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Nick Clegg's New Year Message to Shibley: a leader without followers
Dear Shibley,
Well what a year! A white-knuckle election; a new coalition government; Liberals in power for the first time in 70 years.
I’ve recorded a short message reflecting on the events of 2010 and looking forward to what Liberal Democrats will deliver in Government in 2011.
Some people will continue to predict the worst for our Party – the same people who have been underestimating the Liberal Democrats for as long as we have existed.
But we prove them wrong at every single turn. The next twelve months will be no different, because we will continue to build the liberal, fairer, greener Britain that we all believe in.
Happy New Year!
Nick Clegg
Liberal Democrat leader
Labour knows its mistake over civil liberties from the last time – but it’s a lie to say that the Liberal Democrats are the only party of civil liberties. Nick, your party makes me sick!
There is a better way: Nick Clegg and his last Christmas
There is an economic crisis – it is a crisis of high unemployment and stagnant growth; it is not, as the ConDems insist, a crisis of the public finances. The ConDems have systematically distorted and exaggerated problems with the public finances. The UK was never in danger of becoming the next Greece. The rising deficit reflected the collapse in tax revenues and rising cost of unemployment benefits during the recession. It was not caused by out of control public spending.
History does not support the ConDem assertion that cuts will be good for growth and jobs. But history does support the STUC’s belief that deep and premature cuts will lead to persistently high unemployment.
There is a Better Way!
Video : "9/12/10 Tuition Fee Protest – What The BBC Didn't Report" by Xanna Ward Dixon
“9/12/10 Tuition Fee Protest – What The BBC Didn’t Report” by Xanna Ward Dixon
Disgusted to see Swinson, Teather and Featherstone there
Here is a list of how LibDem MP’s voted this evening.
Voted against the Coalition proposals:
Annette Brooke (Dorset Mid & Poole North)
Sir Menzies Campbell (Fife North East)
Michael Crockart (Edinburgh West)
Tim Farron (Westmorland & Lonsdale)
Andrew George (St Ives)
Mike Hancock (Portsmouth South)
Julian Huppert (Cambridge)
Charles Kennedy (Ross, Skye & Lochaber)
John Leech (Manchester Withington)
Stephen Lloyd (Eastbourne)
Greg Mulholland (Leeds North West)
John Pugh (Southport)
Alan Reid (Argyll & Bute)
Dan Rogerson (Cornwall North)
Bob Russell (Colchester)
Adrian Sanders (Torbay)
Ian Swales (Redcar)
Mark Williams (Ceredigion)
Roger Williams (Brecon and Radnorshire)
Jenny Willott (Cardiff Central)
Simon Wright (Norwich South).
Voted in favour of the Coalition proposals:
Danny Alexander (Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch and Strathspey)
Norman Baker (Lewes)
Sir Alan Beith (Berwick-upon-Tweed)
Gordon Birtwistle (Burnley)
Tom Brake (Carshalton & Wallington)
Jeremy Browne (Taunton Deane)
Malcolm Bruce (Gordon)
Paul Burstow (Sutton & Cheam)
Vincent Cable (Twickenham)
Alistair Carmichael (Orkney & Shetland)
Nick Clegg (Sheffield Hallam)
Edward Davey (Kingston & Surbiton)
Lynne Featherstone (Hornsey & Wood Green)
Don Foster (Bath)
Stephen Gilbert (St Austell and Newquay)
Duncan Hames (Chippenham)
Nick Harvey (Devon North)
David Heath (Somerton & Frome)
John Hemming (Birmingham Yardley)
Norman Lamb (Norfolk North)
David Laws (Yeovil)
Michael Moore (Berwickshire, Roxburgh & Selkirk)
Andrew Stunell (Hazel Grove)
Jo Swinson (Dunbartonshire East)
Sarah Teather (Brent Central)
David Ward (Bradford East)
Steve Webb (Thornbury and Yate)
The LibDems reach the final precipice, but there they go!
“They reach the final precipice where they have a chance to turn back .. but there they go!”
The symbolism for the Liberal Democrats is amazing.
But these ones “survive the ordeal” by swimming. Will David Laws, Danny Alexander and Nick Clegg swim one way, while Vince Cable and Simon Hughes go the other way? Time will tell. And – above all – what will the ‘Lemming Legend’ do?
Clegg and more broken promises on tax avoidance. The BBC won't cover it.
Aside from what is happening on broken promises in elsewhere, today (Saturday) is a coalition against tax avoidance.
Please look at this website post : WHY WE AND THE STUDENTS ARE FIGHTING THE SAME BATTLE
Tackling rich tax avoiders was one of the Lib Dems’ four key election pledges, right alongside opposing tuition fee hikes. Both have been broken. This coalition has let Vodafone off a £6bn tax bill and appointed serial tax avoider Sir Philip Green to advise the government on cuts. Sir Philip’s £285m tax dodge could pay the fees of 32,000 students. The money Vodafone were let off would cover every single cut to higher education many times over.
But this is not just an issue of fees, it’s an issue of solidarity. The students have done a damn good job of articulating their link to the wider anti-cuts movement. The issue of tax avoidance is a way that we can forge those links on the street. Pensioners, unemployed, those on incapacity benefit, public service workers, unionists and others have all joined UK Uncut actions around the country. Sitting together in shop doorways, blockading the high street stores of the tax avoiding rich, we can build the sort of networks necessary to build this movement beyond a single issue and bring down this government.
Whilst inflicting savage public spending cuts on the poor and indulging the rich, this government likes to claim that ‘we are all in this together.’ All we need to remember, is that if the government reclaimed the £25bn tax avoided by rich individuals and corporations every year, it could pay for all of the services the government is planning to cut.
This Saturday the students will be joining a growing coalition to take on tax avoiders. Let’s join together, let’s go on the offensive, let’s take this to the high streets.
NEWSFLASH – it’s going really well so far. Here’s Polly Toynbee and @pennyred
It looks as if some people have in super-glued themselves to Top Shop!
No doubt there’ll be another media whitewash by the BBC.
The Liberal Democrats' demise is now totally malignant
Remember this? (Actually from the Conservative Home website currently.)
Long-term benefit claimants could be forced to do manual labour under proposals to be outlined by Work and Pensions Secretary, Iain Duncan Smith. Duncan-Smith is due to outline plans for four-week placements doing jobs like gardening and litter clearing. He has apparently signalled that the message will be: “Play ball or it’s going to be difficult.”
This seems like a return to workhouses, last left behind in the Victorian times, along with the last vestiges of venture philanthropism, aka the new Big Society. Social engineering through the back door, some might say.
It now is crystal clear that the Conservatives are using the cuts as a thinly-disguised veil to introduce ideologically and driven cuts which are offensive to a majority of English people who didn’t vote for them. And what is even more disgusting is that they are allowing the Liberal Democrats to bear the brunt of this unpopularity, while the Conservatives are still sky-high in the polls, Nick Clegg says nothing (an old adage is ‘silence is agreement’), the Liberal Democrat activists don’t appear to agree with the substance of what is, after all, a Conservative party. Only a complete fool doesn’t now understand the gravity of the Lib Dems’ situation – how they have utterly sold out.
Vince's speech at the LibDem conference: Many themes should be a top priority for us too
Vince’s speech, unlike the misreporting of it mainly from the BBC who patently didn’t understand the business or legal issues involved, made for very interesting reading for me as a Labour member with an interest in both business and commercial law. I would like to discuss various intriguing aspects of it for me.
But to hold our own we need to maintain our party’s identity and our authentic voice.
This is now being an increasingly difficult problem for the Liberal Democrats. There has to be by necessity an alignment of the beliefs and values of the leadership of the Party and its grassroot members. It was interesting to eavesdrop on the discussion that the Party had earlier this week on brand strategy, as it was clear from the floor that there is much confusion about the brand identity and brand equity of the members of the Party. Of course, the position on the rate of cuts which ultimately emerged from Vince Cable and Nick Clegg remains for many quite unfathomable, and certain issues are pretty straightforward by the Liberal Democrats, for example strong Liberal (anti-statist) values in civil liberties. However, certain grey areas see problems for the leadership and activists alike; for example, free schools is an incredibly perplexing area for the Liberal Democrats to embrace in a way so enthusiastically as Michael Gove’s fervour.
We will fight the next general elections as an independent force with our options open. Just like 2010. But coalition is the future of politics. It is good for government and good for Britain. We must make sure it is good for the Lib Dems as well.
Yes, indeed. It is now ‘do-or-die’ for the Liberal Democrats. There won’t be an end of ‘boom-and-bust’ in this context, unfortunately, because if the Liberal Democrats get the economic recovery and cuts wrong, even if the recession ends, they will be unelectable for a decade. However, it is argued that if the Liberal Democrats make a success of their new Coalition policy, the Coalition politics of pluralism could become accepted.
There was, of course, a global financial crisis. But our Labour predecessors left Britain exceptionally vulnerable and damaged: more personal debt than any other major economy; a dangerously inflated property bubble; and a bloated banking sector behaving as masters, not the servants of the people. Their economic model combined the financial lunacies of Ireland and Iceland. They built a house on sand and thought that they were ushering in a new, progressive work of architecture. It has collapsed. They lacked foresight; now they even lack hindsight.
If Cable feels Labour is in denial over the deficit, undeniably he has been slow to come to the conclusion that the crisis was global. I remember him pontificating in the Commons about how it was an academic philosophical issue of where the financial crisis came from, but it was necessary to find a solution for it. Vince Cable’s lack of acceptance that this was a global crisis historically speaks volumes.
We know that if elected Labour planned to raise VAT. They attack this government’s cuts but say not a peep about the £23bn of fiscal tightening Alistair Darling had already introduced. They planned to chop my department’s budget by 20 to 25%, but now they oppose every cut, ranting with synthetic rage, and refuse, point blank, to set out their alternatives. They demand a plan B but don’t have a plan A. The only tough choice they will face is which Miliband.
This statement is totally ridiculous. If Vince Cable is so self-effacing, can he not at least give a suitable explanation for this poster?
But I am not seeking retribution. We have a pressing practical problem: the lack of capital for sound, non property, business. Many firms say they are already being crippled by banks’ charges and restrictions.
This is undoubtedly a sensible line of attack for Vince and George to pursue, as it encompasses the Liberal
Democrats’ values of fairness, and Labour’s lack of engaging with the public about how the bankers, who had largely caused this crisis, were not been punished for their recklessness. If anything, it is perceived that Labour pumped lots of taxpayers’ money in it, whilst the leading CEOs in the investment banks received knighthoods and huge bonuses. Labour’s fundamental error, if there is to be one single one amongst the plethora, is the unforgiveable increase in the rich-poor divide, which will forever be a legacy of Labour. It began in earnest with Thatcher, progressed with Blair, and compounded through Gordon Brown’s long stint as Chancellor. This should be a top priority for Labour too.
And the principle of responsible ownership should apply across the business world. We need successful business. But let me be quite clear. The Government’s agenda is not one of laissez-faire. Markets are often irrational or rigged. So I am shining a harsh light into the murky world of corporate behaviour. Why should good companies be destroyed by short term investors looking for a speculative killing, while their accomplices in the City make fat fees? Why do directors sometimes forget their wider duties when a cheque is waved before them?
This is an incredibly important paragraph in my opinion, as short-termism has been identified by many academics in leadership, including William George at the Harvard Business School, as a major cause of irresponsible leadership in business. This, together with failures in corporate governance and corporate social responsibility in a post-Enron age, remain admirable targets for Vince’s wrath. This should be a top priority for Labour too.
??But the big long term question is: how does the country earn a living in future? Natural resources? The oil money was squandered. Metal bashing? Mostly gone to Asia. Banking? Been there, done that. What is left? Actually quite a lot. People. Skilled and educated people. High tech manufacturing of which we already have a great deal. Creative industries, IT and science based industries and professional services. In my job I meet many outstanding, world class, British based companies. But we need more companies and more jobs in the companies we have. It is my job as Business Secretary to support business growth. And this knowledge based economy requires more high quality people from FE, HE and vocational training. Here, we have a problem. Businesses cannot grow because of a shortage of trained workers while our schools churn out young people regarded by companies as virtually unemployable. The pool of unemployed graduates is growing while there is a chronic shortage of science graduates and especially engineers. There has to be a revolution in post 16 education and training. We are making a start. Despite cuts, my department is funding 50,000 extra high level apprenticeships this year – vital for a manufacturing revival. My Conservative colleague David Willetts and I want to sweep away the artificial barriers between universities and FE; between academic and vocational; between full time, part time and continuing life long learning; between the academic and vocational.
The ‘Yeah, but’ is that Vince Cable is making savage cuts in universities such as Cambridge, currently top in the world, at a time when we should be investing in basic research, translationary research and applied research, with a view to investing in our country’s future. This should be a top priority for Labour too.
