The arrival of Jeremy Browne’s Race Plan, published by the think tank Reform, has generated plenty of coverage in the mainstream and new media. Everyone – within the community of political nerds at least – has, for a few days at least, been talking about Jeremy. Presumably that […]
It was an uncomfortable experience reading today’s Work and Pensions Committee report on what we are now calling the “social sector size criteria” – aka the bedroom tax – and other components of housing support affected by welfare reform. It was uncomfortable because the cross-party Committee highlights the […]
Over at the New Statesman on Friday Ryan Shorthouse argued that liberals should look to the Conservatives to find the party delivering on a liberal agenda. In the post he reprises some themes that he set out in his contribution to the Liberal Reform fringe meeting at Liberal Democrat […]
What to do about the housing crisis? It’s a question that, should you have been so inclined, you could have focused on throughout much of yesterday’s proceedings at Liberal Democrat Spring Conference. A motion on the reform of planning policy was passed, unamended, during the morning’s official business. […]
That’s what the Liberal Democrats are risking. That, at least, is the view Jeremy Browne expressed on last night’s Radio 4 programme about Nick Clegg. Chris Huhne wasn’t much more complimentary about the current strategy of trying to situate the party between the two major parties. Huhne felt […]
Yesterday I had a meeting with someone about a thing. Before we got started my interlocutor looked at me rather accusingly and, apropos of nothing at all, said “Someone tells me you’re a member of the Liberal Democrats”. This was a decidedly unexpected turn of events. I felt […]
Sometimes pronouncements emanating from Liberal Democrat Ministers are a puzzle. They are either naïve or disingenuous. And if they are disingenuous then they must think we’re all naïve. The proximate cause of this observation is Norman Baker’s post “We’re not turning into authoritarians!” at Liberal Democrat Voice yesterday. […]
And so it came to pass. Almost as you would have anticipated. Labour’s bid to win today’s vote against the so-called “bedroom tax” was defeated. There was speculation during the day about how many Liberal Democrats would vote with Labour. The answer, when it came, was two. The […]
Reshuffle day is for politics nerds as transfer deadline day is for football supporters. You hope for some big name signings and some surprise moves between big clubs, but most of the activity takes place in the lower divisions. What was the most interesting component of today’s activity? […]
Tim Farron is by far the most accomplished orator among the current generation of leading Liberal Democrat politicians. Rarely does one of his speeches as Party President pass without someone making use of the word “barnstorming”. His speech on the opening day of this year’s autumn conference was […]
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