Liberal democrats

Friday

James Forsyth

Clegg: Sheffield Forgemasters decision could be revisited

In an interview with Prospect Magazine, Nick Clegg has suggested that the decision not to loan government money to Sheffield Forgemasters ‘could be revisited.’ When pressed on whether the decision to cancel the loan was an odd decision given the coalition’s stated aim of rebalancing the economy and encouraging manufacturing. Clegg replied, “I agree. The trouble is the money that Labour had provided came from a budget in the business department that was running on empty. The treasury and Vince Cable felt it wrong to take money from somewhere else. But the whole issue could be revisited.” This strikes me as a dangerous thing to suggest. If the issue is

Peter Hoskin

Clegg turns his attention from the students to the banks

‘Tis the season to bash a banker – or it is if you’re a Lib Dem, at least. After the stresses of last week, Nick Clegg lets off steam with an aggressive interview in the FT. “They don’t operate in a social vacuum,” he says of the City’s moneymen, before seething that, “it is wholly untenable to have millions of people making sacrifices in their living standards, only to see the banks getting away scot-free.” He even suggests that the government should consider a one-off bonus tax, like that introduced by Labour last year.   Will anything come of it? On the evidence so far, probably not. The coalition –

Wednesday

Daniel Korski

A “two stone” solution to the Euro crisis will unbalance the coalition

Whatever the British government wants, moves are now afoot on the Continent to address some of the structural problem with the Euro. They may in the end lead to some form of fiscal federalism. So far they are not supported by Angela Merkel, the key decision-maker, who worries constantly about the court in Karlsruhe, which has set clear limits on further European integration. But they are said to be supported, at least in part, by Finance Minister Wolfgang Shauble. Writing in the Financial Times, Frank-Walter Steinmeier and Peer Steinbrück argue that the EU needs “a more radical, targeted effort to end the current uncertainty, and provide stronger support for the

David Blackburn

The anti-Clarke campaign is gaining momentum

After months of whispered asides, Theresa May cut loose yesterday and expressed what may on the Tory right (not to mention Labour’s authoritarian elements) feel: Ken Clarke’s prison proposals are potentially disastrous. Prison works. Tension has built to its combustion point, but there is no apparent reason why May chose this moment. Perhaps she was inspired by the persistent rumours of Cameron’s displeasure with Clarke? Or maybe the cause was Michael Howard’s smirking syntax as he denounced Clarke’s ‘flawed ideology’ in yesterday’s Times? Either way, the campaign to move Clarke sideways in a Christmas reshuffle is gaining momentum. The usual suspects from the right of the parliamentary party have been

Alex Massie Alex Massie

The Tories’ Lib Dem Dilemma

Danny Finkelstein’s Times column (£) today is typically smart. I doubt any leading political columnist in Britain enjoys paradox more than the Fink.  Consider this, he suggests: the flak the Lib Dems have taken for their reality-based flip-flop on tuition fees is, on the surface, a blessing for the Tories. But that masks another fact: the students and their cheerleaders aren’t upset with the Tories because, deep down, they expect them to be heartless, cut-throat bastards. Worse still, the coalition could reframe and reinforce that view: everything nice and cuddly will be due to the moderating Liberal Democrat influence; everything brutish and reactionary the proof that Tory blood still runs

Tuesday

David Blackburn

Talking point: the West Lothian question

Political Betting carries this table on the breakdown of the tuition fees vote. English Lib Dems were noticeably more loyal than their Celtic counter-parts (only 16 of 43 voted against the bill), which reflects the left-wing political focus in those regions and perhaps the divide in the Liberal Democrat party itself. But, clearly, the West Lothian question is at issue here. Personally, I’m swayed by the argument that the new fees arrangement will affect applications to Scottish universities and therefore it is the business of Scottish MPs. That higher education was devolved in the first place is another, more interesting debating point. The comments section is yours…

David Blackburn

Reid: essentially, Miliband’s not fit for purpose

John Reid made a bruising and quite extraordinary appearance on the Daily Politics earlier today. He demolished the Labour leader. Reid’s analysis was concise: there has been a vacuum at the heart of Labour since Tony Blair’s departure. Gordon Brown was divisive, at best, and clearly not up to the demands of leadership. And, Reid intimated, Brown’s child shares his father’s foibles. Ed Miliband has not impressed so far, having failed to understand the cause of New Labour’s success. Case in point, his support for the coalition’s very liberal policies on crime, and his inability to perceive that New Labour’s sustained dominance was due to constant policy renewal, not ideological

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Keeping the troops happy

A media narrative is rapidly emerging that the Tories are taking advantage of the Liberal Democrats, using them to defend the coalition’s most unpopular polices. On the Today Programme this morning, Justin Webb pressed Paul Burtstow, the Lib Dem health minister, on whose idea it was that he, the Lib Dem, come on the programme to defend the government against the Health Select Committee’s critical report. The implication was clear, that Burstow had been sent on because it was bad news. I think this narrative is a bit shonky. Yes, the Liberal Democrats took the brunt of the criticism over the fees hike but that was because they were breaking

Monday

James Forsyth

Expect the unexpected

Peter Kellner has an interesting comment piece up on the YouGov site about how we are in the unusual position of having three relatively unpopular party leaders. Nick Clegg’s approval rating is down at minus 29 but that hasn’t helped Ed Miliband who is at minus 15. David Cameron does have a positive rating, but only just. His approval rating is plus one. As Kellner points out, normally when one political leader is unpopular another benefits. But that hasn’t happened this time: a sign of how strong a hold anti-politics has on the public consciousness. This discontent is mirrored by how all three parties are having quite serious debates about

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Who are the government’s regulation busters?

Each time politicians fight regulation, regulation normally wins. So far it seems like this coalition government is no different. John Redwood has been busy tabling parliamentary questions asking each department how many regulations have been introduced, and how many repealed. Rather than “one in, one out” in turns out that two regulations have been introduced for every one revoked. Eric Pickles emerges as the star, having revoked twice as many as he introduced. But the rest? Here’s the league table: I don’t think that the “guilty” ministers have been lax. It’s just that the system is out of control. Three years ago, John Hutton renamed his department “Business, Enterprise and

Peter Hoskin

Eric Pickles kickstarts the local blame game

We’ve got lots of power – please take some. That’s the central message of today’s localism bill, and of Eric Pickles’ article in the Telegraph to accompany it. Indeed, the government’s 15-page document to explain the bill features the word “power” (in the context of shifting power away from the centre) over 50 times. Eight of those come in Nick Clegg’s short, Lib Dem-friendly foreword. The specifics of the bill are, on the whole, already familiar. It’s all about elected mayors, local referendums and greater budgetary control for councils. But just because we’ve heard this drumbeat before, it doesn’t make it any less radical. As the BBC’s Mark Easton notes,

Peter Hoskin

And a comprehensive rejection?

After Ed Miliband’s buttery overtures to the Lib Dems earlier, a response courtesy of the party president, Tim Farron. It offers, on the surface at least, a vicious rebuke to the Labour leader – and a staunch defence of what the coalition has achieved. Here it is in full: “Labour have just spent 13 years sucking up to Rupert Murdoch and George Bush – why would any sane progressive even give them a second glance? As part of the coalition government, Liberal Democrats have started fixing Labour’s economic mess, taking millions of people out of Income Tax and reforming British politics. Things Labour had 13 years to do but failed

David Blackburn

A comprehensive offer to Liberal Democrats

It seems strange for Ed Miliband to veer from offensive to charm quite so quickly, but it’s a decent ruse nonetheless. Miliband deliberately cites David Cameron’s famous ‘comprehensive offer’ and many disenchanted Lib Dems will be swayed by his three point-plan, especially after the recent Grayson intervention. Disingenuous? Yes. Opportunistic? Very. Coherent and well-defined opposition to trebling tuition fees? Certainly. Now for some policies, perchance…  

Sunday

Fraser Nelson

Cameron must head for the common ground

All the attention last week was on the Lib Dem split – but what about the division within the Conservatives? This is the greater threat to the coalition, and while there is not likely to be an earthquake soon, one can discern the outlines of the tectonic plates. Ladbrokes has odds of 5-2 of an election next year, and these don’t seem so short when one considers the short life of coalitions in British peacetime history. So where might the tension lie? A while ago, I referred to the bulk of the party as “mainstream Conservatism,” as a more useful phrase than the tautological “Tory right”. Tim Montgomerie last week

James Forsyth James Forsyth

The Lib Dem insurgency

The Liberal Democrats are not like the other two parties. The acitvists still have real power and set the policy agenda of the party. This is what makes Richard Grayson’s intervention in The Observer today so important. Grayson is one of the leading activists on the left of the party. After Nick Clegg’s election as leader. he organised a concerted push by the beard and sandals brigade to take over the powerful party committees and thus check the more economic liberally instincts of the party leadership. So his call for Lib Dem members to start cooperating with Ed MIliband is far more than just a cry of pain. The Federal

Peter Hoskin

Clegg suffers the backlash

If this morning’s papers are anything to go by, Nick Clegg is in freefall. The man who was the Lib Dems’ biggest electoral asset is now a magnet for all sorts of political digruntlement. Exhibit A: the Ipsos MORI poll (£) in today’s News of the World, where 61 percent of respondents say that they don’t trust Clegg, compared to 24 percent in April. He has gone from being “the most trusted politician since Churchill,” to one of the least since … well, ever. It is no small irony that the leader who sailed most capably on the winds of “change” and “new politics” in the TV debates has, whether

Saturday

Fiona Melville

Conservatism is a broad church

A long time ago, I worked for CCHQ, David Cameron’s leadership campaign and them back in CCHQ again. We spent months trying to define what Conservatism really is. I don’t think we ever really got a pithy soundbite, because the root of its success is that it evolves to suit the times. Perhaps the best description is that it is a pragmatic creed, wary of dogma, going with the grain of human nature, and focusing on effective policy that leads to real improvements. We have some fundamental values – a belief in individual freedom but also in social and personal responsibility, an understanding that power must be devolved as close

Friday

Daniel Korski

The students vs the Lib Dems

One of the things I heard yesterday when I strolled around the edges of the protests, particularly from older people, was how the coalition’s policies had politicised Britain’s young. “It has really made my children wake up”, said an elderly bystander with a wistful look in his eyes.  Student leaders say they now hope to punish Lib Dems who voted for the tuition fees, targeting MPs in seats such as Bath, Burnley, Bradford East, Bristol West and Brent Central.   The sense of rage directed against the Liberal Democrats comes, I suspect, from a deeper sense of betrayal – and not simply student dissatisfaction over today’s issue. In politics time

Peter Hoskin

The coming battle over Mainstream Conservatism

It’s not just the students who are waging a political struggle. In yesterday’s Times (£), Tim Montgomerie fired up a debate over the future of the Conservative Party that will no doubt simmer through the rest of this Parliament. For those who can’t delve behind the paywall, the argument was broadly this: that a tension is emerging between liberal Conservatism and a more traditional Conservatism. On the side of the Liberal Conservatives are those who want to extend the union with Nick Clegg and his party; a group which may well include the Tory leadership. On the other side are those who want the Tories to go it alone after

Fraser Nelson Fraser Nelson

Sifting through the wreckage

The revolution may not be televised, but protests certainly are – and the process magnifies the drama. Since last night, the news broadcasts have all had footage of two thugs trying to smash the windows of the Treasury and, in the process, familiarising themselves with the properties of bombproof glass. The attack on Charles and Camilla’s royal limo is splashed across all this morning’s front pages. The script is so well-rehearsed now that I hesitate to repeat it: the vast majority are peaceful protesters, infiltrated by vandals who soak up the attention. Many of the protesters yesterday looked like they’d get a cab straight back home to their Notting Hill