Today's Schools White Paper on SEND reform is, in certain respects, a document Liberal Democrats should welcome. The investment is substantial: £1.6 billion for an Inclusive Mainstream Fund, £1.8 billion for specialist services, and a long-overdue write-off of 90 per cent of local authority SEND deficits that were pushing councils toward effective bankruptcy. The aspiration, a well-resourced, inclusive mainstream, with early intervention, genuine specialist support, and families treated as partners rather than adversaries, is the right one. The problem is not the destination. It is the route the government has chosen to get there. A right is not the same ...
Hope from The Hague: What Rob Jetten's victory means for liberals everywhere Today, in the Netherlands, something quietly historic has happened. Rob Jetten, leader of Democrats 66, has become Prime Minister. The youngest ever (at 38) and the first openly gay person to hold the office. Pause on that. In a European political landscape where we are so often told that the future belongs to the angry, the polarising and the populist, the Dutch electorate has chosen something else. They have chosen the broad, confident Centre. They have chosen liberalism. For we Liberal Democrats, there is real encouraging here. Yes ...
BBC News wins our Headline of the Day Award with this tale of mysterious Lincolnshire: Is it a UFO? Is it the Northern Lights? No, it's the "Flying Banana". A blue glow that has lit up Lincolnshire's night sky in recent weeks has been traced to an unlikely source: a bright yellow train. Network Rail said the mysterious light comes from its new measurement train - nicknamed the Flying Banana - which looks for faults on the line for engineers to repair. The company said on hazy nights, equipment from the yellow train can create a blue glow "that looks ...
In mid February, UK dual nationals were alerted by media reports to an imminent change in immigration regulations. This involves the requirement that dual nationals present their UK passport at the overseas airline check-in desk before boarding any flight to the UK, or that they present (alongside their foreign passport) a 'Certificate of Entitlement' to Right of Abode in the UK, priced at a whopping £589. This deeply concerns many of us in Liberal Democrats Overseas, and we expect the Party to speak out loudly and forcefully on this matter. Will Forster MP, our shadow immigration and asylum minister, has ...
There were three council byelections last week (I don't include town and parish councils). Things to note about these contests:Labour were defending all 3 seats. They lost all of them.The seats fell to Plaid Cymru, Greens and Lib Dems.Reform won nothing. I think this is the first time since the May 2025 elections in which Reform came away empty handed.In Caerphilly, PC's share of the vote was
Sanne Dijkstra-Downie will, we hope, be an MSP in May. She is standing in the target constituency of Edinburgh Northern and heads the Lothians list. At Scottish Conference this week, she spoke in our pre-manifesto debate to highlight one particular commitment which is particularly important to her – the provision of Pupil Support Assistants in schools. The pre-manifesto commits us to: Boost in-class support in every school by inflation-proofing Pupil Equity 270 Funding, hiring more pupil support assistants (PSAs), and ensuring teachers 271 are given proper stable contracts instead of short-term and zero hours work. Sanne said: As one of ...
On Friday last week, I carried out a tour of Sunniside in my council ward to look at flood risk areas and solutions. I was accompanied by my ward colleague Marilynn Ord, and engineers from both Gateshead Council and Northumbrian Water. They are working on plans to tackle flooding. We are hoping that the plans will be completed and go out to public consultation in the coming months. I had
A staple of election campaigns for several decades has been the (lookalike) handwritten letter, usually on one or two pieces of A5 paper and delivered in a handwritten envelope. The letters are typically handwritten by the candidate and then printed, while the envelopes are more frequently individually hand addressed by volunteers. The whole effect is to stand out from other election literature, and also to provide an appropriate medium for a more personal message from a candidate. Common now, and even spreading to organisations outside politics, their origin is usually dated to well into the second half of the twentieth ...
Richard Reich argues that employers will not share the gains from AI unless they are made to: "If the five-day workweek with five days of pay shrinks to four days with four days of pay, and then to three, and to two, and perhaps one, AI will supplant most people's work and drive down our take-home pay. We may see a dazzling array of products and services spawned by AI, but few of us will be able to buy them." "In opposing these children's homes, neighbours resort to language about children in care that they would not use for other ...
I've watched the images of two American aircraft carriers moving toward the Middle East and I don't feel reassured. I feel uneasy. Let me say something clearly before anyone tries to misrepresent this: I despise the Iranian regime. I despise what it does to its own people. I despise its repression of women, its crushing of dissent, its morality police, its execution of protesters, its export of proxy militias, and its cynical use of religion to entrench power. The Iranian people deserve better than the system that rules them. But despising a regime does not mean losing the ability to ...
It's become all too common for Mid Wales to be neglected by the Welsh Government whenever rail investment is announced. This week's announcement from the Prime Minister and First Minister, endorsing Transport for Wales' long-term rail vision, is more of the same. Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe Liberal Democrats have recently commented on this, highlighting that of the confirmed £445 million out of a possible £14 billion from the 2025 Spending Review settlement, seven new stations have been announced: six situated between Cardiff and Newport, and one in North Wales. Mid Wales, meanwhile, will receive no new stations or any ...
Nation Cymru reports that fresh calls have been made for a UK-EU customs union after a major new economic study found that Brexit has reduced UK GDP by between 6% and 8% by 2025. The news site says that the research by leading economists Nicholas Bloom, Philip Bunn, Paul Mizen, Pawel Smietanka and Gregory Thwaites concluded that the impact of leaving the European Union has been large, persistent and cumulative: The report found that, compared to similar advanced economies, the UK has suffered significantly weaker growth since the 2016 referendum. According to the study, business investment is now 12-18% lower ...
The Innocents, Jack Clayton's adaptation of Henry James classic ghost story The Turn of the Screw, is a wonderful film, and this documentary is worthy of it. You don't see many of them here, but it's rightly been said that even monochrome behind-the scenes photographs of The Innocents are terrifying.
Ponden Hall, which can be found below the village of Stanbury near Haworth, has been suggested as one of the inspirations for Thrushcross Grange in Emily Brontë's Wuthering Heights and also for her sister Anne's Wildfell Hall. What is certain is that the Brontës knew the Heatons, the family who owned Ponden Hall, and would visit them to make use of their extensive library. And, as everyone is talking about Wuthering Heights, I have been thinking about the place. Ponden Hall was put up for sale in 2020, so you can see the interior in a Country Life article from ...
Sun 22nd
15:00
Watch: Ed Davey's speech to Scottish Conference: A positive Lib Dem vision for Scotland
I have to be honest, it's a while since I've watched Ed Davey's Conference speech live. I'm usually to be found at Not the Leader's Speech. I mean, I can watch the speech on You Tube later, but the precious time with my friends I only see twice a year can't be replaced. However, the pubs weren't open yesterday morning at 10 am when he delivered his speech to Scottish Conference. Having not seen him do this for a while, I have to say he's really become a lot more confident in his delivery and his stage presence has become ...
As Liberal Democrats, we pride ourselves on internationalism grounded in law, evidence and moral seriousness. That is precisely why the increasingly casual use of the word "genocide" in debates about Israel and Gaza should concern us. The 2024 provisional measures issued by the International Court of Justice did not determine that Israel has committed genocide. The Court found that there was a plausible risk requiring provisional steps to prevent escalation. That is not the same as a finding of genocidal intent – the specific legal threshold required under the Genocide Convention. No final judgment has been delivered. To present provisional ...
Sun 22nd
11:04WATCH: Alex Cole-Hamilton's speech to Scottish Conference: Lib Dem revival will get things done
For the first time in over twenty years, the Scottish Liberal Democrats can approach the Holyrood elections with a degree of optimism. Our Conference this weekend was buzzing. Held in Dynamic Earth, a tourist attraction overlooking the Holyrood Parliament (well worth a visit if you are in Edinburgh), there was a real feeling that this was our time. Introduced by two recent by-election winners, leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said that we were on the cusp of a huge Liberal Democrat revival and the presence of a large number of Lib Dem MSPs would mean that we would get things done. He ...
I really liked Queen when they first appeared. They were inventive, clever, witty... Everything that Mud, Sweet and most of the singles chart in 1974 weren't. Killer Queen is a good example of them in this period. Then came global stardom and stadium rock, which is rarely inventive, clever and witty. Laibach's satirical reworking of One Vision as a Nazi anthem tells us something important about the genre. Maybe I was just the right age for early Queen. Bohemian Rhapsody has never sounded as impressive as it did when I first heard it, aged 15, just as I liked Seven ...
Russia Russia is a petro-state. Its economy. Its ability to feed its people and, most important of all, its ability to wage war, is tied to the price of a barrel of oil. Twenty percent of government revenues come from the oil and gas industries. Back at the start of the Ukraine War the price of oil peaked at $120 a barrel. Vladimir Putin was able to wage war, pay pensions and maintain social services while keeping inflation under control and fending off sanctions. This week oil prices dipped to $62 a barrel. And to persuade the likes of China, ...
The Guardian reports on new data that has found that one in nine new homes in England built between 2022 and 2024 were constructed in areas that could now be at risk of flooding. The paper says that the figures show the number of homes being built in risky areas is on the rise, with a previous analysis showing that between 2013 and 2022, one in 13 new homes were in potential flooding zones: The research comes with the government under huge pressure to deliver new affordable housing, amid signs that the climate breakdown is accelerating. Data published by the ...