Liberal Left is not radical but conservative

Liberal Left, a new Lib Dem internal pressure group, was launched today with a website and a sympathetic article in the Guardian.

Both are liberally scattered with the hurrah words "progressive" and "radical". I have never been quite sure what the former means, but from what I have seen on Liberal Left so far, there is nothing radical about it. It seems dedicated precisely to avoiding hard questions.

You can explore the group's website for yourself, but take this quotation form the Guardian article. Speaking of one of the group's leading figures, the party's former policy director Richard Grayson, he says:

Asked to pinpoint the three strongest policy differences that Liberal Left had with the coalition, he said the deficit, tuition fees and the role of city academies in education.

On the deficit the questions radical should be asking are whether it is moral to leave an ever-growing debt for out children and whether they should be so committed to economic arrangements that leave them having permanently to placate the very people they despise most - international financiers.

On tuition fees they should be asking whether it is really a priority - let alone such a high priority - to fund not particularly academic middle-class youngsters to spend three years at university when our education system and society in general are already so stacked against the working class. It is also possible to ask whether our pile it high, sell it cheap of higher education now gives many graduates the career or educational advantages it claims it does.

And on education, we see more and more areas of our national life dominated by the products of private schools (even sport and pop music). Meanwhile access to the good schools in the state sector is rationed by parents' ability to afford the higher house prices in the streets that surround them. Moaning about city academies really does not cut it if you call yourself a radical. Where is the anger?

Richard is right to say there is a long tradition of dissent inside the Liberal Democrats and that:

"We have never been a democratic centralist party in which the whole party has to abide by a conference decision for ever more."

So he and his allies have every right to form a group, even if I would rather we all put more effort into deciding what the Liberal Democrats believe before we dedicated ourselves to dissenting from it.

But it would have been better if those who cannot stomach a coalition with the Tories had gone to the special conference that endorsed it and argued their case at the time.

Because Richard is not wholly accurate when he says the Lib Dems never said that Labour's spending should be reduced. As I recently discussed, the party committed itself to tax cuts rather than further increases in public spending as long ago as its 2008 autumn conference.

And really this was the issue that was at stake in our last leadership contest - a contest in which one of Liberal Left's leading lights told us that she would trust Nick Clegg with her life.

I am all for radicalism in the Liberal Democrats, but we should not confuse it with nostalgia for the Labourism of 5 or 10 or 20 years ago.

How will Nick Clegg's call for more tax cuts be received by his fellow Liberal Demcrats?

At the last election my party promised to raise the personal allowance to £10,000 for ordinary taxpayers. And I am extremely proud that the Coalition is on track to do so over the course of this Parliament. We’ll make sure that anyone earning £10,000 or less will pay no income tax at all and for those on middle incomes, the first £10,000 they earn will be tax free. 

For millions of basic rate taxpayers – ordinary, hardworking people – that means paying £700 less in income tax each year, around £60 a month. 

In the 2010 Budget we increased the tax allowance from £6,475 to £7,475. This year we have already announced a planned rise of an additional £630 - meaning that a total of 1.1 million more people will no longer pay income tax at all. 

But today I want to make clear that I want the Coalition to go further and faster in delivering the full £10,000. Because, bluntly, the pressure on family finances is reaching boiling point.

Nick Clegg's speech to the Resolution Foundation today has been well received by the press and Liberal Democrat bloggers.

"Nick Clegg's call for tax cuts may save the Lib Dems from annihilation" suggests Daniel Knowles on the Daily Telegraph site (a trifle melodramatically, but then - judging by his photograph - he is only 14). While Prateek Buch for the Social Liberal Forum is enthusiastic, seeing the proposed changes as part of the Liberal Democrats' fairness agenda.

For what it is worth, I am enthusiastic too. One of the problems Labour regularly runs into is that, despite its rhetoric, it is difficult to make the rich pay more. Of course, there are things you can do, such as taxing property rather than income, but the result is that increased public spending tends to increase the burden on lower earners until they become unwilling to bear it.

Certainly, I found this argument easy to make during one of my rare television appearances.

But not all my Liberal Democrats will agree with me. Because this is very much the debate we had at our Bournemouth autumn conference in 2008. There the party agreed to fight the following general election promising tax cuts, but as a Daily Telegraph report from the time shows, there was a significant minority in the party that did not agree with this strategy:

Opposition to the programme was led by Evan Harris, the party's science spokesman, and fellow MP Paul Holmes, who argued that those in most of need of help were too poor to receive any benefit from tax cuts. 

Their amendment sought to bind the party to tax cuts only after other priorities had been met, including tackling child poverty and climate change. 

Telling delegates about the plight of hard-up families in his constituencies, Mr Harris added: "Most are so poor that they will never pay taxes."

The vote in Bournemouth was clear enough - conference voted three to one to approve the new policy - but no debate can settle such a question for all time.

And it is notable that those in the party who have been less enthusiastic about the Coalition have emphasised their opposition to cuts in public spending.

If money has been found to cut tax, won't they (whether they have called themselves "Progressives", "Social Liberals" or use some other slightly vaguely defined category) now be calling for a reduction in those cuts?

Or will they keep their heads down because Nick Clegg's speech has gone down well and it is good to see the party pursuing a clear strategy at last?

Chris Huhne shows true leadership qualities

From the Southern Daily Echo:

Eastleigh MP Chris Huhne has said he stands by the result of the Lib Dem leadership election despite reports uncounted votes would have made him winner.

Mr Huhne, pictured above, lost the race to Nick Clegg by just 511 votes cast by more than 41,000 party members in one of the closest contests in political history.

It was claimed yesterday that he would have won had about 1,300 postal votes not got caught up in the Christmas post and missed the deadline.

Reports said an unofficial check of the late papers showed Mr Huhne had enough votes among them to hand him victory.

Chris has done well to knock the story on the head - it is tempting to say that he is showing the qualites of a true leader - but it is hard to avoid a little speculation.

Today Stephen Tall poured scorn on the idea that those uncounted papers might have brough Chris Huhne victory:

For sure, the gap between Nick and Chris was a wafer-thin 511. But for the result to have been overturned by ballot papers received after the closing date would mean that Chris would have had to have picked up 70% to Nick’s 30% of the final 1,300 ballot papers. Given how close both candidates were running throughout the contest, this stretches credulity.

I do not think it does stretch it that far. As I recall, it was clear that the momentum was with Chris Huhne during the latter stages of the leadership campaign. So much so that Jeremy Hargreaves, one of Nick Clegg's most enthusiastic supporters in the Lib Dem blogosphere, wrote this when the result was announced:

I am of course delighted that Nick Clegg has won the race to be our next Leader - obviously I’d rather it hadn’t been quite so close (if the contest had lasted another week, I think it’s pretty clear that Chris would have won it).

I remember being tempted at the time to post a comment on Jeremy's blog saying that we must hope the next general election campaign does not go on too long.

The truth, I suspect, is that no one would have mentioned those uncounted ballot papers if Nick had made a surer start to his leadership of the Liberal Democrats. If he can raise his game, we shall not hear of them again.

I don't suppose Nick wants my advice, but that won't stop me. May I suggest that he tries not to sack any more of his most effective front-bench spokesmen and avoids boasting about his sex life in future?

How the Lib Dem leadership contest almost turned into a bloodbath

The current issue of the House Magazine has an article on the challenges facing Nick Clegg, written by Greg Hurst.

More striking, however, are Hurst's claims about the tensions behind the scenes during the recent leadership contest. Writing of the tension between Nick and Chris Huhne, Hurst says:

Things could have been still worse. Sir Menzies, who blamed Huhne henchmen for undermining his leadership and hastening his departure, had to be restrained from launching a public attack upon him during the election. We must await the publication of his memoirs to judge Sir Menzies' determination to settle such scores.

Similarly, Charles Kennedy remains aggrieved at the role played by some younger MPs in forcing his resignation and seizing control of the party by backing Sir Menzies and then Nick Clegg. Several close Kennedy allies threw themselves into Chris Huhne's campaign in the hope of wrestling back the leadership from the "Orange Book" upstarts.

There was, briefly, a real prospect of the two ex-leaders turning on the rival candidates; in the event, threatened with the mutually assured destruction of the Lib Dems' remaining credibility. a Cold War-like stand-off was achieved.

I don't know how much truth there is in all this, but I do know that Chris Huhne's attempt to draw Nick Clegg out on his beliefs on public services was entirely legitimate. The fuss over the headline "Calamity Clegg" should not blind us to this.

Given how well Nick's speech at the weekend has gone down with the press and the party (to judge by Lib Dem bloggers, at least), he would have done better to be more forthcoming on what he had in mind as leader.

Lib Dem leadership contest: Inquiry into voting process

"I phoned to vote for Chris Huhne 10 times but never got through, isn't it?"
Mrs Snood, Llanwrtyd Wells

Clegg vs Huhne: Why a near tie was the logical result

Congratulations to Nick Clegg on being elected as leader of the Liberal Democrats.

It was a leadership contest between two men from almost identical backgrounds, and one in which ideological or policy differences were rarely allowed to surface. Therefore a near tie was the logical result.

It has been obvious from reading Lib Dem blogs in recent weeks that Nick has the ability to evoke tremendous loyalty among younger activists. (I suspect those of us who favoured Chris Huhne tend to be older and are less starry-eyed about politics and life in general.)

This is an undoubted asset, but if he going to generate similarly warm feelings amongst the electorate Nick is going to have to display the immense ability to communicate that has often been claimed for him, but was too rarely displayed during the campaign.

The irony is that I have always suspected that I am closer to Nick on policy than I am to Chris. However, given the policy-free campaign, it is hard to be sure.

Writing in The Times last week, Peter Riddell said:

Along with close allies such as David Laws and Norman Lamb, he has been keen to open the supply side in schools and health. He wants to encourage new providers, as in Sweden, though with more help for poorer parents in order to reduce inequality.

If he leads the Liberal Democrats in that direction I shall be greatly encouraged. If he had said it during the campaign, I would probably have voted for him.

The president's role in Lib Dem elections

The controversy over Simon Hughes's endorsement of Nick Clegg has reached the Independent.

Pandora quotes a sensible response from Ros Scott:

"It is entirely a matter for the president but, personally, I wouldn't have done it," she tells me.

"The job of the president is to act as a mouthpiece for the members. If, for example, there was a problem with the election, the president would not be seen as independent."

Thanks to Lib Dem Voice.

There's still time to vote

Alex Wilcock helpfully points out that there is still time to vote in the Lib Dem leadership election:

My own tip to get the vote out is that a first class stamp may now be risky with the Christmas post, but that if you’re in London and really want to make sure, the ERS office in Clarendon Road is only a few minutes’ walk from Turnpike Lane (Piccadilly Line Tube).

If you do vote that way, you may well meet Alex on the doorstep. And, he suggests, Simon Hughes too.

The FT's advice to the Lib Dems

And good advice it is too:

the party should emphasise its commitment to localism in one of the most suffocatingly centralised states in the developed world. The two big parties both nod earnestly in support of devolved decision-making – and then promote policies that hoard power in Whitehall.

The government’s decade-long refusal to reform local government finance speaks eloquently to its determination that city, town and parish councils do nothing but what they are told by the Treasury. Mr Cameron’s response is to pretend that the best way to reinvigorate local decision-making is to encourage referendums to cap the council tax.

There is similar space in the clash between civil liberties and an increasingly authoritarian state. This is not just about opposing the extension of pre-charge detention limits for suspected terrorists or dangerously illiberal identity cards. As important is a sustained assault on the ethos that says the state can gather more and more data on every citizen – and use that information as it pleases. The mislaid personal details of 25m taxpayers represents the tip of a very big iceberg.

Finally, the Liberal Democrats should promote the idea that pluralism can be the natural ally of fairness. With Mr Blair gone, Labour is slipping back into its default prejudice in favour of monolithic mediocrity in the provision of public services. The Conservatives still leave the suspicion that their preference for market-based disciplines is careless of the need for equity. There is room here for what Mr Blair would have called a third way: choice and diversity harnessed to the cause of fairness as well as excellence in publicly funded schools and hospitals.

All in all, this adds up to a distinctive, liberal manifesto. For all that the two main parties have been monopolising the headlines, there is still a large pool of uncommitted voters. The Liberal Democrats should keep it simple. They might learn, though, to be more careful with their leaders.

Last night a leadership candidate saved my life

I have found it hard to get too excited about what I have described as "a battle of my personable Westminster-educated former MEP is better than your personable Westminster-educated former MEP".

Other bloggers have not faced this difficulty.

Linda Jack's 10th reason for voting for Nick Clegg is:

I would trust him with my life, so I know can trust him with my party.

Blimey!

I have worked in some hairy by-elections in my time, but it has never come to that.

Clegg vs Huhne: It's a two-horse race

This makes things more interesting.

The people at Chris Huhne's campaign website claim a late surge of support for their man:

The figures show that the number of undecided voters has fallen dramatically over the past ten days (from 38.4% to 17.5%) and that these members have plumped overwhelmingly for the Eastleigh MP.

What should we make of this?

Mike Smithson from politicalbetting.com writes:

I have quizzed Huhne’s campaign manager about how this was carried out. The “pollster” was not one of the conventional firms but a market research company which for various reasons they do not want to name publicly though I have been told who it was ...

That there is a move to Huhne seems to chime with other signs but it is hard to measure the scale and to assess the impact on the outcome given that a large number of members have already voted.

Lord Bonkers' Diary: Clegg and Huhne (or is it Huhne and Clegg?)

And so our week with Rutland's most celebrated peer draws to a close...

Sunday
Whom should I meet at a café on the Great North Road but Huhne and Clegg? One is on his way to a television interview: the other is on his way home from a constituency dinner. I cannot recall which was to be interviewed and which had just dined, but then I often have trouble recalling which is Clegg and which is Huhne.

Our conversation turns to the annoying way that both the Labour and the Conservative parties have been thieving our policies of late. "What we need, gentlemen," I say banging the formica-topped table to emphasise my point, "is policies that no other party will want to steal." I trust that my point is taken.

Earlier entries can be found at Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and, indeed, Saturday.

House Points: The alternative Lib Dem short-list

My House Points column from this week's Liberal Democrat News.

Alumni alternatives

The air over Westminster is black with chickens coming home to roost. According to the Civil Aviation Authority they are stacked six deep as far away as Kettering. The Labour Party made such play of ‘sleaze’ in the 1990s that it was bound to come back to bite them in the bum one day. Now it has.

If you can hear an unfamiliar sound, it is probably John Major laughing his socks off.

As events are moving so quickly this week, let’s cross the road from the Palace of Westminster and visit Westminster School. The old pile is particularly relevant to Lib Dems at the moment because our leadership election is being conducted by two of its former pupils.

I suspect this tells us something unpalatable about the composition of our party and also about the success of state education in fostering social mobility. But those debates are for another day.

So if we have to be led by someone from Westminster School, let’s look at some other former pupils and see who else we could have.

Ruth Kelly and Tony Benn are obviously out, and Nigella Lawson’s family connections make her an unlikely leader too. But, as Asquith’s great granddaughter, Helena Bonham Carter has an impeccable Liberal pedigree.

Shane McGowan - lead singer of The Pogues and one of the less obvious former public school boys - would appeal to a certain sort of voter. But perhaps we would do better with the smoother approach of Flanders and Swann?

Lovers of the arts might want us to go for Martin Amis, John Gielgud or the great 17th-century composer Henry Purcell. And everybody has a soft spot for A. A. Milne. He would certainly be a safer bet than Kim Philby.

If we want to play safe and choose an established Liberal politician then we can choose between Lord John Russell, who was twice prime minister in the mid-nineteenth century, and Sir Charles Dilke. Dilke was the great hope of the radicals towards the end of that century, but his career foundered after a scandalous divorce case.

So, as a short-list, how about Helena Bonham Carter, A. A. Milne and Lord John Russell? I know which way I would vote.

The Economist on the Lib Dem leadership contest

It is a balanced piece, as you would expect, and the conclusion is cheering:

All in all, however, the Lib Dems are lucky in their candidates; and partly as a result, the party is picking up in the polls. They are luckier still in their acting leader. Mr Cable—who coined the single best line of Gordon Brown's premiership this week when he pointed out that the prime minister had metamorphosed from being Stalin to Mr Bean—is having a very good war.

You know when you've been Blincoed

The Comment is Free profile of Nicholas Blincoe - author the other day of a distasteful attack on Chris Huhne - now reads:

Nicholas Blincoe is an author, critic and screenwriter. He is a former advisor to Nick Clegg MP.

I am pleased to hear it.

Nicholas Blincoe

There's been no reliable word from Team Clegg about the status of the article on Comment is Free by Nicholas Blincoe. But Richard Allan did write to James Graham as follows:

A little earlier this afternoon, my attention was drawn to an article by Nicholas Blincoe on the Comment is Free website. I have not met Nicholas before and he is not a part of the Nick Clegg Campaign Team. I understand that he has been one of a number of people to advise Nick on speeches previously, hence his self-description.

The contents of the article are a personal viewpoint and in no way associated with this campaign. I have therefore contacted Nicholas to request that he makes this clear in a posting on the Guardian site. He has agreed to do this and I hope that a clarification will appear in short order.

And Blincoe has added the following comment to his own article:

I should point out that I am wholly detached from his campaign team: pressure of work, finishing a book, has meant that I have been unable to participate in his stirring leadership campaign. I have been wishing him well from the sidelines. And occasionally, firing off acerbic missives as a commentator.

On that basis my occasional contributions to leaders' speeches entitle me to style myself a "former volunteer adviser to Paddy Ashdown and Charles Kennedy". I might find it easier to get commissioned by the Guardian if I did.

As we are all meant to be on the same side, let's play nicely and make no more fuss about this article.

But Blincoe is an interesting figure. As an Independent profile explains, he contributed to All Hail the New Puritans. This was a collection of short stories "written to a series of rules that banned authorial asides, poetic sentences, flashbacks and ornate punctuation".

That is a style he could have adopted with profit in his Guardian piece.

And it is hard to disagree with Blincoe when he says:

novelists are very, very bad at being involved in politics, because they always want to do and say their own thing. I very much admire Edward Said, but he was absolutely useless as a politician because he just wouldn't work with other people.

But it's hard to be too critical of someone who has written for Waking the Dead.

Did Nick Clegg approve Nicholas Blincoe's attack on Chris Huhne?

There is a horrible article on Comment is Free today in which Nicholas Blincoe makes all sorts of accusations against Chris Huhne.

James Graham is suitably rude about it:

Speaking ... in the spirit of collegiality, could Team Clegg please lean on their “advisor” Nicolas Blincoe and get him to shut the fuck up?

The silliest point occurs where Blincoe accuses Huhne of being posh. This is a childish insult at the best of times, but in a contest where both candidates attended the same public school it is simply ludicrous.

The Guardian describes Blincoe as "a volunteer adviser to Nick Clegg’s leadership campaign".

Which naturally leads you to ask: Did Nick Clegg approve this article before it was submitted? After all, as Blincoe says:

Let's just remind ourselves that this is a Liberal Democrat election. The teams involved are so tiny that Huhne would have to know what his guys were doing. He would know what they ate for breakfast ... even what soap they used. If he didn't, what kind of leader would he be?

I look forward to hearing from the Clegg camp. In the mean time, I suggest they follow James Graham's advice on the way to deal with Blincoe.

I shall vote for Chris Huhne again

A month ago I wrote:

In the last election campaign I used this blog to declare my support for Chris Huhne. It was not a hard decision to make. To my mind he was by some way the best of the four candidates set before us.

This time I find the candidates - Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne - much more evenly matched. Therefore the sensible thing to do is to see how the campaign develops and decide whom to vote for when the time comes to send my ballot paper in.

I have watched the campaign develop and now have my ballot paper, so it is time to make up my mind.

I shall be voting for Chris Huhne.

In a contest in which there is so little between the candidates in terms of policy and background it is hard to be too partisan. But Chris strikes me as the more forceful character and the better communicator of the two.

The Edinburgh hustings

A lively account from The Journal ("Edinburgh's student newspaper"):

This must be why Scotland wants Chris Huhne – because when it really hurts, you want your dad to make it better, not your flash favourite uncle.

Clegg and Huhne on Newsnight tomorrow

Thanks to Lib Dem Voice for pointing out that Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne will be slugging it out debating the issues on Newsnight tomorrow (Tuesday, BBC2 10.30 p.m.)

More on the programme's website. Let's hope Paxo is tough enough for this gig.