The victor of the Chesham and Amersham by-election gave her first speech in Parliament today, featuring a hunt for a chocolate factory: pic.twitter.com/U8ygi9qWx3 — Sarah Green MP (@SarahGreenLD) September 7, 2021 Email* Enter Email Confirm Email Name* First Last What would you like to receive?* Liberal Democrat Newswire: monthly newsletter Polling UnPacked (political opinion polling news): max 1 email per day Mark Pack blog posts and council by-election results: max 1 email per day Lib Dem news from www.LibDems.org.uk and the media: max 1 email per day Official Lib Dem news from Scotland: max 1 email per day Official Lib ...
Lib Dem MPs have slammed the Government for breaking two election promises in as many hours. Today Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak announced that they were going to pay for social care in about the most regressive way possible, by placing the burden on National Insurance. That takes in more lower paid people. The £130 it will cost for someone on £20,000 a year doesn't sound much, but, believe me, the poorest households will feel every single penny. There were fairer ways of doing this, but you can't expect that from a Conservative Government. Emma Kennedy had it right on ...
Ahead of tonight's vote on the controversial Elections Bill, Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Home Affairs Alistair Carmichael MP said: "You don't strengthen our democracy by making it harder for people to vote. "The Conservatives' voter ID law is a blatant assault on our fundamental democratic rights, and Liberal Democrats will resist it all the way. "Between this and their attacks on the courts, the Human Rights Act and the right to peaceful protest, Boris Johnson and his Tory Ministers are desperately trying to stop people holding them to account for their disastrous policies. We won't let them. "Instead of pushing ...
Commenting on Boris Johnson's latest press conference, Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey MP said: "These broken manifesto promises are betrayals that will haunt Boris Johnson's premiership. Whether it's young working families, carers or small business owners, those catastrophically failed by the Conservatives during the pandemic are now being asked to pick up the tab. "The Liberal Democrats will oppose these unjust plans in Parliament tomorrow and urge all Conservative MPs to do the same. For the past two elections we have been clear about how to fix the social care crisis in a fair and progressive way. The Government must ...
Reacting to the announcement that the triple lock on pensions has been scrapped for the next year, Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for the Treasury Christine Jardine said: "Another day, another broken Tory promise. With two million pensioners living in poverty, the triple lock was their guarantee that they wouldn't have to face the old days of 75p rises. "Now it's gone. Even if this Government says it's a temporary move, how can pensioners have any faith that this is the one promise they will keep? "Liberal Democrats demand that the Government doesn't leave pensioners living in poverty high and dry. The ...
Second paragraph of third chapter:A shake of the coif-covered head.Set in mid-19th century Ireland, an English nurse is sent to investigate the mystery of a child who apparently survives without food, in the immediate aftermath of the famine. It's pretty obvious to the attentive reader what is really going on from an early stage, but it's a well-told story and the ending was unexpected. (However, I really doubt that a 19th-century Englishwoman would be unaware of the Biblical story of manna!) You can get it here.
pic.twitter.com/U8ygi9qWx3 — Sarah Green MP (@SarahGreenLD) September 7, 2021 A wonderful sight for those of us who helped get Sarah Green elected as MP for Chesham and Amersham. A short while ago, she made her maiden speech. It was warm, generous, gracious and funny. She paid a lovely tribute to her predecessor Dame Cheryl Gillan, talked about her beautiful constituency with huge affection and got in a criticism of HS2, a description of the roads as an assault course for drivers and a takedown of the Government for its absurd plans for voter ID. And here it is in full, ...
As we head into the Autumn conference and debating season, for those of us for whom Europe is still the most defining issue of our time, the next couple of months are going to be very exciting. As a member of the Liberal Democrats you are going to have the opportunity to have your say. In June the European Union launched its "Conference on the Future of Europe", whose purpose is to generate ideas and set out a vision for how the EU should develop and improve in the future. The Conference is the widest process of engagement with its ...
A Liberal Democrat press release brings the news: Ahead of a vote in Parliament on the controversial Elections Bill, Liberal Democrat Spokesperson for Home Affairs Alistair Carmichael MP said: "You don't strengthen our democracy by making it harder for people to vote. "The Conservatives' voter ID law is a blatant assault on our fundamental democratic rights, and Liberal Democrats will resist it all the way. "Between this and their attacks on the courts, the Human Rights Act and the right to peaceful protest, Boris Johnson and his Tory Ministers are desperately trying to stop people holding them to account for ...
Responding to the news that Boris Johnson has failed to produce a sustainable social care plan and broken his election promise not to raise national insurance, Leader of the Liberal Democrats Ed Davey MP said: "This is yet another broken promise from the Conservatives that will hit working families hard. Boris Johnson gave voters a cast iron guarantee that he would not raise National Insurance - and now he's breaking voters' trust again. "Even worse, the Government's plans won't fix the social care crisis. Our loved ones will still not get the quality care they need. "This is two broken ...
Passing Merseyrail trains at Aughton Park Station on Merseyrail's Northern LIne to Ormskirk It's true, they all tend to serve the city at the centre of things and rarely offer connectivity between the satellite towns/districts. I've often thought about this because of my experience with Merseyrail but the same will be true of virtually all metro/transit systems. The link below addresses Greater Manchester's very similar problem:- www.youtube.com/watch?v=s0yekbZWMWw&t=482s But like Greater Manchester, there are potential solutions available subject to the money to do them and the political will. Readers of this blog site will probably recall that I've always been sceptical ...
How should decisions about how our elections are run be made? You would hope that all the parties would get together and come up with something that we should all agree with. Or at least a truly independent body would annoy everyone equally by coming up with things that some like and some don't. Here's how not to do it – let a Government which has more MPs than its vote share deserves change the rules to suit itself. That is far from democratic. The Conservatives are looking to the example of the experts in voter suppression, the US Republicans, ...
Mon, 12:56: RT @Bencjacobs: At almost 58, Andrew Jackson was the oldest member of the Senate in 1825. Today, that would make him younger than over 70 c... Mon, 16:05: Nadia Whittome MP on trauma and recovery: 'Some said I couldn't have PTSD because I haven't been in a war' https://t.co/UMbpOYGIww A fascinating profile. Someone to watch. Mon, 18:16: A Hero Born, by Jin Yong https://t.co/HRwZaL4g2W Mon, 18:25: RT @pmdfoster: Thread by @tconnellyRTE on #brexit NI protocol latest. Note that he says Article 10/state aid clause rewrite request being... Mon, 18:25: RT @tconnellyRTE: So, back from the summer break and ...
Over at the Guardian, Simon Jenkins has got Boris Johnson bang to rights on the lies that have led to the shambles now enveloping British trade with Europe. He quite rightly says that the Prime Minister is wrong that our current predicament was an unavoidable price worth paying to leave the EU: In order to further his chances of becoming Tory leader Boris Johnson made two commitments. One was to resign from the EU, the other was to depart Europe's customs union and single market, aspects of which embrace other non-EU states such as Norway. The second decision was an ...
Tue 7th
09:09
Christine Jardine: Government should pay for medicinal cannabis prescriptions for children with Epil...
Surely any person, when the quality of life for a child is on the line, would quickly come to the conclusion that paying up is the right thing to do? Ever since she was elected as MP for Edinburgh West, Christine Jardine has been pushing the Government to give access to medicinal cannabis particularly to children who suffer from rare forms of Epilepsy for whom it can make a huge difference. She has seen at first hand how it can transform the lives of the children who take it. In her Scotsman column this week, she talks about Murray Gray, ...
In face of long-term funding and other issues in Health & Social Care Bungling Boris has managed to try and get the money from the wrong place for the wrong reasons. He appears to be making no intelligent attempt to ... Continue reading →
Further to the numerous concerns raised with me by residents following a number of accidents at the Balgay Road/Blackness Road and Avenue junction, I raised the matter with Traffic and Road Safety Team Leader at the City Council. I am pleased to have now had the following helpful update : "We have been out to this junction and have spoken to adjacent residents regarding the junction and they were quite informative. It is our intention to include this junction as a future road safety location and we will be looking to undertake additional measures to improve road safety for the ...
There are worse things in the government's Elections bill than its proposals for compulsory voter ID, says David Howarth. "How did Labour collapse? Is the party's 20-year decline the result of inevitable structural change, or can it be traced back to individual decisions and mistakes? To find out, the New Statesman spoke to more than 20 key figures, from former leaders and ministers to senior advisers. Could they, between them, identify ten key moments in Labour's collapse?" Harry Lambert presents "a tragedy in ten acts". Richard Scorer responds to the Independent Inquiry into Child Sexual Abuse report on the experiences ...
