The leak to the BBC hinting at the scale of the cuts to welfare budgets being modelled by the Department for Work and Pensions has caused consternation. And so it should. Given that George Osborne has refused to say what he is proposing to cut from welfare spending it was inevitable that any information would attract attention. It is frankly outrageous that he is unwilling to be transparent with his plans. But that's a different issue. The BBC leak suggests that disabled people, unemployed people and those with caring responsibilities could bear the brunt of reduced spending. The Conservatives have ...

Posted by admin on Alex's Archives

A couple of photos taken on Monday 10 May 2010 while the Coalition negotiations were going on. Suddenly the Liberal Democrats were of interest to the world's press. As a sign that we were now an important party, a couple of gorillas in suits appeared in reception at Cowley Street to vet visitors. When I took the photo from inside the building I thought they were going to arrest me under the Official Secrets Act.

Posted by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England

I'm going to do a proper blog post later, if I'm well enough (been busy today and it's taken it out of me), but I thought I'd set out my best guesses as to what the final result of the election will be. I think in terms of MPs, we're going to have something like [...]

Posted by Andrew Hickey on Sci-Ence! Justice Leak!

 

Posted by Eric Avebury on Eric Avebury

Didn't they once used to be the party that talked about international solidarity amongst workers? Didn't they once used to at least say they stood for decent, liberal, progressive values? Those days are gone. Look what you can buy in their shop for £5. [IMG: Labour immigration mug] It's one of their key pledges in this election. The way to deal with UKIP's rise is to challenge them with evidence, not pander to them. You can also, by the way, buy 1000 Nick Clegg Wanted posters for £35. Their arguments are pretty weak and not what you would call entirely ...

Posted by The Voice on Liberal Democrat Voice

Two years ago, further responsibility for discretionary payments to people in need was transferred from the Department of Work and Pensions (DWP) to local councils. That was a perfectly sensible decision as local councils are better placed to determine local needs than a central government department. But since then, Shropshire has underspent the allocated budgets [...]

Posted by andybodders on Andy Boddington

Jeremy Thorpe was the Liberal Party's most charismatic leader since David Lloyd George, whom in many ways he tried to emulate. I first met him when he came to speak at the Oxford Union while I was Secretary of the university's Liberal Club and I was dazzled by his wit, his talent for mimicry and [...]

Posted by jonathanfryer on Jonathan Fryer

Yes, this is for real and for sale from the UK Labour Party: Oh look – Labour are selling 'controls on immigration' mugs. I wonder how many Haringey Labour will order this time? pic.twitter.com/9ulbqdzqgp — Jenni Hollis (@JenniferHollis) March 28, 2015 Of course it's in line with Labour's recent election leaflets on immigration which even one of their own MPs described as "pandering to Ukip" and with Labour's support for the Tories on immigration: [IMG: Labour backs Tories on immigration]

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

One of the neat features of the now-not-so-new Liberal Democrat campaign database, Connect, is that way it lets you use barcodes for quick data entry. Barcodes of course require barcode scanners, which is where this recommended device comes in, the My-Link USB Laser (Bi-directional) Barcode Scanner*: [IMG: My-Link USB Laser (Bi-directional) Barcode Scanner] It comes with a touch of controversy as some campaigners swear by getting large numbers of super-cheap scanners for a fiver on eBay, but along with others I'm in the camp of spending a little bit more to get extra durability and reliability, especially for equipment that ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

After all, they're a modern, progressive and liberal party, the party of the metropolitan elite, the one with all the forward-thinking ideas. A truly internationalist party you might say, one that looks outward to the world and has a positive attitude towards it... They're also the party that will sell you this: [IMG: Pledge_4_Mug_-_Controls_On_Immigration] I wonder how many Ed Miliband's bought for his family?

Posted by Nick on What You Can Get Away With
YouGov

Who could have foreseen that? Anyway, Metro wins our Headline of the Day Award.

Posted by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England

By the end of this weekend, the Liberal Democrats will have knocked on one million doors this year. That's pretty incredible. Paddy Ashdown has been in Bath today to campaign for Steve Bradley and mark that important milestone. Liberal Youth members have been out in force too. Bristol students called our election chief a "charm machine" which is a whole load more respectful than he got in Scotland last weekend when Willie Rennie dubbed him Father Jack after his sweary outbursts in press briefings. Campaigning in Bath with @paddyashdown he's a charm machine! — Bristol LD Students (@LDSocBristol) March ...

Posted by Newspuppy on Liberal Democrat Voice
Sat 28th
16:50

Goodbye to all that

In May of 2011, I was elected to Mendip District Council and became the youngest person ever to be elected to the authority. I could barely think as they were counting the votes, and by the time the result was announced, I could do nothing but cry. Cry with relief, exhaustion and confusion at everything that had happened. Election campaigns, as many of you will know are (as a good friend once said) the best of times and the worst of times. They're incredible. There's no feeling like being involved in something that you're so passionate about, side by side ...

Posted by Sam Phripp on So Sam said...

Lib Dems Believe Wordle 9

It's about freedom. That one word is the clarion call for Liberal Democrats. Liberal Democrats believe that maximising personal freedom is fundamental to a liberal society. We believe that freedom means the opportunity to make the most of our lives, while recognising that our actions must not prevent others from sharing those opportunities and that we may need to take active steps to extend freedom to all. A core aspect of our commitment to freedom is a commitment to civil rights, and that cause belongs to us more than to any other party. That means supporting fundamental civil rights to ...

I asked the other day why on earth the Liberal Democrats had indulged the Tories' last minute motion on the re-election of the Speaker which brought this Parliament to a rather undignified end. We still haven't had any real justification as to why we allowed this to take that leap from William Hague's head to Commons Order paper, but I thought that you would be interested to read the Liberal Democrat interventions in the debate, both of which were against the motion. David Heath's remarks were very brief but to the point: Further to the point of order, Mr Speaker. ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice

[IMG: USB 3.0 hub from Sabrent] Sabrent's 4 Port USB 3.0 Aluminium Hub is nicely made, with a rubberised non-slip finish on the bottom and generously spaced USB slots that make it easy to unplug and plug devices even when the other slots are all in use. Despite that generous spacing, it is light and small with the only real blemish being the thick and clunky cable to connect the hub to your main device. The Sabrent Hub is USB 3.0 compatible, which may well mean nothing to you if you're not up with the technical details of USB, but ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

Three current and one (sadly) former liberal MEPs have written for the European Parliament's Magazine following a Liberal International meeting in Oxford. They argued that liberals must stand together against the far-right and the politics of fear. Catherine Bearder, Dutch MEP Hans van Baalen, our Graham Watson and Swedish MEP Cecilia Wikström show how liberals see the world: As liberals, we will be standing together against the racists, the xenophobes and those who believe Europe needs to return to its fragmented past. Liberals are naturally internationalist; it is in our DNA. We view the world as a global stage, not ...

Posted by NewsHound on Liberal Democrat Voice

According to the one opinion poll I've seen, Ed Miliband was the loser by 54% to 46%, though my own impression was that Miliband's performance, in both content and presentation, was far superior to that of David Cameron. That is probably because my views are more in sympathy with Miliband's than Cameron's: it is hard to be subjective in these matters. Nevertheless, I do think Miliband missed two open goals in. The first was in the interview with Jeremy Paxman, whose hectoring and repetitive:" Did the Labour government borrow too much?" was crying out for a firm: "No, we borrowed ...

Posted by Peter Wrigley on Keynesian Liberal

[IMG: Salmond New York] The Herald reports that Alex Salmond has postponed a trip to the US to promote his book which had, incredibly, been due to take place in just 10 days' time, after the start of the general election campaign. His publishers pencilled in signings in New York and Toronto for the week after next, during the annual Scotland Week festivities. Banff & Buchan MP Eilidh Whiteford was also lined up to appear at a hustings in Gordon, where Mr Salmond is the SNP candidate, during his absence. Jean Marie Kelly of HarperCollins in New York said yesterday: ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice
eUKhost

So reports Information Age: Britain's hopes of enabling online voting in general elections by 2020 have faced a dose of reality after a security vulnerability in an Australian system was exposed. The iVote system was introduced for the New South Wales (NSW) State Election in 2011 for voters who are more than 20 kilometres from a polling station, and has also been used in subsequent state by-elections. But its use in NSW's state election this month has faced intense scrutiny after researchers discovered a major security hole that could allow a hacker to read and manipulate votes... Election security researchers ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack

On the day Earth Hour takes place, the Liberal Democrats have released a video with Nick Clegg and Julia Goldsworthy at a Cornish seal sanctuary. They highlight the nature bill that's part of our 5 green laws in the manifesto. I know this is childish but every time I see that headline, I think of a cartoon David Laws, greened up like Elphaba in Wicked. The party's video communications are really good at the moment. Enjoy this one. Our plans for a Nature Bill include removing exemptions from all plastic bag charges to safeguard our environment and protect wildlife. Posted ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice

This looks fun - tonight on Channel 4 at 9.

Posted by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England

The City Council have announced that local residents can now pre-register for new city-wide energy tariffs that will be amongst the cheapest in the country. In January the council entered into a partnership with OVO Energy to establish dual and single fuel (electricity only) energy tariffs that are exclusive to residents with Peterborough local authority [...]

Posted by Cllr Darren Fower on Cllr Darren Fower

Dirk Bogarde was born on 28 March 1921.

Posted by Jonathan Calder on Liberal England

Don't forget to put your clocks FORWARD overnight, as British Summer Time starts I'm not going to get into the annual argument that we should abandon the practice / have permanent summer time / have double summer time etc, as for every view by parents / farmers etc there is an opposite one.

Posted by Alisdair Gibbs-Barton on Alisdair Gibbs-Barton

It's WWF's annual Earth Hour tonight, between 8:30 and 9:30. Many of us will be turning our lights off to show that the planet and its environment is a priority and to show that we want our government to take it seriously. I noticed that this year it clashes with Channel 4's docudrama thingy about the Coalition. When I moaned about it on Twitter, people reminded me about Channel 4 + 1. WWF Scotland have asked the country's political leaders to contribute a blog post to explain what Earth Hour means for them. Willie Rennie's is here. He starts off ...

Posted by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice

When I was a teenager, I was affected by punk music for a distinct period of time. Up until I discovered it, I was very much a little metalhead - both the music itself and the politics of punk changed my life. Although I'm not the little anarchist I was at fifteen any longer, the fight for individual thought I found in punk remains near and dear to my heart. So I thought I would list the five songs that most encapsulate what punk is. Imagine if an alien landed on Earth and asked "What is punk rock?" – these ...

Posted by Nick on nicktyrone.com

Yesterday's Plaid Cymru election launch was splashed across all Welsh media with their message that voters need to seize the opportunity to take the future of Wales into their own hands. However, closer inspection indicates that what is actually on offer is just Labour-lite with a dragon attached. The promise that the nationalists will unite with the SNP and the Greens to form a negotiating bloc in the event of a hung Parliament is fair enough, but it is unlilkely that such an unstable alliance will prove attractive to anybody. What is most bizarre about Plaid's position though is that ...

Posted by Peter Black on Peter Black

[IMG: image] It was very exciting to be at last night's West Berkshire Lib Dems campaign launch at Newbury Town Hall. We were very privileged to have Liberal Democrat Party President Sal Brinton present. She gave a very inspiring speech (photo above). I was also very inspired to hear Judith Bunting give a rousing address. "We get knocked down but we get up again", said Judith and the sound controller, Tony, quickly googled Chumbawamba's "Tubthumping" ("I get knocked down but I get up again") and played it, unscripted, at the end of Judith's speech. Sadly, I only I noticed this ...

Posted by Paul on Liberal Burblings

#InMyShoes: scientists share photos of their footwear in support of eight-year-old girl (tags: ) These horrifying political face swaps could determine how you vote in May (or not) The Con/Kip one is utterly terrifying though. (tags: ) The Growth of the Beard - British Library European studies blog (tags: ) Today's headlines show just how much work is still to do on mental health stigma (tags: ) Conservative benefit cut options leaked - none of these are exactly a surprise Nor is "Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls" looking at some of the same options #labservatives (tags: ) Sweden's feminist foreign minister ...

[IMG: David Heath] On Thursday a valedictory debate for retiring members took place in the House of Commons. Members whose service totalled several hundred years bade farewell to the Commons. Three of them were Liberal Democrats and we'll be publishing their speeches in full. Today we have David Heath, MP for Somerton and Frome for 18 years. You can read the whole debate, with speeches from long-standing and distinguished MPs such as Gordon Brown, Joan Ruddock, Sir George Young and Elfyn Llwyd, here. I always said that I would leave this place before I lost the buzz of having the ...

Posted by The Voice on Liberal Democrat Voice

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-31951751 The BBC has the story – see the link to their web site above. Well I am a railway nut, so probably no surprise that this item on the BBC web site, which an old friend pointed out to me, has took my interest.

Posted by Cllr. Tony Robertson on Sefton Focus » Sefton Focus

A constituent recently pointed out that, in trying to obtain a permit to allow him to temporarily site a skip on the roadside during house improvements, he was surprised he could not directly apply on-line via the council's website. As I am keen that constituents are offered as many services on-line as possible (as well as alternative ways for those not wishing to go on-line), I asked the City Council's Head of Transportation why this was not possible on-line and have been advised as follows : "The current arrangements are that an applicant can access the form from Dundee City ...

The debate about the future of Sefton Borough has recently been ignited again by Southport Councillors calling for the Borough to be split. I share their frustrations despite living in Lydiate and representing Maghull and Lydiate on Sefton Council. [IMG: This wall art is on a former railway now pedestrian tunnel behind Bootle's New Strand Shopping Centre. Sadly it has gained a little unwanted graffiti.] This wall art is on a former railway now pedestrian tunnel behind Bootle's New Strand Shopping Centre. Sadly it has gained a little unwanted graffiti. Sefton is an odd place geographically and my guess is ...

Posted by Cllr. Tony Robertson on Sefton Focus » Sefton Focus

[IMG: Most of the one million doors are easier to get to than this one.] Most of the one million doors are easier to get to than this one. Over this weekend, the millionth door will be knocked on by Liberal Democrat campaigners since the start of the year.* That's not counting the several hundred thousand phone calls also also made and is an important part of the party's attempt to buck the national trend in both key Westminster constituencies and also many local council wards. Two different recent constituency polls (in London and Scotland) have shown the promising prospects ...

Posted by Mark Pack on Mark Pack