worst prime minister ever, Liz Truss, raised eyebrows last week by describing the government’s Tobacco and Vapes Bill as “unconservative”. This is rather odd, because the Conservative instinct has always been to ban the things they don’t like. They didn’t like the idea that children might find out that gay people exist, so they banned teachers from talking about them. They didn’t like that people in Scotland might be able to self-identify as trans, so they banned the Scottish government from allowing it. And, most pertinent to what I am writing about now, they don’t like (most) recreational substances, so for the past several decades they’ve wedded themselves to the disastrous so-called War on Drugs.

Conservatives have a very shallow understanding of what freedom is, and when a conservative starts talking about freedom, alarm bells should start ringing. What these rebel Tories mean by freedom is the freedom for people like them to continue doing the things that people like them have traditionally done, such as hunting foxes, making racist jokes, or in this particular case, smoking tobacco. It generally does not include things that people who are not like them want to do, such as protesting peacefully, being transgender, or smoking cannabis. Unfortunately for them, Rishi Sunak has realised that he’s only got a few months left in Downing Street to scrape together some sort of meagre legacy, and so now Truss and her friends are experiencing the cognitive dissonance that comes from a conservative government approaching smoking in a conservative way.

So no, Liz, our esteemed former comrade, a smoking ban is not un-conservative. Banning a health risk and deploying our overstretched police in a futile forever-war against it is actually a very conservative thing to do (and also a very Labour thing to do, but that’s neither here nor there). Conservatives have never understood true freedom; that is the liberal domain. Which is why-…. Wait, what do you mean, the Lib Dems voted for this?!

Let’s backtrack a bit. I was raised with a pretty simple message: drugs are bad and I shouldn’t do them. I’ve still never done them. However, when I was seventeen, I discovered that some of my friends had smoked cannabis. The idea that they could be treated as criminals for this disturbed me, and it was a big moment in my teenage journey towards embracing liberalism. I joined the Liberal Democrats a few months later, and I’ve enthusiastically supported our position on cannabis ever since. Friends in the party have been campaigning for legalisation for far longer than I have.

To be very clear, the failure of the parliamentary party to oppose this smoking ban has possibly fatally undermined our campaign on cannabis. Watching the leadership tying itself in knots trying to explain how these positions somehow aren’t incompatible by means of weapons-grade centrist nuance was embarrassing.

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Nick Baird

The Conservatives have just announced a big increase in defence spending – how should the Lib Dems respond?

By Nick Baird | Wed 24th April 2024 - 12:45 pm

Yesterday Rishi Sunak announced a plan to substantially increase UK defence spending, up to 2.5% of GDP by 2030. This announcement moves the Tory position from an aspiration to achieve this “when economic circumstances allow” to a firm plan with actual budget cash numbers from this year through to 2030.

The timing is interesting – it is less than two months since the Government passed its Spring Budget without any attempt to fund this aspiration, but since then two things have happened. One is that Keir Starmer moved Labour’s policy position to match the unfunded “aspiration”, and (perhaps more importantly) the Daily Mail ran a sustained campaign demanding a defence spending increase.

Beyond the spin and hyperbole of the speech and press release, the Government has also issued a supporting document with more detail, available here and the simultaneous release of this slick and glossy document indicates the Government has been working on this for a while.

In many respects, this is a sensible plan which actually aligns quite closely with the Lib Dem policy “Liberal Values in a Dangerous World” adopted at this year’s Spring Conference, including investing in people to tackle the recruitment and retention crisis within the Armed Forces and civilian MOD, providing a long term procurement pipeline to give industry confidence to invest in capacity and R&D, and reiterating the importance of alliances.

There are a couple of important things currently missing from the Government’s plans however. One is that the Government’s announcements so far do not commit to reverse the current cuts to the Armed Forces, for example in the size of the Army or the Typhoon fighter fleet. These are crucial issues, as the only way the UK could have more capacity available to fight a big war in the next 2-3 years is to reverse planned cuts now.

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Michal Siewniak

9th May – Was it worth it?

By Michal Siewniak | Wed 24th April 2024 - 11:16 am
One of the most amazing and precious things in our lives, in my view, is that we meet so many different people. Some encounters might be difficult and challenging, others can be inspiring and fulfilling.
We all have a wonderful story to tell. We have all embarked on this incredibly rewarding and rocky journey; a gigantic life adventure. Each one of these stories is unique and special in so many years.
In May, it will be 20 years since Poland and 9 other European countries joined the EU. So many European migrants left their countries of origin and settled in the UK. These individuals became our friends, neighbours, partners, wife, husbands or work colleagues. We have learnt a lot from each other, haven’t we?
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NewsHound

Graham Watson to stand in European Elections – in Italy

By NewsHound | Wed 24th April 2024 - 9:04 am

Many of us are sad that we are not participating in the elections to the European Parliament for the first time since 1979.

However, one longstanding liberal Europhile is heading up ALDE party United States of Europe’s list in North East Italy.

Our Graham Watson, formerly Lib Dem MEP for the South West between 1994 and 2014 is seeking election to the European Parliament. He has joint Italian and British nationality and his wife is Italian.

From ALDE:

On 20 April, ALDE Party members Più Europa, libdem europei and Radicali Italiani in Italy presented their joint list “Stati Uniti d’Europa” (United States of Europe) for the European elections.

At an event in Rome with other parties on the list, partners unveiled the list’s official logo and selection of lead candidates for each of the five Italian constituencies.

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News Meerkat

Another chief constable makes a formal apology to the LGBT+ community #ApologiseNow

By News Meerkat | Tue 23rd April 2024 - 12:00 pm

The Peter Tatchell Foundation, a registered charity, is running a campaign called “#ApologiseNow” which has this petition statement:

Demand all UK police services apologise for their past persecution of the LGBT+ community: raiding bars, clubs, saunas and even private birthday parties. Plus, officers arrested same-sex couples for mere kissing, cuddling and holding hands, and they abused LGBTs as ‘poofs’ & ‘queers’.

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Lord William Wallace

Are we part of ‘the Deep State’?

By Lord William Wallace | Tue 23rd April 2024 - 10:00 am

If you have been reading reviews of Liz Truss’s self-justifying new book, you’ll know that she was defeated as Prime Minister by the sinister forces of the bureaucratic deep state. Michael Gove has for years called the same phenomenon ‘the blob’.  Others on the populist and irrational right call this ‘the liberal conspiracy.’  In the House of Lords some weeks ago, Peter Lilley began to attack the ‘liberal conspiracy’ that was preventing honest Conservatives from following ‘the will of the people’, and became almost incoherent when our benches began to laugh.  He clearly believes that these conspiratorial forces are real, and powerful.  How many of those in the Telegraph and Mail and on social media who write profusely about this actually believe in what they allege, as opposed to using it as a convenient way to attack ‘the Guardianistas’ and the reasoned consensus, is hard to tell.  But there’s no doubt that the message does convince some of its listeners that democratic institutions are biased against them, and that only their populist heroes can represent the pure people against the corrupt establishment – to which you and I all, according to them, belong.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged and | 32 Comments
Robin Stafford

Health Podcast – The Elephant in the Room

By Robin Stafford | Mon 22nd April 2024 - 5:45 pm

In the latest of the Green Book podcasts we’ve looked at health, not from the usual angle of the NHS itself but at the health of the UK population.  If you missed it last month, you can still catch up. 

Why is it that we have one of the unhealthiest populations amongst developed countries? What might that mean in terms of demand and costs in the NHS, apart from all the wider social and economic consequences?  

It’s not as if this is news, as it has been covered in detail by people like Sir Michael Marmot, with his reports going back to 2010, and others before that.  Is it just about more money and resources for the NHS – or are we missing something in how and where we tackle the problems?

Norman Lamb chaired the session, having been a Lib Dem MP and health minister as well as the current chair of a health trust.  Joining him was Wendy Taylor who was a clinical oncologist as well as a current councillor in Newcastle with a particular interest in public health. Joining them we had two guests who are currently writing a book on the subject, which they have loosely titled ‘The Elephant in the Room’.  Roy Lilley and Ed Smith both have business backgrounds but have led and worked extensively with health trusts and both public and private health bodies.  Whilst being strong supporters of the NHS, they see the impossibility of dealing with the ever-escalating demands of an unhealthy population.  

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Mark Valladares

20-21 April 2024 – the weekend’s press releases

By Mark Valladares | Sun 21st April 2024 - 9:30 pm
  • Lord Cameron urged to answer questions in the House of Commons amid global conflicts
  • Long Covid may have reduced Scotland’s GDP by £120m and cost 11,000 jobs
  • Scottish Liberal Democrats attack Government over GP closures
  • Blackie: Abolish London’s bedtime

Lord Cameron urged to answer questions in the House of Commons amid global conflicts

  • Liberal Democrats call on “unelected and unaccountable Foreign Secretary” to take questions from MPs
  • Layla Moran MP writes directly to the Foreign Secretary demanding accountability

Liberal Democrat Foreign Affairs spokesperson, Layla Moran MP, has written to the Foreign Secretary urging him to appear in the House of Commons this week.

The letter to Lord Cameron follows escalation of the conflict in the Middle East, a G7 Summit, and the ongoing war in Ukraine.

Last week, the government blocked a request by cross-party MPs which called on Lord Cameron to be accountable for the question.

In the letter, Layla Moran MP writes:

The public are demanding answers from you about the government’s response to these situations.

Every day thousands of people write to their MPs, wanting to know what the government is doing to ensure aid can reach the people of Gaza, why we haven’t proscribed the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps or wanting to know how we are combatting Russia’s expansionist exploits into our allies’ territory.

In the 21st century, it should not be the case that our Foreign Secretary is both unelected and unaccountable.

You speak on behalf of the United Kingdom as our most senior diplomat. Yet you refuse to speak to your own elected Members of Parliament.

Our constituents must have the ability to have their concerns put directly to the Foreign Secretary.

Long Covid may have reduced Scotland’s GDP by £120m and cost 11,000 jobs

Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton has today called on the Scottish Government to develop a long-term plan for tackling Long Covid after a new economic report indicated that the condition may have reduced Scotland’s GDP by a massive £120m.

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Tom Arms

Tom Arms’ World Review

By Tom Arms | Sun 21st April 2024 - 9:23 am

United States of America

Self-inflicted cracks are starting to appear in the MAGA edifice. The two Republicans wielding the sledgehammers are Alabama’s conspiracy theorist Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene and, of course, Donald Trump himself.

The former president, has time and again, demonstrated a total disregard for the rule of law, or at least its application to his affairs. Next week the judge in his New York trial, Juan Merchan, will decide whether Trump is guilty of contempt of court for repeatedly breaching a gag order against his making comments about witnesses, jurors, the judge, the judge’s family or any court officials.

It is a legal courtesy for opposing legal teams to give a day or two’s advance notice of witnesses to give the lawyers time to prepare. The prosecution has asked the judge that they be allowed to withhold the information on the grounds that Trump is likely to issue intimidatory comments on his Truth Social platform. The judge has agreed.

Marjorie Taylor Greene – who has been dubbed “Vladimir Putin’s Envoy Extraordinaire to the US Congress” by Democrats and moderate Republicans – appears determined to totally destroy Republican credibility. Her main target is the $60 billion aid package for Ukraine which has been held up for months by far-right MAGA Republicans in the House of Representatives.

The package is expected to be approved this weekend. But Ms Greene is determined to make a last ditch effort to kill the aid bill with a series of outrageous amendments, including: No humanitarian aid for Gaza, withdrawal from NATO, no support for a two-state solution, and – best of all – a demand that any member of Congress who votes in favour of aid for Ukraine be conscripted into the Ukrainian army.

Ms Greene and the other members of the right-wing Freedom Caucus have managed to alienate moderate Republican congressman who are expected to cross the floor to vote with Democrats to pass the aid bill. Republican Congressman Derrick Van Orden said that he and his colleagues were “sick and tired” of being “bullied” and “blackmailed.”

Europe

America’s “cancel culture” came to Europe this week–and then cancelled itself.

Cancel culture, is a term used by mainly US conservatives to decry the efforts of liberals to block (or “cancel”) public appearances by right-wing speakers. The tactic has become especially popular American university campuses where left-wing student demonstrations have forced the cancellation of speeches by right-wingers.

Conservatives – quite rightly – see this as an attack on free speech.

This week the Edmund Burke Foundation, a conservative American think tank/pressure group, was hosting a conference of right-wing European luminaries in Brussels. Or at least, it was until it encountered the cancel culture of a series of Brussels mayors.

Trouble started the weekend before the event when one of the mayors of Brussels 19 districts decided that the Euro-sceptic foundation’s National Conservatism Conference would not be welcome in his district which included the EU institutions. He feared that the speakers’ anti-EU, anti-immigration and anti-LGBT views would attract violent counter demonstrations. So the venue was shifted to a building near the European Parliament where another district mayor turfed out the organisers.

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Tom Arms

Observations of an Expat: Poor Bibi

By Tom Arms | Sat 20th April 2024 - 10:13 am

Spare a thought for Bibi Netanyahu. He is caught between a rock and several hard places. He is fighting external wars against Hamas, Hezbollah and Iran; an internal war against his cabinet colleagues and a diplomatic one against the Biden Administration and most of the rest of the world, if not all of it.

The results of this complex picture could be Armageddon, stalemate or any one of the many in between scenarios.

While pondering the fate of the Israeli prime minister you may also want to consider all the other players who are dragging the world to the brink of a Middle Eastern abyss: President Joe Biden, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khameini and Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar. They are locked in a dangerous escalating tit for tat dance of death.

Within the Israeli cabinet there is a four-way tug-of-war between Prime Minister Netanyahu, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and War Cabinet Minister and Opposition Leader Benny Gantz. They all appear to hate and distrust each other.

According to sources, Gallant and Gantz have hardly spoken to each other since Benny Gantz beat out Yoav Gallant for the top military job ten years ago. Itamar Ben-Gvir is an ultra-Orthodox Jew who said Netanyahu should “go berserk” after Iran’s missile attack on Israel. He described Israel’s retaliatory attack on Iran’s third most populous city, Isfahan, as “lame.”

Gallant is not as extreme as Ben-Gvir, but not far off. Benny Gantz is the nearest thing to a dove that there is in the Israeli war cabinet. But even he is calling for the “total destruction” of Hamas. If elections were held today, Gantz would be prime minister.

All four men have conflicting views on a post-war Gaza. Netanyahu wants the army to take over. Gallant wants an ill-defined arrangement with the West Bank’s Palestinian Authority. Ben-Gvir is pushing for replacing the 2.2 million Gazan Palestinians with Israeli settlers and Benny Gantz is keeping his cards close to his chest, but hints at a politically slimmed down two-state solution.

Netanyahu, according to sources, deals with his rivals by ignoring them. All the major decisions since October 7 have been made by the prime minister without – or with the minimum – consultation.

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Mark Valladares

19 April 2024 – today’s press releases

By Mark Valladares | Fri 19th April 2024 - 10:00 pm
  • River Thames Tsar should be created to tackle sewage crisis
  • Menzies Scandal: Ethics adviser must investigate Conservative Chief Whip
  • Sick note speech: Sunak blaming British people for failures on NHS and economy
  • Lib Dems respond to SNP interview on ditched climate targets

River Thames Tsar should be created to tackle sewage crisis

  • Liberal Democrat Leader calls for new government appointed role to hold Thames Water to account for sewage pollution
  • New role could pave the way for wider reforms of water industry with increased environmental accountability and new representation on water company boards
  • Ed Davey will make the announcement during a local elections visit to the River Mole in Esher and Walton today

The Liberal Democrats are calling for a new River Thames Tsar to be appointed by the government, in a bid to hold the country’s biggest water firm to account.

Leader Ed Davey visits the River Mole in Esher and Walton, a marginal Surrey constituency, to announce the policy. The Esher and Walton constituency was in the top 100 worst for sewage dumping last year and saw a staggering 135% increase in spills.

This policy is part of the party’s plan for water industry reform, including transforming water companies into “Public Benefit Companies”, by ensuring environmental experts sit on water utility boards. The reforms aim to put an end to water companies putting profit before the environment. The Liberal Democrats have also called for Ofwat to be abolished, so a new tougher water regulator can be created.

The new River Thames Tsar proposed by the Liberal Democrats would have various roles, including:

  • Attending Thames Water board meetings
  • Hosting public meetings with river users and environmental groups
  • Ensuring the Environment Agency follows up on reports of sewage pollution into the Thames and its tributaries

The latest policy announcement follows the Government’s decision to appoint a River Wye Tsar last week, amid concerns of agricultural pollution. The Liberal Democrats are calling for the new River Thames Tsar to have a high public profile, with Feargal Sharkey and Steve Backshall suggested as possible candidates.

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Charles Quinn

ALDC by-election Report, 18th April

By Charles Quinn | Fri 19th April 2024 - 7:11 pm

There were 3 principal council by-elections this week. Two on Thursday and a rare election on Tuesday. Just like last week our Lib Dem candidates secured an excellent win and an extremely close second place in the elections we contested on Thursday.

Our win came on East Cambridgeshire DC in Ely West ward. The was a Lib Dem defence. Congratulations to Councillor Ross Trent and the East Cambridgeshire team for not only holding the ward but doing so by increasing our vote share by over 10%!

East Cambridgeshire DC, Ely West
Liberal Democrats (Ross Trent): 1125 (47.9%, +10.6%)
Conservative: 760 (32.2%, +10.3%)
Labour: 466 (19.8%, -2.7%)

We also contested the seat of Farnham Castle on Waverley BC. Despite not standing here in the last election Lib Dem candidate Theresa Meredith-Hardy finished second and was only 28 votes off winning – securing 30% of the vote and pushing Labour into third. This is a truly exceptional result and reward for the hard work put in by Theresa and the Waverley Lib Dem team. You’ll get it next time!

Waverley BC, Farnham Castle
Farnham Residents: 307 (32.5%, -17.6%)
Liberal Democrats (Theresa Meredith-Hardy): 279 (29.6%, new)
Labour: 217 (23%, -11.7%)
Conservative: 141 (14.9%, -0.2%)

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Katharine Pindar

Tell the young: look to the Lib Dems not Labour for progressive politics

By Katharine Pindar | Fri 19th April 2024 - 10:30 am

The Labour Party appears now to be following a Tory-light policy. Keir Starmer has ditched the £28 bn pledge to follow Green policies, regardless of the needs of young people to be able to consider their many years to come of living with climate change with some hope. And of their immediate extreme needs, for decent and affordable housing, it is the Young Liberals who strengthened the Lib Dem housing policy passed at Bournemouth last September (F31, ‘Tackling the housing crisis’) with a demand for thousands more social dwellings to be built.

On taxation, the two main parties seem to be converging, despite the Tories’ greater inclination (not fulfilled) to cut taxes. Rachel Reeves, the Shadow Chancellor, will keep to modest projected spending, obeying the same fiscal rules as the Government. The Tories have stolen the Labour proposed taxing of Non-Doms policy to help find funds for the NHS, and the Labour response is only to close the policy’s loopholes, such as not allowing a half-year pause before taxation begins. What other measures can Ms Reeves take? She plans to tackle tax avoidance, apparently, by greatly adding to the numbers of HMRC staff to investigate it. Since 56% of the tax avoidance is supposed to be from small businesses, the owners of such businesses must fear where her demands will light. Her aim is to cut the tax gap by £5bn by the end of the next parliament by that means. She has no policies for major gains from taxation despite the vast needs of our country today.

The one major objective to which both parties are adhering, to avoid adding to the National Debt through extra borrowing and increased taxation, is a questionable one. The required growth of GDP, set back by the limitations of Brexit, can only come from major investment, with government backing for example businesses utilising new technology, and greater promotion of industries increasing wind, tidal and solar power.

It is our party which is up to the job. In our councils up and down the country, Liberal Democrats are grappling with the problems caused by the deficiencies of funding for the hospitals, local government services, the pay of carers and of teachers, and for house building. The policies passed at our conferences demand better provision to meet the many national needs of our run-down country, and we are not afraid to demand the taxes necessary to pay for them.

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Mark Valladares

18 April 2024 – today’s press releases

By Mark Valladares | Thu 18th April 2024 - 11:00 pm
  • Police taking up to 17 and a half hours to respond to anti-social behaviour calls
  • Thames Water: This corporate clown show must end
  • “Flushed away”- Welsh Lib Dems urge Welsh Government to support maintenance of public toilets
  • Scot Lib Dems respond to SNP and Greens ditching climate change targets
  • Khan manifesto launch
  • Cole-Hamilton speaks after more days of turmoil for Humza Yousaf

Police taking up to 17 and a half hours to respond to anti-social behaviour calls

Average police response times to anti-social behaviour incidents have increased by 37% since 2021, with some forces taking an average of 17 and a half hours to arrive at the scene, shocking new figures uncovered by the Liberal Democrats have revealed.

The figures were obtained through a series of Freedom of Information requests to all police forces in England. 27 forces provided full responses.

In 2023, it took an average of 3 hours and 40 minutes across police forces for an officer to turn up to the scene of anti-social behaviour incidents. This is an increase of 34% compared to average wait times across police forces in 2021, which stood at 2 hours and 44 minutes.

The figures revealed a disturbing postcode lottery, with huge differences in average response times between police forces.

Suffolk had the longest wait times in England last year, with police taking an average of 17 and a half hours to attend anti-social behaviour reports, followed closely behind by Norfolk where wait times were 17 hours and 29 minutes. Cambridgeshire also had extremely long wait times, which stood at 11 and a half hours.

Meanwhile, anti-social behaviour calls in Essex were attended to in less than 8 minutes on average.

In recent years, some forces also experienced huge deteriorations in wait times. In Surrey, where Lib Dem Leader Ed Davey will be making a campaigning visit today, wait times have increased by 281% since 2021, up to nearly 5 and a half hours.

London wait times have more than tripled in that same time period, up a staggering 353%.

The shocking figures come just months after the Crime Survey for England and Wales found that in the year ending September 2023, more than one third of people had experienced or witnessed some type of anti-social behaviour, with the police recording 1 million incidents.

The Liberal Democrats have slammed the Conservative Government for these figures, arguing that years of ineffective resourcing have left local police forces overstretched, under-resourced and unable to effectively respond to local crime. This includes taking more than 4,500 community officers (PCSOs) off the streets since 2015.

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