I'm more or less over the pneumonia now, but still fatigued as hell — I went to bed at 8PM yesterday, and slept eleven and three-quarter hours. Between that, work, and buying a house (contracts were exchanged today) I've not had time to write. My current plan is that over this weekend I'm going to [...]
Conservative opposition Councillor Tim Crowley has a letter in the Sutton Guardian repeating his claims at council that the Lib Dems' Opportunity Sutton Economic Development strategy is just an empty sound bite from me. However attracting more than £350 million in new investment into the borough in less than two years is no mean feat [...]
When my political hero Charles Masterman was appointed to the cabinet in 1915 he was obliged, under the law of the day, to resign as an MP and fight a by-election. The photograph above must come from that campaign. Masterman was defeated in Bethnal Green and again at a second by-election in Ipswich shortly afterwards. Unable to get back into parliament, he was put in charge of the British propaganda effort when the First World War broke out. Masterman is often described as an unlucky politician, and there is certainly something in that. However, his defeat at these two by-elections ...
Wed 19th
20:31
LibLink: Danny Alexander: We ignored siren voices in the Tory party on 40p tax rate to give £1...
[IMG: Screen Shot 2014-03-19 at 19.44.37] To write for the Mail once might be considered unfortunate. To do so twice in three days has to be considered careless. Mind you, Lady Bracknell would no doubt have read that paper. Danny Alexander follows on from Sunday's article with this piece on how the Liberal Democrats stopped the Tories from confining tax cuts to the rich alone. First, a little differentiation: We've forced it onto the agenda at every Autumn Statement and Budget and by April this year will have delivered a tax cut worth £700 to 25 million working people. I'm ...
The Royal Mint has released the design of the new pound coin to be used from 2017. Billed as the most secure coin in the world, it is primarily being introduced to combat the proliferation of fake £1 coins. For younger readers, it's based on the first coin to feature Queen Elizabeth's face, the threepenny bit. The Mint is vague on the details but 'a competition' will be held in the near future to decide the 'tails' side of the coin. How about Prime Minister Lloyd George? He became Prime MInister around 100 years ago, in 1916, pulled Britain through ...
This first appeared on Liberal Democrat Voice So the Chancellor has just sat down. Here are my first thoughts on the Budget. Nick gets his Workers' Bonus The personal tax threshold rises to £10,500. I doubt it was anything to ... Continue reading →
@OllyGrender Perhaps he's going to introduce VAT on rabbits? — Mark Pack (@markpack) March 19, 2014
Wed 19th
18:11Opinion: Expansion of apprenticeships shows that Liberal Democrats are the party of young people.
[IMG: Made by apprentices reception License Some rights reserved by Apprenticeships] As someone who believes tackling long-term youth unemployment and giving opportunities to young people should be the Liberal Democrats' next great mission in Government, I very much welcome the news in the Budget of new measures to grow the number of apprenticeships in our economy. These initiatives are set to create 100,000 more apprentices which is fantastic news for young people in communities up and down the Country. To ensure this happens, Liberal Democrat Ministers are providing £85million in both 2014-15 and 2015-16 to extend the Apprenticeship Grants for ...
Today's Headline of the Day Award goes to the Independent.
There always seems much mockery when it comes to bingo and the way the government taxes it. But what if I told you that under Labour, bingo was taxed more heavily than any other form of gambling? Strange but true. So I for one welcome today's cut in the bingo tax...here is an oldie from 2009 In defense of the bingo tax cut Its not often I praise or commend this government, but to be fair they do make it hard for me to do so! I will praise them on reducing the bingo tax. Now I know this has ...
That, at least, was Richard Nixon's verdict on November 1971. His successors in office since 1989 would have done well to remember that. The oafish, drunk, incompetent Boris Yeltsin was an exception and a national embarrassment to most Russians. He is widely reviled for precipitating the disintegration of the Soviet Union, and facilitating the theft of the state's wealth by a small number of oligarchs. The Clinton era is remembered in the US as the good times. In Russia they were, for most people, a time frightening change and economic hardship, with a dose of national humiliation layered on top. ...
[IMG: EU Parliament Brussels - Some rights reserved by Poetografie] Good news from Brussels. Two Liberal Democrat MEPs have won awards in the MEP Awards 2014. First up was Chris Davies for his work to secure sustainable fishing through Fish for the Future. .@ChrisDaviesMEP has received an award for his work reforming #CFP to restore Europe's fish stocks #MEPawards pic.twitter.com/T5kYMfONC4" — LibDem MEPs (@LibDemMEPs) March 18, 2014 The man himself was pleased: Just won a parliamentarian of the year award for my cross-party work with Fish for the Future. Seriously chuffed. #cfpreform — Chris Davies (@ChrisDaviesMEP) March 18, 2014 And ...
When the Liberal Democrats took back control from the Conservatives of Bath and NE Somerset in 2011 we found plans in train to remove much Council operation from the Guildhall. Our approach was to scrap these ideas. The Guildhall is important to residents. Our plan is to rejuvenate the Guildhall and keep it as the political hub of the Council and grow its commercial uses. Our first scheme was to develop part of one end into a co-working hub The Guild – very successfully and this weekend hosting its first Hackathon. Our second scheme was to increase our revenue stream ...
Most of our candidates in target wards this May are rightly defending their local record of action and campaigning. The materials for this have been promoted by ALDC over many years . See our earlier articles! "A record of action, a promise of more" has been one of the mantras of the party for years [...]
Much of this year's Budget comes as little surprise. With a tight fiscal background and given George Osborne's penchant for playing to the gallery, so much is predictable. Ditto the widely-trailed coalition announcements on the income tax threshold (where Nick...Read more ›
Hitchcock was a great director but he made some lame films: the Birds was one of them. Variety has broken the story that Michael Bay's Platinum Dunes studio is remaking 'the Birds' with Bay himself acting as a producer. It would be fair to say that many film fans have not exactly welcomed this: Would [...]
Wed 19th
14:33
Pretty sure this man's odds on being the Lib Dem Shadow Chancellor for the next General election jus...
So, the big surprise in the budget was the wholesale re engineering of the savings landscape, with what Osborne called the biggest shake up in pensions since the 1920s bang in the middle. And one person had their fingerprints all over those pension changes. And they're a Lib Dem. The shadow chancellor in 2015 might not be Danny or Vince. Steve Webb. It could be you
Today's budget takes place during the backdrop of a record number of people in work and with business investment forecast to increase. Forming the coalition provided the UK with the stable Government it needed to sort out Labour's financial mess. Liberal Democrat policies are at the heart of the long term economic plan that is delivering jobs and growth in Wales. Today the Liberal Democrats have managed to raise the tax-threshold to £10,500. This means 1,160,000 people in Wales will have had their tax cut by £800 since the Liberal Democrats came into Government. Before the election, David Cameron said ...
MP Julian Huppert has welcomed a Budget which puts more money in people's pockets, creates more apprenticeships and helps businesses to grow. He said the Budget, delivered today (Wednesday, March 19), also brought some welcome news for pensioners and researchers and has given incentives for people to save. "We have worked hard to help working families, support job creation and give our young people greater opportunities," said Julian. "I am delighted that we have been able to increase the personal tax allowance again next year to £10,500. Thanks to this Liberal Democrat policy ordinary working people will have £800 more ...
Iain Martin - who is an excellent and thought provoking Twitter follow btw, if Twitter is your thing - posed the following question last night. And I wonder if I don't know the answer. Michael Gove. Firstly: is he in the 'out of Europe' Brigade? Well, I rather think so... he certainly seems on the sceptical side... I'm not happy with our position with the European Union. But my preference is for a change in Britain's relationship," said Gove. "My ideal is exactly what the majority of the population think, which is that the present situation is no good, to ...
[IMG: George Osborne with Red Box, Budget 2012] So the Chancellor has just sat down. Here are my first thoughts on the Budget. Nick gets his Workers' Bonus The personal tax threshold rises to £10,500. I doubt it was anything to do with the petition being pushed on social media in the last few days. This was down to the hard work of our ministers staying on message, in volume, over time, in budget negotiations. Nick Clegg has stuck with this through the entire Parliament and given us a very tangible promise kept – and more. "I am proud of ...
As we have talked about before Posters and Stakeboards are a great way to build your candidate's name recognition and show voters that Liberal Democrats can win in their area. With polling day in the European and local election just 65 days LDHQ have some great offers on both posters and correx stakeboards. To order [...]
"So, we should do more than one squeeze leaflet then?" is a question that has been asked at two campaign planning meetings I've attended recently. The answer is a resounding "YES!". Many local parties have a tradition of delivering one squeeze leaflet, or one set of target letters, during the latter stages of a local [...]
[IMG: st Andrews flag saltire scotland Some rights reserved by Fulla T] Last week saw the intervention of two giants of Scotland's political landscape in the debate over Scottish independence. An emerging consensus came to light after Gordon Brown, the former prime minister, and Sir Menzies Campbell, former UK leader of the Lib Dems, issued separate calls for the Scottish parliament to be given sweeping new powers as an alternative to independence. While Gordon Brown was speaking in Glasgow, over in Edinburgh Sir Menzies Campbell was publishing a new report on the Liberal Democrats' proposals for devolution. Both statements saw ...
A really useful publication from Public Zone about online fundraising. It's from 2012 but still packed full of useful insights. Download
For those of you who are interested her is a brief rundown of some of the main political events (or events featuring political figures) at the upcoming Cambridge Literary Festival starting on1st April. Saturday 5th of April, Douglas Alexander, 1pm In conversation with Rafael Behr, political editor of the New Statesman, about his new collection of essays Influencing Tomorrow: Future Challenges for British Foreign Policy. 5th of April, New Statesman Debate, 5.30pm "This house believes that baby boomers left society worse than they found it." 6th of April, 11.30am Former Home Secretary, Alan Johnson will be discussing his ...
A major new childcare package to help millions of parents with the cost of living and give children the best possible start in life was unveiled by Nick Clegg today. The new tax-free childcare scheme, announced by the Liberal Democrats last year, will be increased from £1,200 to £2,000 per child and the scheme will be brought forward to Autumn 2015. This means that working parents earning at least £50 per week, will get 20% off the cost of childcare up to a limit of £10,000 for every child under the age of 12. Those working part-time, on maternity leave ...
[IMG: Refuse collection bin lorry LicenseAttribution Some rights reserved by bilbobagweed] Today's Telegraph says "David Laws: Councils should charge for bin collections" It's a headline designed to get you imagining piles of uncollected rubbish on the streets when people don't pay. It's designed to invoke all of your senses. The smell of waste left to putrify in the noonday sun, that tell-tale sound of scurrying little rodent feet, and then the sight of pink-eyed, hungry rats. Everywhere. That unmistakeable smell of decay is already in your nostrils, isn't it? Ugh. The report is about evidence given by Laws and Oliver ...
[IMG: Budget 2010 photocall] One of my top 3 suggestions for this year's budget was: "Scrap the absurd twice-yearly cycle of Budgets and Autumn Statements." It wasn't an original idea – the economist Tim Harford suggested it a couple of years ago, arguing "It may be an enjoyable political platform but there is no economic justification for the annual kaleidoscope of trivia." Tory peer and Times commentator Danny Finkelstein has tooted the same horn today: I think one of the most useful reforms the Chancellor could make is to scrap the annual Budget. ... There are two big fiscal events ...
In those heady days immediately after the 2010 general election, I used to argue that 'austerity' might play an urgent and vital role in rescuing public services. I doubt whether anyone paid much attention. They looked at me as they often did, as if they found it hard to place me exactly. But I argued this on the Lib Dem federal policy committee, so - who knows - it could have strengthened the ambition for austerity in small ways. I thought that austerity might be the only way to shock services, which had been hollowed out by New Labour's targets ...
Julian Huppert on improving the private rental sector (tags: ) L'Wren Scott was a successful fashion designer - not just Mick Jagger's girlfriend (tags: ) British intelligence watchdog is like Yes Prime Minister, says @julianhuppert (tags: ) [IMG: comment count unavailable] comments
Wed 19th
08:55
Media types, please note - women you could contact to talk about #indyref in final 6 months
If you follow me on Twitter, you might have noticed my frequent irritation that so many of the political programmes seem to think it's fine to have all male panels. As Scotland nears the biggest decision it will take in ... Continue reading →
[IMG: image] Over at Netmums, Nick Clegg has been answering questions about the new tax free childcare system announced yesterday. He explains the three elements, including the extra help for families on the lowest incomes: Firstly, if you're a working family with children under 12, which doesn't receive tax credits, Universal Credit or Employer Supported Childcare, but both parents are working or you're a lone working parent, the government will provide 20% of your child care costs up to £10,000 a year. This will cover parents working full-time and part-time as well as, for the first time ever, those mums ...
Recent news that free public wi-fi will be available in Glasgow's streets and public spaces from the start of the 2014 Commonwealth Games and that Edinburgh city centre could have free open-air wi-fi as early as this summer, has highlighted the need for Dundee to have a similar offering as soon as possible. As town and city wireless internet access becomes more common, more and more across the world are setting up free town/city centre wi-fi hotspots for their citizens and visitors and its something I am very keen to see implemented in Dundee. Many cities are discovering it's a ...
One of the problems of devolution is that you are not in control of your own destiny on a wide range of issues. That is particularly the case in Wales where our legislative powers are limited and we are still arguing about funding formulas and tax. In these circumstances it is wise to temper one's critcism of the UK Government, just in case one's own party should take a similar stance at a UK level and completely undermine one's position. With a few exceptions, Welsh Labour have not taken this advice. They have been quite partisan on reforming the Barnett ...
1. Listen to the speeches if you must, but disregard just about everything you hear. The Chancellor will be framing the language to deliver the message he wants you to hear and despite the fact they have not even seen any details the opposition will have already written their speeches to tell you how evil it all is. 2. Look between the lines of the Chancellor's speech for the hard announcements. If, for example, the chancellor announces a new tax or a raising of the tax threshold then this will happen. If you have time go on the Treasury website ...
ConservativeHome asked me for some top lines about my wishes for George Osborne's fifth budget today. Here they are... My top three requests: 1) No surprise this one: an increase in the personal allowance to £10,500 take more of the low-paid out of income tax. The Lib Dems alone campaigned for this tax-cut in 2010; now both the Tories and Labour want to do it. (It would be more progressive to raise the National Insurance threshold, albeit politically less sellable; then abolish NI completely, merging it into income tax.) 2) A major transfer of funding powers from central to local ...
The Welsh Labour Government continues to undermine the democratic process by its continued use of fast tracked legislation and framework bills. Three successive Bills were introduced via the emergency and fast track procedures in 2013: the National Health Service Finance (Wales) Bill; the Agricultural Sector (Wales) Bill; and the Control of Horses (Wales Bill). There has also been an increase in the number of Framework Bills, including the Social Care Well-Being (Wales) Bill which is to be debated today in the chamber. Framework Bills rely heavily on regulations to flesh out the details. This means that Assembly Members are often ...
I'll freely admit, this is puerile, childish, base and beneath me, but I could not resist the headline once I had come up with it in my head. And then again it's not every day that a world leader, up for re-election in 8 weeks' time, pees himself in public. [IMG: Prostate Cancer Foundation] You can too via their website www.pcf.org or to Prostate Cancer UK here. It is interesting to note how Santos chose to carry on with his speech, and none of his handlers dived on stage to cover up his potential embarrassment. He deserves respect for his ...
