I have already commented here on the summit of nationalist leaders nine days ago in Cardiff and the mixed messages it sent about Plaid Cymru's prioritites in government. In doing so, I quoted Wales-on-Line's political editor, Ruth Mosalski, who said that throughout the Senedd campaign the First Minister claimed that his first goal was to show people what a Plaid government can do but, she continued, with the jury still out on what his government has actually achieved on the key issues of health, education, and the cost of living, he was now putting the divisive topic of independence front ...
On Monday, Conference debated our motion "Restoring Trans Rights", and the motion passed overwhelmingly. As Chair of LGBT+ Liberal Democrats, I'm proud of that – proud of everyone who put the work in, proud of the people who got up and spoke, and proud that our party said clearly, again, that it stands with trans people. But there is one thing I want us to carry forward from that debate. We win the argument by making it. We win the vote by voting for it. We do not need to win it by shouting anyone down. There will always be ...
I am surprised to see Lord B. inviting a Labour peer to lunch at the Hall. Time was, he would have hunted him with hounds over the hills of High Leicestershire. With this entry, our week at Bonkers Hall comes to a close. Don't forget to download the latest issue of Liberator from the magazine's website. Sunday Cook is pleased I am being "economical - like they are in the church sometimes" by inviting a Labour peer over for lunch. "You must be worried about that Burnham fellow," I remark to him as he fields the gravy boat. "Starmer always ...
I always find it odd that, when we have had hundreds of Lib Dems discussing policy for days, we then have the leader announcing a major new policy in his speech, just as everyone's about to go out the door. In Spring it was a new British nuke, which we've mercifully not heard much about since. However the tax cut policy announced yesterday might have more longevity. Basically we are going back to one of the really popular ideas from the coalition years, and raising the threshold at which you pay tax to £15,000. This is the idea initially brought ...
Let's travel far from Brighton and the Liberal Democrats's autumn conference to an hour-long discussion of Christopher Hill's The World Turned Upside Down: Radical Ideas During the English Revolution, a book published in 1972. I read it just after I had taken A-level History and found it more interesting than anything I had read about the 17th century while studying for that. Somehow it fitted together with Jethro Tull's album Songs From the Wood to form a ruralist, traditionalist strand in my politics that I have never quite been able to expunge. If Hill was a revisionist historian then Ann ...
Here is the full text of Ed Davey's closing speech at the 2026 Liberal Democrat autumn conference in Brighton: Something big and dangerous is happening in our country. Hundreds of thugs, in black shirts and balaclavas, are marching on our streets. First Dover. Then Portsmouth. Their aim? To intimidate. To spread fear. To stoke racism. They may call themselves patriots, but they would tear our country apart. We must not let them. Conference, we have seen this before. Racism on Britain's streets is sadly nothing new. Even though the vast majority of our fellow citizens share our values of decency, ...
BBC News wins our Headline of the Day Award. The councillor is Christian Vassie, a Liberal Democrat member of City of York Council, and the sign has gone up in the village of Wheldrake. Britain's hedgehogs salute him.
"Later he announced that the party are now in favour of cutting fuel duty by 10p, a policy that has not been agreed by conference and one that flies in the face of our commitment to tackling climate change. The Deputy Leader, Daisy Cooper also launched a new economic policy in her speech, which, once I had got hold of it, appears to be largely sensible, however, that too has not been approved by conference and it also talks about tax cuts."Peter Black reports from the Liberal Democrats' autumn conference in Brighton. George Monbiot asks why lawbreaking on our roads ...
Yesterday afternoon, Lib Dem Conference passed a motion calling for the EHRC's Code of Practice to be withdrawn and for work to be done on a cross party basis to work out what changes in the law were necessary to ensure that everyone, women, trans people, everyone can go about their lives in dignity and safety. It is not beyond the wit of people to find a way of doing that, and it is something that can be relatively easy given the political will. The motion was passed overwhelmingly, as these things usually are. In fact, it looked to me ...
I tried telling the old boy that the Port of Dover has its own police force, whose relations with the Kent force has at times been opaque, but he was determined to give it both barrels this time. Saturday I am disgusted at the events in Dover. We used to know how to deal with these Blackshirt types - come to think of it, I believe there's still a Wellington bomber in an outbuilding of some farm or other on my estate. I shall have it serviced, repainted and put at the disposal of the Chief Constable of Kent, who ...
My last day before I disappear on five buses. I had a run along the promenade and noticed a police operation. I take my hat off to the police. We should remember that they spend an awful lot of time and care following up "concerns for safety". Often they are like emergency social workers. Full marks to them. Hove Plinth is a thing. At the moment it has a beautiful sculpture called "Flight of the Langoustine" on it (pictured). While having breakfast I watched the debate on A Liberal Vision for primary health care. It was good to see our ...
It maybe that I have been spoilt by nearly 40 years of attending Liberal and Liberal Democrats conferences.. I was in Llandudno in 1981, when conference voted by 1,600 to 112 to form an electoral alliance with the SDP and David Steel told us to go back to our constituencies and prepare for government. I was one of the 112. I was present in Eastbourne in 1986 for the defence debate when the representatives defied the party leadership and unconditionally rejected the compromise on defence agreed with David Owen. I saw the electrifying speech by Simon Hughes MP for the ...