A new council service will be taking to the streets of North East Lincolnshire from Thursday, March 18, with the aim of building community pride in the borough’s neighbourhoods.

The service, known as Community pride, is a combination of the council’s warden and environmental enforcement services, but with a new and improved focus of better meeting the needs and expectations of the community.

It has been introduced following consultation with residents, which showed that crime, environmental crime, and anti-social behaviour are of greatest concern to the local population.

Councillor Peter Burgess, the Liberal Democrat portfolio holder for the environment and the green agenda, said:

“This new and improved service aims to build community pride in North East Lincolnshire and we will be working with all our residents to ensure that we tackle the problems they are facing in their neighbourhoods.

“Previously the neighbourhood safety scheme wardens and the environmental enforcement teams have worked separately. However, this new service is about bringing all their work together so they are working to one agenda. This will ensure we have a greater impact and the aim is to make a real difference to people’s lives in North East Lincolnshire.”

Key aspects of the new service include:

• New more flexible working, so officers are on the streets when it really matters
• Improved street presence
• Increased efficiency by focusing on the customer and cutting unnecessary bureaucracy
• Enhanced graffiti removal, with closer working with Community Payback
• Improved visibility and identity with new uniforms and vehicle branding
• Better communications with the public so that they know what the service is doing and why
• Improved working with Humberside Police, the Environment Agency and other key agencies

Liberal Democrat leader of the council, Councillor Andrew De Frietas, said:

“We have listened to the concerns of the public and they have told us that improvements are still needed in a number of areas, including high visibility patrols, dealing with fly tipping, littering and dog fouling.

“Community Pride will tackle all of these areas in a much more efficient way. It is important that we work very closely with our partners, such as the Police and the Environment Agency, to ensure that we are all working together to improve our area.

“We want to encourage residents to tell us where they are experiencing problems and we will work with them to ensure that their neighbourhoods are always a pleasant place to live and work.”

The telephone number for members of the public to call regarding any enviro-crime incidents is (01472) 324770.

2010 is a year of exciting changes for Britain.

The students of Britain have been let down and lied to by successive governments.  From Labour introducing tuition fees and top up fees, to the Conservatives planning to raise them to £7,000 and to hike interest on student loans.

The students of our country deserve better.  Tuition fees mean that most students now leave university with staggering debt.  Conservatives want to raise those fees to at least £7,000 a year.

The Liberal Democrats believe that education should be free and plan to abolish university tuition fees entirely.

We deserve better and this year is our opportunity to stand up and fight for it.Students form a vibrant part of our community here in Grimsby and North East Lincolnshire, and it is only right that you will play a vital role in deciding who the next MP here is.

During February, I posted a number of articles on this website about the monthly crime figures for North East Lincolnshire. January was an historic month, with crime levels at an all time low.

At this moment in time North East Lincolnshire is seeing a major impact of some very good partnership working and month on month since the middle of last year crime levels have fallen dramatically, and once again we have gone one better in February – outstripping Januarys’ best ever performance!

Last month, Chief Superintendent David Hilditch said:

“January’s figures come on top of excellent figures for October, November and December which made 2009 a very good year for us. February has got off to a good start as well. 

“I would hope that we would all want to see a safe and prosperous area with low crime levels and so I am disappointed that some people choose to assume that good results for North East Lincolnshire can’t be true. We’ve got something to celebrate here. 

“The story behind the figures is that we have relentlessly been targeting the top offenders and some of the prison sentences we have seen in the last year have been very pleasing. At the other end of the scale we have been working very closely with the Youth Offending Service and many other partners to keep kids out of trouble.”

The Chancellors’ Debate will take place on the 29th (Channel 4) March

We want to celebrate these debates and get people involved, meeting, discussing and debating. So why not set up your own ‘Debate Nights’ party for people to get together and watch the debates; whether this be a party at home, in your local town hall or pub, or online.

How to

It’s easy, find a place, set up a TV, get some food and invite people.

Promote your event

We’ve created a flyer to help you spread the word of your event: Click Here to download it.

We want you to take part by organising your own, whether just getting together with a group of friends, your local party or just throwing the doors open for any takers. Take part online too using the Twitter hashtag: #gonick or on comment here on ACT.

Let us know

If you want to advertise your debate night you can create an event here on Act or on Facebook. Let us know about your event whether you wish to advertise it or not and we’ll list all the parties happening across the UK.

For the first time in British political history, the leaders of the 3 main political parties will go head-to-head for live televised debates. The opening up of political debate in the lead up to the 2010 General Election will mean you can get a better insight in to the policies, styles and personalities put forward.

The Leaders’ Debates will take place on the 15th (ITV), 22nd (Sky) and 29th (BBC) April 2010

The Chancellors’ Debate will take place on the 29th (Channel 4) March

We want to celebrate these debates and get people involved, meeting, discussing and debating. So why not set up your own ‘Debate Nights’ party for people to get together and watch the debates; whether this be a party at home, in your local town hall or pub, or online.

How to

It’s easy, find a place, set up a TV, get some food and invite people.

Promote your event

We’ve created a flyer to help you spread the word of your event: Click Here to download it.

We want you to take part by organising your own, whether just getting together with a group of friends, your local party or just throwing the doors open for any takers. Take part online too using the Twitter hashtag: #gonick or on comment here on ACT.

Let us know

If you want to advertise your debate night you can create an event here on Act or on Facebook. Let us know about your event whether you wish to advertise it or not and we’ll list all the parties happening across the UK.

In the last 48 hours members of 38 degrees have sent more than 10,000 complaints to their MPs expressing their concern overomy Bill.

This week politicians said that those opposing the bill are “web anarchists”, which is a convenient way for them to avoid the many concerns the public has about this bill, but the fact remains that many people have strong concerns that the government is forcing a complex bill through Parliament without addressing legitimate concerns from many people.

The government is planning to use a special ”fast track” process designed for the weeks before an election, that is intended to pass urgent and uncontroversial measures, to force thorough these controversial new powers.  This process is problematic at the best of times because it removes the normal democratic checks, and removing scrutiny and debate over such a complex bill that gives unprecedented new powers to the Government is deeply worrying.

The bill contains list of new powers that would (amongst many things) give the government power to disconnect millions of people, block websites, create the potential for back-door censorship and could mean the end of open WiFi.  Even  Schools and libraries could have their internet connection cut off if people infringe any copyright.

One group that is very keen on to see the bill approved is the music industry. Early this month it was discovered that parts of the bill have been copied word for word from a draft “suggestion” which was written by the music industry lobbyist group, the BPI.  

It was recently reportedin the Guardian that the same lobbyists admitted the only way to get the bill through would be to rush it through without any proper parliamentary debate.

Those opposing the bill are a growing and powerful movement of companies, libraries, consumer groups and of course us, the public. Facebook, Google, Yahoo, Virgin, Orange, eBay and BT who came together earlier this month to express their concern over this bill.

38 egrees have joined with the Open Rights Group (ORG) to oppose the bill.  As Jim Killock, ORG’s Executive Director says:

“At the fag end of this Parliament, disastrous laws to disconnect families from the internet and introduce web censorship powers that we haven’t even seen, could get passed into law without proper debate.

Serious laws, that would disrupt people’s freedom of speech and their daily lives, and potentially create new web censorship powers, deserve proper scrutiny and debate. Anything less is undemocratic and unaccountable, not to mention deeply irresponsible.

That is why 38 Degrees is joining the Open Rights Groups’ call for a proper open debate on this Bill. Please write to your MP now to demand that this Bill is properly debated.”

The Government is right to attempt to tackle the many issues surrounding the internet, but to rush these complex new measures through Parliament is wrong. To think that Labour might rush them through before a general election without anyone noticing is wrong. This law needs a proper debate and proper scrutiny. That’s why ten thousand people have written to theirr MPs.

If you haven’t done so already now is the time to write to your MP and tell them why we oppose the Digital Economy Bill: http://www.38degrees.org.uk/digital-economy-bill

“Executives, unions and politicians need to start acting like grown ups and get this sorted before the public declares a plague on all their houses,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Transport Secretary.

Commenting on railway workers voting in favour of strike action, Norman Baker said:

“In all the political mudslinging over who is to blame for strike action by BA or railway workers, it is the passengers who are suffering the most.
 
“There is no need for any of these strikes to go ahead. Management at British Airways and Network Rail need to get back round the table with the unions to sort this mess out before people’s holiday, business and travel plans are ruined for no good reason.
 
“There is far too much macho posturing and cheap political point scoring going on all sides of these disputes. Enough is enough. Executives, unions and politicians need to start acting like grown ups and get this sorted before the public declares a plague on all their houses.”

“Today’s announcement has shown us yet again that for all of Cameron’s posturing, the Tories can’t be trusted to deliver on the environment,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary.

Commenting on the Conservative’s Energy Security Green Paper, Simon Hughes said:

“Blindly pledging to build a new nuclear plant every 18 months is a recipe for disaster.

“Nuclear power has always required huge amounts of public money and David Cameron’s signal that the Tories are ready to turn on the taps of taxpayer support risks billions that we simply can’t afford.

“Nuclear energy is not clean energy. A new generation of nuclear power stations would leave us with a legacy of deadly radioactive waste that will take hundreds of years and billions of pounds to clean up.

“As David Cameron himself said only four years ago, not having a plan to deal with this toxic legacy is completely irresponsible.

“Today’s announcement has shown us yet again that for all of Cameron’s posturing, the Tories can’t be trusted to deliver on the environment.”

A report from the National Audit Office has warned that the student loans and grants system in England is at substantial risk of being hit by delays again this year.

According to the National Audit Office, it is anticipated that the Student Loans Company will have to process twice as many applications this year, but there is no guarantee that it will be able to cope with the  demand.

Last autumn tens of thousands of students faced delays before receiving their grant and loan payments last autumn after the Student Loans Company struggled to keep up.

The National Audit Office’s report on last years shambles found less than half of applications (46%) were fully processed by the start of the academic term last year, compared with 63% in 2008.  Applications had been arriving faster than the Student Loan Company was able to process them, and by September 6 there were 241,000 applications that had not been fully processed.

When the start of term approached, the report found that calls from students enquiring about their applications rose, with four million made to the Student Loan Company last September, and in spite of having a target of no more than 14% of calls being abandoned, 87% were left unanswered during the month.

Between February 2009 and January this year, only a fifth (21%) of calls were answered in 60 seconds, and more than half (56%) were left unanswered.

The findings showed the SLC took 33% longer to process an application in the 2009/10 academic year, than it had taken local authorities in 2008/9, and on average, it took 12.4 weeks for an application to be processed in 2009/10, compared to 9.3 weeks in 2008/09.

The SLC took over processing applications by new students from local authorities for the first time in 2009, for the academic year 2009/10, but the report was criticised the Student Loans Company and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS), saying they had underestimated the challenges of centralising the service.

This year, the SLC will handle applications from students starting university this autumn, as well as continuing to deal with applications from students who started last year.

The report concludes:

“The company expects to process at least twice as many applications in 2010, when it becomes responsible for applications from both first and second years, and it is unproven whether it has the capacity to provide a good service this year.”

A spokeswoman for the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills said:

“We welcome this report which provides further background to the processing issues at the Student Loans Company (SLC) last summer. As soon as the department became aware of the problems, both ministers and officials acted immediately including making more resources available.

“Last year we commissioned Professor Sir Deian Hopkin to carry out an independent review of the lessons learned and the SLC and the Department fully accepted the recommendations in the report and are implementing them.”

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference 2010

If you didn’t make it to Birmingham last weekend, you can still watch all of the keynote speeches, including those from Chris Huhne and Vince Cable, as well as Nick Clegg’s inspiring closing speech. You can also access the full conference agenda with updated motions and policy. Find out more >

Election an opportunity to win back privacy

Nick Clegg yesterday said in a speech to Privacy International that the election this year is “an opportunity for the British people to vote to take their privacy back.”
Read more >

We’ll be the change that works for you

This week we made our conference soundtrack - ‘We’ll be the change that works for you’ - available for download on iTunes. It draws on our new slogan for the General Election, with all proceeds going towards our campaign. Download now >

Tory immigration policy worst of both worlds

The Liberal Democrats this week called for tougher immigration control in densely populated areas like London and the South East while allowing more migrants elsewhere. 
Read more >

Debate nights – be part of it

A major part of the campaign in 2010  will be the live televised debates broadcast on ITV, BBC and Sky.

Why not hold a party at your local pub, town hall or even at home to get your friends together. We’ve created a host of materials and ways to get involved both on and offline.

Find out more >

The next meeting of the Yarborough Action Group will take place on April 1^st, 2010 at the same venue as the last one, which is the Community Room, Queens Court, Cambridge Park at 6.30 pm.

Anyone who has an interest in trying to make the Yarborough Ward of North East Lincolnshire a better place to live in, work in, or visit is welcome to attend.

The agenda for the meeting will include:

·         Progress report on issues raised at the last meeting

·         Any new issues

·         An assessment of neighbourhood policing priorities

·         A member of e factor will also be present to give information of the support available for anyone who is thinking of becoming self – employed

A record of the last meeting can be found by clicking here: yarborough-community-meeting-notes-110210.pdf

Mr Hague is guilty of a cynical cover-up for a shabby decision which has cost British taxpayers more than £100 million”, says the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary

Commenting on William Hague’s admission of a “mistake” concerning Lord Ashcroft’s tax status, Chris Huhne said: “William Hague promised the Prime Minister that before Lord Ashcroft received his peerage he would pay “tens of millions” in British tax, but then never even checked whether the promise was kept. He has treated the taxpayer with total contempt.

It is utterly unbelievable to say, as William Hague did this morning, that he was not aware of the tax implications of these negotiations that dragged on for four months when he was kept informed by his closest loyalist, the Chief Whip.

Mr Hague is guilty of a cynical cover-up for a shabby decision which has cost British taxpayers more than £100 million.

William Hague is not fit for any role in Government, let alone that of Foreign Secretary. Lord Ashcroft must now meet his £100 million tax bill.”

Labour’s hypocrisy on the environment was today revealed by Liberal Democrat research showing that Jim Murphy has doubled the number of ministerial cars used by the Scotland Office, despite Scottish Labour’s call today for action to reduce the emissions of government cars.

Meanwhile, Scottish Labour’s energy spokesperson Lewis MacDonald is completely at odds with Labour’s Energy Secretary Ed Miliband over coal power:

• On Monday 15 March, Lewis MacDonald said: “If Scotland is going to make a significant contribution to cutting carbon emissions, it makes no sense to start by building a coal-fired power station […] If this goes ahead it will set back Scotland’s prospects of meeting our commitment on climate change”
• This is entirely at odds with Ed Miliband’s claim that “In order to ensure that we maintain a diverse energy mix, we need new coal-fired power stations”

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Scotland Secretary, Alistair Carmichael said:

“This shows the gulf between what Labour promise and what they actually do.

“It is hard to see how Labour can call for greener ministerial limos while Jim Murphy has doubled the number of cars he uses at the Scotland Office.

“Labour are also hopelessly split on energy, criticising coal power in Scotland while in Westminster they back new, dirty power stations.

“13 years of failure have shown that whatever Labour say during the election, they cannot be trusted to back it up with real action in Government.”

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg will today say this election is ‘an opportunity for the British people to vote to take their privacy back’.

In his speech to Privacy International to mark their 20th Anniversary, Nick Clegg will say:

“Labour has spent 13 years trampling over people’s privacy. From allowing children’s fingerprints to be taken at school without their parents’ consent; to making us a world leader in CCTV; to wasting vast sums of taxpayers’ money on giant databases that hoard our personal details. And now we hear that ministers want pensioners to swap their bus passes for ID cards.

“The Government’s staggering record on losing private data – leaving it in pub car parks and on commuter trains – just makes matters worse.

“And there’s an even bigger issue at stake: Labour’s flagrant disregard for our privacy flies in the face of hard won British liberty. It betrays a deep distrust of the British people, as well as an obsession with controlling every aspect of everyday life from Whitehall.

“Those same reflexes underpin this Government’s obsession with law-making. Since 1997 they have flooded the statute books with nearly 4,300 new ways of making us criminals. Some of them are completely bizarre, like ‘disturbing a pack of eggs when directed not to by an authorised officer’, and ‘causing a nuclear explosion’, as if we needed a new law for that.

“And where do all these new laws get us? Only one in a hundred crimes ends in a conviction in court.

“The Conservatives talk a good game on privacy, but scratch beneath the surface and it’s clear they can’t be trusted to roll back Labour’s surveillance state. Just look at their plans to make it even easier for the police to watch and record people getting on with their daily lives, all in the name of cutting red tape.

“Only the Liberal Democrats will bring an end to the endless snooping on innocent people.”

“There is a real fear that these cuts are preparing the ground for tuition fees to be raised,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Universities Secretary.

Commenting on the Government’s announcements of cuts to university budgets, Stephen Williams said:

“Universities and young people are bearing the brunt of Labour’s economic failure.

“There is a real fear that these cuts are preparing the ground for tuition fees to be raised.  It would be totally unfair for young people, the innocent victims of the financial crisis, to be punished in this way.”

“Dementia has a crippling effect on families across the country and this problem is only going to get bigger as people continue to live longer,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on the findings of the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Dementia’s inquiry into the funding of the National Dementia Strategy (NDS) released today, Norman Lamb said:
 
“This report makes for depressing reading and reveals that Labour’s dementia strategy is failing.
 
“We urgently need to improve services for people suffering with dementia and make sure that funding is available to provide carers with valuable time off.
 
“Dementia has a crippling effect on families across the country and this problem is only going to get bigger as people continue to live longer.
 
“If we want to ensure this money gets to the people who need it we must give local people the power to hold their local health service to account.”

The panel for this week’s Any Questions has been announced, and once again they haven’t included a Liberal Democrats on the panel.

This week’s panel features a Conservative MP, a Labour MP, a right-wing pundit and a Green candidate – but no Liberal Democrat.

The story has been covered at http://bit.ly/ldvu0317 - and it includes details of how you can make a complaint to the BBC.

Although the BBC never directly admits “we’ve got it wrong”, the overall level of pressure does make a difference - so please do lodge a complaint and share the post with others.

There’s a link to all the different ways of making a complaint (phone, letter, web) at http://bit.ly/ldvu0317

North East Lincolnshire Care Trust Plus has been recognised regionally for innovations in dementia care. Five local services for people with dementia were recently showcased at an event in York including the Gardens, the Haverstoe Suite, the dementia academy, dementia care mapping and Admiral nurses. 

The Yorkshire and Humber Improvement Partnership (YHIP), which is coordinating the regional response to the National Dementia Strategy (published by the Department of Health in 2009), hosted a launch event earlier this month. ‘The Big Event’ showcased regional innovations in dementia care.  

The CTP was represented by all five innovative services, with one service holding an informative workshop, two others holding desktop discussions and two others having marketplace displays. 

Jeanette Logan, head of older people’s mental health services for the CTP, said:

“We are proud that locally we are striding ahead in terms of improving the quality of local services for local people, especially at a time when reports are disappointing around the national response to the challenges of the National Dementia Strategy.

 “We are developing and designing services that offer new solutions which not only enhance the quality of care for people with dementia and their carers but also go some way to addressing challenges posed by the rising numbers of local people with a type of dementia.   

“This is and has to be a multi agency approach and we are fortunate to have built a local network of key individuals and agencies that enables us to ensure services will be commissioned and provided according to the specific needs and demands of the local area.” 

The CTP is currently developing its commissioning strategy for dementia services and commissioners have been instrumental in terms of support and backing for the both the dementia care mapping and Haverstoe initiatives as well as supporting proposals for the development of the dementia academy. 

The five services have also been included in the soon to be published Yorkshire and South Humber innovations in dementia care directory and are among other services that have been identified as part of a baseline assessment of PCT/CTP positions against the National Dementia Strategy.

Andrea Parr, strategy coordinator, older people’s mental health services, said: “A significant amount of hard work by a number of people has gone into designing and delivering services of this standard. 

“The shared goal of the health and social care community within NE Lincs should be to enable people to maintain their independence and remain in their own homes for as long as possible.  There still remains a significant amount of work to be done, but having our efforts recognised in this way makes us feel proud of our achievements and spurs us on with other developing projects.” 

Project details:

The Gardens – acute inpatient and assessment suite. An innovative design and staffing structure which allows for the highest quality of care provision both while in hospital and on discharge.  A new element to the staffing means that care and support can also be offered in the home to prevent an admission where possible. 

The Haverstoe Suite – a specially designed and staffed unit at Huntleigh Lodge in Cleethorpes which caters for people with dementia with more complex needs, providing intensive input from specialist OPMHS services and preventing out of area placements.  

The dementia academy – a joint project with the local independent and third sector as well as other key partners which will establish North East Lincolnshire as a centre of excellence for dementia care. Offering training, advice and support to anybody delivering care or interacting with somebody with dementia from specialist staff to members of the public. 

Dementia care mapping – a method of assessing the impact of one to one or group care provision on a person with dementia.  Feedback allows for individuals and teams of staff to identify areas of good practice as well as areas for improvement. 

Admiral nurses – The CTP is fortunate to have two of 80 national Admiral nurses.  Working in partnership with the charity For Dementia, the CTP is able to offer specialist support and advice to the carers of people with dementia and to work on developing and rolling out programmes of information and training for carers.

The prime minister has written to Sir John Chilcot to clarifythe evidence he gave to the Iraq inquiry. Mr Brown claimed that defence spending had risen in real terms every year, however the letter to Sir John Chilcott shows that defence spending actually fell in real terms during four of the years that Mr Brown was chancellor.

Here is the full text of the prime minister’s letter:

“It is time for a simpler, more cost-effective system which helps farmers get their payments efficiently, effectively and on time,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Rural Affairs Secretary.

Commenting on the UK’s £15.9milliuon fine for failing to comply with Common Agricultural Policy rules, Tim Farron said:

“The British taxpayer is now stumping up for the Government’s incompetence but British farmers have already paid a high price.

“The Government’s failure to issue payments promptly in 2005 pushed many farmers to the brink.

“The chaotic handling of the Rural Payments Agency has now cost the British taxpayer £90million in fines to the EU.
 
“It’s absolutely staggering that Defra is throwing money down the drain at a time when all Government departments are being asked to tighten their belts.
 
“It is time for a simpler, more cost-effective system which helps farmers get their payments efficiently, effectively and on time.”

“He should apologise for the fact that under his watch our troops have not had the equipment they need to do the job,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Defence Secretary.

Commenting on Gordon Brown’s announcement that he is writing to the Iraq Inquiry to clarify evidence he gave on defence cuts, Nick Harvey said:

“Gordon Brown should do more than simply clarify the matter with the Iraq Inquiry.
 
“He should apologise for the fact that under his watch our troops have not had the equipment they need to do the job.
 
“They have struggled without sufficient helicopters for too long.
 
“It is a scandal that it has taken so long to get the Snatch Land Rover out of service in Afghanistan.”

“The Liberal Democrats will guarantee that a million unpaid carers who work the longest hours get a week’s break every year – to be taken in whichever way they choose,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on today’s Princess Royal Trust for Carers report, which reveals that next year Primary Care Trusts only plan to spend 25% of the £100m they have been allocated to increase services for carers for this purpose, Norman Lamb said:
 
“This report makes clear that Labour has completely let down millions of hardworking unpaid carers across the country.
 
“Yet again we see that ministers have chased headlines with grand spending commitments but completely failed to make sure the money gets through to the people who really need it. This is tantamount to a fraud on vulnerable people.
 
“The Liberal Democrats will guarantee that a million unpaid carers who work the longest hours get a week’s break every year – to be taken in whichever way they choose. Only a guaranteed right will stop vital funds for respite being diverted into other parts of the NHS.”

“A fall in the jobless figures hides the surge of people who have lost hope and resigned themselves to long-term unemployment,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary.

Commenting on today’s unemployment figures, Steve Webb said:

“Today’s figures show that the number of people in work has actually fallen. The sad story is that people are giving up on looking for work instead of finding jobs.
 
“A fall in the jobless figures hides the surge of people who have lost hope and resigned themselves to long-term unemployment.
 
“Ministers cannot afford to gloat. It’s especially important to support those who have been out of work for a long time. They need extra help to get back into work and avoid a life on benefits, the fate which so many faced under the Tories as a result of the last recession.”

“Giving children a greater choice of sports will increase sporting take up and decrease drop outs,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Culture, Media and Sport Secretary.

Commenting on today’s Government announcement that 3000 new after school clubs offering Olympic and Paralympics sport will be provided for young people, Don Foster said:

“We have been calling for more after school sport provision for a long time. Giving children a greater choice of sports will increase sporting take up and decrease drop outs.
 
“Currently fewer than a third of children do the five hours of sport each week this Government promised. This one-off sum won’t be enough to produce the huge boost in sports participation needed.
 
“Grassroots sport has lost out because of lottery money being diverted to pay for the Olympics. By changing the way the national lottery is taxed, we could produce long term dividends for all good causes, including grassroots sport.”

“Only the Liberal Democrats will provide the investment in green jobs we need to get Scots back into work,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Scotland Secretary.

Commenting on new figures which show Scottish unemployment is still rising while overall UK unemployment falls, Alistair Carmichael said:

“The Government’s claim that their action is ‘making a difference’ clearly doesn’t extend to Scotland.

“Yet again it looks like Labour is taking Scotland for granted.

“Only the Liberal Democrats will provide the investment in green jobs we need to get Scots back into work.”

“If the Home Secretary hadn’t meddled in the work of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs we would already have had their advice and the Government would be able to act,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary.

Commenting on the legal drug methedrone following the deaths of two teenagers, Chris Huhne said:

“The failure to classify methedrone is a direct consequence of the Government’s interference in the independent advice of its scientific advisers.

“If the Home Secretary hadn’t meddled in the work of the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs we would already have had their advice and the Government would be able to act.”

Ministers have been forced to reopen four JobCentres that cost more than £1million to close, research by the Liberal Democrats has revealed

The Government has been forced to make a U-turn on their JobCentre closure programme after a huge rise in unemployment placed unexpected pressure on the network. As part of its closure programme, over 500 JobCentres were closed, even as the recession took hold last year.

Unemployment skyrocketed by up to a third in the areas affected in just one year while the JobCentres were closed.

The Government spent £336,000 closing the JobCentre in South Northfield, Birmingham and another £758,000 closing one in Broadway, Bexleyheath, answers to Parliamentary Questions show.

Between January 2009 and January 2010, the claimant count shows that:

• Unemployment increased 33% in South Northfield, Birmingham, from 2,472 (7.3% of the working age population) to 3,292 (9.5%)
• Unemployment increased by 25% in Broadway, Bexleyheath, from 1,386 (3.4%) to 1,732 (4.2%)

The Government also closed JobCentres only to re-open them again in Great Moor Street, Bolton and Erdington, Birmingham. While the JobCentres were closed, the number of people out of work rose by 28% and 22% respectively.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Steve Webb said:

“It is good to hear that ministers have finally backed down and started reopening Jobcentres in areas where unemployment has wreaked havoc during the recession.

“Jobseekers need all the help they can get and shouldn’t have to travel miles to get it.
 
“The Government was arrogant and short-sighted to close more than 500 jobcentres at a great cost to taxpayers, it is a shame they didn’t realise their mistake sooner.”

According to the Standard newspaper, one of Gordon Brown’s senior officials at No 10 is being paid by the Unite trade union.

Clare Moody, who is a national officer for the union that is involved in the BA cabin crew strike, has been given a desk in the Prime Minister’s political office that deals with policy development and government relations, and although she works in the heart of the Government her salary and pension are being paid for by the union.

The revelation has been made amid growing concern amongst Labour supporters about the growing influence that the Unite union has over the Labour party, and the four days delay before the Prime Minister eventually criticised the union over the British Airways dispute.

Lord Mandelson is known to be worried that the union is using Labour candidate selection meetings to control the next Labour MPs, and he has made a point of helping a Blairite moderniser onto the shortlist in James Purnell’s old parliamentary seat, in defiance of Unite officials who had blocked the choice.

The Standard is reported to have telephoned Ms Moody this morning. She answered with her name at her desk in the political office, and when she was asked if the union paid her salary, she replied:

“Can I get back to you. This has come a bit out of the blue. I will come back to you.”

M/s Moody works at No 10 with Joe Irvine, the Prime Minister’s political secretary, who is a former Unite national official, whose salary is paid by the Labour Party.

Ray Collins, Labour’s general secretary, also used to work for the union and is described as “extremely friendly towards Unite”.

It also emerged today that a number of members of Unite, including leader Tony Woodley and Political Director Charlie Whelan, have been given security passes to the House of Commons.

The passes give the union barons a free run of the Commons estate, including access to bars and lobbies where they can approach MPs. They could also use Commons facilities like the library researchers if they were listed as a researcher to an MP.

Tory MP Ben Wallace said:

“Union bully boys like Charlie Whelan and Tony Woodley strut around Parliament like they own the place.

“As BA passengers struggle to make alternative holiday plans, the Labour Party engages in buying votes and twisting the truth with union money.”

Mr Woodley has a pass from Labour MP Rob Marris while Mr Whelan’s is sponsored by the Labour Party HQ.

Ms Moody also has a Commons pass, courtesy of Labour select committee chairman Terry Rooney. She is listed in the Commons records as an officer for Amicus, Unite’s predecessor union. She flew to America in 2008 on behalf of the union to study the presidential elections and learn lessons for Labour’s campaign for a fourth term. She has also stood for Parliament in 2005 in Salisbury.

A Downing Street spokesman would not confirm who paid her salary but said it did not come from public funds, and neither No 10 nor the Labour Party would confirm or deny that Ms Moody was unique in being paid by a trade union rather than a party.

Liberal Democrat MP for Leeds North West, Greg Mulholland this week signed a pledge to voters ahead of the forthcoming general election that he will vote against any increase in fees in the next parliament.

The National Union of Students (NUS) has launched the Vote for Students campaign to encourage candidates to pledge to protect student interests by opposing attempts to lift the cap on student top-up fees.
Details can be found on the NUS website http://www.voteforstudents.co.uk/

The Vote for Students funding pledge states:

“I pledge to vote against any increase in fees in the next parliament, and will put pressure on the Government to introduce a fairer alternative.” Greg Mulholland said:

“I am fully behind the NUS and their commitment to keep higher education affordable for all.

“In these times of economic uncertainty it is even more important that we recognise the importance of education and continued investment in the countries future.”

NUS President Wes Streeting said:

“The vast majority of the general public is against higher fees, and although this review has been set up to report after the general election, voters deserve to know where their MP stands on this highly emotive issue.

“I am delighted that Greg he is standing up for students and their families in Leeds North West by signing up to this pledge. He has demonstrated his determination to give every young person in Leeds North a fair chance to go to university.”

A recent YouGov poll commissioned by NUS revealed that 88% of the public does not think the review should even consider increasing fees, while a majority believes that it should look at alternatives. Last year, research by Opinionpanel showed that a political party’s position on tuition fees would affect how 79% of students would vote in a general election.

According to a Parliamentary report,Benefit claimants owe an £1.85 billion in overpaid money, but the Department for Work and Pensions is recovering less than £300 million a year.

The cross-party Commons Public Accounts Committee said the DWP needs to “significantly improve” the way it pays out benefits and should make greater efforts to recover any overpayments.

Among the 1.6 million people who have received overpayments are over 30,000 people who owe sums of more than £10,000 and over 100,000 people who have four or more different debts.

About 8,600 of these people owe sums in excess of £20,000 and their average debt of £30,581 will take more than 60 years to repay with the maximum £9.75 a week that can be taken from people still on benefits.

The report said the DWP has had some success in improving debt recovery procedures, and has increased the amount recovered from £180 million in 2005-06 to £281 million in 2008-09, but the total debt is still rising, and will has reached £1.85 billion by March 31, 2009, an increase of 11% over the previous two years, because the cost of overpayments were still greater than the amount recovered.

The committee warned the situation is likely to get worse as the recession makes people less able to repay money they owed.

Income Support claims were found to account for more than 70% of all debts, and £9.3 million of overpayments that were less than £65 were written off during 2007-08 because they were considered too small to justify the cost of recovering them.

Committee chairman Edward Leigh said:

“An immense amount of money, currently £1.85 billion, is owed to the Department for Work and Pensions by claimants who have been paid too much benefit.

“The size of the debt is increasing, moreover, as the amount of overpaid benefit being clawed back is outstripped by the amount referred for recovery action. The current economic malaise is only likely to make worse the rate at which debt can be recovered.

“If the department is to deal with this rising trend in benefit debt, then it has to improve the way it approaches the prevention of debt. It should also review its procedures for validating claims for Income Support, a benefit which is particularly susceptible to big overpayments.”

Shadow work and pensions secretary Theresa May said:

“Labour need to get a grip. It is unforgivable that while taxpayers are tightening their belts, the Government is racking up more debt through poor administration.”

The Pocket Guide to Policy summarises the party’s key policies at a page per portfolio, for use by the party’s campaigners and for anyone who is interested to know what we are proposing.

The document has no formal status, although the policies summarised within it have all been passed by local party representatives at party conference.

The Electoral Commission consulted four lawyers – two Queen’s Counsel and two junior counsel – at a total cost of £81,000 before it cleared Lord Ashcroft’s donations to the Conservative Party through Bearwood Corporate Services, according to a Parliamentary answer to the Liberal Democrats.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said:

“It is appalling that the Electoral Commission has had to go to four different lawyers, on top of its own legal team, at a total cost of £81,000 before they got the answer that they wanted, which was to give the all clear to Lord Ashcroft’s dodgy donations.
 
“The Electoral Commission should now publish all the legal advice so that others can make a judgement about whether to challenge this decision in the courts.
 
“This smacks of the sort of legal tourism we saw in the Government over the illegal war in Iraq and at Lehman’s before it collapsed, where some lawyers wouldn’t give the opinion they wanted so they moved on until they found one who would.”

“Labour promised mothers a choice over where to give birth at the last election but they simply haven’t delivered,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on Gordon Brown’s announcement that expectant mothers will be given new rights about where they give birth, Norman Lamb said:
 
“Gordon Brown is living in a fantasy land. Labour promised mothers a choice over where to give birth at the last election but they simply haven’t delivered.
 
“Mothers aren’t being given a choice because there simply aren’t enough midwives to handle the growing birth rate. Nothing that Labour is proposing will address that problem.
 
“Rather than reeling off even more undeliverable pledges, Labour should concentrate on delivering on the promises they’ve already made. Recruiting extra midwives so that everyone can have a safe birth should clearly be the number one priority.”

Jim Murphy and Alex Salmond have today welcomed the leasing of sites for marine renewable energy generation off Scotland, despite the fact that their respective governments’ flagship schemes have paid out nothing to fund marine energy technologies.

Liberal Democrat research has found that:

• Not one project has yet received funding from the UK Government’s £42m Marine Renewables Deployment Fund
• Not one project has yet received funding from the Scottish Government’s Saltire Prize, although over £77,000 has been spent on advertising it 

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Scotland Secretary, Alistair Carmichael said:

“Governments in London and Edinburgh have delivered little more than rhetoric on renewables so far.

“Today’s announcements are welcome, but this is the start of a process rather than the end.

“Both Labour and the SNP’s flagship marine energy funds have paid out nothing to technologies crying out for support.

“The politicians falling over themselves to welcome these announcements must now make sure they deliver on their earlier commitments to ensure we see real progress.”

“Both parties need to agree to a cross-party Commission designed to reach agreement within a year,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on today’s King’s Fund report on social care, Norman Lamb said:

“Today’s report supports the Liberal Democrat view that the fairest way to fund social care in the future is through a partnership between individuals and the state.

“While everyone agrees that the social care system is in urgent need of reform we have to be realistic about the state of the public finances. That’s why it’s so important that all the major parties sit down together and work this out.

“Older voters won’t be fooled by Labour and Tory attempts to win their votes with piecemeal policies. Both parties need to agree to a cross-party Commission designed to reach agreement within a year.”

The Liberal Democrats will today call for tougher immigration control in densely populated areas like London and the South East while allowing more migrants elsewhere.

In a keynote speech to Policy Exchange today, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne will say that an overall national limit of the sort proposed by the Tories would be too lax in London and the South East and too tough in Scotland.

Commenting, Chris Huhne said:

“Immigration is vital to our economy but lots of people are worried by the issue because of Labour’s catastrophic mismanagement of the system.

“If we are to make the case for a liberal immigration policy, we have to give the public confidence that the flow is properly managed and the pace of change is reasonable.

“The Liberal Democrats are the only party offering a hard-headed assessment of the needs of different regions and parts of the economy.

“We need a system that makes migrants go to those areas that most need them.

“The Tory policy of pulling up the drawbridge because we have reached an arbitrary national limit would bring in the worst of all worlds.

“Immigrants would continue to crowd into the most populous parts of the country – making the policy too lax for the South East of England and too tight for Scotland.”

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg today gave a speech to the IPPR on deficit reduction.

Something big is missing from the public debate about the deficit.
The public.
Politicians, economists and business leaders have been firing pot-shots at one another for well over 18 months on this issue.
But so far it has been a process largely confined to a political and economic bubble in Westminster, Whitehall and the City of London.
The debate has been cut off from the realities of people’s everyday lives.

We have had groups of economists trading letters in the newspapers about the best time to begin fiscal contraction.
We have had Alistair Darling and George Osborne, Gordon Brown and David Cameron using these disparate economic analyses to score points off one another in TV studios and the House of Commons.
We have had lists of demands from the CBI and the Institute of Directors.
We have had commentary from the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
Half of the debate has been political posturing, and the other half elevated economic theorising.

There is an enormous risk ahead.
In a democracy, dramatic change cannot be imposed from above or it will fail.
It has to be led by a process of political engagement.
You only have to look at the scale of industrial unrest in Greece to see that it is impossible to reduce a public deficit quickly if you do not find a way to persuade people to go along with the process.
And you only have to look at the success of the fiscal contraction in Canada, where a purposeful attempt was made to engage the public, to see that it is possible to rally support for deficit reduction, and it makes it easier to achieve the necessary cuts.

My point is simple:
If we do not find a way to take the people of Britain with us on this difficult journey of deficit reduction…
We will not be able to make the journey.
We will instead follow Greece down the road to economic, political and social disruption.

In my view, regardless of the outcome of the next election…
It is unrealistic to presume that this level of change can be driven through by the standard procedures of Westminster politics.
Our current government was elected with the support of just 22% of eligible voters.
How can a government elected without majority support ever command majority support for something as painful as deficit reduction on the scale required?

If a government tries to ram through major change to public spending solely through the usual Westminster combination of machismo and threats from the Whips, it will not only fail…
It could find itself torn to pieces.

The debate on public spending has been too narrowly focused on timing.
It has forgotten the biggest and most essential ingredient of all: how to win public support.

Economists and politicians alike need to remember what public spending is.
Yes: your approach to public spending says a lot about your political identity.
But no: that doesn’t mean the sole purpose of public spending is for ideological positioning.
Yes: the big numbers and the economic trends are important.
But no: that doesn’t mean public spending is just numbers on a balance sheet that can be increased or decreased at will to fit with an economic theory.

Public spending is not just numbers.
Public spending is nurses’ and doctors’ salaries.
It is text books and computers in the classroom.
It is police on the streets and judges in the court room.
It is the difference between decent tanks and soldiers dying from roadside bombs.
Public spending is the difference for millions of families between making ends meet and having to go without.
Reducing it is going to be extremely difficult.
And it will be painful.

The scale of the deficit we are dealing with at the moment is enormous.
£175bn this year.
12 and a half percent of GDP.
A deficit of which the Government thinks up to £80bn is structural, meaning it will not be eliminated by anticipated economic growth.
One of the worst myths being peddled by some within both Labour and Conservative parties at the moment is that the deficit can be eliminated simply through better management, efficiency drives and waste reduction.
As if we can reduce public spending by as £80bn or more a year without anyone noticing.
That is not true, and it is wrong to pretend otherwise.
Even efficiencies usually mean redundancies, and that means more people out of work.
The truth is that to eliminate the deficit, we are going to have to look in detail at everything the government does…
And some of them will simply have to stop.

This is an unprecedented challenge in the modern era.
We need to bring about the biggest fiscal contraction in post-war political history.
This will mean enormously tight spending rounds for many years to come.
Liberal Democrats will be setting out in advance of the election a full plan for £15bn a year of savings that can be delivered by 2012…
Assuming the economy is in a strong enough position by then to bear this level of fiscal restraint.
But we are the first to admit that our plan does not yet go far enough.
Even by end of the next Parliament, there will be another £10-15bn of savings to find over what we have announced and the Government has already found.
With another £40bn of savings in today’s prices that need to be identified by 2018.
And those figures, enormous though they are, are all built on the presumption of decent growth and that the government’s proposed 8-year timetable for deficit reduction remains appropriate.
Liberal Democrats believe we may need to revisit both the timetable and the level of savings required…
If borrowing conditions worsen dramatically, if growth does not match up to Treasury expectations or if the structural element of the deficit turns out to be larger than estimated.

Let’s be absolutely straightforward about this.
There is no serious doubt that at some point in the next eight years…
The government is going to have to stop spending as much as 10% of what it spends today.
This is not just a huge challenge for the mandarins and the politicians who will have to pore over the books of every department in search of cuts to make…
It is a huge challenge for every citizen of the United Kingdom…
All the millions of people who have to adjust to a new kind of environment for public spending.

We have to ease the pain.
We have to make sure people are bought into, not alienated by, the process of deficit reduction.
And ensure that cuts do not undermine fairness, but strengthen it.
I have identified three principles on which the process of deficit reduction should be based.
They are timing, consultation and fairness.
By sticking to these three principles, I believe we can buy people into the process of governmental change ahead.

First: timing.
This has, at least, been the subject of extensive debate, but good economics has been crowded out by political dogma.
My approach is simple:
We must get the timing right because if we cut public spending too quickly, we risk undermining a nascent recovery…
And undermining the growth in tax receipts that is so desperately needed.
It’s like cutting back a tree – do it at the wrong time of year, and you will kill the tree.
Do it at the right time, and you help it to grow strong.

That is why Vince Cable and I have set out five objective economic conditions that we will assess when judging when public spending should begin to be cut.
These are: the rate of growth; the level of unemployment; credit conditions; the extent of spare capacity in the economy and the cost of Government borrowing.
Our working assumption is that the conditions will be right for cuts from 2011-12, but not before.
So in our first year of office, we will recycle the money from any cuts we can identify…
Like taking the top 20% of claimants out of the tax credit system…
Into an economic stimulus and job creation package…
To help kick-start the economy on a greener footing.

This jobs plan will be fiscally neutral…
But it will get up to 100,000 people back into work.
Demonstrating a clear commitment from government to put jobs and growth first.
Ensuring there is a clear benefit to individuals from the initial cuts we make…
And helping win public support for change.

The second principle on which deficit reduction plans should be based is consultation.
It would be completely wrong for officials and ministers of whatever government is elected on May 6 to lock themselves in a room for a few months and announce a plan.
The outcome would be instant anger and alienation.
Imagine it:
Knowing nothing for week after week about whether your job was secure…
Your benefits were protected…
Or your school was safe…
Waiting for the announcements, unclear about the future and unable to influence the outcome.
And when the announcements came…
It would be like twenty Budget days come all at once.
Everyone desperately trying to work out from the small print how they will be affected.

You simply cannot cancel one in ten pounds of government spending without asking people – the people who run public services and the people who use them – how best to do it.
I believe Britain must learn from the approach taken by the Liberal government in Canada in the 1990s.
At that time, Canada had an annual budget deficit a tenth the size of its economy…
Almost as large as the UK’s is today.
Rather than making cuts behind closed doors, the Liberal Government realised that if people were to understand what needed to be done they had to talk to them.
They held a massive consultation.
About every last line of public spending.
Asking the people who really knew: what to cut and what to protect.
And they managed to eliminate that vast deficit in four years…
Taking the people with them.

Liberal Democrats will follow Canada’s lead.
After the election, we will hold an emergency budget and interim spending review which will put in place cuts which could be realised within the financial year, such as scrapping the Child Trust Fund or restricting tax credits, to release money for our job and infrastructure package.
Subject to our five economic tests being met, that interim spending review will also put into place the cuts for 2011-12 identified in our manifesto.
Then, throughout the summer and early autumn…
We will hold a comprehensive spending review of all departments…
Consulting for three or four months with people in every part of Britain…
In every industry…
Of every age.
Not just to win support…
But to seek ideas.

The people who use public services and the people who run them know far better than ministers and mandarins what is needed and what is not.
Last autumn I set up a website called Ask the People in the Know, where I sought ideas from public servants about how and where to cut.
We were flooded with hundreds of suggestions.
From wasteful procurement practices to unnecessary projects.
People out there in the country are full of ideas.
We just need to harness those ideas, using the innovative capacity of everyone in Britain to tackle this unprecedented national challenge.

The third essential principle is fairness.
It’s a fundamental British value.
It’s something everyone instinctively understands.
It must be right at the centre of our minds when we look for savings that can be made.
Not just because it is right in principle…
But also because it is the only way to maintain solidarity…
And ensure continued public support for deficit reduction.
No-one will support cuts to public spending that seem to have an unfair impact on the people most in need of help.

So we need to choose cuts that have a fair impact.
We need to keep the door open to limited new spending, where it is essential for fairness.
And we need to put fairness into our tax system, too.
So people do not feel they are being forced to pay through the nose for disappearing services.

Identifying cuts that have a fair impact is challenging.
But possible.
Our proposal for restraint in public sector pay, for example.
Instead of proposing a blanket freeze, like the Conservatives, or a 1% pay rise like Labour…
We propose a cash limit on pay rises of £400.
That will ensure the lower your salary, the higher percentage pay rise you are eligible for.
For an NHS manager on £90,000, £400 is a tiny increase.
But for a janitor on £12,000, it would be a substantial 3% pay rise.
This proposal is not only right in principle, because it means those with the broadest shoulders take the greatest strain…
It is also right for practical purposes because it is fair, and will therefore secure broader support for pay restraint that may have to last for several years.

In other areas, it is only possible to make cuts fair if you redirect some of the money into alternate spending.
Liberal Democrats will not, for these reasons, put every penny we can save into deficit reduction…
We will use one third of that money for alternate spending…
To really enshrine fairness in our society.
We propose a pupil premium, worth £2.5bn a year for our schools, targeted at helping children from the most deprived backgrounds, but making it possible for schools to cut class sizes and increase one-to-one tuition to the benefit of everyone.
We propose 3,000 more police on the beat
We propose a pay rise for our troops, especially those at the more junior ranks.

If all people hear is austerity and cuts…
They will lose hope.
If people see that there are choices being made…
That some cuts are being used to improve their lives or the lives of those in tremendous need…
They will be readier to support the process.
And rightly so.

Fairness must not just be constrained to what government spends money on, however.
We need to put fairness into our tax system, too, to win support.
That is where our fair tax package comes in.
Liberal Democrats propose the most radical reform of our tax system in a generation.
We will ensure no-one pays tax on the first £10,000 they earn, paid for by closing loopholes that unfairly benefit those at the top and increasing taxes on polluting aircraft.
That means complete freedom from income tax for 3.6m low earners and pensioners.
And £700 in the pockets of tens of millions more.

This is the right thing to do for the sake of fairness, correcting the imbalance that has long meant the poorest pay a higher proportion of their income in tax than the richest.
It is the right thing to do for economic recovery, too, as it will put money back in the pockets of millions of people who are currently struggling…
And the evidence suggests a high proportion of that money will be spent, circulating in the economy and driving consumer demand.
But our tax changes are also part of a grand bargain between a future government of whatever composition…
And the British people who want to see they are being looked after and supported even as the deficit is reduced and public spending falls.

Most people recognise that paying taxes is a social obligation, by which we contribute to shared services that we depend on as a community.
But how can anyone feel positive about paying taxes when they see the wealthiest people getting out of paying their dues?
And how much anger will it create if people feel they are paying too much tax at the same time as losing public services on which they depend?

Our tax package offers a way forward: the means by which public support for his long and difficult process can be won and maintained.
Tax cuts for millions will sweeten the very bitter pill of the largest fiscal contraction in modern history.
If we do not implement these changes…
It will be impossible to rally people behind public sector spending cuts…
And any serious attempt to cut the deficit will fail.

By making the tax system fair…
We can ensure people see the benefit of change…
We can ensure that cuts to public spending do not hurt individual families who cannot take the strain.
And we can ensure that the process of reducing the deficit carries public opinion instead of alienating already disenfranchised voters from the political process.

Reducing the deficit will be one of the biggest challenges for the next government, whatever its complexion.
With several public sector unions already campaigning against government proposals for spending restraint…
While business organisations campaign for tax cuts…
It is clear that the political challenge will be as large, if not larger, than the practical challenge.

Deficit reduction will take the best part of a decade.
It will take great courage and effort to maintain public support for restraint and austerity for such a long period of time.
One-off bribes such as those Labour is predicted to include in the budget will not sustain support over the long term.
But I believe if fairness is put first in identifying cuts…
If tax reform is brought forward to put money back the pockets of the millions of people who depend on public services…
If government makes the effort to ask the people who run public services and the people who use them for their ideas on how and what to cut…
And if growth is nurtured by maintaining public spending for one more year, while recovery is still fragile…
It will be possible.
We will be able to reduce the deficit…
Protect the nation’s financial position…
And build a stronger, fairer and more united Britain.

“On average, a £10,000 debt repaid at the minimum rate will still take more than 35 years to pay off,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Business Secretary.

Commenting on new rules on the cost of credit card borrowing announced by the Government today, John Thurso said:

“Credit card interest rates have been hiked to their highest levels since June 2006 despite the fact that interest rates have bottomed out at 0.5%. We need a maximum interest rate put in place to end this profiteering.

“It’s right that the most expensive debt should be paid off first but the Government’s lack of action on minimum repayments means that credit card debt will still take decades to repay.

“On average, a £10,000 debt repaid at the minimum rate will still take more than 35 years to pay off.

“Credit cards will remain a very expensive way to borrow. The Government must do more to provide financial advice to all consumers to allow them to make informed lending decisions.”

“Labour has failed when it comes to our children’s health,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on the Chief Medical Officer’s report released today which calls for fitness tests for children in secondary schools, Norman Lamb said:
 
“Sir Liam Donaldson is right to raise concerns about the state of our children’s health but routine ‘bleep tests’ won’t by themselves solve the obesity crisis facing the country.
 
“Labour has failed when it comes to our children’s health. Gordon Brown claimed three years ago that every child would get the chance to do five hours of sport each week but less than a third are doing it.
 
“It’s hardly surprising that physical activity has declined and obesity soared when ministers spend all their time obsessing about targets, process and surveys.

“Physical activity should be a central part of our children’s lives, not an optional extra. This means protecting playing fields, ensuring lottery money is spent on facilities and improving links between schools and community clubs so kids have somewhere to keep playing sport once they leave school.”

“This is a pretty desperate attempt from Ed Balls to re-package existing deprivation funding for schools,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Schools Secretary.

Commenting on the Government’s launch of a consultation on the future of schools funding, David Laws said:
 
“This is a pretty desperate attempt from Ed Balls to re-package existing deprivation funding for schools.
 
“What is missing is any suggestion of additional money.

“Since it would be politically impossible to cut the budgets of some schools to shift money to others, what Ed Balls is talking about is political posturing not serious policy.”

“If any Government tries to cut back too soon, it will aggravate unemployment, making the deficit worse and compounding the country’s problems,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor.

Responding to the Bank of England’s latest quarterly bulletin and its warnings of job market uncertainty, Vince Cable said:

“This is strong confirmation from the Bank of England that the British economy is still weak.

“Although unemployment is not as bad as it could have been given the extent of the economic collapse, there is still worrying uncertainty.

“The clear implication of the Bank’s analysis is that if any Government tries to cut back too soon, it will aggravate unemployment, making the deficit worse and compounding the country’s problems.

“Each party must set out a clear process of what and how it will cut to tackle the deficit, but when this starts must be guided by economics, not political dogma.”

The Government is now involved in a damaging row with the country’s biggest union after a cabinet minister launched an extraordinary attack against a planned strike by British Airways cabin crew.

Transport Secretary Lord Adonis said the planned seven days of industrial action could put the future of the airline at risk, calling the walkouts “totally unjustified.”

Unite hit back at the minister, saying he was “badly informed” about the long-running dispute, adding that he should be urging the airline to reinstate an offer it withdrew last week.

It is understood that the union has made representations to 10 Downing Street about the minister’s intervention, and it is now expected that the Prime Minister will directly intervene.

Lord Adonis appealed to Unite to return to the negotiating table in an attempt to avert the industrial action planned to begin with a three day strike from next Saturday, followed by a four day stoppage from the following weekend.

Lord Adonis told BBC1’s Andrew Marr show:

“The impact this will have will not only be deeply damaging on passengers, it will … threaten the very existence of British Airways.

“The stakes are incredibly high in this strike. I absolutely deplore the strike, it is not only the damage it is going to do passengers and the inconvenience it’s going to cause - which is quite disproportionate to the issues at stake - but also the threat it poses to the future of one of our great companies in this country.

“It’s totally unjustified, the strike, on the merits of the issues at stake. I do call on the union to engage constructively with the company at this late stage.”

A Unite spokesman said:

“Lord Adonis appears badly informed. We all want to avoid strike action and Unite is always ready to negotiate. Unite was preparing to put BA’s offer to our members. Had they accepted it, there would be no strikes.

Unite is a major Labour Party donor and critics have claimed the Government is unwilling to condemn the union’s actions.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Transport Secretary, Norman Baker said:

“BA and the Unite union are behaving like spoilt children in the playground and as usual it is innocent passengers who will suffer. They should call off their strike immediately and find some other way to make their point.

“The fact this strike is due to occur at roughly the same time as the Network Rail dispute looks suspiciously like co-ordinated union action. The unions are trying their best to wind the clock back to the 1970s and create a Spring of Discontent.

“The consequences for the Labour Party will be the same as they were in 1979.”

You can watch a video of Nick Clegg’s speach to the Liberal Democrats Spring Conference by clicking on the picture below

Liberal Democrat Work and Pensions Spokesman,Lord Oakeshott said that he was surprised that the CPS has decided that Baroness Uddin will not be charged over her expenses, but he added that it was now time for the Lords’ interests committee to deal with her.

He said:

“If the courts can’t deal with her the committee must,”

Lord Oakeshott said it “can’t be right” that she can claim a home as  her main home where she has reportedly never been seen by neighbours, and added that he was “very surprised” that the DPP had chosen not to proceed with charges.

“Vote for what you believe in… or you will wake up on May 7th facing another five years of more of the same,” said the Liberal Democrat Leader.

Shall I tell you the one phrase that bothers me more than any other? It’s this.
“That’s just the way things are”.
No. The way things are is not the way they have to be.
 
We do not have to live in a country where the poorest pay the biggest chunk of their income in tax. We do not have to live in a country where politics is the plaything of wealthy donors and corrupt MPs. We do not have to live in a country where the banks can profiteer at the expense of everybody else and our climate is in jeopardy. We do not have to live in a country where children’s chances are determined more by their parents’ background than by their own hopes and dreams.

There is a better way.
 
Imagine instead a primary school with classes of just 20 pupils. Imagine being able to take home the first £10,000 you earn completely free of income tax. Imagine a generation of young people finding work in thriving local manufacturing companies. Imagine being able to sack corrupt MPs, instead of just shouting at them on TV. Imagine knowing your vote counts. Imagine it.

These are not dreams. They are ambitions. Our ambitions. And they are ambitions which can come true if we do things differently.
 
But we will never do things differently as long as the job of governing this country remains a game of pass-the-parcel between the two old parties. For 65 years now we have had Labour and Conservative governments. First the blue team. Then the red. Then blue, then red, and yet nothing really changes. The same old promises, always broken.

No wonder people feel let down. No wonder people feel they shouldn’t expect too much. The old parties have drained our ambition to do things differently. They seem to say: we’ve been in charge for decades – don’t now start hoping for more. That’s just the way things are. No.
 
This year’s election is a huge opportunity. Everybody knows, in their heart of hearts, that we need real change. Everybody knows that the way we got here is not the way out.
 
The time to believe in our ambitions starts today. The time to do something different in politics. The time to fight for a fairer Britain. The time to bring real change. It starts today. Change that works for you.

Something really important has been happening in our politics for years. Something big – but gradual – so you wouldn’t notice it from day to day. There is a vast and growing army of people who look at the two old parties and say “no thanks.” People who, like me, like you, want something different.

In 1951, only 2% of voters chose someone other than Labour or the Conservatives. At the last general election, it was 32%.
 
Now, a gimmick here, or a lucky break there may boost Labour or Conservative poll ratings for a few weeks or months, but it cannot, and will not reverse the trend. Who seriously believes that the British people, offered so much choice in every aspect of our daily lives, will ever again settle for a two-party system? If you have two parties, you only ever have two ideas. Actually that’s on a good day. Most of the time they can’t even rustle up a single good idea between them.
 
Labour: the party of the many. The many disasters. You know their new slogan: a future fair for all.
If that sounds familiar, that’s because they’ve used it before. Seven years ago. Well based on what’s happened since then: it isn’t a slogan – it’s a warning. It’s like advertising a second trip on the Titanic. Gordon Brown’s unsinkable economy. Actually, there is one thing I have to give Gordon Brown credit for: He handled Piers Morgan a lot better than I did.
 
As for the Conservatives: the world’s first offshore political party. It used to be a British party. Now it’s a wholly-owned subsidiary of Lord Ashcroft, a man who collects tax havens the way some people collect beer mats. How can David Cameron claim to clean up politics, when he can’t even clean up his own party chairman? The label still says Made in Britain, but the money says Made in Belize.
 
With these two old parties, it is a dismal choice between the party of the few and the party of no-one. A choice between the wrong direction and backwards. They haven’t noticed people are tired of being told there are only two answers to every question. They haven’t noticed people are ready for something new. Ready for something different. And ready to make it happen.

We have had a great weekend. Coming together, here in Birmingham. To vote through the four big promises that will be the heart of our manifesto. Fair taxes that put money back in your pocket. A fair start at school for every child. A fair economy: protecting and creating jobs by reforming the banks and investing in a green future. And a fair deal for you from politicians, cleaning up and clearing out the rotten old system.
 
We have been rigorous in focusing ourselves on these four pledges. We understand that the days of shopping list manifestos are over. The economic and financial circumstances mean we must choose. To focus on what is essential, and not promise more than we can afford. The party which will win the argument during this General Election will be the party which strikes the right balance between generosity and restraint, hope and realism, spending and saving.
 
That is why I make no apology in stating bluntly that we will never take risks with the public finances. Whether we like it or not, we will have to fix the mess Gordon Brown has made. Without sanity in spending, we won’t be able to protect our public services. We won’t be able to give our brave troops the equipment and support they so desperately need in Afghanistan. We won’t be able to provide the fairness we want for all. The question facing us is not whether to cut the deficit. It is how and when.
 
Everyone who’s ever cut back a tree knows there are many ways to do it. You can cut back badly and kill the tree. Or you can do it in a way that helps the tree to flourish in the future. Encouraging growth in a new direction. So as we reduce the deficit. We must cut in a way that does not make the country less fair.  Or less green. That does not jeopardise front line services in the NHS and schools we all depend on. And does not choke off recovery.
 
Labour is in denial about the need for cuts. This week Alistair Darling and Gordon Brown confirmed the pre election budget won’t include any more details on how to bring the deficit under control.
No courage. No honesty.
Just a miserable attempt to save their own skins.
 
Meanwhile the Conservatives have started to make threats. David Cameron, George Osborne and Ken Clarke marched into the City of London the other day and declared that if voters didn’t give them the result they want, the markets would tear the house down.
Cynical. Desperate.

The Tories think they’re entitled to victory – the moment they feel it slipping from their grasp, they start lashing out. It’s a political version of a protection racket: do what we want, or else.
 
Liberal Democrats are, I believe, the guarantor of good sense. After all, we are the party of Vince Cable. We are the guarantor – whatever the outcome of the election – that no risks will be taken with Britain’s financial position. Liberal Democrats have gone further than any political party in identifying cuts – we will be setting out a programme of savings of £15bn a year by 2012. From ending government contributions to Child Trust Funds to removing the top 20% of claimants from the tax credit system. From cancelling the ID card programme to abolishing the Government Offices for the Regions. We have put together, line by line, the most substantial and deliverable programme of deficit reduction in British politics. And we have taken the bold step of cutting back, dramatically, our proposals for new spending.

Postponing ideas that have long been close to our hearts but which are not immediately affordable. So we can put two thirds of the money we save straight into reducing the deficit.
 
It is the first time in our history that Liberal Democrats have ever set out a plan for net reductions in government spending. But I am the first to admit that it does not go far enough. There will be more to do, and we will have to find these savings together, as a nation. Our plan is a down payment – a declaration of intent. Your guarantee that Liberal Democrats are putting Britain’s financial future at the heart of our plans for government.

People often ask me what the Liberal Democrats will do after the General Election. I’m flattered that people think I can predict the future. The newspapers certainly think they can. Some days I read we’re planning a deal with Labour. Some days that we’re planning a deal with the Conservatives. Other days that we’ll refuse to talk to anyone at all. Yet, when all the speculation is said and done, I keep coming back to some simple truths:
I am not the kingmaker.
The 45 million voters of Britain are the kingmakers.
They give the politicians their marching orders, not the other way round.
It’s called democracy – and I kind of like it.
 
Almost 1 in 4 voters chose the Liberal Democrats at the last election. If that increased to 1 in 3, we could lead the next government. This election is a time for voters to choose, not a time for politicians to play footsie with each other. The party which gets the strongest mandate from the voters will have the moral authority to be the first to seek to govern. And voters are entitled to know what Liberal Democrats will do – in whatever situation we find ourselves in.

This weekend we’ve given the answer:
We will give you fairer taxes. We will make sure your child gets the fair start in life they deserve.
We will create a new, fair economy where we are no longer held hostage by the greed of bankers in the City of London. And we will give you a fair, open and transparent politics after the gross betrayal of the expenses scandal. It really is as simple as that. No-one can guarantee what the election result will be. But I can guarantee what we will always fight to deliver.
 
And if you like what we say. If you share our values. If you want fair taxes, a fair start in life for your child, a fairer economy, and a new, fair politics. Vote for it.

Tax

One of the biggest changes we offer is to your tax bill. My philosophy on tax is simple. A fair tax system is one that rewards hard work, enterprise and initiative. It penalises pollution and other threats to the common good. It bears down on unearned wealth. That is what we will deliver.
 
Under the Liberal Democrats, no-one will pay tax on the first £10,000 they earn. Let me repeat that: Because this is one of the most substantial changes to tax that a party has ever offered at a General Election. Under the Liberal Democrats, no-one will pay tax on the first £10,000 they earn.
 
We’re not talking about tinkering or tweaking. We’re talking about fundamental, substantial and irreversible reform. Under the Liberal Democrats, no-one will pay tax on the first £10,000 they earn.
 
3.6 million people will be freed from paying tax altogether. Tens of millions more on low and middle incomes will get a tax cut of £700 back in their pockets. A real change to deliver lasting tax fairness for everyone.
 
The Conservatives may want tax cuts for millionaires. We will deliver tax cuts for millions.
 
But it has to be paid for. No-one is going to fall for a false promise of a giveaway. So we will make five simple, but substantial changes to pay for this tax cut. One: Equalising pensions tax relief so top earners no longer get more than everyone else. Two: Equalising Capital Gains Tax with Income Tax so people who make their money trading shares and properties pay the same rates as everyone else. Three: An increase in aviation taxes. Four: A crack down on tax avoidance. And finally – a new mansion tax on properties worth over £2m. This is one tax even oligarchs and billionaires will not be able to avoid. You can’t put a mansion in a briefcase and take it to Belize.
 
Just imagine the difference this change would make. You know anyone working full time on the minimum wage pays more than a £1000 in income tax every year? Under the Liberal Democrats, their tax bill will plummet to less than £6 a week. They’ll be £700 better off. £700 to pay for children’s school clothes, to fix the car, to pay the heating bill.

That is change that works for you.
 
Children

Liberal Democrats will give every child the fair start they deserve. By reducing class sizes and increasing one to one tuition in our schools. Children have to be nurtured and cherished, right from the start.
 
Miriam and I know this as parents of three lovely little boys. We see for ourselves that what happens to our 8 and 5 year old boys in the classroom has a dramatic effect on their enthusiasm to learn and their self confidence which will shape them for the rest of their lives.
 
Mind you, I think both Miriam and I were a little surprised when our eight year old son declared the other day that he had a plan for winning the election. He’d been counting up his pocket money, and suggested we could pay everybody off to vote for us. It’s not so much the suggestion I mind, it more that he’s clearly giving his best ideas to Lord Ashcroft first.
 
But as much as children depend on us today. We are going to depend on them for far longer. Think about a child in your local primary school, doing experiments with egg cartons and elastic bands. That child could be the inventor of a cure for cancer which saves your life thirty years from now.
 
We don’t know what the future holds. We don’t know what our children will achieve. All we know is that our country is still not a place truly fit for them to grow up in.
 
Labour’s target for school achievement is to ensure that at least three out of every 10 children in a school get five good GCSEs. Three out of every 10. Imagine being in a class where just passing means you are the exception. We are teaching our children to drop their expectations. Telling them to aim low.

It has to change.
 
Liberal Democrats are the only party promising new investment in our schools. We’ll be putting more money, £2.5 billion every year, into schools to pay for more teachers, better discipline and catch-up classes. An average primary school could cut class sizes to just 20, ensuring children starting out at school have the personal, nurturing relationship with their teacher they need. An average secondary school could put the money into catch-up classes for 160 pupils. Making sure no child is ever left behind.

That is change that works for you.
 
Economy

The recession has hurt millions of families. But the problems run deeper than just the immediate crisis. For too long, a succession of Conservative and Labour Governments have been obsessed about looking after just one square mile – the City of London. It’s time to invest in the other 100,000 square miles of Britain. Creating jobs and growth that lasts for every town, city and village of this country.
 
After the economic crisis that rocked the world. We must not rebuild the fortresses of old. We must use this as an opportunity to build something new. Not least to ensure we can pass on to our children a planet worth living on. We now know that the next few years are probably our last chance to avert unstoppable climate change. This is not a problem, it is an emergency. It must guide everything we do as we rebalance our economy.
 
Growth that lasts does not threaten our children’s future. It recognises that our planet is a gift that must be cherished. That tomorrow is our responsibility as much as today.
 
And growth that lasts does not leave an underclass behind. It brings everyone along, sharing prosperity – because the more people are included. the more people are enabled to seize opportunities, the more prosperity there is for all.
 
But we cannot have a new kind of growth with the old kind of banks. It is time to break them up.
Bring back competition. Bring back diversity. Bring back building societies.
 
And until we do it we should insist that banks pay a premium on their profits to the taxpayers who have bailed them out. We will separate low risk utility banking from high risk investment finance once and for all. So banks never again take insane risks which jeopardise your everyday savings.
 
Some people say it is impossible to split the banks like this. They’re usually – you guessed it – the bankers themselves. The governor of the Bank of England says it is not only possible but essential to break up the banks. He’s right. They’re wrong. Only the Liberal Democrats say: The banking industry, no industry, must ever again occupy such a privileged position that it can hold a gun to the head of rest of the economy. Never again.
 
But reforming the banks should not be an act of retribution. It is about getting money flowing to the thousands of businesses starved of credit today. Without support from banks, companies go bust, and the jobless remain without hope.
 
I was staggered when I heard that RBS, a bank we own, was lending millions of pounds to help Kraft buy Cadbury. A great Birmingham company. RBS was funding this deal which everybody knew would cost jobs in Britain. While small business customers of this very bank were being turned down for loans or charged extortionate rates. This was a scandal. And Labour let it happen. When we bailed out the banks: Did you ever imagine your money would be used to put British people out of work? Only Liberal Democrats say: never again.
 
Once the banks are lending again. We can turn our attention not just to protecting jobs, but to creating new ones. In our first year in office, we will use the money from that banking levy. And the money from reforming tax credits. To create as many as 100,000 jobs in green industries. Kick-starting the economy on a new, sustainable footing.
 
I was standing in a shipyard on the Tyne just a few weeks ago. It was deserted. And I thought back to the days gone by when it would have been humming with activity. It’s heartbreaking to think of that decline. And the devastating impact it had on whole communities.
 
But it is inspiring to imagine these old shipyards. Once the pride of Britain. Coming back to life as a hub for building the vast new turbines needed for offshore wind and tidal energy. Helping to power Britain and Europe with clean, safe energy for all.
 
Britain used to lead the world. We built ships. We designed railways. We laid the first telegraph cables across the oceans. This is the nation of Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the telephone. Of Isaac Newton, who made modern science possible. Of Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the greatest civil engineer in history.
 
We have to harness that inventive spirit once again. We have been blinded for too long by the glitz of the financial services sector. Blinded to the real, solid virtue of making things. It has to change. Under the Liberal Democrats, it will change. No longer just betting on things. We will start Britain building things again. That is change that works for you.
 
Politics

But there’s something standing in the way of change. Our political system. All the pomp and ceremony of our Parliament. All the adorably daft rituals. Have been camouflage for corruption.
 
It is just plain wrong that a government elected by the votes of just 22% of people can rule however it likes. It is just plain wrong that a government can commit us to an illegal war against the will of the people. It is just plain wrong that some MPs were so out of touch with the basic principles of right and wrong that they thought it was ok to do up house after house at taxpayers’ expense, flip them and flog them off for a profit.
 
People say all politicians are the same. They are not.

Of course, Liberal Democrats are not perfect. But no Liberal Democrat MP “flipped” their home in this way. None of our outer London MPs even claimed a second home allowance. And it was Liberal Democrats who fought against Tory and Labour attempts to keep the whole scandal hidden in the first place. So don’t let them tell you we are all the same because it isn’t true.
 
Liberal Democrats are the only party that understands expenses were just the tip of the iceberg. Our whole political system is a mess. David Cameron and Gordon Brown talk about political reform. But they won’t even contemplate the really radical changes we need.
 
Only Liberal Democrats will get big money and corrupt donors out of politics altogether. Change the voting system to abolish safe seats and make every vote count. Reduce the number of MPs by 150.
Reverse the tide of decades of centralisation. Devolve power over the police and NHS to local communities. Pass a freedom bill to protect our hard-won rights and liberties from the whims of government ministers. And give constituents the right to sack corrupt MPs.

That is change that works for you.
 
Conclusion

Four steps to a fairer Britain:
Fair taxes.
A new, fair start for all children at school.
A rebalanced, fair and green economy.
And clean, open, fair politics.
 
For Gordon Brown, change is what you promise when you want everything to stay the same. For David Cameron, change stops on May 7th. It’s change for him, not change for you. We are different.
 
I want to warn you about something that is coming in the next few weeks. We are going to hear a nonsensical claim from the two old parties. Designed to scare people into voting against their best interests. The Conservatives will say: vote Lib Dem… get Brown. Labour will say: vote Lib Dem… get Cameron.

Don’t believe it for a second. They are wrong.
Vote Lib Dem… get change.
Vote Lib Dem… get fairness.
A vote for the Liberal Democrats is not a vote for anyone else.
It is your guarantee of real change that works for you.
 
A vote for the Liberal Democrats is a commitment to hope and opportunity.
It’s a vote that says:
I want government to be honest and open.
I want a green economy.
I want fairer taxes.
I want a fairer future for my children and for all our children.
 
I know there are many people who listen to the Liberal Democrats and really like what they hear.
But you worry that your vote would be wasted. You worry that your choice won’t make enough of a difference. So you are thinking of giving your vote to someone else. Some people are thinking of holding their noses and voting for Brown just to keep out the Conservatives. I say to you: don’t do it.

Some people are thinking of holding their noses and voting for Cameron just to get rid of Labour. Don’t do it. You have a once in a generation opportunity for real change.
A wasted vote is one that throws that opportunity away.
A wasted vote is one for a party that is stuck in the past.
A wasted vote is one for a party you don’t believe in.
 
How do you want to feel when you wake up on May 7th and hear the news? Would you smile at the prospect of five more years of Gordon Brown? Would you be thrilled if a Conservative government was now in charge?

If the answer is no, then don’t give them your vote. If you vote for less… you will get less. If you compromise on them… they will compromise on you. Just good enough – is not good enough any more.
 
When you think about who to vote for remember that the future of your country is at stake. Whatever you do… do not settle for the way things are.

Be demanding.
Vote for what you believe in.
Vote with your heart.
 
If you once voted Labour but have lost hope. If you once voted Conservative but don’t know what they stand for any longer. If you have given up voting altogether because nothing ever seems to change. Vote for something different this time.
 
Vote Lib Dem: get fairness.
Vote Lib Dem: get change.
Vote for what you believe in… or you will wake up on May 7th facing another five years of more of the same.
This is your chance.
This is your opportunity – for the sake of our future, do not waste it.
 
Choose the Liberal Democrats.

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference today backed plans to rebalance the economy and create thousands of new green jobs.

The plans will play a vital part in a fair recovery that locks in investment and ensures a path of low-carbon growth.

The plans for a green economic stimulus package are a core part of the Liberal Democrat election manifesto and include:

•  Immediate investment to expand our green energy infrastructure
•  Bringing hundreds of thousands of empty homes back into use
• Insulating schools and other public buildings
• An ‘eco-cashback’ scheme to reward people who make energy efficiency improvements in their homes
• A National Infrastructure Bank to promote long-term investment in sustainable public transport and renewable energy

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary Simon Hughes said:

“The Liberal Democrats have set out a blueprint for a fair economy that’s fit to last.

“A green stimulus package will help boost investment in clean energy, reduce fuel bills and create thousands of new jobs.

“Labour and the Tories can’t be trusted to deliver the green growth we need.

“Only the Liberal Democrats have bold and credible plans to rebalance the economy and put Britain at the forefront of this vital transition.”

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference today passed plans to clean up politics and urgently create a fairer and more local political system.

The proposals include:
 
 - A fairer voting system
 
 - A requirement for those who stand for Parliament or sit in the House of Lords to pay tax in Britain
 
 - A fully elected second chamber
 
 - The right for voters to sack their MP
 
 Commenting, Liberal Democrat Manifesto Chair, Danny Alexander said:
 
“Our broken political system desperately needs to be cleaned up.  Public confidence in politics is at an all time low, and the way the country is governed needs urgent reform.  
 
“The Liberal Democrats have passed plans today to make politics fairer, local and more transparent.  
 
“Labour has had 13 years to change our broken politics, and it’s failed to do so.
 
“Only the Liberal Democrats would end safe seats, reform the voting system and give local people a real say over how their neighbourhoods are governed.”
 

David Cameron had failed a key test of character and leadership by failing to confront Lord Ashcroft over his broken promises said the Liberal Democrat shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne.

The full text of the speech is below:

Conference, I have been in our party for 29 years – almost a generation – and I am just as angry at our unfair voting system today as I was when I joined. 

The first general election I fought was in 1983  - I lost three times before I started winning – when we won almost as many votes as Labour but just a tenth the seats.
 
That election night, I knew this is not right.
 
It is not fair.
 
It is no way to run a democracy.
 
Since then, the system has got even worse. 
 
This Labour government has won more than half the MPs with just a third of those who voted, and a fifth of those entitled to vote.
 
No majority government has ever been elected with less support.
 
We have a parliament that reflects our nation as badly as a distorting fairground mirror, a muddle of bulges.
 
This voting system means that we can predict now about half of the MPs in the next parliament.
 
The seats are so safe that the only real contest is for the party ticket.
In safe seats, the general election is just a charade.
 
And we know about human nature.
 
Give someone a job for life, and they will take advantage.
 
Dip their fingers in the till.
 
Clean a moat.
 
Buy a duck house.
 
Claim for a non-existent mortgage.
 
MPs in safe seats were three times as likely to have fiddled their expenses as MPs in battleground seats.
 
Remember not a single Liberal Democrat MP flipped their home.
 
Not a single Lib Dem MP avoided capital gains tax.
 
Not a single Lib Dem MP in London claimed a second home allowance at all.
 
I don’t say we got everything right, but our respect for public money is bred by winning our seats vote by hard-won vote.
 
It’s why we have not been involved in the worst expenses abuses.
 
It is why Liberal Democrat MPs claim lower personal expenses than Labour or Tory MPs.
 
It is also why the same discipline should apply to every MP.
 
Let’s abolish safe seats.
 
Labour has taken a teeny step in the right direction by arguing for one-two-three voting.
 
Talk about deathbed conversions.
 
Thirteen years doing nothing, and it takes the spectre of defeat to spur them to do anything.
 
But so little, so late.
 
True, preference votes remove the need for tactical voting.
 
They let people vote honestly for who they want, without fearing that they will let in who they hate.
 
But they still leave us with far too many safe seats, and the political parties will still decide who stands and wins in Toffshire South or Labour rotten borough North.
 
Instead, our Liberal Democrat system will give every voter the choice of two or more candidates for each party in a three to five MP constituency.
 
Of course, you could still vote to change the party in power.
 
But you could also keep the same party, but vote for another MP.
 
Voters will have the power to vote for the person as well as the party.
 
In Ireland, the professional politicians hate this system.
 
Why?
 
Because a third of those who lose their seats lose to members of their own party, not the opposition.
 
For the first time, every MP will have a strong incentive to answer the letters of their constituents, take up cases, champion local interests and causes.
That’s the real local link.
 
Nor does a representative parliament mean weak government.
 
Greece is the country in most financial trouble, and yet it always has single party government.
 
Britain is next in line, and so have we since 1945.
 
So which part of strong government do David Cameron and Gordon Brown most like?
 
The boom and the bust?
 
The legislative diarrhoea?
 
Or the illegal war in Iraq?
 
Take crime.
 
It is not a sign of strength that the Government has created 4300 new criminal offences since 1997.
 
We do not need these useless laws.
 
Some 60 criminal justice bills.
 
Nine immigration bills.
 
This is the political equivalent of attention-deficit disorder.
 
We need less law and better law.
Law that is properly scrutinised, settled and long lasting.
 
We need a simple penal code that magistrates, police officers and offenders can understand.
 
And we need a focus on what works to cut crime.
 
Liberal Democrats will take no lessons from the Tories or Labour on crime.
 
In Lib Dem council areas, preventive measures have pushed crime down further and faster than anywhere else.
 
In Tory areas, crime is down since the peak by 16 per cent.
 
In Lib Dem areas, it is down 20 per cent.
 
Imagine what more we could do in Government.
 
Labour and the Tories love to posture about tough penalties.
 
But penalties cannot make a blind bit of difference when only one in a hundred crimes ends in a court conviction.
 
The real deterrent is the fear of getting caught, and that means more police on the beat.
 
We are the only party committed to raising police numbers.
 
That means better policing by raising standards.
 
It means prison that reforms offenders, and does not enroll them in a college course in crime.
 
**
 
Whether on crime, or taxes, or the economy, fair politics must surely mean a battle of ideas, not bank balances.
 
As Nick has pointed out, the Ashcroft scandal shows why we must clean up party funding.
 
A billionaire baron from Belize has bought the Tory party like a banana republic, and it stinks.
 
Ashcroft made solemn and binding undertakings to become a permanent resident, and then broke them.
 
He does not pay full British taxes, but he thinks that he should pass laws for those of us that do.
 
Ashcroft wants to run the club, but not pay the sub.
 
This scandal tells us a lot about David Cameron.
 
He would not stand up to Ashcroft.
 
We named and shamed Ashcroft as a non-dom at prime minister’s questions, but even then Cameron failed to ask his over-mighty baron whether he was keeping his promises.
 
If that is the smack of strong management, heaven help the country if Cameron wins.
 
If he can’t clean up his own party, he is not fit for number 10.
 
We have heard a lot about bullying recently.
 
Real bullies sack the weak and suck up to the strong.
 
This was Cameron’s big test of character and leadership, and he failed.
 
He’s rattled.
 
He’s rumbled.
 
And he’s humbled.
 
And fair politics means local politics too.
 
Less power for the centre.
 
More power for Edinburgh and Cardiff.
 
More tax power for communities across England.
 
The business rate back to councils as a first step.
 
Elected health boards.
 
Elected police authorities with real powers to set the precept, and sack the Chief Constable.
 
Only local power can unleash the creativity that we need in tough times.
 
There are two parties in this election
arguing about changing faces and changing places, not changing Britain.
 
What matters is not playing ministerial musical chairs, but transforming the whole way we do politics.
 
By making every vote count, wherever you live, we will give every person in our nation a voice in its destiny.
 
Everyone, however rich or poor, low or high, will have their proper say.
 
You cannot build a fair society on an unfair voting system.
 
In this election, we have the chance of a generation to remake our politics and our society.
 
Don’t miss it.
 
Don’t mess up.
 
Don’t wake up on 7th May saying
“I wish I’d done more”.
 
Wake up saying
“Thank God I did enough.
We’ve won the power to build a fairer Britain.”

Liberal Democrat MEP for Yorkshire & the Humber, Diana Wallis since 1999, has welcomed the news that her parliamentary colleague and ex-Conservative MEP, Edward McMillan-Scott, has joined the Liberal Democrats following his expulsion from the Conservative Party over his opposition to the Conservative position over Europe.

Diana Wallis said:

“I have known Edward for many years and I am delighted he has agreed to join the Liberal Democrats

“Edward has proved himself to be a pro-European and a strong advocate of human rights across the world.

 Liberal Democrats is now the only party in the region to have two MEPs and it means that the two British Vice Presidents of the parliament are both Liberal Democrats and are both from Yorkshire & the Humber. It reinforces just how much more influence the Liberal Democrats

Liberal Democrat PPC for Great Grimsby, Andrew De Freitas also welcomed the news:

“ We already have the hard working Diana Wallis and with Edward McMillan-Scott, who is a very compassionate and sensible Conservative, this area will only benefit.

“It was a big problem when the Tories broke away from the mainstream grouping and aligned themselves with the right-wing parties. It leaves them as a small group now and if we get a Conservative government after the general election, it will leave them with little impact in Europe.”

This article was written by Vince Cable and appeared in today’s Mail on Sunday:

Does trade matter? Should we be bothered if Britain has a whopping deficit in manufacturing trade?

Well, yes, we should. A problem which haunted a generation of political leaders and chancellors is returning in a new form.

For a long time the country’s balance of payments disappeared as an issue: something that belonged to the era of steam trains, black and white TVs, The Beatles and Harold Wilson’s pipe.

Manufacturing: Britain needs to engender respect for people who make and build things

Except for a few, unhappy years in the European Exchange Rate Mechanism – remember Black Wednesday? – our sterling exchange rate has floated against other countries’ and, as a consequence, the balance of payments has, sort of, balanced itself.

If the trade deficit or the overall payments deficit got too big the pound could fall to help exporters and vice versa. A good theory. One less headache for Chancellors.

But there is a problem.

When I spoke at a conference of British manufacturers last week someone showed me a chart that described how, after being broadly balanced for half a century, in the decade after 1997 Britain’s balance of trade plunged to £60billion – five per cent of our economy.

This was the boom time on our Fantasy Island when imported goods were consumed on credit and exports suffered. Another £20billion or so went on travel.

Much of this deficit was paid for by financial services: banks and the rest of the City. But, as we have painfully discovered, banking is not some London-based El Dorado, pouring out everlasting riches for the economy to consume, but a highly precarious, risky industry that ultimately collapsed in a heap, and which we rescued.

The economist part of my brain says this problem will sort itself out because the pound will fall to make British manufacturing more competitive. 

The pound has indeed fallen – by 28 per cent against other currencies since before the credit crunch. Unfortunately the latest trade data tells the opposite story: exports in January fell (the worst monthly fall for eight years) and the deficit deteriorated.

One explanation for the January disappointment is that the developed world markets to which we export are also growing very weakly or not at all.

For all the talk about the new ‘gold rush’ to Asia and other emerging markets, trade with Ireland is larger than with China, India and Brazil combined.

The euro area generally is struggling, the US is also faltering badly. World trade fell by 12 per cent last year.

Crisis: Financial services cannot pour everlasting riches into the economy

So we have countries (like ours) trying to boost their economies through ‘export-led growth’ – but there aren’t buyers at the moment.

However, there are causes for hope and celebration – impressive British manufacturers who have survived and who are battling on.

A couple of weeks ago I visited Cosworth in Northampton. This company makes the engines for four of this year’s F1 teams and has branched out into various specialised areas of engineering where it is as good as anyone in the world.

On top of this, the firm is producing apprentices.

Last week I had lunch with an entrepreneur from Leicester who makes bushes for large electric insulators exported around the world, including to China.

A firm in my constituency also sells much of its production – a key component of wind turbines – to China.

In Luton, I met an impressive businessman who set up a company turning plastic waste into a substitute for plywood – a new British technology.

His customers want far more than he can produce.

These manufacturers have several things in common: advanced technology; high-quality specialist products; totally committed British managers and owners; and loyal, highly skilled workers.

There are many success stories – in biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, information technology, TV, music and computer games, as well as specialised manufacturers. But there aren’t nearly enough of them.

To turn Britain back into a successful manufacturing country, part of what is needed is a cultural change: a respect for people who make things and for businessmen and women who invest their money in genuinely wealth-creating industries.

The Government should not be involved in picking winners. There was too much of that in the past and a lot of money was wasted. What the Government can and should concentrate on is ensuring that young people are educated to a standard where they are trainable and employable.

It can and should encourage teenagers to see the value of vocational training in technical colleges as an alternative to university, which for many is becoming an expensive route to unemployment.

And it is the Government’s job to ensure that there is a functioning infrastructure – transport, ports, energy, digital – which is why I believe we need an infrastructure bank.

Unless these things are done, creating a platform for a manufacturing revival, there will be no base for Britain to pay its way in the world and those old worries about the balance of trade, and payments, will reappear – with a vengeance.

Vince Cable is the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman

Shortly after Vince Cable’s Conference Speech to the Liberal Democrat Spring Confernce, I received the following email from the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor.

In his email, Vince Cable outlines how the Liberal Democrats would make Britain a fairer and more sustainable society; they would invest in green jobs, change our unfair tax system, and improve the living standards of pensioners.

However, the Liberal Democrats would make some immediate and necessary savings, such as cancellation of Trident which is longer needed. Please take time to read the email from Vince Cable:

Dear Les,

I have a very simple message for you. We the Liberal Democrats were right about the financial crisis. We warned of the dangers and led the debate when the crisis came. And now we have a clear vision for the future of the British economy.

Now the public wants to know who can guide the country out of the present crisis. Who’s going to deal with the broken, discredited banking system. Who’s going to lead Britain out of the longest recession since the War. And who will deal with the unsustainable level of Government borrowing.

Today in my speech to Liberal Democrat Party Conference I set out the Liberal Democrat answers to these questions. You can read it here.

The challenges are enormous. We have to be frank with people about the difficulties ahead. We have to be fiscally responsible. But the Tories and their cronies want to create a financial panic to frighten people into voting for them on May 6th.

Only the Liberal Democrats have identified £15bn of savings to make from bloated bureaucracy and unaffordable commitments. We will identify our priorities and debate them publicly. That’s open, democratic and Liberal.

Only the Liberal Democrats will invest in jobs with a Green New Deal.

Only the Liberal Democrats will change our unfair tax system so that 3.6 million people will no longer pay any income tax at all. Pensioners will be £100 better off and the average person’s income tax bill will be cut by £700.

People are desperate to see the back of this Labour Government. But they don’t want the same old Tories. And make no mistake, the Tories are exactly the same.

Thank you for what you are doing in the Liberal Democrat campaign to change Britain for real.

Best wishes,

Vince Cable MP
Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor

PS. You can read my full speech here. And if you want to get more involved in our campaign, please do make a donation, or get in touch with your local party to offer your help.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Housing Minister, Sarah Teather has today give a speech to Spring Conference setting out the party’s plans to bring hundreds of thousands of empty homes back into use.

The full text of the speech is below:

Conference, I blame the Labour party for disengagement with politics. 

Sure, expenses has been a total disaster, and has made people angry.

But actually, I don’t think that is where the rot set in.

It set in in 1997.
Just after the election.
It started the day Tony Blair got in his ministerial car and travelled to one of the poorest estates in the country and pledged to stand up for the forgotten people.

It started, in the euphoria and relief that we all felt when we finally saw the back of the Tories.

It started in the lonely journey of the loyal Labour voter, who stuck with them in the dark days of the Tories, and who heaved a sigh of relief when Labour came to power.

It started then, because every promise Blair made that day has since been broken, discarded, or left to whither away.

Labour forgot the forgotten people.
They forgot the people who elected them.
They forgot the people who needed them most.

And I am left wondering what the point is of a Labour Government.

They raise taxes on the poor.
They let the poorest children fail at school.
They stand idly by while families are destroyed by housing misery that they could easily fix.

Labour’s betrayal is where the rot set in.

The record speaks for itself.

1.8 million families languishing on housing waiting lists.
Three quarters of a million families in severe overcrowding.
One in ten children in my constituency in temporary accommodation.

I have spoken to families in my constituency with TB.
One family member picks it up on their travels, and when you live in an overcrowded damp Victorian hovel it isn’t long before the whole family gets it.

I have parents sharing beds with 8 and 9 year old children, because there is nowhere for the other child to sleep.

6 people in two bedroom flats,
Children with autism having to sleep in the living room with their brother,
Marriages devastated.
Education ruined.

How do they get away with this? For 13 years.

This is the Labour party.
This is what they have become.
This is their legacy.
The truth is, that housing is a deeply personal issue.
For too long, it has been swept under the carpet.
Until the Government feel they are losing votes over it, they think they can afford to keep on ignoring it.

A few weeks ago, the London Evening Standard began a campaign highlighting the hidden misery of thousands of Londoners stuck in poverty and poor housing.
It felt like a chink of light.
Thank God, finally a newspaper campaigning on housing.

We need housing on every front page.
It should be a political issue.
It should decide how people vote.
Labour must not be allowed to get away with this.
We will not allow Labour to get away with this.

Under Nick Clegg, we will be the only party going into this election promising a billion pound investment in this country’s housing stock. Because we understand that housing affects everything.

You can’t fix antisocial behaviour, or under performance at school, if children have nowhere to work or play.

It is no good having a great health service if the real cause of depression, chest disease, high blood pressure and goodness knows what else is actually the hideous stressful condition in which people are living.

This is fundamentally about fairness. Fairness for the poorest, fairness for our children, fairness for families.

Liberal Democrats, if we don’t make this case, nobody will.

We certainly won’t hear it from the Tories.

The Tories don’t know what they are talking about.
They have no idea how the other 90% live.
Scratch the surface and the old Tory party is alive and well.

A couple of weeks ago they issued a press release claiming that fifty percent of teenage girls in deprived areas are pregnant.
The figure was wrong. It was actually 5%.
But no-one in Conservative central office questioned it because it fitted with their stereotypes about poor people.

Just as it did when Chris Grayling claimed our inner cities are all like the US show the Wire.

They will do anything, say anything, to peddle their ‘Broken Britain’ slogan.
The Conservative party love to demonise the poor.

No, the Tories think the only way to solve the housing crisis is to change the law so that it is easier for big developers to stuff vulnerable families in to houses the size of shoe boxes.

That, and persistent rumours about their secret plans to whack up rents for social tenants to private market levels.
That would be a disaster.

Last year, a young woman came to visit me.
She had been on the housing waiting list for years.
In that time, she had taken a degree and was absolutely desperate to work full time.
But she couldn’t afford to work, because if she did, she would lose the benefit that paid her exorbitant private rent.

She had done a calculation of all the money she had received in housing benefit while she had been waiting.
Look – she said – they could have built me a house!

If you abolish subsidised rents for Council and housing association homes, all that is going to happen is that many more people will end up on housing benefit, and many fewer people will be able to work.

Put poor people into worse housing, and make them pay more for it.
That’s it. That’s the Tory big idea.
 
The Tories have been colluding in keeping housing off the political agenda because they have nothing to say.

What frustrates me so much is that the Government can do something about the appalling cases I see in my advice surgeries every week.
This isn’t an insoluble problem.
It isn’t free, and it can’t be fixed overnight.
But it can be done.

There are things we would do. Things we would do now.

While millions of families wait for housing, 650,000 properties sit empty in England alone.
Empty, ignored and slowly falling to pieces.
Everyone in the country can tell you about a house near them that no one lives in.
It is a scandal that the Government just lets these precious homes rot.

Empty properties are a scar on our communities.
They invite squatting, antisocial behaviour, and bring down the whole street.
Just think how a family living with overcrowding feels when they see a property all boarded up.

It’s time we made use of the homes we have.

The Liberal Democrats will invest £1.4billion in bringing a quarter of a million of these homes back into use.

Think what that money could achieve.
50,000 builders, joiners, plumbers, electricians, carpenters back in work.
A shot in the arm for the construction industry.
Streets across the country smartened up.
Squatters replaced by families desperate for a home.

That would be the difference under the Liberal Democrats.

The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about.

When demand outstrips supply, prices go up.
That’s basic economics – even George Osborne could grasp that.

If we can’t keep up with housing demand as we come out of recession, prices go up, people borrow more than they can afford, and bang, we are right back where we started.

If we lose all our construction workers in the recession because there is no work for them, we’ll never keep pace with demand.

It’s as if the government haven’t learned a thing from the past two years.
Investing in more housing will protect the economy and save a generation.

By making this billion pound promise the Liberal Democrats throw down the gauntlet to Labour and the Tories to do the same.

Liberal Democrats, we are the only party heading into this election promising to invest new money in housing.

We need to win so that we can deliver the housing people so desperately need.

The 1.8 million families languishing on the housing waiting list haven’t won under Labour.

The young couple still forced to live with their parents haven’t won under Labour.

The family living six to a room in conditions akin to Victorian England have not won under Labour.

Perhaps it was inevitable that the Labour party would forget the forgotten people.
The collectivist roots of the Labour party lends easily to sweeping individual rights under the carpet in the name of the supposed greater good.
The trouble is that the only greater good the Labour party still believe in is winning their fourth term.
They have forgotten that winning isn’t just about winning.

We won’t forget the people who elected us because that is the nature of our politics. People, individuals, their stories, their concerns is at the heart of what Liberal Democracy is about.

We will win for the people who need us most.
And we will win where no one expects us to.
We will win because we can give people hope again.

Hope that things can change.
Hope for a fairer country.
Hope for real justice for those stuck at the bottom.

We can re-ignite hope in the millions of people who have given up on the power of politics to change their lives.

We have the policies, the principles and the passion to turn a disillusioned voter into a positive vote for change.

And that’s why, when we are out day after day, knocking, stuffing, delivering, phoning.
When we are using energy even we didn’t know we could muster, that’s what keeps us going.

Conference, Labour have failed and the Tories haven’t really changed.
This is our time.

We must deliver.

Our job is to go out there and persuade people that voting changes things.

So let’s go out and do it.

Liberal Democrat party members have approved introducing a ‘mansion tax’ on homes worth over £2 million in a motion today at their spring conference.

Other measures in the proposals for tax include raising the threshold for income tax to £10,000, which will be paid for by closing tax loopholes.

Vince Cable claimed that his plans are the most radical for a generation.

“Gordon Brown created a tax system that has some of the lowest earners paying hundreds of pounds in taxes that they can ill afford while the very wealthiest treat tax as if it’s optional,” he said.

“For their part, the Tories flail around in confusion over their marriage tax plans and can only commit to a tax cut for millionaires.

“It is right to ask those with the broadest shoulders to bear a little more of the burden so that millions of people on normal earnings get the break they need.

“We all know that the country is in for some tough times ahead.

“But we believe that it is simply not possible to address the problem of an unsustainable budget deficit without parallel action to rebalance the tax system and eliminate the unfairness at its core.”

Nick Clegg’s Chief of Staff, Danny Alexander today gave a speech to Spring Conference setting out the main themes of the Liberal Democrat General Election campaign.

The full text of the speech is below:

Conference – I have been working on this manifesto for nearly a year now. Since then, my wife has become pregnant with our second child.

I wouldn’t draw this comparison with her, but I can tell you that working on a manifesto has some similarities: my hopes, my ambitions for how things will change once it comes out. The sleepless nights.

But with the due date for our baby at the end of May, I hope to get the manifesto out before then!

This election is a huge opportunity for the Liberal Democrats.

Your hard work, your dedication to our Party and your ceaseless activity to get the Lib Dem word out, means we are poised to make gains across the land. I hope our hard work on the manifesto will help you to close the deal.

Two ideas will dominate this election campaign: change and fairness. Only one party is arguing at this election for both fairness and change: the Liberal Democrats.

Change: because business as usual is not the answer to the economic, political, and environmental crises that we face.

Fairness: because too many people in our society are still held back because of the circumstances of their birth, their sex or their parent’s bank balance.

The dreadful crises we have faced give us the chance to reshape our country.

We believe that change must be built around that one simple, powerful, and very British value: fairness.

Unlike Gordon Brown – and despite my red hair – I am not known for my bad language. But fairness is not the only ‘F word’ I am going to use today.

It sometimes helps to be able to sum up the other parties in a single word, so let me do it for you.

What is the “F” word for Labour: I say it is F for failed.

And what is the “F” word for the Conservatives: I say it is F for fake.

Failed ……. Fake ……. Nothing could contrast more with what we want for the future.

The core of the Liberal Democrat manifesto will be short, direct and to the point.

We have stripped away everything that is not essential because the country cannot afford it.

And we have set out in detail – more directly than any other party – how we will tackle the crisis in our nation’s finances.

We won’t make a single promise to the British people without saying exactly how we will pay for it.

We have taken some difficult decisions. I know it is not easy to put on hold some long-standing party commitments that we won’t be able to deliver in the next Parliament.

But it is the right thing to do – because we will not make promises we can’t keep.

But what we can promise is four big steps to a fairer Britain.

Only four.

But four big changes – more significant than anything Labour or the Tories will offer - to reshape the country we live in.

Fair taxes.

A new, fair start for all children at school.

A rebalanced, green economy.

And clean, open politics.

These four pledges are the main subjects of our debates this weekend so let me say something about each.

Fair taxes first. Thanks to Labour and the Tories, the poorest people lose more of their income in tax than the richest. That’s not fairness.

A banker pays only a fifth of his capital gains in tax, while the person who cleans his office gives a third of their meagre wage to the taxman. That’s not fairness.

Our plan is simple: we will make the first £10,000 you earn tax free.

I believe this is the single most radical, distinctive, and fair policy on offer from any party at this election.

That will put £700 into the pockets of almost every working person. £1400 for the average family with two earners.

Real money back in the pockets of people who are struggling to make ends meet.

Over 3 million more of the lowest paid people will pay no income tax at all. That’s fairness.

Every week in the Highlands, I meet families who are facing real financial difficulties. Income falling, bills to pay, children to feed and clothe.

They see all the money going to the banks, hear all the talk of cuts, and ask ‘who is standing up for me?’

The answer is the Liberal Democrats.

We’ll pay for it by closing loopholes exploited by the wealthy.

Yes, Lord Ashcroft, that does mean you as well. It’s time to stop thinking you can pass laws, buy seats, but not pay our taxes.

I’m not saying that Lord Ashcroft uses his money to buy influence – but he has had Christmas Number 1 in Belize for the last 15 years in a row.

We will tax capital gains the same as income. End higher rate relief on pension contributions. A new mansion tax paid on the value of homes over £2 million, and fair taxes on polluting air travel.

It is only the Liberal Democrats who are brave enough to tell some of the wealthiest people in the land that – at a time when millions of families are struggling to get by - they will have to pay more.

The first £10,000 you earn, tax free. That’s fairness.

Second, a fair chance for all children.

Under Labour and the Tories in the UK, a child’s chances in life are more closely linked to their parent’s income than anywhere else in Europe. That’s not fairness.

Our plan will give every child the individual attention they need to reach their full potential.

We will cut class sizes to help every child do better.

We are the only party that will spend more on schools - targeted at the children who need the most help.

Head-teachers will be freed to spend that money on what they think will make the most difference. Whether it is smaller classes, more one-to-one tuition, or after school classes.

Even in the depths of the recession, we will find new money for education – by scaling back tax credits to better off families – because it is so important to the future of our country.

Third, a new, rebalanced economy.

Labour and the Tories have been so in thrall to the City, they ignored the rest of the economy and caused the longest recession on record. That’s not fairness.

The Liberal Democrats, with Vince Cable as chancellor, will break up the banks so that they can never again wreck the economy. And until the break up is complete, our new banking levy is the only credible proposal in British politics to make them pay for the guarantee we give them.

We will build a balanced, sustainable economy – growth that lasts. In our first year in government, we will invest to create new jobs and boost the recovery.

And crucially, that investment will be green.

Labour and Conservatives ignored the environment and pushed nuclear energy, dirty coal, airport expansion. That’s not fairness for future generations.

By investing in new, low carbon industries we can keep people in work while we protect our planet too.

And, of course, we will repair the nation’s finances. This year, government is spending £178 billion more than it raises in tax. Even when the recovery gets fully underway, that gap is predicted to be £78 billion.

If we don’t close that gap over the next few years, our economy will be ruined. We will set out – in detail – our plans to guarantee that won’t happen.

Our measures include: the banking levy, scrapping the child trust fund, no like-for-like replacement of Trident, capping public sector pay rises, scrapping ID cards and biometric passports.

I could go on – but I am sure Vince has much more to say on this later.But I will add that it says something when the Financial Times thinks you’re the most credible party on reducing the deficit.

The Liberal Democrats have the best plan for fixing the economy. We are the best guarantee this country has of future financial stability.

Fourth, clean and decent politics.

Under Labour and the Tories, the broken political system has given government’s total power with a small minority of votes. That’s not fairness.

They have conspired to create a corrupt system of expenses, and then allow those who break the rules to hang on in office. That’s not fairness.

They have hovered up power from communities and councils to the centre. That’s not fairness.

Our plan will put power back where it belongs: with the people.

A fair voting system to end safe seats and ensure representative government;

Giving people the power to sack their MPs if they break the rules;

Power taken from Westminster and given to communities;

An end to big money in politics.

Reforming politics is essential to make the country fairer.

On top of these steps, our manifesto will also set out how a Liberal Democrat government will:

Protect the NHS frontline, using the health savings we find to safeguard services.
Immediately restore the link between pensions and earnings, so pensioners don’t fall further behind when growth returns.
Use the amount of money we would save by scrapping ID cards to put 3000 more police on the beat.
Cut desk jobs at the MOD so we can pay our brave service men and women a decent living wage.

Conference, I have known Nick Clegg for 15 years and have worked with him closely since he became our leader – as his chief of staff and on this manifesto.

I can tell you that of the three party leaders, he is the best qualified of them all to be Prime Minister. He is plain-speaking, tells it as he sees it, and most importantly his politics is motivated by his deeply held belief that this country needs to be fairer. His leadership is what our country needs.

He has been clear from the start that these difficult times mean we must be clear about our priorities:

Fair taxes.

A fair start for all children.

A rebalanced, green economy.

And clean, open politics.

I want to be clear about one thing: those four steps are a unified package. They must be implemented together if we are to get the fairness we want in Britain. All for one, and one for all.

The more Liberal Democrat votes, the more Liberal Democrat MPs, the more power we will have to deliver our package for a fairer Britain.

The next election isn’t between Brown and Cameron, much though they would both like to pretend that it is.

It’s between the old way of doing politics and the real change represented by Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats.

I know we are ready to lead this country. In fact, I believe we are the only party with a clear plan that can lead the country out of the mess we are in.

If you want change, vote for the only Party that will bring about change. Change that works for you – vote for the Liberal Democrats.

Just after Nick Clegg’s live Q & A at the Spring Conference in Birmingham he took questions sent in from people who were unable to attend the conference, via Facebook and Twitter.

You can view a short video of the question and answer session at http://tinyurl.com/yfltw2f

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference today backed radical plans to change the education system to give children a fair start in life.

The proposals include:

• An extra £2.5bn investment in schools to reduce class sizes, improve discipline and provide more one-to-one tuition to help struggling pupils, paid as a pupil premium to schools for each of the poorest 1m children they teach
• The scrapping of tuition fees for first undergraduate degrees, whether studied full or part-time, over six years

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Children, Schools and Families Secretary, David Laws said:

“It is a disgrace that where children are born and how much their parents earn can still dictate how well they do at school.

“Schools should be a level playing field, opening up opportunities and making sure that all children have a fair chance to achieve their potential.

“Our plans to invest an extra £2.5bn in schools will enable headteachers to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with the support they need.  We will set schools free from constant Government interference so they can focus on getting the best from all children.

“I am proud that the Liberal Democrats have made such a clear and bold commitment to give every child a fair start in life.”

Liberal Democrat Spring Conference today pledged its commitment to ending child detention in immigration centres.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said:

“It is a moral stain on this country’s proud reputation in accepting refugees that we are routinely locking up children for months at a time even though they have committed no crime.

“Locking children up in this way can do them serious physical and psychological harm. This is the behaviour of the Victorian workhouses, not 21st century Britain.

“The Government must find its long lost moral compass and put an end to child detention immediately.”

The former leader of the Conservative MEPs who stood against Tory-backed Michal Kaminski has announced his defection to the Liberal Democrats at the Party’s Spring Conference in Birmingham. 

Edward McMillan-Scott, the Conservative’s most senior MEP, has joined the Liberal Democrats. 

The former leader of the Conservative MEPs who stood against Tory-backed Michal Kaminski has announced his defection to the Liberal Democrats at the Party’s Spring Conference in Birmingham. 

Edward McMillan-Scott, the Vice-President of the European Parliament with responsibility for human rights and democracy, was welcomed to the Liberal Democrats by Leader, Nick Clegg. 

Edward McMillan-Scott, MEP for Yorkshire and North Lincolnshire said: “I have been around the higher circles of the Conservative Party for long enough to fear that on Europe Cameron says one thing in opposition and will do another in Government. 

“I have long fought against totalitarianism and the extremism and religious persecution it brings. It was wrong of Cameron to associate with MEPs who have extremist pasts in his new European alliance. 

“My reasons for joining the Liberal Democrats are that in Nick Clegg they have a leader whom I like, admire and respect. They are internationalists, not nationalists. They are committed to politics based the values of fairness and change. 

“From being a liberal Conservative I become a conservative Liberal. Most of my family are liberals: I am pleased to join the Liberal family.”

Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg said: “I am delighted to welcome Edward McMillan-Scott to the Liberal Democrats.

“For many years he has fought for human rights and democracy world wide and he is rightly a respected politician across Europe.

“As someone of principle he has refused to cosy up to right wing extremists, despite pressure from the Tory machine.

“This flies in the face of David Cameron’s claims of change. It shows that people of principle, who believe in fairness and want real change for Britain are at home in the Liberal Democrats.”

“If civil servants don’t talk like the rest of the people in this country, then they are in danger of having a ‘goldfish bowl facilitated conversation’ that no one much cares about,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Communities and Local Government Secretary, Julia Goldsworthy.

Commenting on the LGA’s annual list of words that public sector workers shouldn’t use, Julia Goldsworthy said: “It is essential that the public knows what officials are up to and it’s not enough just to publish what councils spend on the web.

“The decision-making process needs to be easy to understand, instead of hidden behind baffling ‘Labour speak’.

“If civil servants don’t talk like the rest of the people in this country, then they are in danger of having a ‘goldfish bowl facilitated conversation’ that no one much cares about.”

In a speech to Chatham House today, Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg set out what is at stake in foreign policy at the coming General Election. 

Nick Clegg said: “Gordon Brown and David Cameron want to pretend that foreign policy is not an issue at the General Election. Gordon Brown doesn’t want to remind voters of the disastrous decision to go to war in Iraq. David Cameron doesn’t want to remind voters that he is friendless in Europe.

“The real truth is that the future of British foreign policy is as much in the balance as the future of our economy, or the future of our political system.

“This election is an opportunity to turn the page on the Labour-Conservative consensus on foreign policy which has been in place since the Suez crisis: one of following what the White House wants rather than leadership in Europe and the world.

“Of course our relationship with the US is of immense importance, but that should not mean that Britain unquestionably does what America wants when it is not in our interests to do so. On Iraq, on Russia, on the Middle East, on the interrogation of torture suspects and many other issues our strategic interests have differed.

“Baroness Manningham-Buller’s admission that the US kept our security forces in the dark about unacceptable interrogation techniques only confirms the impression of an unbalanced and unequal relationship.

“That is why, in the same way we must rebalance an economy that is over-reliant on bankers, we must rebalance foreign policy that is over-reliant on the White House. It is time to repatriate British foreign policy by standing tall in our European backyard and pursuing a policy of partnership – not followership – with our friends in the US.

“At this General Election only the Liberal Democrats realise what is at stake and are prepared to spell out what a different foreign policy would look like.”

“It’s very difficult to see how the man who claimed to have abolished boom and bust can campaign on his stewardship of the economy after the greatest bust for decades. 

Responding to the Prime Minister’s economic speech this morning and the announcement of the Budget date, Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable said: “Gordon Brown’s speech shows he is leading with a weak hand.

“It’s very difficult to see how the man who claimed to have abolished boom and bust can campaign on his stewardship of the economy after the greatest bust for decades.

“The only reason he is, of course, is because the Conservatives are even worse. The only consistent thing about their economic policy is that they have been consistently wrong.

“The Budget must clearly spell out where Labour intend to make spending cuts in order to tackle the budget deficit. All we have seen from the Prime Minister today is more waffle.

“Gordon Brown admits that there are bumps in the road ahead. The public know that and expect all parties to follow the Liberal Democrat lead and tell them where the bumps are and how we will be navigating our way over and around them.”

“These are deeply alarming figures which suggest that British exporters simply haven’t been able to take advantage of the big devaluation which occurred in the last year,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable. 

Commenting on the news that UK exports took their biggest plunge in more than three years during January, Vince Cable said: “These are deeply alarming figures which suggest that British exporters simply haven’t been able to take advantage of the big devaluation which occurred in the last year.

“They suggest that the long term decline and neglect of British manufacturing has taken its toll and that an awful lot more needs to be done to rebalance the economy to make it more competitive.

“It is wrong to suggest that the British economy can escape from this recession by just relying on exports. It just isn’t happening.

“Exports are one modest part of the national economy. We need an economy that is strong and secure across the board – and the Liberal Democrats are committed to delivering that.”

“Only the Liberal Democrats have produced a credible and coherent plan for dealing with the deficit,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable. 

Commenting on the BCC’s downgrading of its expectations for economic growth this year, Vince Cable said: “The BCC are spot on.

“The British economy is still weak and cutting spending too soon risks stifling growth and recovery.

“The Liberal Democrats have made it clear that the point at which we cut spending will be based on economics and not political dogma.

“While Labour buries its head in the sand and the Tories mire themselves in confusion, only the Liberal Democrats have produced a credible and coherent plan for dealing with the deficit.

“The BCC are also right to highlight the key role that sound and solvent small and medium sized businesses have to play in our economic recovery. 

“Unfortunately, many of these businesses are being starved of the capital they need. The nationalised and semi nationalised banks must work in the national interest and get credit flowing to these businesses so that they can survive and expand. This will protect jobs and ensure that growth isn’t damaged.”

“It is imperative that Royal Mail now delivers on promised transformations,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Business Secretary, John Thurso. 

Commenting on yesterday’s agreement between Royal Mail and the Communications Workers Union, John Thurso said: “I welcome the fact that Royal Mail has reached an agreement to end this long running dispute.

“The Royal Mail still faces some tough challenges however, as it confronts a ballooning pension deficit and a long term decline in mail volumes.

“It is imperative that Royal Mail now delivers on promised transformations and the efficiency needed to operate in a competitive mail market.”

“The idea that the UK upheld international law by invading Iraq is pure Labour doublespeak,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary.

Commenting on David Miliband’s appearance before the Chilcot Inquiry, Edward Davey said:

“David Miliband and Gordon Brown are on a PR offensive to rewrite the history of the Iraq War.
 
“The idea that the UK upheld international law by invading Iraq is pure Labour doublespeak.
 
“Iraq diminished our standing in the Middle East and the wider world and divided us from our natural allies.
 
“Nobody will listen to Labour when it comes to restoring Britain’s reputation abroad.”

“Labour’s cuts are already biting across the NHS and their failure to cut back on waste means that it is the most vulnerable who are losing out,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on the report by the Princess Royal Trust for Carers which reveals that only 23% of the money allocated to help carers was used in this way, Norman Lamb said:
 
“The Government has completely neglected the vital work that carers do and this report is further evidence of the scale of the problem.
 
“Labour’s cuts are already biting across the NHS and their failure to cut back on waste means that it is the most vulnerable who are losing out.
 
“This report highlights the need for a guarantee to respite care which only the Liberal Democrats are committed to.”

“David Cameron and George Osborne are stoking up fears in the markets, actively trying to destabilise the pound and reduce the Government’s ability to borrow”, says the Leader of the Liberal Democrats

Speaking to party workers, Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg accused the Conservatives of ‘a crude form of blackmail’ by encouraging fears of a fall in the stock market.

Nick Clegg said:
“The Conservatives are so desperate that they have resorted to a crude form of blackmail.
“David Cameron and George Osborne are stoking up fears in the markets, actively trying to destabilise the pound and reduce the Government’s ability to borrow.

“It’s like a protection racket: vote for us or our friends in the City will lay waste to your economy, your savings and your job.

“There is nothing positive in the Conservatives’ election strategy. It’s built entirely on the hatred of Gordon Brown, stoking up fears of a broken society and now threatening economic meltdown.

“It’s a strategy that is completely negative and without hope, and it’s becoming increasingly obvious that people aren’t going to fall for it.”

It’s not like Nick Griffin to shy away from publicity. His reaction to any possibility of a flicker of spotlight is to run towards it, maximising the impact of his message of hate. But it seems that the BNP leader is now revealing a reticent side to his personality.

Today’s London edition of the BBC’s Politics Show will be covering the constituency of Barking, the one which Griffin hopes towin and become the BNP’s first MP. The programme will feature a discussion between the main parties’ candidates for the seat – and in the case of Barking, the BNP are sadly one of the contenders. But Griffin won’t be appearing, despite an invitation from the BBC. Why?

It appears that Griffin is running scared not just of the BBC, but also of LibDem candidate Dominic Carman. Griffin derides the proposed discussion as ‘another Question Time lynch mob set-up’ and Carman as ‘a failed journalist and plastic candidate in Barking whose sole intention it is to lie about me instead’.

So why this hatred of the LibDem candidate in particular? Because, as announcedlast week Dominic Carman is not only the son of the late George Carman QC, but also Griffin’s very unofficial biographer. The Times stated that Carman, ‘intends to use information from his research into the biography to attack his opponent. It was never released because publishers were unwilling to associate their brand with the BNP leader’.

“I will put it to good use in exposing Griffin beyond what’s already been in the public domain,” he said. “It’s very important to fight a strong campaign and it will be critical to challenge Nick Griffin every step of the way. I want to make people think long and hard about voting for him in Barking. It’s very, very important.”

So what is Griffin’s excuse for chickening out? He accuses independent producers Juniper of conspiring with the Labour Party, the BBC and the Conservatives and LibDems to ‘shut out’ Griffin’s party and ‘gang up against the BNP in a four-to-one attack’.

Griffin’s second argument is even more bizarre. He takes issue with the BBC for ‘setting up a debate between parliamentary candidates … where the agenda has been preset to only discuss local issues’. Apparently the Labour councillors who currently run the council in Barking and Dagenham have fed inside information to the other participants in today’s programme, in order to leave the BNP looking stupid. I didn’t realise they needed any help.

The secret of Nick Griffin’s successes over the past few years has been to present himself and the BNP as political outsiders, just as much the victims of the establishment as the white working classes he seeks to represent. But shouldn’t someone who represents himself as the leader of a legitimate political party be willing and able to make a case for himself and his party’s politics whenever the opportunity presents itself? Has Nick Griffin realised that his party and politics have no justification in today’s Britain and that their game is up? And have the media learned their lesson – that sunlight is the best disinfectant? Play ‘no-platform’ with the BNP and they become martyrs. Give them the same opportunities as the other parties and they run away in fright.

As The Guardian’s Dave Hillstates on his blog, ‘Carman’s candidacy only become known a week ago. Is it already having the desired effect?’

The annual event, celebrated on 8 March acknowledges the achievements of women across the world while also focusing on the continued disadvantages millions of women still face.

“I am pleased to add my support to International Women’s Day. It is crucial that people are able to come together to celebrate the achievements of women around the world. However this is not a time to just be reflective but also a time to look forwards and work together to stamp out all signs of inequality that threatens to undermine our society.”

“As the first woman from the Turkish community to be elected as councillor, I am a strong supporter of International Women’s Day, and campaigner for more women in public life. We must join forces and speak out against the continuing evil of so-called ‘honour killings’, most recently the terrible death of a young Turkish woman, Tulay Goren. Woman across the world continue to suffer. We have a duty to be the voice and the change that will make a difference to their lives.”

“I’m delighted to support International Women’s Day because I think it’s important we remember the struggle of women both past and present to win the right to vote and to stand for election. As a new Mum running for Parliament I still get asked - Why isn’t your partner standing instead? How can you do it with a baby? You’re not going to breastfeed here are you?  We need to keep on working for equality so that little girls born today enjoy even greater opportunities and are supported in their dreams.”

“The fight for women’s equality is not finished. And as lucky as I am to work for a party where equality and fairness runs through our very bones, some women do not have the same luxury. As a second generation Ghanaian, I am aware of the shocking poverty women and girls in Africa face on a daily basis. Though I shake my head in despair and give a sum of money each month to a charity, the visceral pain some women still face shakes me to my very core. We must not forget and we must not get complacent. We still have a fight, so lets win it together.”

“Taking this day to pause and remember the struggles of women throughout history to seek equal opportunity remains as vital as it always has been. Clara Zetkin’s original ideals of pressing for female equality resound as true now as they did nearly one hundred years ago. International Women’s Day marks the triumphs of women and girls around the globe and on this day we stand together, looking forward, to improving education, increasing representation and eradicating inequality.”

“I support International Women’s Day because I feel that women are still the unsung hero’s of modern British society. While things have progressed since my mother’s generation - for example there are many more women in work - the pressure on women has also grown exponentially. Women can now be a mum, partner and career woman all at the same time but are often less paid. We should celebrate our achievements but realise there is still a long way to go before true equality. Just take Parliament as an example: 51% of the population represented by 20% of MPs! Shocking. Come on ladies, let’s make this election count!”

“I’m delighted to be one of millions of women celebrating International Women’s Day today. Across the world, women boast extraordinary achievements. Despite poverty, we raise families. Despite discrimination, we excel and prosper. Despite pressures to fulfil roles that are defined for us, we can be strong, confident and secure in ourselves. To all young girls, I say one thing - become the woman you want to be.”

“I’m supporting International Women’s Day because women are the answer to many of the world’s problems and investing in women’s education, empowerment, and entrepreneurship will change the world.”

“How wonderful to have a global day celebrating women, the roles we play in the home and our achievements in society.  May I wish all women the courage of their convictions, and the ability to greet each challenge with a smile!”

“I support International Women’s Day to recognise the role of women in society throughout the world and it is essential that their determination be celebrated across the world.”

“The Liberal Democrats have made it clear that the point at which we cut spending will be based on economics and not political dogma,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor.

Responding to the CBI’s submission to the Chancellor urging him to use  his last Budget before the election to set out more details of spending plans for government departments in order to boost confidence in the UK’s public finances and provide economic stability, Vince Cable said:

“This submission highlights how dangerous the Government’s position is.

“The country can’t afford to have political parties playing politics with the public finances.

“The British people and the markets have the right to know how and when each political party will tackle the deficit.

“The Liberal Democrats have made it clear that the point at which we cut spending will be based on economics and not political dogma.

“While Labour buries its head in the sand and the Tories mire themselves in confusion, only the Liberal Democrats have produced a credible and coherent plan for dealing with the deficit.”

“Scotland deserves real change, and the Liberal Democrats are the only ones to deliver it,” said the Liberal Democrat Leader.

Ahead of today’s speech at the Scottish Liberal Democrat Spring Conference, Nick Clegg said:

“Labour has failed to deliver for Scotland. Labour’s banking crisis and recession has caused serious damage to the Scottish economy and businesses.

“Under the Labour Government the gap between rich and poor has grown wider and social mobility has foundered.

“In Scotland, life expectancy remains lower than anywhere else in the UK and it is losing jobs at the fastest rate in Western Europe.

“All this has to change and neither the Conservatives nor the SNP are capable of doing it.

“The Lib Dems in Scotland have set the political pace on our campaign for a fairer society.

“Scotland deserves real change, and the Liberal Democrats are the only ones to deliver it.

“Under a Liberal Democrat Government, you will not have to pay any income tax on the first £10,000 you earn.

“This will free half a million Scots on low incomes from having to pay any income tax at all and put £700 back in the pockets of people on low and middle incomes, providing an incentive to work and save.”

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary.

Commenting on reports from the Electoral Commission that Tory officials had refused requests to be interviewed by investigators, Chris Huhne said:

“It’s extraordinary that officials of a major political party should refuse a meeting to answer questions from the regulator designed to ensure funding is open and honest.

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary. 

“The Conservatives must now answer the question about who told their officials to withhold cooperation from the Electoral Commission. On whose authority was this request refused?”

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary.

Commenting on reports from the Electoral Commission that Tory officials had refused requests to be interviewed by investigators, Chris Huhne said:

“It’s extraordinary that officials of a major political party should refuse a meeting to answer questions from the regulator designed to ensure funding is open and honest.

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary. 

“The Conservatives must now answer the question about who told their officials to withhold cooperation from the Electoral Commission. On whose authority was this request refused?”

Liberal Democrat Home Affairs spokesman, Chris Huhne answers your questions in today’s Independent. 

Chris Huhne answers questions such as ”Don’t you rely on ‘non-doms’ too?” and “Are you a Liberal or a Social Democrat?”

You can read the complete list of questions and answers  from the Indepedent at http://tinyurl.com/yjq56vb

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg will today accuse David Cameron of using “a crude form of blackmail” to raise fears of “economic meltdown” if the Conservatives are not the clear winners at the next general election.

Mr Clegg will compare the threat to a “protection racket” and accuse David Cameron of trying to win the election through fear.

As the value of the pound fell last week, the Conservatives claimed that market concerns over the possibility of a hung Parliament and uncertainty about the direction of Britain’s economy were to blame.

Shadow business secretary Kenneth Clarke also warned voters not to “elect themselves into a financial crisis”.

Mr Clarke warned that a fourth term for Labour would leave Britain “at the mercy of the bond markets and international finance”, which would cause interest rates to soar and the pound to be “sent on a downward spiral”.

Speaking to Liberal Democrat workers today, Mr Clegg will say:

“The Conservatives are so desperate that they have resorted to a crude form of blackmail.

“David Cameron and George Osborne are stoking up fears in the markets, actively trying to destabilise the pound and reduce the Government’s ability to borrow.

“It’s like a protection racket: vote for us or our friends in the City will lay waste to your economy, your savings and your job.”

Nick Clegg will also say that scaremongering about the economy is one part of a wider tactic of negative campaigning by the Conservatives.

Mr Clegg will say:

“There is nothing positive in the Conservatives’ election strategy,”

“It’s built entirely on the hatred of Gordon Brown, stoking up fears of a broken society and now threatening economic meltdown.

“It’s a strategy that is completely negative and without hope, and it’s becoming increasingly obvious that people aren’t going to fall for it.”

Speaking on the Andrew Marr Show this morning the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable said the Liberal Democrats would be willing to work with either of the other parties in the event of a hung parliament, although he refused to expand on how they would approach such a scenario.

Vince Cable was clear in his opinion that a hung parliament was not something to be feared, he said,

“I think we could work with other parties, why not? The public expects us to be business like.”

“The public mood is very much for politicians to work with each other rather than doing tribal politics,” he added.

However, he refused to “spell out” exactly how the Liberal Democrats would approach the other parties in the event of a hung parliament.

“I don’t think it’s helpful or necessary to spell out precisely what that means… I think it’s important for the public to know what broad approach we would take.”

“Any deal breakers are things that we discuss publicly – we want to see financial responsibility, fair taxation, and the British economy rebalanced in terms of finance,” he added.

Vince Cable dispelled the myth that coalition governments mean weak leadership, he was keen to point out that in many respects they have a good record in dealing with economic crises and rejected the assertion that fear of a hung parliament had caused the pound to sink last week.

THE PUBLIC MOOD IS VERY MUCH FOR POLITICIANS TO WORK WITH EACH OTHER RATHER THAN DOING TRIBAL POLITICS SAYS VINCE CABLE 

“All the evidence from countries in the western world is minority governments have a better record in managing economic crises,” he said.

On the supposed link between speculation of a hung parliament and the pound’s fall, Vince Cable said: “I don’t think the two things are connected we have a very small downward movement in the pound earlier this week…It was given a political spin.” He said the fall in sterling was most likely a consequence of Prudential’s activities.

Vince Cable reiterated that the Liberal Democrats would look to ensure financial responsibility and fair taxation in government.

“Our view is that of course as a party we have got to be on the side of financial responsibility, we don’t want to see any damage to the national economy,” he said.

“The specific tax increase we have advocated is in relation to the banking system…the banks are currently underwritten by the taxpayer…we think they should pay for that insurance,” Vince Cable added

The Liberal Democrats have stepped up their pressure on the part nationalised banks, and this week they will focus their attention on the loss making bank Lloyds – the bank that use to say yes.

Loss-making Lloyds bank must reveal how far it has fallen short of its 2009 lending targets, say the Liberal Democrats. The Banking Group must now say how far it is falling short of government lending targets; the Liberal Democrats want the bailed-out bank to come clean.

Loss-making Lloyds, which is 41% owned by taxpayers, came under fire when it published its 2009 results last month, for refusing to disclose “net” lending figures that would show whether or not it had met the targets set by the government to keep £11bn of credit flowing during the recession.

Business groups have complained that firms are still struggling to get finance, echoing official data showing lending by banks to companies fell last year for the first time since records began.

 Now the Liberal Democrats are stepping up their criticism of Lloyds, demanding more transparency. “Where are Lloyds’s net lending figures?” asked the Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson, Lord Oakeshott. “It is now a year since targets were set. They have produced their results and had promised they would show how far they had fallen short and they haven’t.

“It’s absolutely the public’s right to know how far Lloyds have fallen behind their commitment.”

Speaking on Sky News earlier today, Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg accused the Conservatives of a “glorified form of blackmail” with their claims that a hung parliament would damage to the economy.

Mr Clegg said the Conservatives were inplying:

“Vote for us otherwise the markets will tear the economic stability of this country to bits.”

“Every time they come under any pressure they start lashing out,” he added

“What the markets rightly demand is clarity, and the Conservatives aren’t giving it, about how you bring the structural deficit down.”

The Liberal Democrat leader also supported Gordon Brown’s decision to visit our troops in Afghanistan, and said he was amazed by the Conservative criticisms, saying:

“It is right that the prime minister should go and visit our troops in Afghanistan,”

“(It is) almost a constitutional duty for the leader of this country to show our collective sense of gratitude to our brave soldier on the front line.”

Mr Clegg added that he would be curious to see whether David Cameron takes a TV crew with him next time he visits Afghanistan.

The electorate is weary of two-party wrangling and tactical voting. It is ready for a third option, which breaks new ground

British politics could be at a major turning point. Take a look at some basic facts: in the 1951 general election, only 2% of voters supported parties other than the Conservatives and Labour. At the local elections last year, that figure had shot up to 40%. During the last two general elections, for the first time in post-war Britain, more people didn’t vote at all than voted for the winning party. Gordon Brown is Prime Minister even though only 22% of eligible voters supported the Labour Party at the last election; at the same election, almost one in four of those people who voted – close to six million voters – supported the Liberal Democrats, yet only 10% of MPs are Lib Dems.

You can read the rest of theis article from today’s Independent at http://tinyurl.com/ycjdpq3

 The way Britain’s run means the Government doesn’t have to listen to you. One party can get control over Parliament even if only a quarter of people vote for them. So individual people and families don’t seem to have a voice to influence what happens. The old parties are comfortable because they know they’ll get into government every few years - so they never change things and they never will. But people are fed up of being ignored. It’s time to make a real change. We need to have an open political system that’s designed to listen to people and deliver what they need. Everyone should have an equal voice - not just people who can pay for big donations.

The Liberal Democrats will throw open the doors of government, reinvigorate Britain’s democracy and give power back to people. We will modernise government so that it serves the interests of all people, not just the vested interests of politicians, corporations or rich donors. Liberal Democrats plan to reform government so there will be no more privileged patronage, no more dodgy dossiers, no more excessive secrecy. Government should uphold the law, as well as our liberties, not seek ways to undermine them. We will create a British democracy for the 21st century that people can be proud of.

Read the full policy briefing for Constitutional Affairs.

WE NEED A SYSTEM OF “FAIR, DECENT, TRANSPARENT POLITICS” SAYS In a key speech to the Scottish Liberal Democrat conference in Perth, the Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg pledged to clean up politics in the wake of the MP expenses scandal and concern over party donations.

Nick Clegg told the conference the Westminster parliament was looked on with “disgust”, rather than “pride”.

Mr Clegg also set out his vision for a “fairer” society, through tax reform and a better start for children.

On expenses, Nick Clegg told delegates that he wanted the public to be able to sack their MPs, and backed a directly-elected House of Lords.

And he dismissed Tory donor Lord Ashcroft as a “tax dodger”.

The peer’s “non dom” status has caused a political row, because it had been thought he had agreed to pay full UK tax in order to become a peer.

Nick Clegg called for argued that there needed to be “fair, decent, transparent politics”, arguing the Westminster expenses scandal was the “symptom of a deeper malaise” that had seen MPs “abusing the system on an industrial scale”.

“We will deliver the new politics - fair votes, a directly elected House of Lords, clean up the murky business of party funding,” he pledged.

The Liberal Democrat Leader outlined four steps to a “fairer Britain” - fair taxes for all, a fair start for all children at school, a fair and sustainable economy and fair, transparent & local politics.

These included making first £10,000 of earnings tax-free, which would be paid for by closing tax loopholes exploited by the wealthy, spending more on schools and “breaking up the banks” to prevent another financial crisis.

Nick Clegg said a key priority was delivering an extra £2.5bn a year to schools, raising the money given to children on free school meals from the most deprived backgrounds to the amount that children tend to receive in fee-paying schools.

And he vowed: “In the first year of a Liberal Democrat government we will use £3.5bn from savings and cuts in the government expenditure we have identified to invest in a new economy - not the old economy, not the old economy of excess and greed, but the new sustainable green economy.”

Mr Clegg hit out at the “greed of the bankers” but also attacked the “failure of Gordon Brown to keep that greed in check”.

He said he wanted to “change the fundamental assumptions by which both Conservative and Labour governments at Westminster have sought to run the British economy”.

“Of course we need a vibrant, competitive financial sector, but never again should the greed of the bankers in the City of London hold a gun to the head of the rest of the British economy,” said Mr Clegg.

“So I say an end to the banking of excess and greed - split up the banks. Split up Lloyds. Bring the Bank of Scotland back home.”

The following article was written by the Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesman, Vince Cable, and originally appeared in the Mail on Sunday:

Prison arouses strong feelings.  For many people worried about the level of crime, there are not enough prisons, sentences are too short and conditions are too cushy.

For others, worried about high reoffending rates, there are better – and cheaper – alternatives to prison in many cases.

Public outrage comes to the boil when a particularly vilified prisoner receives an apparently light sentence or is released early.  Last week, that outrage was vented on James Bulger’s killer Jon Venables.

I have a generally law-abiding constituency.  Yet I had a very atypical advice surgery in Twickenham last week when several cases surfaced involving serious crime.

Each caused me to question the role played by prison in dealing with the individuals concerned.

An elderly lady came to see me about her grandson.  Let me call him Mr A. He is serving a sentence for GBH.

He had drug problems and had gone into a pub, got into an argument with a barman and in the fight that followed pulled out a knife, causing injury.  As I told his grandmother, prison was what he deserved.  But the story didn’t end there.

In prison he had been subjected to male rape, a terrifying experience made all the worse by the incidence of Aids in his prison. He had not reported the assault for fear of retaliation by the assailant’s gang of friends.

He is now ready for release but cannot get on to one of the Government’s courses that prepare prisoners for civilian life.

It has created hoops for prisoners to jump through before they are released but then doesn’t provide the hoops because the prisons don’t have the money or staff for rehabilitation courses.

He is very likely to run into the same problems as another constituent, Mr B, also sent to prison for GBH.  But there the similarity ends.

Mr B was a have-a-go hero who intervened to stop a brutal attack on a woman but was arrested because in trying to protect her, he had been caught in the violence.

In court the judge praised him for his courage but, because Mr B had foolishly pleaded guilty, had no alternative but to give him a short custodial sentence.

He has no family support and no money and is now sleeping on a sofa of a friend who is a volatile schizophrenic. He asked for my help in finding a safe and secure place to live so he can rebuild his life.

Mr C is in an entirely different predicament. He is an articulate, educated but very angry man having served ten years for an offence he did not commit.  He was convicted as the Mr Big of a drug-dealing gang, but the evidence was flawed.

His innocence has been established in an appeal to the European Court of Justice, but for complex, procedural reasons this verdict is not accepted in the UK. I am pursuing this issue with Ministers responsible for the rules.

I do not want Mr C to end his days like another constituent whom I visited over Christmas, housebound with terminal cancer.

Too little is being done to help those who genuinely want to go straight and acquire education, mental health treatment or rebuild their lives. 

He has been unable to obtain a pardon for false imprisonment after serving five years for bank robbery on the basis of wrong identification.

The conviction was eventually recognised to be faulty but he has been unable to obtain a full pardon, let alone compensation.

Such cases are exceptional.  More typical is Mr D. His family is caring and supportive but has had more than its share of tragedies, including his mental illness.  This led him to the bottle and he is now an alcoholic.

Alcohol makes him violent and anti-social and he is at present serving the latest of several prison sentences.

It is obvious that he should be treated outside the prison system but the alcohol addiction services won’t take him on until his mental illness is being treated and the mental health services won’t treat him until he kicks his alcohol dependence.

Thousands of prisoners are in this Catch 22, failed by other social services.

Last week, I bumped into Mr E, who campaigns as a member of a local residents’ association.

A decade or so ago, he got into a bitter dispute over a small sum of money in the accounts of a local society.

Mr E was served court injunctions which he then broke because he believed that they compromised his freedom of speech. He served several months in prison for his defiance.

Of these men, only one should have been in prison, Mr A, and he will emerge from the experience seriously damaged and potentially more of a problem for society.  That is the story of our prisons.  There are large numbers of people who ought not to be there.

As a result, there is no room for serious villains who ought to be there.  So they are given sentences that are too short or non-custodial or are released prematurely.

The public become angry and urge the building of more prisons.  But that isn’t feasible in the current financial climate and doesn’t deal with the people who shouldn’t be in prison.

Too little is being done to help those who genuinely want to go straight and acquire education, mental health treatment or rebuild their lives.

Prison won’t work while we pay through the nose to keep the many inside who should be out, instead of catching the real criminals.

Vince Cable is the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman

“How can we trust a man who still believes that this illegal war and all the horror it has caused was right?” said the Liberal Democrat Leader.

Commenting on Gordon Brown’s appearance at the Iraq inquiry, Nick Clegg said:

“This was the day Gordon Brown finally had to come clean and admit that he believes the Iraq war was right.

“We now know we were betrayed by Gordon Brown and we were betrayed by the Labour Party.

“How can we trust a man who still believes that this illegal war and all the horror it has caused was right?

“When the Liberal Democrats were the only party to oppose this immoral invasion we didn’t just speak for us, we spoke for the nation.”

The annual event, celebrated on 8 March acknowledges the achievements of women across the world while also focusing on the continued disadvantages millions of women still face.

”

I am pleased to add my support to International Women’s Day. It is crucial that people are able to come together to celebrate the achievements of women around the world. However this is not a time to just be reflective but also a time to look forwards and work together to stamp out all signs of inequality that threatens to undermine our society.”

“As the first woman from the Turkish community to be elected as councillor, I am a strong supporter of International Women’s Day, and campaigner for more women in public life. We must join forces and speak out against the continuing evil of so-called ‘honour killings’, most recently the terrible death of a young Turkish woman, Tulay Goren. Woman across the world continue to suffer. We have a duty to be the voice and the change that will make a difference to their lives.”

“I’m delighted to support International Women’s Day because I think it’s important we remember the struggle of women both past and present to win the right to vote and to stand for election. As a new Mum running for Parliament I still get asked - Why isn’t your partner standing instead? How can you do it with a baby? You’re not going to breastfeed here are you?  We need to keep on working for equality so that little girls born today enjoy even greater opportunities and are supported in their dreams.”

“The fight for women’s equality is not finished. And as lucky as I am to work for a party where equality and fairness runs through our very bones, some women do not have the same luxury. As a second generation Ghanaian, I am aware of the shocking poverty women and girls in Africa face on a daily basis. Though I shake my head in despair and give a sum of money each month to a charity, the visceral pain some women still face shakes me to my very core. We must not forget and we must not get complacent. We still have a fight, so lets win it together.”

“Taking this day to pause and remember the struggles of women throughout history to seek equal opportunity remains as vital as it always has been. Clara Zetkin’s original ideals of pressing for female equality resound as true now as they did nearly one hundred years ago. International Women’s Day marks the triumphs of women and girls around the globe and on this day we stand together, looking forward, to improving education, increasing representation and eradicating inequality.”

“I support International Women’s Day because I feel that women are still the unsung hero’s of modern British society. While things have progressed since my mother’s generation - for example there are many more women in work - the pressure on women has also grown exponentially. Women can now be a mum, partner and career woman all at the same time but are often less paid. We should celebrate our achievements but realise there is still a long way to go before true equality. Just take Parliament as an example: 51% of the population represented by 20% of MPs! Shocking. Come on ladies, let’s make this election count!”

“I’m delighted to be one of millions of women celebrating International Women’s Day today. Across the world, women boast extraordinary achievements. Despite poverty, we raise families. Despite discrimination, we excel and prosper. Despite pressures to fulfil roles that are defined for us, we can be strong, confident and secure in ourselves. To all young girls, I say one thing - become the woman you want to be.”

“I’m supporting International Women’s Day because women are the answer to many of the world’s problems and investing in women’s education, empowerment, and entrepreneurship will change the world.”

“How wonderful to have a global day celebrating women, the roles we play in the home and our achievements in society.  May I wish all women the courage of their convictions, and the ability to greet each challenge with a smile!”

“I support International Women’s Day to recognise the role of women in society throughout the world and it is essential that their determination be celebrated across the world.”

According to today’s Telegraph, up to 820 jobs will be created as work begins on a new £200-million bioethanol plant in North East Lincolnshire.

Planning permission was granted for the plans from Vireol in July 2008,  and it has now been announced that building work on the Moody Lane plant will begin this summer.

The new plant wiill create 70 permanent posts once the plant is running in 2013, and up to 750 construction workers will be needed to build the plant.

Chief executive of Vireol, David Knibbs said that the vast majority of the new jobs will be given to local workers, who have a “good reputation” for the construction and running of chemical plants.

Mr Knibbs said:

“It has been quite a tough journey to get here, but this is going to be great for the local area. It will be centred around the creation of local jobs.  As far as we are concerned, we have the best site in Europe.

Mr Knibbs said that the majority of the wheat used at the plant would be from Lincolnshire farmers, via local grain merchant Gleddell, which will provide a welcome boost to the local agricultural industry, but Mr Knibbs is eager to avoid fears that by using wheat in this way, food prices would be forced up.

He said:

“The agricultural industry in the UK is not running at full capacity, and farmers are not being asked to produce as much as they physically can.

“What we can expect is that farmers will expand their production to meet the demand.”

The news has been welcomed by the chairman of the Louth branch of the National Farmers’ Union, John Smith, who farms in the Louth and Horncastle area.

Mr Smith said:

“This is a very exciting project, right on our doorstep, which ticks three or four major boxes.

“This is the first plant of its kind in Lincolnshire.  There is already one in Teeside, and one in Hull, but they don’t necessarily benefit Lincolnshire farmers, and this one will.”

Lord Ashcroft faced fresh allegations today following reports that he has avoided paying VAT on opinion polls that he had carried out for the Conservative party.

The non-dom Conservative Party deputy chairman finally revealed his tax status on Monday, finally bringing an end to much speculation and ten years of secrecy.

David Cameron and William Hague have both been asked questions about their honesty and competence after it has been discovered that Mr Hague knew Lord Ashcroft’s tax status months before his party leader, but failed to tell him.

The Guardian claims today that the Lord Ashcroft ordered a huge opinion poll in marginal constituencies in 2005 and paid through one of his companies in Belize, which meant that he avoided paying VAT on the transaction.

The opinion polls, which were carried out by YouGov and Populus, are estimated to have cost £250,000.

Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Vince Cable told the newspaper:

“This is quite serious.  We are now not talking just about Ashcroft’s non-dom status, but about systematic tax avoidance in funding Conservative party activities such as polling.

“How far were the Conservatives aware that Ashcroft did not pay VAT, as would have been incurred by any normal polling activity?”

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg delivered an attack on Gordon Brown following his appearance at the Chilcot inquiry into the Iraq war earlier today.

Speaking at the Scottish Liberal Democrat conference this afternoon, Mr Clegg said Brown had finally come clean over what he thought about the Iraq war.

Nick Clegg said:

“He has said today, finally he has come clean, that he believes the Iraq war was right. That tells you all you need to know about the moral compass of Gordon Brown,”

“He thinks it’s right that 179 brave British soldiers lost their lives in Iraq…that it was right that 150,000 Iraqi civilians lost their lives, that it was right that our reputation in international affairs is in tatters, that it was right that we went to war and yet find the world no safer after the war occurred. How can we trust a man like that?”

Nick said the Liberal Democrats had “spoken for the nation” in opposing the war.

“If you want to live in a world guided by values and principles, human rights, international rule of law, the dignity of citizens and nations around the globe, we know now that you were betrayed by Gordon Brown, you were betrayed by the Labour party, and I remain proud that it was this party, our party, your party, the Liberal Democrats, that were the only party that stood up to the rush to this illegal and immoral invasion.”

The Humber Link bus service, which provides a link between Grimsby and Hull, has received a subsidy of £10, 000 from North East Lincolnshire Council which will secure the future of the srvice for the immediate future.

The bus service is used by many people from North East Lincolnshire to visit friends and relatives, as well as patients of hospitals in the Hull area, and students attending the University.

 Further talks have been arranged by N E Lincs Council with Hull City Council, North Lincolnshire Council,Lincolnshire Council, and Humberside Airport to secure further funding towards the loss - making bus route.

Nick Clegg cast doubt on the Gordon Brown’s evidence to the Iraq inquiry, saying that it ‘flies in the face’ of what we had heard from frontline soldiers.

Mr Brown informed the inquiry that every request for equipment was granted by the Treasury, and that no military option was ever ruled out on the basis of cost, but Nick Clegg said:

“It flies completely in the face, it flatly contradicts, what we know about the shortages that our brave men and women fighting on the front line were facing.”

“I believe what the soldiers have said, what those who’ve been on the front line have said, and this is well documented.”

“Scotland deserves real change, and the Liberal Democrats are the only ones to deliver it,” said the Liberal Democrat Leader.

Ahead of today’s speech at the Scottish Liberal Democrat Spring Conference, Nick Clegg said:

“Labour has failed to deliver for Scotland. Labour’s banking crisis and recession has caused serious damage to the Scottish economy and businesses.

“Under the Labour Government the gap between rich and poor has grown wider and social mobility has foundered.

“In Scotland, life expectancy remains lower than anywhere else in the UK and it is losing jobs at the fastest rate in Western Europe.

“All this has to change and neither the Conservatives nor the SNP are capable of doing it.

“The Lib Dems in Scotland have set the political pace on our campaign for a fairer society.

“Scotland deserves real change, and the Liberal Democrats are the only ones to deliver it.

“Under a Liberal Democrat Government, you will not have to pay any income tax on the first £10,000 you earn.

“This will free half a million Scots on low incomes from having to pay any income tax at all and put £700 back in the pockets of people on low and middle incomes, providing an incentive to work and save.”

In this issue of LD2010 Nick calls for a fair start for children, Vince answers your questions on the economy and we launch ‘Why Vote Lib Dem.

Political Slot: A fair start for children

This week Nick spoke about Liberal Democrat plans to help improve the lives of children in Channel 4’s Political Slot. He also spoke to the Salvation Army about the importance of early years education in tackling inequality. Read our full policy on improving education here. Watch the video >

Danny Alexander launches ‘Why vote Lib Dem?’

This book, which went on sale yesterday, covers topics as varied as fair taxes, gay rights, looking after our armed forces, political reform and the fight against climate change.
Read more >
Ashcroft estimated to have saved £127m in tax

“Non-doms have to tell the taxman that their first allegiance is to another country. No-one should be a British lawmaker whose first allegiance is not to Britain,” said Chris Huhne.
Read more >

Labour has condemned people to overcrowded housing

“People should not be condemned to homes more suitable for battery hens. Labour has left us right back where we were under the last Conservative Government,” said Sarah Teather.
Read more >
Vince responds to your questions

Two week’s ago we asked you to submit questions to Vince Cable on the economy. Yesterday he recorded answers to the questions as voted for by you. He covers subjects including economic recovery, investing in green jobs and nuclear power. Watch the video >

5th - 7th February:
This weekend Scottish Lib Dems will be hosting their spring conference in Perth. Nick Clegg and Tavish Scott will talk about how we will make Scotland fairer.
Find out more >

12th - 14th March:
Birmingham will be hosting federal spring conference. Policy discussions will include a full debate on the youth policy paper, as well as consultation sessions on localism and international development. Find out more >

Housing charity Shelter claimed today that the Government has gone back on its commitment to revise the 1935 overcrowding standard.

The Government has responded to a Shelter petition, saying that it will not update the overcrowding standard, as promised in 2004, until “the right processes are in place to support overcrowded households”.

The response from the Government’s has arrved as latest statistics reveal the number of households in overcrowding has risen to more than 650,000, which is the highest level for more than 14 years.

Campbell Robb, chief executive of Shelter, said:

“Overcrowding is a huge blight on children’s lives, with devastating consequences for their health, education and future chances.

“It is simply unacceptable for this antiquated standard to remain in place, allowing kitchens and living rooms to be considered as acceptable places for children to sleep.

“After six years in which the Government has failed to keep its promise, we urgently need a uniform statutory standard for England which delivers a modern understanding of space and privacy, together with significant resources to end this hidden part of our housing crisis.”

“Investment in health and education is a false economy if children are being brought up in cramped conditions, more vulnerable to health problems and unable to find space to do their homework.”

The Government says that it has provided £15 million over three years to support local authorities to tackle overcrowding, but this is the equivalent of only £32 a year for each overcrowded family in the social rented sector.

The response from the Government also mentioned its commitment to ensure that a third of new affordable homes that will be built over the next year have three or more bedrooms, but Shelter points out that with house building at its lowest level since 1946 and less than a quarter of affordable homes built last year being family-sized, this target could take much longer to achieve.

Mr Robb added:

“Shelter is calling on all political parties to make tackling overcrowding a priority in the next parliament. This means urgently updating the standard, delivering significantly more family-sized homes, and increasing funding to stop the terrible impact overcrowding has on children’s lives.”

Liberal Democrat Shadow Housing Minister Sarah Teather said: “Labour’s betrayal of the hundreds of thousands of families stuck in cramped conditions is frankly unforgivable.
 
“Overcrowding means children unable to do their homework, and families falling apart due to the stress of living on top of each other. 
 
“Labour has left us right back where we were under the last Conservative Government.  We urgently need to bringing many more homes back into use and update the outdated rules on overcrowding.
 
“People should not be condemned to homes more suitable for battery hens.” 

“The Liberal Democrats will change the rules so that fuel bills reflect fuel costs and consumers are not ripped off again and again,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary.

Commenting on Scottish and Southern Energy’s decision to cut gas bills by an average of 4%, Simon Hughes said:

“Token price cuts in March won’t fool customers already hit by bumper bills.

“Wholesale prices have plummeted but customers have hardly seen any benefit.

“The Liberal Democrats will change the rules so that fuel bills reflect fuel costs and consumers are not ripped off again and again.”

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary.

Commenting on reports from the Electoral Commission that Tory officials had refused requests to be interviewed by investigators, Chris Huhne said:

“It’s extraordinary that officials of a major political party should refuse a meeting to answer questions from the regulator designed to ensure funding is open and honest.

“It’s the equivalent of a criminal suspect asking a police officer whether their work is really necessary. 

“The Conservatives must now answer the question about who told their officials to withhold cooperation from the Electoral Commission. On whose authority was this request refused?”

Around 110,000 women are each set to miss out on up to £10,400 over the next decade because they were born as little as a day too early to benefit from changes to state pension rules, Liberal Democrat research has revealed.

Government reforms mean that from 6 April this year, both men and women will need to make 30 years of National Insurance payments to be eligible for the full state pension.

The changes mean that a woman who has paid National Insurance for 30 years whose 60th birthday falls on 6 April would be entitled to a full state pension, whereas a woman who was born a day earlier and has worked just as long would only be entitled to three quarters of this – or around £75 a week in 2010-11. This could mean women retiring this year before the 6 April cut off could miss out on as much as £10,400 over the next decade.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Steve Webb said: 

“The April 2010 changes to the rules on state pensions are entirely welcome and long overdue. But they create a cliff-edge for those who reach pension age immediately beforehand. 

“Many of these women could lose out on up to £10,000 simply for being born a few days too early.  

“Big changes like this should be phased in. Even now, the Government could look again at how it is working out pensions for women retiring in 2009/10 and consider giving them some of the benefit of the new rules.”

A former chief executive of the Conservative party has accused William Hague and David Cameron of showing poor judgment by failing to ask Lord Ashcroft some “pretty obvious questions” about his tax affairs.

Senior Conservative frontbenchers have been showing their disappointment that their leaders had failed to resolve Ashcroft’s tax status, with one even warning of a “fuck-up”, former Chief Executive of the Conservatives.

Barry Legg, said the millionaire peer had caused damage to the party through giving the impression that he is not committed to Britain.

Mr Legg, said:

“It has been a bit of an embarrassment for quite some time that a major donor was in all likelihood not domiciled … it is damaging that you have somebody contribute so much money to the Conservative party who basically doesn’t want to pay taxes in this country. It questions the commitment of that donor to the country.”

“There are some pretty obvious questions to ask,”

“It looks as if those people in a position to ask those questions have decided for whatever reason not to press the matter.

“It probably reflects poor judgment on the part of people that are in charge of the party. People haven’t pressed the questions. Well, they’re pretty obvious questions. People who are pretty bright should be able to work out what those questions are and require an answer.”

The Green Party’s candidate for Weston super Mare has withdrawn from the General Election contest before it has even begun because he wants Liberal Democrat Mike Bell to win the seat.

Dr Richard Lawson had been nominated by his party to fight the Weston seat currently held by the Conservatives, but Dr Lawson has today announced his decision to withdraw his candidacy “to increase the chance of the Liberal Democrats taking the seat”.

Dr Lawson said:

“This is the result of a great deal of soul-searching over the past weeks. The thing that swung it for me is the recent news that the Conservative opinion poll lead is declining. This raises a faint possibility that the LibDems could win in Weston.

“My candidature was founded on the idea that Weston was a safe Conservative win. That platform becomes shaky if Weston becomes vulnerable to a LibDem gain.

“I could not live with myself if the Greens in Weston got, say, 1,000 votes, and the Tory won by a margin of 100 votes over the LibDem, and David Cameron formed a Government with an overall majority of one.

“I urge all who would have voted Green to vote instead for Mike Bell.”

Liberal Democrat candidate Mike Bell said:

“I welcome Dr Lawson’s decision. Weston is a marginal seat and Dr Lawson confirms that the choice here is between myself and our sitting Conservative MP.

“Many people view the prospect of a Conservative majority at Westminster with concern, especially when we have seen what real Conservative leadership looks like in our own Town Hall. I am determined to give local people a chance to vote for real change at the General Election and, for the first time in our history, send a Westonian to Westminster.”

“Overcrowding means children unable to do their homework, and families falling apart due to the stress of living on top of each other,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Housing Minister.

Commenting on today’s petition by Shelter to update the 1935 overcrowding standard, Sarah Teather said:

“Labour’s betrayal of the hundreds of thousands of families stuck in cramped conditions is frankly unforgivable.
 
“Overcrowding means children unable to do their homework, and families falling apart due to the stress of living on top of each other. 
 
“Labour has left us right back where we were under the last Conservative Government.  We urgently need to bringing many more homes back into use and update the outdated rules on overcrowding.
 
“People should not be condemned to homes more suitable for battery hens.”

“He always stood up for what he believed in, even if that meant inviting unpopularity at times. His intellectual integrity is an example to everyone in politics,” said the Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg.

Commenting on the death of former Labour Leader Michael Foot, Nick Clegg said:

“Michael Foot was great parliamentarian, a great intellectual and a great idealist.

“He always stood up for what he believed in, even if that meant inviting unpopularity at times. His intellectual integrity is an example to everyone in politics.”

“We need to make sure every child gets an excellent education, not just a lucky few,” the Liberal Democrat Shadow Schools Secretary will say.

At a speech to CentreForum’s Conference on ‘School Reform; from policy to practice’ today, David Laws will say:

“The Conservatives’ plans for education are fundamentally flawed.

“Their apparent commitment to a Pupil Premium is totally meaningless unless extra money is put in.  Without extra money, many schools will see their budgets cut.  

“This will be even more devastating at a time when public spending will be squeezed, especially as the Tories are already targeting the Education budget for cuts.

“It makes no sense to give freedoms to some schools, but deny them to others.  The Conservative plans to simply rely on the market, without any accountability or local oversight will not work and will have little impact in the vast majority of schools. 

“We need to make sure every child gets an excellent education, not just a lucky few.”

Actor Colin Firth, former Director of Public Prosecutions Sir Ken Macdonald QC and musician Brian Eno have all contributed to a book entitled ‘Why Vote Liberal Democrat’.

The book, which goes on sale on Thursday, covers topics as varied as fair taxes, gay rights, looking after our armed forces, political reform and the fight against climate change.

Other contributors include Gurkha veteran Madan Kumar Gurung, political reform campaigner Pam Giddy and Duwayne Brooks, Stephen Lawrence’s best friend who was with him on the night he died.

Commenting Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg said:

“There are hundreds of reasons to vote Liberal Democrat, but there is also just one reason: the will to create a better, fairer Britain by doing things differently. This is what unites all the contributors to this book.

“I am delighted such a great group of people from so many different backgrounds have come together to share their reasons for backing the Liberal Democrats.”

“Liberal Democrats will give schools the money to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with more individual support by committing an extra £2.5bn,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Schools Secretary.Commenting on today’s IFS report ‘The Pupil Premium: assessing the options’, which shows how many schools would have their budgets cut under Conservative plans to bring in a Pupil Premium without extra funding, David Laws said:

“This independent report confirms the Tories’ proposals would be disastrous for thousands of schools, wrecking opportunities for millions of children.  

“The Conservatives’ plans will mean many schools have their budgets slashed.
 
“David Cameron may talk about raising standards but his plans commit no pounds and no pence of extra money to our schools.  He now needs to be honest about the devastating impact this will have on England’s schools. 
 
“Liberal Democrats will give schools the money to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with more individual support by committing an extra £2.5bn. This extra cash and our plans to set schools free to raise standards will give every child a fair start in life.”

The row over Lord Ashcroft will not go away for the Tories

Douglas Alexander MP, Labour’s General Election Co-ordinator responded to the latest revelations about Lord Ashcroft and William Hague in the Guardian and The Times said:

“Tonight’s revelations shift the focus of the Ashcroft saga firmly to William Hague’s door.

“These letters show that he promised the then Prime Minister, and the Political Honours Scrutiny Committee that Lord Ashcroft would become resident in the UK for tax purposes and pay in William Hague’s own words to the Prime Minister “tens of millions a year in tax”.

The papers also suggested that he was not suitable for a peerage.

Last night the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable called on the HMRC to review Ashcroft’s tax status in the UK.

He said:

“There does seem to be a strong case for HMRC to investigate the potential abuse of non-dom status,”

It also emerged last night that Vince Cable’s colleague Chris Huhne had written to the HMRC and he said an inquiry was necessary to establish whether Ashcroft had wrongly avoided paying more than £127million in taxes. Liberal Democrat Peer, Lord Oakeshott in the meantime has written to Gordon Brown and the cabinet secretary, Gus O’Donnell, to demand the immediate release of all documents to substantiate Ashcroft’s claims – specifically that the government agreed to downgrade the undertaking he made when he was ennobled to become a UK resident to allow him to retain his non-dom status.

The Cabinet Office, which holds all the documents relating to Ashcroft’s ennoblement, confirmed that it agreed with him that an undertaking to become a “permanent resident”, under which he would pay full tax, could be replaced with a commitment that he would “live indefinitely and would therefore be a long-term resident”, to ensure he lived in the UK and attended the Lords. That change was made in June 2000, a few weeks after his conditional nomination was announced, but the Cabinet Office would not clarify whether this affected his tax status, or how Ashcroft subsequently used a loophole in the law introduced eight years later which allowed “long-term residents” to remain non-doms.Chris Huhne’s letter, to Lesley Strathie, the chief executive of HM Revenue and Customs, states that there are still important questions to answer.

The letter says:

“I am writing to ask that you investigate the tax affairs of Lord Ashcroft to ensure that he pays full UK taxes on his worldwide income from the tax year 2000-2001 and that his status as a non-domiciled taxpayer is rendered void,”

Chris Huhne refers to Ashcroft’s original promise to become a permanent resident and calculates that the tax saved by being a non-dom would amount to £127million over 10 years.

Lord Oakeshott’s letter urges the release of all documents to clarify the nature of the “subsequent dialogue” Ashcroft said he had with the government which “reversed” his original undertaking to Hague to become a permanent resident.

The Tories must now stop dithering over Lord Ashcroft; they must come clean and tell the truth.

The election Commission has found that more than half of young people eligible to vote have not registered

Officials have been asked to make another effort to persuade more people to register for the general election.

The Electoral Commission said more than 3.5 million people may not be registered.  It’s research suggested 56% of 17-25 year olds were not on the electoral register, and
criticised “token” efforts by some election officials to encourage more people to register to vote.

The Electoral Commission said some election registration officers were not doing enough to raise awareness of the need for people to register.

The electoral Commission carried out research in eight local authorities to check how complete their electoral registers were.

People must be on the local electoral roll if they want to vote in the next general election, which is widely expected to be held on 6 May as well as the local elections which will take place on the same day.

The Commission said its findings suggested that only 44% of 17 to 24-year-olds were registered to vote, and only 69% of voters from ethnic minorities. Of people who had moved house in the last year, only 21% were registered.

People are elgible to register to vote from the age of 16, although they will not be able to actually vote until they are 18, but the commission said that 3.5 million eligible voters were missing in 2001 and due to a decrease in registered voters in the early 2000s, there might be even more now.

In its annual assessment of the performance of returning officers, the Commission says generally they have improved across all areas, but it said performance in raising public awareness of the need to register to vote was “particularly weak”.

The report said:

“In many instances promotional work appears to be a token approach to demonstrate that the statutory duty is being met, rather than reflecting a well-thought-out approach to improving registration rates in localities where they are lower,”

Commission chairman Jenny Watson said the general election could be called at any time and there may only be a few days to register once that happened.

She said the failure of some election officials to promote registration “isn’t good enough” and added:

“We have asked every registration officer to make one final push before the general election.”

“We need to ask fundamental questions about the timing of our annual canvass in the autumn when elections are typically in the spring,” she added.

John Turner, of the Association of Electoral Administrators, told the BBC that voter participation was “an area that clearly needs improvement - I don’t think anyone would disagree with that”.

He said:

“This is clearly an area of concern and something that needs improving, and I would go along with the conclusion the Electoral Commission have drawn - that we need to go back to basics and question the whole way of doing registration.”

He added that he had long believed that the annual canvass should be carried out closer to the election.

David Cameron the Conservatives had hoped that the controversy over Lord Ashcroft would just go away, but the fact remains that the issue is not a “dead horse”, but we need to know how Lord Ashcroft is funding the Tory Party.  

It is now time for the Electoral Commission to conclude their investigation into donations made by Bearwood Corporate Services Limited to the Conservative Party. This evening the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said he has written to the HMRC urging them to investigate the tax status and tax affairs of Tory donor Lord Ashcroft and ask him to pay owed money back.

Chris Huhne said:

“For him to be a legislator in the House of Lords when he was not paying taxes is shameful.”

Chris Huhne said Ashcroft owed £127million from non-paid taxes over the last 10 years, and rejecting claims by David Cameron that the issue was a “dead horse”, he said that “This is not over yet.”

Earlier today the Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg

“I think if you are seeking to influence the outcome of the next general election… then it is wholly wrong that you basically seek to pay taxes only partially in this country.”

“We urgently need a nationwide scheme to make every home a warm home,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary.

Commenting on the Government’s announcement of a green loans scheme for households who want to make energy efficient improvements to their homes, Simon Hughes said:

“It is staggering that it has taken this Government nearly 13 years to come up with plans to green our homes and cut people’s fuels bills.

“Refurbishing our homes should be a win-win situation, but Labour has bungled this kind of thing before.

“Today’s announcement will leave millions of families without the warm homes they need for up to 20 years.

“We urgently need a nationwide scheme to make every home a warm home.”

Lord Ashcroft is estimated to have saved more than £127m in British tax since he became a member of the House of Lords, according to Liberal Democrat research.

Lord Ashcroft’s annual tax saving is conservatively estimated to be £12.76m and he has been a member of the House of Lords for a decade.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said:

“Anyone who wants to pass laws in this country should pay this country’s full taxes and not hide behind the special offshore status of non-doms.
 
“Non-doms have to tell the taxman that their first allegiance is to another country. No-one should be a British lawmaker whose first allegiance is not to Britain.
 
“On even the most conservative estimates, Lord Ashcroft has avoided vast amounts of British tax by deploying the non-dom tax dodge. If he challenges our estimate of how much tax he has dodged, then there is a simple solution: publish the figure.”

“Liberal Democrats will give schools the money to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with more individual support by committing an extra £2.5bn,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Schools Secretary.

Commenting on today’s IFS report ‘The Pupil Premium: assessing the options’, which shows how many schools would have their budgets cut under Conservative plans to bring in a Pupil Premium without extra funding, David Laws said:

“This independent report confirms the Tories’ proposals would be disastrous for thousands of schools, wrecking opportunities for millions of children.  

“The Conservatives’ plans will mean many schools have their budgets slashed.
 
“David Cameron may talk about raising standards but his plans commit no pounds and no pence of extra money to our schools.  He now needs to be honest about the devastating impact this will have on England’s schools. 
 
“Liberal Democrats will give schools the money to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with more individual support by committing an extra £2.5bn. This extra cash and our plans to set schools free to raise standards will give every child a fair start in life.”

Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader and Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable in a speech to the Green Alliance has today re-affirmed the Liberal Democrat commitment to environmentalism.

In his speech, Vince Cable:

• Argues that the recession provides a unique opportunity to re-shape our economy and that environmental goals can go hand in hand with job creation
• Suggests that a creating a ‘green spine’ for the economy will allow many diverse activities to branch from it, from the creative industries and pharmaceutical and biological science through to specialist IT services
• Reiterates the party’s commitment to setting up an Infrastructure Bank
• Reaffirms the party’s objection to Heathrow expansion and new nuclear power

Thank you for the kind invitation to speak to you.

The fact that you have invited me I take as a challenge to demonstrate that the Liberal Democrats see the environment in holistic terms: not as a separate set of concerns but connected to mainstream economic policy. I am also aware that I am following in the footsteps of Mr George Osborne. I see that, since that meeting, the Tories have deleted the environment from their list of 10 Reasons to Vote Conservative. I don’t know what you did to him but I can assure you that I won’t react in the same way. The environment – defined as part of a sustainable economy - will be a major plank of our election message.

When you mark your card after the beauty parade of political parties may I suggest that depth of commitment is not measured only, or even mainly, by the number of boxes which the parties tick in terms of policy statements. To explain the Liberal Democrat position on the environment, I go back a generation to the late 1970s. At that time, I wasn’t involved in Liberal politics; I worked for a Labour Minister, John Smith. I was however intrigued by an earnest group of people who came round my local streets in Twickenham collecting bundles of paper for recycling. In truth, I think I regarded them as rather loopy. But they weren’t a joke. A few years later they wiped out the local Labour Party, defeated the Conservatives and, having taken over the council, launched a pioneering drive in municipal recycling which we now regard as a basic function of local government. And twenty years ago when climate change was still a subject confined to the scientific journals Paddy Ashdown asked me – I had just become the candidate for Twickenham – to set up a group looking at the issue, out of which came the ideas for green taxes on which we have continued to build. The Green Fiscal Commission we regard as the best source of new thinking on the subject.

Perhaps I could indulge in a few more personal recollections: not to personalise the arguments but so that you are clear where I am coming from. My starting point is that of a fairly hard-nosed economist whose formative years were spent working in or with developing country governments in Africa, South Asia and Latin America. I had a pretty negative view of conservationists who seemed obsessed by preserving animals and views for rich, white, people to look at while keeping the local population in a romanticised traditional lifestyle. I saw my job as identifying ways of helping an expanding population of poor people to improve their living standards. And I regarded as economically illiterate the Club of Rome, anti growth, theorists whose obsession with raw materials running out took no account of prices. I confess that I continue to trail various environmental heresies with mixed results. Some years ago I was ranting about the fallacy of the concept of ‘food miles’ at a public meeting and seriously annoyed a farmer in the audience, a lady with strong, green, views. The argument continued after the meeting but it was resolved; we are now very happily married.

But my first encounter with serious environmental thinking was as part of the small team which worked with Mrs Brundtland to produce Our Common Future in the mid-1980s and which first launched the concept of ‘sustainable development’. ‘Sustainable development’ has become a mantra we all now use. But it emerged from fierce debate between those, mainly from developed countries, who wanted economic growth slowed down to take account of environmental damage and limits, and those with a developing countries standpoint, including me, who wanted economic growth speeded up to reduce poverty. ‘Sustainable development’ was an ideological compromise – a plea for growth which respects the environment. The underlying tension remains and is reflected in the way different views of the EU on the one hand and China and India on the other at Copenhagen. ‘Converge and contract’ – the compromise formula for climate change – is designed to resolve that tension but agreement is a long way off. And both sides are right. The continued growth of greenhouse gas emissions threatens serious consequences for the next generation. But the rapid growth achieved in China , especially, and India in the last three decades has lifted hundreds of millions out of poverty and there is an enormous, understandable, appetite to continue.

I moved from Brundtland to work on the first of the major intergovernmental reports on climate change to Commonwealth Prime Ministers and worked with the East Anglia scientists and others who were trying to raise awareness of the issue over two decades ago. I was persuaded of the need to take climate change seriously – as was Mrs Thatcher, one of the Heads of Government to whom the report was presented – by the rigour of the climate scientists: stating that there was a problem but always acknowledging uncertainty and the range of error; never overstating the case.

No one could now complain about lack of awareness of the climate change issue. But I worry about the damage done by failure at Copenhagen and the process of rapid political retreat now taking place, particularly in the USA. The underlying problem is that climate change is an elite project with a narrow and thin political base. It depends critically on public trust in science and scientists. That trust has now been dented. I know that the sceptics are employing every dirty trick in the book and are wildly overstating the significance of a few pieces of slipshod work and exaggerated claims. But much damage has been done to trust in climate science. I don’t agree with a lot of George Monbiot’s work but he was absolutely spot on in his tough response to the slippage of scientific standards. Scientists complaining about emails being stolen and the burden of FOI requests are behaving like the more obtuse MPs during the expenses crisis.

What is now required to restore trust is to reassert the importance and values of science: making it clear that man made global warming is not a fact but a scientific hypothesis with strong evidential support; that there is a lot of uncertainty about magnitudes and impacts; but that the costs of preventive action are likely to be much less than the cost of climate change if it materialises. Climate science must be open to challenge, like all good science. It is not a religion. And critics, however tiresome, have to be treated with courtesy not abused (I can’t be the only person who takes deep offence at the term ‘climate change deniers’, equating sceptics with neo-Nazi holocaust deniers). Those of us who are still convinced that climate change is a major challenge have to reflect that humility if the arguments are not to be lost, irretrievably. What I can assure you is that the Liberal Democrats will continue to give prominence to climate change as a crucial issue we must address.
   
But let me turn to our approach to policy. Where economics and environment come together is in recognising that the costs of environmental pollution should be captured in the price. A proper marriage of economics and environment would sweep away the array of subsidies, protectionist trade policies and tax breaks which disguise the costs of farming, water extraction, fishing, timber production, waste disposal, energy production, mining and manufacturing. Pollution costs would be taxed as the rather dry pre-Keynesian economist Pigou argued almost a century ago. There has been some progress at least in the developed world to tackle that agenda. The Liberal Democrats bring together environmentalism and liberal market economics and are comfortable promoting sustainable economics; while our sister parties, in Canada and Germany for example, have a track record of delivering on the ground.

That is also the rationale for carbon taxes which are clearly the best way of setting a carbon price for consumers and producers. Liberal Democrats support the concept. But in practice we are starting from somewhere else: a complicated system of national taxes bearing quite heavily on motor vehicles but hardly at all on domestic heating or aviation, with a modest industrial – climate change – levy and an EU carbon trading regime (which has so far had minimal impact on the carbon price because permits have been issued too liberally and grandfathered rather than auctioned).

We suggest that one useful step forward is to introduce realistic pricing for aviation in ways that circumvent the treaty restrictions on taxing aviation fuel. Aviation is a rapidly growing source of emissions and the last redoubt of the old idea that polluters don’t and won’t pay. Aviation has unfair, distorting tax advantages over competing modes of transport, notably long distance rail, because there is no tax on fuel, no charge for landing rights which, in a sensible world, would be auctioned (and in contrast to the track charges imposed on rail operators) and with subsidised landing charges (cross-subsidised by shopping in the bizarre, Alice in Wonderland world of aviation regulation). As a result aviation does not pay for carbon, or localised – nitrogen dioxide – pollution or the disamenity of noise, especially at night. We suggest as one – modest – first step: changing the tax base, and increasing tax, by applying it to flight take-offs in a way which captures the emissions generated by the engines and flight distance and scrapping the current ticket tax which penalises the efficient use of aircraft and doesn’t tax air freight. We would aim to raise £2.6bn from this green tax which would contribute towards cuts in direct taxation on the low paid. We are also opposed to the current ‘predict and provide’ approach to airport expansion in the South East. We hope that the Conservatives will be as good as their word in working with us to stop Heathrow expansion in particular.

Road transport is already taxed relatively heavily in the UK by international comparison – a fact which encourages road hauliers to dodge British tax by filling up with diesel on the continent. But despite unpopular tax indexation, the cost of motoring has risen less rapidly than the cost of bus or train travel. Moreover, petrol duty and VED make no distinction between travel on congested roads where there are alternatives and remote rural areas where there is no congestion and no alternative. We should be moving towards a proper road user pricing system for which the technology is now available. Tax is however only one way of changing behaviour. A more direct route is a tightening of energy efficiency standards – miles per gallon – for new vehicles along the lines advocated by my former boss at Shell, Mark Moody-Stuart.

Tougher standards – for insulation in new building are likely to work better for domestic heating than the price mechanism – higher taxes – which would cause fuel poverty with only a very blunt incentive to invest in energy efficiency. And in parallel there has to be a concerted drive to improve the existing housing stock, street by street, rather than the current fragmented, shambolic, set of programmes.

There are big strategic choices to be made in power generation. At present, progress on new renewables in the UK is pitifully slow and the opportunities for changing the basic model of energy delivery to local, distributed, power systems is being missed, though feed in tariffs will help in future. The government has effectively shelved the 2003 White Paper which set out a strategic framework based on energy conservation, new renewables and – transitional – gas. Intensive lobbying has led to agreement for a new generation of coal-fired power stations as at Kingsnorth and more importantly support for a new generation of nuclear power stations. I appreciate that nuclear power has attractions to many in the green movement because it is an – almost – zero carbon fuel. Its proponents have also cunningly exploited public anxieties about energy security with wildly exaggerated stories about disruption to gas supplies which, in the case of the UK, are very diverse and safe. The hidden costs of nuclear waste storage and decommissioning are vast. When I spoke in Parliament against the bailout of British energy in 2003, some of the best analysis I encountered came from Greenpeace.  The Liberal Democrats oppose new nuclear power not from some theological opposition to the principle – it would be ludicrous to declare war on physics – but because of the potential hidden cost – the blank cheque needed from the taxpayer - and the potential which nuclear power has to ‘crowd out’ new renewables. A traditional, grid based, system gets in the way of more innovative, distributed, localised systems.

But the whole environmental agenda is in danger of being derailed by the current economic crisis. Economic necessity concentrates the mind. The environment has plummeted down the list of the electorate’s priorities.

Much of the established green approach, resting as it does on environmental taxes and a more general approach to frugality, assumes that there is a large appetite for self flagellation. For those people who clamoured for a zero growth world – well, here it is and it isn’t very nice.

Fortunately there is a growing recognition that the current economic crisis presents opportunities as well as threats to environmental thinking. The key issue is jobs and where they come from. Britain has a major short term problem of cyclical unemployment or underemployment arising from the banking collapse and recession and a longer term structural problem of generating jobs and growth out of an economy which can no longer rely on consumption driven by household debt, inflated property prices and the high octane economy of the sharks and young bloods in the City.

The short term problem cries out for classic Keynesian public works based on ‘shovel ready’ projects. The construction sector has been the worst hit by the recession and arguably has the richest potential for job creation directly and through supplier industries from timber frames to ceramic fitting. There is massive pent up demand for social housing, and supply is seriously constrained by lack of funding. Improvement of empty and substandard property for rent is one – relatively cheap – way forward. The Liberal Democrats have also been arguing for a concerted programme of home insulation.  Since we acknowledge that there is a major fiscal contraction ahead and no scope for enlarging deficit financing we identify savings from government spending which can be redeployed in this way. Environmental goals can be neatly reconciled with job creation. I shy away from the term ‘green jobs’ since it implies that non-green jobs like being a car mechanic or a gas fitter are somehow less worthwhile which is not right or sensible. Indeed I note with some amusement that the centrepiece of President Obama’s ‘green’ public works programme is road building.

Liberal Democrats are anxious to ensure that the baby of environmentalism is not thrown out with the bath water of unsustainable public spending. We are, for example, seeking to use some of your ideas on carbon spending for saving money.

The term Green New Deal also captures the convergence of economic and environmental aims. The term suggests a short term, recession, programme but it has been better described to me by Colin Hines, one of the authors of the idea, as creating a ‘green spine’ for the economy from which many diverse activities will branch. It is already possible to see some of the activities around which future employment and growth will occur – creative industries; pharmaceutical and biological science; specialist IT based services; health and education services; and financial services disarmed of their destructive potential.

Environmental services and industries are another and could be a leading sector with encouragement. Much will happen spontaneously led by market demand. But this new economy will require infrastructure, preferably a green one. There is a potentially vast demand for digital infrastructure, new and improved public transport, renewable power production and transmission systems plus the education and training of a new generation of scientists, engineers and skilled workers to operate this new economy. The Government is not going to be able to finance much of the infrastructure because the public sector balance sheet is so weak. The funding will have to come from the private sector and I have been promoting the idea of an Infrastructure Bank tapping into the hundreds of billions in annuity funds of pension and insurance companies looking for a home in the UK or retail investment in what could be ‘green bonds’. Part of its remit would be environmental but it would clearly have a broader infrastructure role. It could also mobilise private, retail, investors looking for an attractive, long term productive use of their savings. Colin Hines has coined the term ‘savers and saviours’ – what is needed is the imagination and leadership to link employment growth, environmental imperatives and the self interest of entrepreneurs and investors.

The Liberal Democrats want to work with like-minded people to develop that vision. We must take these ideas forward on all fronts: national, international and local.  Birmingham City Council which we run in joint administration with the Conservatives has advanced plans for a municipal green new deal.  Given our traditions of localism, we have more confidence in bottom up than top down initiatives. A sustainable future will require both.

The General Election result risks being ‘tainted’ if the large sums donated by Lord Ashcroft to the Conservatives are found to be illegal, the Liberal Democrats have said.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne has written to the Electoral Commission to ask it to conclude its inquiry before the General Election.
 
In the letter, Chris Huhne said:

“Should the Conservative Party secure a majority following the General Election using donations made by Bearwood Corporate Services Limited, and your investigation were to conclude after the General Election that these donations were illegal, this would raise serious concerns about the legality and validity of the entire election result.”

It was claimed last night that Conservative peer Lord Ashcroft has deprived the public of more than £127 million in a 10-year-long tax dodge.

The amount was estimated after the Conservative party’s biggest donor yesterday admitted he is a “non-dom” and does not pay all of his taxes in the UK.

Lord Ashcroft, whose main business interests are in Belize, has promised to take up UK residence permanently in return for his peerage 10 years ago.

Lib Dem Chris Huhne, who calculated the figures, said:

“He’s avoided vast sums in a non-dom tax dodge.”

The Ashcroft scandal is another blow for Conservative leader David Cameron, whose party’s lead has been gradually decreasing in the opinion polls.

The news will also cause outrage because Ashcroft’s £127 million could have been spent on schools, hospitals and frontline police officers.

Lord Ashcroft’s fortune has been estimated to be £1,100million, which would earn him at least £55 million in income.

The Tory deputy chairman would have paid £12.76 million a year in tax on it if he was based in Britain.

That means over 10 years the public losing out on £127,600,000 in lost income.

Mr Huhne added:

“Anyone who wants to pass laws about tax in this country should pay the full taxes and not hide behind the special offshore status of non-doms.

“If he challenges our estimate, then there is a simple solution: publish the figure.”

A Tory official said: “The same question could equally well be asked of the non doms who
have given Labour £10million since 2001.”
How the taxpayer has missed out £127.6M

Lord Ashcroft’s fortune is estimated at £1,100 million by the Sunday Times Rich List.

A 5% annual return is £55m. If he kept 80% offshore taxpayers would miss income from £44m.
He can split his tax between capital gains and income tax.

At 18%, capital gains tax on £22m = £3.96m, plus 40% income tax on £22m = £8.8m. That’s £12.76m a year or £127.6m in 10 years

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg has today set out the importance of early years education in tackling inequality in a speech to the Salvation Army. Committing the Liberal Democrats to invest an extra £2.5bn in schools, Nick Clegg said that parents and schools must work together to make sure that children get the best possible start in life.

I’d like to thank the Salvation Army for inviting me to speak today.
 
Last winter, I went out with your Sheffield branch at the crack of dawn to try and help some rough sleepers.
It was a wet cold morning, and we found ourselves in a derelict warehouse, windows smashed, rubble and refuse everywhere, needles strewn across the floor, where people were sleeping in the most horrible conditions imaginable.
And – for the first time – I truly understood the reach the Salvation Army has.
Right into the most distressing, most hidden, parts of our society.  
Where you help people without judgement, without prejudice, without expectation.
An ethos which represents the best side of all of us.
 
Let me take this opportunity to congratulate you particularly for your Seeds of Exclusion Programme.
That work has been enormously revealing in terms of the complex relationships between the different forces that lead to social exclusion.
 
There is a simple principle that the Salvation Army, the Liberal Democrats, and many of the organisations here today share:
It’s this: the fortunes of someone’s life should not be decided at their birth.
A person’s fate shouldn’t be settled by their sex, their colour, their postcode, or their parents’ bank balance.

In a fair society no one can tell you to lower your sights because - no matter how hard you try - the things you dream of somehow aren’t for you. 
 
I want to talk about that society today.
About how we don’t live in it yet, but about how we can.
If we are willing to tackle the unfairness that sends some children along one path while others are left behind.
If we intervene to head off the destructive patterns of behaviour that take root when people are young.
If we invest in people before it becomes too late – investing in our schools to close the gap between children from deprived homes and those who are better off.
  
Let’s start with where we are.
Britain isn’t fair.
There is profound inequality everywhere you look: how much people earn, the homes they live in, the schools they send their children to.
In a fair society there will be differences between people’s lifestyles, of course.
But your place in society won’t be decided for you; it will be up to you to decide for yourself.

That is a socially mobile Britain.  
Some people say it is too much to hope for.
How can you move everyone upwards? There isn’t enough space at the top.
I say: that’s an excuse.
It is shrugging your shoulders at unfairness.
It is getting in the way of making Britain better.
 
Better than 23% of children living in poverty.
Better than millions of pensioners seeing out the winter in a single room because they can’t afford to heat their whole house.
Better than a baby born today in a poorer part of my city, Sheffield, dying on average 14 years before a baby born in a wealthier neighbourhood down the road.
 
We heard last month from the National Equality Panel that the richest 10% of people in Britain are now more than 100 times as wealthy as the poorest 10%.
In 1997, when New Labour was first elected, no one would have believed it would end like this, but Labour’s bright, shiny promise of a fair society has faded away.
And all that remains is disappointment, hardship, and – worst of all – hopelessness.
 
I travel around the country every week.
The people I meet are angry, they want more for their families and their neighbourhoods, they’re desperate for change.
But too many are no longer sure that’s possible.
It’s a completely understandable reaction, after 18 harsh years under the Conservatives, followed by let down after let down from Labour.
But that sense of powerlessness is dangerous.
It’s stops people demanding the Britain they want to live in.
 
Our big task now is giving people back their hope.
It’s something the Salvation Army does every day – with people who have problems with drink or drugs, women escaping violent relationships, prisoners coming to terms with their pasts.
It’s how you help people turn their lives around.
We’re only going to turn this country around if we do the same: make people believe it is possible. 

For politicians, that means spelling out the big changes that really mean something to people.  
The Liberal Democrats have laid out four steps to do that.
Four steps we can begin taking immediately to make a real difference to people’s lives:
Fair taxes, a rebalanced economy, decent, honest politics, and a good start for all of our children.
I’d like to take each in turn, but I’ll concentrate on the last one.
Because so long as opportunity is a privilege for some children but not others, any programme to tackle inequality is condemned to failure.
 
First, tax.
Our tax system is grossly unfair.
It’s a scandal that the poorest 20% of people in the country still lose a bigger chunk of their incomes to the tax man than the richest 20%.
That a millionaire still pays a lower rate of tax on his capital gains than his cleaner does on his or her wages.
The Liberal Democrats would close the loopholes exploited by big business and the very wealthy, giving everyone else a break.
Low and middle income earners wouldn’t pay a penny on the first £10,000 they earn. Giving most people £700 back every year, while 3.6 million pensioners and people on low incomes wouldn’t pay any tax at all.
 
Second, rebalancing our economy.
For decades successive governments made our whole economy subservient to a single square mile: the City of London.
So when our financial services collapsed, British taxpayers and businesses were left paying the price.
My party understands that there are nearly 100,000 square miles in Britain.
We want to usher in a new era where growth and jobs are spread across the nation.
By placing a new emphasis on infrastructure, on people, and on green technology…
I want to live in a country where we learn to build things again, not just place bets on computer screens in the City of London.
 
Third, politics must be opened up.
Made honest, decent, relevant.
That means getting rid of the influence of big money that is contaminating our political system.
Introducing fair votes so every vote counts.
And empowering every member of our society, bar none, starting with giving people the right to sack badly behaved MPs. 

Finally, fairness for our children. 
 
Education is everything when it comes to opportunity.
How self assured we are, how equipped we are to deal with adult life, depends very much on the experiences we had when we were young.
And, when it’s done right, education can be society’s greatest liberator.
Because how well you do depends on how hard you work, and nothing else.
 
But Britain’s education system is failing too many children.
Despite the dedication of good schools and great teachers, one in three 11 year olds leave school unable to read and write properly.
And nearly half of 16 year olds leave school without 5 good GCSEs.
 
And it is the worst off children who are being let down most.
By the time children start their formal education the language skills of the poorest already trail nearly a year behind those of the children from middle income homes. 
By age 7 a bright but poor child will have been overtaken by his or her better off classmates.
By age 16 poorer teenagers are only half as likely to get 5 good GCSEs as everyone else.
That means less chance of further training, less chance of a good job, less chance of a stable life.
 
So what can we do?
 
Helping our schools make sure no child falls behind is half the answer.
And I will come on to how the Liberal Democrats would do that in a moment.
 
But schools can only do so much.
Because a good education doesn’t end at the school gate.
Every good parent knows that their children can only flourish if they are also taught the right values, given the right support, at home. 
If they are read to when their young, if someone checks their homework, if they are encouraged to ask question after question.  
 
For most parents providing that support is a natural reflex.
Life is hard for many working families.
But I meet plenty of mothers and fathers who work punishing hours and still find the time for their children’s education.
 
But, sadly, there are those who don’t.
A small minority of parents who do not see their children’s education as part of their duties as parents.
Who drop their children off in the morning, pick them up in the afternoon, and think that’s their job done.
 
Most probably their parents were the same with them.
But these are different times.
We now know, beyond any question, that, when it comes to a child’s development, what happens in the home is just as important – if not more – than what happens in the classroom.
That’s why, for example, children who are read to every day achieve better results.
 
When you deny a child that support, you hold them back.
Having a child is the greatest gift.
But it is a gift that carries duties.  
You hold their life’s fortunes in your hands.
When you let them down, you limit their chances.
And, you limit the chances of other children too.  
 
Because when your children fall behind…
When they lack self-confidence…
When they don’t place any value on education…
They’ll play up, and they’ll cause problems for everyone else.
 
We all remember from our own school days:
The pupils sat at the back of the class, disinterested, disengaged, disruptive.
Bored, having lost interest in a lesson they don’t understand; on the look out for other ways to entertain themselves.
Teachers try commendably to help those children, but the bad behaviour spirals.
Maybe they play truant, maybe they become bullies …
Maybe they never catch up, growing up into the lost young men and women organisations like the Salvation Army so often have to help. 
 
The knock on effect is that while teachers are busy trying to get those pupils to toe the line, there’s less time for everyone else, and all of the pupils suffer.
 
I’m a parent – I don’t imagine every classroom can be full of rows of perfectly behaved little angels.
But I don’t accept that a handful of parents who aren’t doing their job properly should be able to hold back the whole class.

 
So the Liberal Democrats in government would make a deal with parents:
You look after your children’s education at home…
And we will make sure they get the best start possible at school.
So on days like today, national offer day, you can rest assured that your children will move from a great primary school to a great secondary school.
 
I’m a liberal.

I don’t believe in the passive assumption that only government can – or should – fix the problems in our society.
Yes, there are huge flaws in our education system that will not be resolved without intervention by the state.
But governments can only make a difference if parents do their bit too.
 
For our part, the Liberal Democrats will make lifting the standard of education in this country an absolute priority.
We have pledged an extra £2.5bn to our schools.
Head teachers will be able to use that money on a whole range of measures to help pupils.
From recruiting the best teachers in the toughest schools, to providing lessons outside of the normal school day, to more catch up classes, more one to one tuition, and head teachers will be able to cut class sizes too.
 
The money will be targeted specifically to closing the gap between children from disadvantaged backgrounds and their wealthier classmates.
That is how we can tackle the inequality that blights our education system…
Which, as a report on social mobility I commissioned from Barnardo’s Chief Executive Martin Narey confirmed, is how we tackle the inequality that blights our society.
 
The extra investment helps not only the poorest children, but all of their classmates too.  
An average primary school could see an extra £90,000 in its budget.
Enough to cut class sizes from 27 to 20.
In an average secondary school, they could go down to 16.
That’s good for every child in the class.
 
The Institute of Fiscal Studies is publishing their analysis of this type of investment tomorrow, which I look forward to reading.
That is important work in moving this debate forward among policy makers.
But many parents will feel they don’t need a report to tell them what they already know:
That any measure which gives teachers more time with their child, and more time bringing into line the children who would otherwise be playing up, can only be a good thing.
 
Ask teachers too - I was at a primary school in Brent just a few weeks ago…
The teachers I spoke to don’t just want to supervise a room full of children.  
They want to teach.
 
The Government did, to their credit, pass a law to cap classes for 5-7 year olds.
But more than 8000 children are still in classes that are technically illegal.
A problem that, with the number of 5-7 year olds rising every year, is only going to get worse.
 
The evidence is clear:
Whilst smaller class sizes are not a panacea on their own, and whilst the effect of teaching children in smaller groups is less as children get older…
They can nonetheless have a dramatic effect on the educational performance of the youngest children.
And we all know that what happens in the first few years of a child’s time at school is of disproportionate importance to their subsequent life chances.
 
So providing smaller class sizes, especially for young children, is one of the most important changes our Pupil Premium will allow head teachers to introduce in their schools. 
 
Ask yourself this:
 
Why does Switzerland, which consistently tops the literacy tables, have some of the smallest primary school classes in the world?
 
Why are more than 60% of the poorest pupils in Rutland not getting any GCSEs higher than a D – where the average secondary school class contains 24 pupils…
While in Westminster, where the average class is only 19, do less than 20% of the poorest children achieve the same result?
 
And why do the best off families pay vast sums every term to send their children to private schools where classes are around half the size of state schools?
 
Because they know that pupils will pay more attention to teachers, there will be less disruption…
And more opportunity to identify individual pupils’ problems, and talents, as they emerge.
 
Under our plans smaller classes won’t be a privilege reserved for the rich.
Our Pupil Premium raises the funding per pupil, for the poorer children, to the same levels as the money spent per pupil in private schools.
Head teachers can use that money to have smaller classes, like in fee paying schools. Taking our poorest children a huge leap towards an education they would otherwise never be able to afford.
 
So education is at the very core of what the Liberal Democrats will be proposing to voters at this election.
We are now the only true party of education.
 
Labour, despite all the money it has put into schools, has failed to transform the life chances of thousands of children who need the most help.
The Conservatives parrot the language of school reform – but refuse to allocate a single penny to make their promises a reality.
 
We are spelling out exactly what we would do, how much it would cost, and how we would pay for it.
And we are asking parents to enter into a deal with us:
Your child’s education will be our number one priority;
Help us by making it your number one priority too.
 
The difference smaller class sizes can make is so important that our Pupil Premium is one of only two substantial and immediate proposals for new investment the Liberal Democrats are making at this election.
The other being a major investment programme in green infrastructure to create jobs and boost the economy.
 
The public finances continue to bear the strain of the economic crisis.
But we can find the money if we are prepared to take tough decisions about what the country can and cannot now afford.  
My party has, for example, identified money that can be saved by taking above-average earners out of the means-tested tax credit system.
By scrapping unnecessary government databases, like the Contact Point children’s database.
And by cutting the vast sums currently spent on central government, including halving the size of the Children Schools and Families Whitehall department…
As well as scaling back BECTA, the quango that tells schools which computers to buy.
These and other savings can be used to reduce our national deficit while we simultaneously invest in our priorities…
Like tackling the impact of disadvantage on a person’s life chances.  
 
The Conservatives have also promised to target funding towards disadvantaged pupils.
But they have not given any detail on how they will pay for it.
In fact, they have committed precisely no pounds and no pence.
It is, in my view, the height of cynicism to pledge a pupil premium – by definition an amount of money per pupil – without attaching a figure to it.
 
It is playing games with people’s hopes to dangle the promise of extra money for children in front of parents with no evidence you can come good on it. 
If they are planning to increase investment for disadvantaged pupils, they owe it to people to come clean about what they will cut to pay for it.
If they are planning simply to shift around existing school budgets, they owe it to schools to come clean on which ones are going to face cuts.
 
What we do know about the Conservatives is that they are going to cut funding for school buildings.
We can only assume – given they have talked about ringfencing the NHS, but have stayed quiet on education budgets – that they are going to cut those budgets overall.
So in the absence of any evidence that they will actually help the poorest children…
One thing we can be sure of is that their promise of ‘brazen elitism’ in our schools is bound to come true.
 
For the Liberal Democrats, education is at the heart of our vision for fairness.
I want us to get to people before they get to the organisations in this room.
 
Uprooting the inequality that is embedded in our schools won’t solve every problem.
But it will start to give every child a chance in life, irrespective of the circumstances of their birth.
It will mean that underachievement, low self-esteem, a lack of self confidence in the classroom, won’t blight a child’s education as widely as they do now.
I don’t want to live in a society where it is all too easy to predict in a maternity ward which children will do well and which children won’t.
 
I want to live in a society where every child has a chance.
 
I want to live in a fairer Britain.

Liberal Democrat Peer,Lord Oakeshott has thatclaimed this morning’s admission from Conservative party deputy chairman and major donor Lord Ashcroft that he is not domiciled in the United Kingdom for tax purposes raised “serious questions” about David Cameron’s fitness for government.

He accused the Conservative party of “disgracefully covering up his subterfuge” and said the peer had been dishonest and unpatriotic in accepting a peerage whilst being a non-dom.

Lord Oakeshott said:

“It’s certainly unpatriotic to be a non-dom and to take a peerage from the Queen for life… how can you possibly accept a life peerage and do that?,”

Lord Oakeshott added that David Cameron had been “posing as Mr Clean-up” but had failed to deal with the questions surrounding the peer’s tax status.

Lord Oakeshott said:

“The significance of Lord Ashcroft is that he is not just a peer, he is bankrolling the Tory election campaign,”

“It raises very serious questions about the validity of the election result.”

“Labour has been just as guilty as the Tories of posturing on penalties and peddling fear,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne.

Commenting on Gordon Brown’s speech on crime and anti-social behaviour, Chris Huhne said:

“Labour has been just as guilty as the Tories of posturing on penalties and peddling fear.

“Labour and the Conservatives have indulged in a sentencing arms race in a desperate attempt to look tough, rather than back more police officers which is the best way to cut crime.”

Mr Huhne said that Lord Ashcroft had bought the Conservatives as though the party were a “banana republic”.

He protested that a “tax dodger from Belize should be able to buy the Tory Party as if it’s a banana republic.”

“We’re talking about the biggest donor to one of Britain’s leading political parties.”

He added that “it stinks”.

Mr Huhne said that this raised questions of judgment for the last three Conservative leaders.

“There’s an enormous question for David Cameron and indeed Michael Howard and William Hague: how could they have allowed this situation to continue?”

He said that it showed there was “a Tory policy of assuming that only the little people should pay tax because the big people can get away with it as they like.”

“It is frankly shocking, it suggests a really appalling indictment of British public life that it’s come to this and a real misjudgment of David Cameron.”

Speaking on Lord Ashcroft’s admission of his non-dom status, Mr Huhne said there was a “difference of scale” between Lord Aschroft’s donations to the Tories and Labour donors such as Lord Paul.

“The reality is that what Lord Ashcroft has done is spent a pretty small part of hix tax savings becoming the biggest donor to the Conservative party.”

“Ministers love kicking difficult political decisions into the long grass. They must come clean about cuts to council funding,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Local Government Secretary, Julia Goldsworthy.

Commenting on today’s BBC survey which reveals tens of thousands of council jobs in England could be at risk over the next five years, Julia Goldsworthy said:

“Three quarters of council money comes from Government grants.  John Denham’s attempt to wash his hands of blame is outrageous.
 
“Councils are currently working in the dark and planning for worst case scenarios as Labour refuses to publish the spending review they promised last summer.
 
“Ministers love kicking difficult political decisions into the long grass.  They must come clean about cuts to council funding.”

Liberal Democrat Leader Nick Clegg has today set out the importance of early years education in tacking inequality in a speech to the Salvation Army. Committing the Liberal Democrats to invest an extra £2.5bn in schools, Nick Clegg said that parents and schools must work together to make sure that children get the best possible start in life.

I’d like to thank the Salvation Army for inviting me to speak today.
 
Last winter, I went out with your Sheffield branch at the crack of dawn to try and help some rough sleepers.
It was a wet cold morning, and we found ourselves in a derelict warehouse, windows smashed, rubble and refuse everywhere, needles strewn across the floor, where people were sleeping in the most horrible conditions imaginable.
And – for the first time – I truly understood the reach the Salvation Army has.
Right into the most distressing, most hidden, parts of our society.  
Where you help people without judgement, without prejudice, without expectation.
An ethos which represents the best side of all of us.
 
Let me take this opportunity to congratulate you particularly for your Seeds of Exclusion Programme.
That work has been enormously revealing in terms of the complex relationships between the different forces that lead to social exclusion.
 
There is a simple principle that the Salvation Army, the Liberal Democrats, and many of the organisations here today share:
It’s this: the fortunes of someone’s life should not be decided at their birth.
A person’s fate shouldn’t be settled by their sex, their colour, their postcode, or their parents’ bank balance.
In a fair society no one can tell you to lower your sights because - no matter how hard you try - the things you dream of somehow aren’t for you.
 

I want to talk about that society today.
About how we don’t live in it yet, but about how we can.
If we are willing to tackle the unfairness that sends some children along one path while others are left behind.
If we intervene to head off the destructive patterns of behaviour that take root when people are young.
If we invest in people before it becomes too late – investing in our schools to close the gap between children from deprived homes and those who are better off.
  
Let’s start with where we are.
Britain isn’t fair.
There is profound inequality everywhere you look: how much people earn, the homes they live in, the schools they send their children to.
In a fair society there will be differences between people’s lifestyles, of course.
But your place in society won’t be decided for you; it will be up to you to decide for yourself.

That is a socially mobile Britain.  
Some people say it is too much to hope for.
How can you move everyone upwards? There isn’t enough space at the top.
I say: that’s an excuse.
It is shrugging your shoulders at unfairness.
It is getting in the way of making Britain better.
 
Better than 23% of children living in poverty.
Better than millions of pensioners seeing out the winter in a single room because they can’t afford to heat their whole house.
Better than a baby born today in a poorer part of my city, Sheffield, dying on average 14 years before a baby born in a wealthier neighbourhood down the road.
 
We heard last month from the National Equality Panel that the richest 10% of people in Britain are now more than 100 times as wealthy as the poorest 10%.
In 1997, when New Labour was first elected, no one would have believed it would end like this.
But Labour’s bright, shiny promise of a fair society has faded away.
And all that remains is disappointment, hardship, and – worst of all – hopelessness.
 
I travel around the country every week.
The people I meet are angry, they want more for their families and their neighbourhoods, they’re desperate for change.
But too many are no longer sure that’s possible.
It’s a completely understandable reaction, after 18 harsh years under the Conservatives, followed by let down after let down from Labour.
But that sense of powerlessness is dangerous.
It’s stops people demanding the Britain they want to live in.
 
Our big task now is giving people back their hope.
It’s something the Salvation Army does every day – with people who have problems with drink or drugs, women escaping violent relationships, prisoners coming to terms with their pasts.
It’s how you help people turn their lives around.
We’re only going to turn this country around if we do the same: make people believe it is possible.

 
For politicians, that means spelling out the big changes that really mean something to people.  
The Liberal Democrats have laid out four steps to do that.
Four steps we can begin taking immediately to make a real difference to people’s lives:
Fair taxes, a rebalanced economy, decent, honest politics, and a good start for all of our children.
I’d like to take each in turn, but I’ll concentrate on the last one.
Because so long as opportunity is a privilege for some children but not others, any programme to tackle inequality is condemned to failure.
 
First, tax.
Our tax system is grossly unfair.
It’s a scandal that the poorest 20% of people in the country still lose a bigger chunk of their incomes to the tax man than the richest 20%.
That a millionaire still pays a lower rate of tax on his capital gains than his cleaner does on his or her wages.
The Liberal Democrats would close the loopholes exploited by big business and the very wealthy, giving everyone else a break.
Low and middle income earners wouldn’t pay a penny on the first £10,000 they earn. Giving most people £700 back every year, while 3.6 million pensioners and people on low incomes wouldn’t pay any tax at all.
 
Second, rebalancing our economy.
For decades successive governments made our whole economy subservient to a single square mile: the City of London.
So when our financial services collapsed, British taxpayers and businesses were left paying the price.
My party understands that there are nearly 100,000 square miles in Britain.
We want to usher in a new era where growth and jobs are spread across the nation.
By placing a new emphasis on infrastructure, on people, and on green technology…
I want to live in a country where we learn to build things again, not just place bets on computer screens in the City of London.
 
Third, politics must be opened up.
Made honest, decent, relevant.
That means getting rid of the influence of big money that is contaminating our political system.
Introducing fair votes so every vote counts.
And empowering every member of our society, bar none, starting with giving people the right to sack badly behaved MPs.

 
Finally, fairness for our children. 
 
Education is everything when it comes to opportunity.
How self assured we are, how equipped we are to deal with adult life, depends very much on the experiences we had when we were young.
And, when it’s done right, education can be society’s greatest liberator.
Because how well you do depends on how hard you work, and nothing else.
 
But Britain’s education system is failing too many children.
Despite the dedication of good schools and great teachers, one in three 11 year olds leave school unable to read and write properly.
And nearly half of 16 year olds leave school without 5 good GCSEs.
 
And it is the worst off children who are being let down most.
By the time children start their formal education the language skills of the poorest already trail nearly a year behind those of the children from middle income homes. 
By age 7 a bright but poor child will have been overtaken by his or her better off classmates.
By age 16 poorer teenagers are only half as likely to get 5 good GCSEs as everyone else.
That means less chance of further training, less chance of a good job, less chance of a stable life.
 
So what can we do?
 
Helping our schools make sure no child falls behind is half the answer.
And I will come on to how the Liberal Democrats would do that in a moment.
 
But schools can only do so much.
Because a good education doesn’t end at the school gate.
Every good parent knows that their children can only flourish if they are also taught the right values, given the right support, at home. 
If they are read to when their young, if someone checks their homework, if they are encouraged to ask question after question.  
 
For most parents providing that support is a natural reflex.
Life is hard for many working families.
But I meet plenty of mothers and fathers who work punishing hours and still find the time for their children’s education.
 
But, sadly, there are those who don’t.
A small minority of parents who do not see their children’s education as part of their duties as parents.
Who drop their children off in the morning, pick them up in the afternoon, and think that’s their job done.
 
Most probably their parents were the same with them.
But these are different times.
We now know, beyond any question, that, when it comes to a child’s development, what happens in the home is just as important – if not more – than what happens in the classroom.
That’s why, for example, children who are read to every day achieve better results.
 
When you deny a child that support, you hold them back.
Having a child is the greatest gift.
But it is a gift that carries duties.  
You hold their life’s fortunes in your hands.
When you let them down, you limit their chances.
And, you limit the chances of other children too.  
 
Because when your children fall behind…
When they lack self-confidence…
When they don’t place any value on education…
They’ll play up, and they’ll cause problems for everyone else.
 
We all remember from our own school days:
The pupils sat at the back of the class, disinterested, disengaged, disruptive.
Bored, having lost interest in a lesson they don’t understand; on the look out for other ways to entertain themselves.
Teachers try commendably to help those children, but the bad behaviour spirals.
Maybe they play truant, maybe they become bullies …
Maybe they never catch up, growing up into the lost young men and women organisations like the Salvation Army so often have to help. 
 
The knock on effect is that while teachers are busy trying to get those pupils to toe the line, there’s less time for everyone else, and all of the pupils suffer.
 
I’m a parent – I don’t imagine every classroom can be full of rows of perfectly behaved little angels.
But I don’t accept that a handful of parents who aren’t doing their job properly should be able to hold back the whole class.
 
So the Liberal Democrats in government would make a deal with parents:
You look after your children’s education at home…
And we will make sure they get the best start possible at school.
So on days like today, national offer day, you can rest assured that your children will move from a great primary school to a great secondary school.
 

I’m a liberal.
I don’t believe in the passive assumption that only government can – or should – fix the problems in our society.
Yes, there are huge flaws in our education system that will not be resolved without intervention by the state.
But governments can only make a difference if parents do their bit too.
 
For our part, the Liberal Democrats will make lifting the standard of education in this country an absolute priority.
We have pledged an extra £2.5bn to our schools.
Head teachers will be able to use that money on a whole range of measures to help pupils.
From recruiting the best teachers in the toughest schools, to providing lessons outside of the normal school day, to more catch up classes, more one to one tuition, and head teachers will be able to cut class sizes too.
 
The money will be targeted specifically to closing the gap between children from disadvantaged backgrounds and their wealthier classmates.
That is how we can tackle the inequality that blights our education system…
Which, as a report on social mobility I commissioned from Barnardo’s Chief Executive Martin Narey confirmed, is how we tackle the inequality that blights our society.
 
The extra investment helps not only the poorest children, but all of their classmates too.  
An average primary school could see an extra £90,000 in its budget.
Enough to cut class sizes from 27 to 20.
In an average secondary school, they could go down to 16.
That’s good for every child in the class.
 
The Institute of Fiscal Studies is publishing their analysis of this type of investment tomorrow, which I look forward to reading.
That is important work in moving this debate forward among policy makers.
But many parents will feel they don’t need a report to tell them what they already know:
That any measure which gives teachers more time with their child, and more time bringing into line the children who would otherwise be playing up, can only be a good thing.
 
Ask teachers too - I was at a primary school in Brent just a few weeks ago…
The teachers I spoke to don’t just want to supervise a room full of children.  
They want to teach.
 
The Government did, to their credit, pass a law to cap classes for 5-7 year olds.
But more than 8000 children are still in classes that are technically illegal.
A problem that, with the number of 5-7 year olds rising every year, is only going to get worse.
 
The evidence is clear:
Whilst smaller class sizes are not a panacea on their own, and whilst the effect of teaching children in smaller groups is less as children get older…
They can nonetheless have a dramatic effect on the educational performance of the youngest children.
And we all know that what happens in the first few years of a child’s time at school is of disproportionate importance to their subsequent life chances.
 
So providing smaller class sizes, especially for young children, is one of the most important changes our Pupil Premium will allow head teachers to introduce in their schools. 
 
Ask yourself this:
 
Why does Switzerland, which consistently tops the literacy tables, have some of the smallest primary school classes in the world?
 
Why are more than 60% of the poorest pupils in Rutland not getting any GCSEs higher than a D – where the average secondary school class contains 24 pupils…
While in Westminster, where the average class is only 19, do less than 20% of the poorest children achieve the same result?
 
And why do the best off families pay vast sums every term to send their children to private schools where classes are around half the size of state schools?
 
Because they know that pupils will pay more attention to teachers, there will be less disruption…
And more opportunity to identify individual pupils’ problems, and talents, as they emerge.
 
Under our plans smaller classes won’t be a privilege reserved for the rich.
Our Pupil Premium raises the funding per pupil, for the poorer children, to the same levels as the money spent per pupil in private schools.
Head teachers can use that money to have smaller classes, like in fee paying schools. Taking our poorest children a huge leap towards an education they would otherwise never be able to afford.
 
So education is at the very core of what the Liberal Democrats will be proposing to voters at this election.
We are now the only true party of education.
 
Labour, despite all the money it has put into schools, has failed to transform the life chances of thousands of children who need the most help.
The Conservatives parrot the language of school reform – but refuse to allocate a single penny to make their promises a reality.
 
We are spelling out exactly what we would do, how much it would cost, and how we would pay for it.
And we are asking parents to enter into a deal with us:
Your child’s education will be our number one priority;
Help us by making it your number one priority too.
 
The difference smaller class sizes can make is so important that our Pupil Premium is one of only two substantial and immediate proposals for new investment the Liberal Democrats are making at this election.
The other being a major investment programme in green infrastructure to create jobs and boost the economy.
 
The public finances continue to bear the strain of the economic crisis.
But we can find the money if we are prepared to take tough decisions about what the country can and cannot now afford.  
My party has, for example, identified money that can be saved by taking above-average earners out of the means-tested tax credit system.
By scrapping unnecessary government databases, like the Contact Point children’s database.
And by cutting the vast sums currently spent on central government, including halving the size of the Children Schools and Families Whitehall department…
As well as scaling back BECTA, the quango that tells schools which computers to buy.
These and other savings can be used to reduce our national deficit while we simultaneously invest in our priorities…
Like tackling the impact of disadvantage on a person’s life chances.  
 
The Conservatives have also promised to target funding towards disadvantaged pupils.
But they have not given any detail on how they will pay for it.
In fact, they have committed precisely no pounds and no pence.
It is, in my view, the height of cynicism to pledge a pupil premium – by definition an amount of money per pupil – without attaching a figure to it.
 
It is playing games with people’s hopes to dangle the promise of extra money for children in front of parents with no evidence you can come good on it. 
If they are planning to increase investment for disadvantaged pupils, they owe it to people to come clean about what they will cut to pay for it.
If they are planning simply to shift around existing school budgets, they owe it to schools to come clean on which ones are going to face cuts.
 
What we do know about the Conservatives is that they are going to cut funding for school buildings.
We can only assume – given they have talked about ringfencing the NHS, but have stayed quiet on education budgets – that they are going to cut those budgets overall.
So in the absence of any evidence that they will actually help the poorest children…
One thing we can be sure of is that their promise of ‘brazen elitism’ in our schools is bound to come true.
 
For the Liberal Democrats, education is at the heart of our vision for fairness.
I want us to get to people before they get to the organisations in this room.
 
Uprooting the inequality that is embedded in our schools won’t solve every problem.
But it will start to give every child a chance in life, irrespective of the circumstances of their birth.
It will mean that underachievement, low self-esteem, a lack of self confidence in the classroom, won’t blight a child’s education as widely as they do now.
I don’t want to live in a society where it is all too easy to predict in a maternity ward which children will do well and which children won’t.
 
I want to live in a society where every child has a chance.
 
I want to live in a fairer Britain.

“We need fair taxation, new green jobs, a fair start for our children and a fair political system,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne.

Commenting on David Cameron’s speech at Tory spring conference Chris Huhne said:

“Once again the speech was short on specifics and on the key assurance of fairness that is essential if we are to tackle our economic problems.

“We need fair taxation, new green jobs, a fair start for our children and a fair political system that gives voters real choice to sack miscreant MPs.”

“We need a fair planning system that is responsive to people’s needs,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Simon Hughes.

Commenting as the Government’s new Infrastructure Planning Commission [IPC] starts to accept applications from developers, Simon Hughes said:

“The Government’s planning stitch-up means big energy projects like dirty coal and new nuclear loom dangerously large.

“Local people with reasonable objections will find that the chips are stacked against them.

“Britain faces being locked in to a reckless and expensive energy mix which would be a colossal mistake.

“We need a fair planning system that is responsive to people’s needs and geared to the rapid development of renewable power.”

The Liberal Democrats will tomorrow vote in Parliament against the decision to freeze state pension top-up payments this April, which will leave almost nine million pensioners worse off.

Last December Ministers set out plans to freeze payments of the State Earnings Related Pension and the Second State Pension, effectively cutting state pension payments by £515million next year.

Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, Steve Webb said:

“Labour has betrayed pensioners by promising to increase their pensions when millions are actually set to receive a real-term cut this year.

“Freezing pension top-up payments will leave almost nine million older people worse off at a time when they are already struggling to make ends meet.

“Older people are already facing high fuel bills following this cold winter and rising inflation eroding their savings

Gordon Brown recently released Labours’ General Election slogan, “A future fair for all”, but the Labour Government’s record on fairness is not good – remember the bolition of the 10p income tax band, for example.

The Sunday Times has revealed that the Treasury dropped plans to increase the tax on private equity just days before two of the industry’s richest tycoons made donations to Labour worth a total of £1.25million.

According to the Times, in the run-up to last December’s budget statement, ministers told officials to draw up proposals to end the special low tax enjoyed by venture capitalists, but according to Treasury insiders, the plans were opposed by No 10 and the private equity sector escaped any tax rises.

Private equity bosses from the bonus were also excluded from the tax imposed on other highly paid City workers in the pre budget report.

Nine days later on 18th December, Nigel Doughty, the chairman of the private equity giant Doughty Hanson and owner of Nottingham Forest football club, who has an estimated fortune of £119 million, gave £1million to the Labour party.

On December 23 the venture capitalist Sir Ronald Cohen, whose fortune is estimated at £220million, donated £250,000 to Labour.

Unsurprisingly both men deny contacting the government with the intentionof influencing their deliberations over private equity taxation and point out they have been long-standing Labour donors.

Liberal Democrat MP, Norman Baker said:

“It is a curious sequence of events when a planned policy change is dropped days before two men, who would have been adversely affected by this policy, give substantial sums to Labour.

“This looks like policy by donation. We need to know how deeply Gordon Brown was involved in this decision.”

On Monday night, Gordon Brown faces a showdown over Labour’s plans to “squeeze” the benefits of nine million pensioners, which it is expected will save the government half a billion pounds.

The Government has proposed freezing part of the state pension from April, but they are telling hard-up retirees they are getting a good deal.

Although the basic state pension of £92.25 a week is set to rise by 2.5%, Chancellor Alistair Darling decided not to apply the increase to the other parts of the total, such as the new state second pension, that make up the total take-home package.

The move will hit millions of pensioners, and with inflation now at 3.5%, the Liberal Democrats claim that it amounts to a pay cut in real terms.

The Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Nick Clegg is hopeful that he can persuade Labour backbenchers to join a vote against the freeze in a Commons motion tomorrow night.

Nick Clegg told the Sunday Express last night:

“It amounts to a huge pension’s betrayal. 

“You’ve got nine million pensioners receiving letters telling them what’s going to happen to their pension from April and they think they’ve been promised a rise from Brown, but in fact when you look at the small print what they’ll see is actually a real terms cut.

“It’s about half a billion pounds less for those nine million pensioners than they should be entitled to.

“That’s short-changing nine million pensioners to the tune of about £60 each for this coming year.

“It’s outrageous that Brown and Darling are trying to describe a cut as a rise.”

In a reference to Labour’s election slogan, he added:

“This is not a future fairer for all, this is a deception.”

He said that £60 “was not a small amount”.

Nick Clegg also said:

“We got a letter from a pensioner couple in Sheffield who found it so difficult to heat their home on a cold day, they travel the bus around Sheffield just to stay warm.

“Tell that couple that £60 is not a lot, particularly with the cold weather and the bills that couple have to face.”

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne said David Cameron’s description of himself as a “salesman” at today’s Conservative spring conference would make people feel uneasy.

Chris Huhne said:

“If you turn up on someone’s door and try and sell them double glazing people are often wary,” 

“Does he really promise anything other than changing the people in the government?” 

He said that people were looking for “real change in the political system” in this election.

Mr Huhne also said that “the real failing” of Mr Cameron’s speech was the lack of an assurance of fairness, the key aspect upon which the Liberal Democrats are fighting their election campaign.

Commenting on the latest poll results which increase the possibility of a hung Parliament, Mr Huhne said that if  that happened his party would not seek to take advantage of it.

“The key thing is not what we can gain from it, the key thing is what is best for the country,” he said.

“People don’t want to see politicians squabbling.”

“We are not the kingmakers, the people are the kingmakers,” 

The Iceland supermarket chain has been criticised for selling bottles of cider that contain more than a week’s alcohol allowance for only £2.75 .

According to today’s Mail on Sunday, Iceland sells bottles of Frosty Jack’s which contain 22.5 units of alcohol, which is more than the 21 per week limit for a woman. The limit for men is 28.

A three-litre bottle of Frosty Jack costs less than the price of a pint in most pubs and is a cheaper way of getting drunk than any of the super-strength lagers and some brands of vodka.

Since the beginning of the smoking ban, supermarkets have met the demand for home drinking by cutting the price of beer, wine and spirits to below cost price, despite many calls for an end to the tactic, and Labour has failed to introduce minimum prices for alcohol, despite there being as many as 40,000 drinkers who die every year as a result of binge drinking.

Frosty Jack Cider contains 7.5% cent alcohol, and works out at 12p for every unit, and is advertised to young people using the slogan: “Until you’ve tried it, you don’t know Jack!”

Don Shenker, of Alcohol Concern, said:

“Alcohol related health costs and crimes are increasing every year as a direct result of cheap alcohol products targeted at young heavy drinkers and this is another example of irresponsible alcohol promotion by supermarkets.’

Iceland claimed that it was being responsible by limiting the amount customers are allowed to buy at one time to 36 litres, which is more than 60 pints and a spokesman said:

“Frosty Jack’s is priced in line with the market place and we operate a policy of challenging anyone who may be under 25 to minimise the risk of consumption by a minor.”

North East Lincolnshire Council has recently taken delivery of a £90,000 mobile youth centre with the aim of bringing multi-media fun and a space to chill out to an extra 1,000 young people spread around the county.

The cash for the 30-foot mobile unit has come from the Government’s Youth Capital Fund Plus (YCF+) pot to provide much-needed up-to-date facilities for young people to give them safe places to meet and positive things to do. The unit will be operational on the streets of North East Lincolnshire next month (March).

North East Lincolnshire’s YCF + funds come under the Government’s Aiming High strategy
to ensure there are plenty of activities for young people, particularly on Friday and Saturday nights. In total £1.96 million has been made available over three years through Aiming High in North East Lincolnshire to increase the participation of young people in positive leisure time activities.

It will be the second mobile resource centre operating in the county giving youth workers the chance to target hard-to-reach areas, including more rural and isolated locations. Extending outwards to around 12 feet, the new unit has a meeting room, space to display the work of the teenagers, an IT working area, WC, and additional lighting for outdoor events. Specialist confidential advice and support will also be available on sexual health, drugs and unemployment.

Young people themselves have played a key part in the design of the unit and the equipment it will boast inside – skills games, arts, crafts, play stations and a Wii – and some will be making promotional videos. They are now coming up with design ideas for the graphics for the vehicle.

Andy Ross, (15), has been a regular user of the first mobile youth centre for the past year or more and is one of a small group of core young people who have helped with ideas to improve the new unit.

“One of the main things was to have a toilet – sometimes we’d have to dash off home, or someone else’s, or run to a local shopping centre! We also wanted more space as the unit is really popular – loads of us go - and the first one got really cramped sometimes. We were also able to help with designs for the walls and what equipment and games we would use.

“It will be great having this second one; it’s bigger, it’s warm, we get to meet up with our mates and play games, have a laugh and enjoy the company. Without them, there is really nothing for us to do and nowhere to go so in the evenings. It keeps us out of trouble and off the streets,” he said.

Steve Davies, operational manager for the Council’s youth service, said: “This is a fantastic new piece of kit and will really boost our ability to deliver flexible, first-class services to the young people of North East Lincolnshire, many of whom we just cannot reach at the moment. The current mobile unit has been with us nearly two years and has really proved its worth, providing an entertaining, safe and informative hub for hundreds of young people.“

Based in Grimsby, the mobile unit is now being kitted out and ‘branded’ before hitting the towns and villages of the county. The Council aim to use it seven days a week, staffed by two youth workers and colleagues from partner organisations.

North East Lincolnshire Council has a  Customer Service team which provides a service for help and advice on:

• Council Tax
• Business Rates
• Housing and Council Tax benefits
• Sundry debtor invoices
• Free School meals
• Housing Advisory Services (home options)
• Planning
• Criminal Records Bureau and Concessionary Travel fares

Cashiers also offer a service to both the public and internal departments by providing a paying-in service and answering enquiries regarding account balances, references and monthly payments.

You can find out more about North East Lincolnshire Council’s customer services at http://tinyurl.com/ydkldqf

Five Grimsby houses which have been left for several years in an unsightly state of disrepair are to be sold on the open market after North East Lincolnshire Council obtained them using Compulsory Purchase Orders.

The properties, on Ainslie Street, Highfield Avenue and Lambert Road, Grimsby, will become the possession of the council on March 1 this year, after which time they will be sold to homebuyers or investors for renovation.

The council took action following several attempts to negotiate with the owner of these properties to have them refurbished to make them habitable once more. Negotiations with owners of other properties in a similar state of disrepair have been successful, and in 2009 three former vacant eyesore properties in Park ward were returned to housing use with the council’s help.

However, properties at 86 and 90 Ainslie Street, 34 and 35 Highfield Avenue and 98 Lambert Road remained untouched despite the support being offered, and the council began proceedings to force their return to the housing market.

Through the council’s Empty Homes Strategy, the council applied to the Secretary of State for five Compulsory Purchase Orders in June 2008. A public inquiry in July 2009 saw support for the CPOs from several members of the public, with objections from the owner of the properties. Following confirmation of the orders the council made a General Vesting Declaration on February 1 this year the effect of which means the council can enter and take possession of the properties.

For those who purchase the properties, financial assistance may be available from the council in relation to the cost of repairing them.

Councillor Geoff Lowis, portfolio holder for regeneration and strategic housing, said: “I’m very pleased to see the end of a long legal process and I now look forward to these eyesore properties being renovated and occupied. Tackling dereliction is a priority for the council and we have committed extra funds in next year’s budget to continue this good work.”

Anybody requiring advice about an empty property can do so by contacting the council’s Empty Homes Officer at Strategic Housing, Private Sector Renewal, St James’ House, St James’ Square, Grimsby, DN31 1EP. Alternatively, you can call (01472) 324749 or email privatesectorhousing@nelincs.gov.uk.

A new addition to libraries in North East Lincolnshire is striking a chord with music fans, helping musicians and budding musicians extend their repertoire.

Take That, Metallica and Coldplay are among the vast range of music scores newly available and free to borrow at Grimsby Central Library.

Music scores can be ordered and collected from any library North East Lincolnshire and it is free to become a member of the library service. For further information, ring (01472) 323600.

The following article was written by the Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader and Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable, and first appeared in this week’s Mail on Sunday:

Anyone who thought that the credit crunch and the banking crisis were over can think again. We are back to bonuses beyond the wildest dreams of someone on an average salary; there is a choking credit squeeze on many British companies and those who work in them; and the profitable big banks that are ‘too big to fail’ have a taxpayer guarantee if they mess up. As for the customers, including millions of small savers, they are just treated as an embarrassing nuisance.

The public might well ask why, just over a year after the banking system had a massive heart attack and was saved at great expense by the taxpayer, the patient is so detached from reality and decency.

For me, the key issue is the failure of the banks, and in particular the semi-nationalised RBS and Lloyds, to meet legally binding obligations to maintain a flow of funds – net lending – to the sound and solvent small and medium-sized companies on which the British economy depends.

RBS has failed to meet its obligations to lend to sound SMEs, says Vince Cable

Credit is central to business, providing working capital to expand. Yet overall bank lending to business, outside of property, fell by 16.2 per cent last year. We put £46billion into RBS and £23billion into Lloyds – £1,200 for every man, woman and child in the UK – to save our economy and enable them to lend. They failed and the Government has encouraged them to push up the share price instead.

The banks’ explanation is that many businesses are cutting back, repaying loans rather than taking out loans to expand. The truth is that the so-called low demand for loans is because RBS and other banks will supply only at very high interest and with demands for more security.

I am not arguing for a moment that money be handed out to all-comers. But unless good, viable companies can get credit, the recession and job losses will continue. The semi-nationalised banks have a legal as well as commercial obligation to help support the recovery of the British economy.

The problem is the banks, including the semi-nationalised ones, are under pressure to boost their share prices. In the case of RBS and Lloyds the reason is that the Government wants to sell off its shares quickly.

The attraction to the banks of building up investment banking is that it creates a honey pot of bonuses. RBS is portraying itself as a paragon of puritan virtue because it has paid out only 30 per cent of profits in investment banking – £1.3billion – in bonuses; this is in a bank making overall losses and paying bonuses out of taxpayers’ money. I gather that 100 staff have taken more than £1million each.

One of the villains of the banking crisis, John Mack, chairman of the giant and venerable but humbled US bank Morgan Stanley, acknowledged last week that: ‘I still don’t think the industry gets it.’ It doesn’t.

RBS tries to justify its own payments by saying that all the investment bank profit will make it easier to repay the taxpayer. But much of the trading activity is in the bonds to finance Government borrowing. So the taxpayer is paying out of one pocket to be repaid in another.

RBS then says that, if we don’t pay our people, they will all migrate to American banks or hedge funds. We can’t disregard this argument, though it remains to be demonstrated that the bank could not function effectively with staff whose demands were considerably more modest.

The world of football offers us some clue about how to deal with highly paid prima donnas. Paying up can buy success (Chelsea) but it can also lead to bankruptcy (Portsmouth). Sensibly managed clubs – Everton, Aston Villa, Fulham – can do well by producing home-grown talent and good teamwork.

So what can be done about these spoilt financial superstars who threaten to burst into tears and jump out of the pram if they don’t earn a million a year? We should start with more transparency and disclosure. RBS won’t tell us who these millionaires are even though they are paid with public money. We have a right to know.

But this problem of extreme bonuses and pay can’t be tackled without dealing with the money-making machines – the investment banks – and the way in which they distort the whole purpose of financial services. The emphasis is on short-term speculation – the ‘casino’ function – so they continue to behave dangerously knowing they have a taxpayer guarantee.

Last week Mervyn King, governor of the Bank of England, argued strongly for the breaking up of the big banks, both to create more competition and to prevent the ‘casinos’ having this taxpayer guarantee. The rather pathetic response of the Government is that this is all very difficult and, anyway, we can’t do anything unless the rest of the world also acts.

The problem for Britain is that the banks are a far bigger part of the economy than they are in America, France and Germany. When they get into trouble and have to be rescued by the taxpayer, Britain suffers worst. This is one of the main reasons why Britain’s recession is so hard. Unless there is strong leadership and a change of direction, I fear that we will just drift into the next banking disaster. And that can’t be allowed to happen.

Vince Cable is the Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman

The Pocket Guide to Policy summarises the party’s key policies at a page per portfolio, for use by the party’s campaigners and for anyone who is interested to know what we are proposing.

The document has no formal status, although the policies summarised within it have all been passed by local party representatives at party conference.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne, has written to the chair of the Electoral Commission to ask that the investigation into donations to the Conservatives by a company owned by Lord Ashcroft be brought to a conclusion ahead of the election.

The full text of the letter is as follows:

Jenny Watson
The Electoral Commission
Trevelyan House
Great Peter Street
London SW1P 2HW Friday 26th February 2010

Dear Ms Watson,

I am writing to you today to request formally that the investigation being carried out by the Electoral Commission into donations to the Conservative Party by Bearwood Corporate Services Limited should now come to a conclusion - in good time before the forthcoming General Election, widely anticipated to be held on 6th May 2010.

Bearwood Corporate Services Limited, since 28th February 2003, has made donations to the Conservative Party totalling £5,056,798.15. It is the most significant single donor to the Conservative party. As you will be aware, for a company to be eligible to make donations to a political party it has to be registered in the UK and carry out business here. A failure on either count would amount to a breach of the law within the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act. It is widely known that Bearwood Corporate Services Limited is a company owned by Lord Ashcroft, a Conservative Peer in the House of Lords and the Conservative Party Deputy Chairman, who himself has made donations to the Conservative Party since 26th March 2001 totalling £111,726.09. Lord Ashcroft no longer makes donations to the Conservative party in an individual capacity, because to do so donors have to be listed on the electoral roll. He has so far refused to reveal whether he is registered to vote in the UK, or indeed whether he is a full UK taxpayer.

Given the sums involved and the no doubt crucial role that these will play in the upcoming General Election campaign of the Conservative Party, I believe it is imperative for the maintenance of public trust in the system of funding of political parties that this investigation is concluded before a General Election is called. You will no doubt agree that it would be wrong and undemocratic for one political party to benefit from funds that may yet be judged inadmissible by your investigation. If this were the case, the Conservative party would be found to have relied heavily on offshore finance. Indeed, should the Conservative Party secure a majority following the General Election using donations made by Bearwood Corporate Services Limited, and your investigation were to conclude after the General Election that these donations were illegal, this would raise serious concerns about the legality and validity of the entire election result.

Furthermore, I believe that this investigation is already one of the longest ever conducted by the Electoral Commission. It was launched in October 2008, and yet, almost 18 months later, no conclusion has been reached. I of course accept the need for complete accuracy and thoroughness in any enquiry the Commission carries out, but I also urge you to take account of the implications of any unnecessary delay for public trust and confidence in our political system. I also note that the Electoral Commission is not a court of law, but a regulatory body. Clearly, you could not announce the outcome of this important inquiry only a week or two before polling day, so surely you should do so now. It cannot conceivably be in the public interest to allow this matter to drag on in the dark with the general election so imminent. I am afraid that this long delay, with no indication even of when you will decide, risks undermining the reputation of your Commission as an effective regulator. It is crucial for you now to rule on this matter so that the nation does not face a tainted election.

I look forward to hearing from you shortly.

Tory Party activists are gathering for their spring conference in Brighton, which is their last nationl meeting before the beginning of the general election campaign.

The two-day spring conference comes at a time when support for the Tories has fallen dramatically; last year they looked unbeatable, but recent polls have suggested that their lead over Labour is narrowing. 

On the eve of the conference, it was revealed that the Tories’ election slogan will be “vote for change”, and this message is likely to be at the centre to David Cameron’s main speech on Sunday. 

Labour will use the Tory conference as an opportunity to launch a new poster attacking the shadow chancellor George Osborne. 

This weekend, the Labour party is releasing more pre-election campaign material with an image of shadow chancellor George Osborne is accompanied by the slogan “Chancer not Chancellor”. 

The Liberal Democrats say only they offer a change to the existing way of conducting politics. 

The Leader of Liberal Democrat’s Chief of Staff, Danny Alexander said: the election was not a choice between Mr Brown and Mr Cameron. “It’s between the old way of doing politics and the real change represented by the Liberal Democrats“For people who want real change, real fairness in Britain there is only one choice: the Liberal Democrats.

Labour has totally failed to make Britain fairer, and the Tories can’t be trusted to do.”

Liberal Democrat MPs have been pressing the government to make sure second home owners pay their fair share of taxes.

Liberal Democrat MP for St Ives, Andrew George and Liberal Democrat MP for Falmouth and Camborne, Julia Goldsworthy said second home owners reduced their bills by letting out their properties, and they also pay business rates rather than council tax, which means that local authorities are missing out. They said a local income tax would be fairer because people who own two properties would have to pay tax twice. Andrew George said: “It’s not a personal issue. It’s the politics of social justice, not the politics of envy. “Many people who own second homes and who have a social conscience actually are aware of this and agree with the points. “There are chronic housing problems in these areas and the existence of second home ownership can only have a detrimental impact on the life chances and life choices of local families who are desperate to find a decent home of their own.” 

A number of local authorise have recently undergone unannounced Ofsted inspections of children’s services and have found with serious area of concern.

An Ofted inspection in North East Lincolnshire took place on on 26 and 27 January, and found children at risk of harm are properly safeguarded by the authority.

The inspection into children’s services at the council examined the effectiveness of contact, referral and assessment arrangements. 

It found concerns about risk of significant harm to children were dealt with immediately. 

The council said it was “delighted” with the report’s conclusions. 

The inspection, which was carried out in January, found vulnerable children were “appropriately seen”, to ensure they were safe. Liberal Democrat Councillor Tony McCabe, the council’s portfolio holder for children and family services, said:

“This report reflects our own assessments and supports our own plans for improvements. 

“We are doing very well in looking after the welfare of children and young people in the borough and are totally committed to the ongoing development and strengthening of arrangements for safeguarding children.”

Ahead of the debate in the House of Commons on the renewal of the use of control orders for another year, Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne has written to the Conservatives to ask them if they will be voting against this renewal in the debate.

Chris Huhne said:

“We should not be the sort of country where ministers put people under house arrest without them even knowing the accusations against them. Control orders are pure Kafka and must end.
 
“Control orders are a constant reproach to Labour’s liberal credentials. The Conservatives have promised to vote with us against them but have repeatedly bottled out of doing so.

“Their line seems to be ‘Lord, make me liberal but not yet’.”

Knit it!

Knitting is officially cool…

Celebrities such as Julia Roberts, Cameron Diaz, Madonna, Kate Moss and Russell Crowe have all been giving it a go!

Come along to Nunsthorpe & Bradley Children’s Centre,
Sutcliffe avenue, Grimsby DN33 1AN
Tuesday 30th March 2010 to find out more.

• Old and new knitters are welcome
• Help will be on hand to get you started
• A buffet lunch will be available from 12pm

At the first session we will be supporting the Infant Feeding
Coordinator to Knit Knitted Boobs to be used for training in
the hospital community.

Please confirm your interest to Lauren Jackson on
Lauren.jackson@nelctp.nhs.uk or 07901103906

I just read an interesting Tweet from Carl Minns, Liberal Democrat leader of Hull City Council.  It compares the Council Tax rates for next year in the four Humberside areas.

• N E Lincs (Lib Dem)  Nil Council Tax increase
• Hull City Council (Lib Dem)  Nil CouncilTax increase
• East Yorkshire (Conservative)  Increase in Council Tax
• North Lincolnshire (Labour)  Increase in Council Tax

Do I see a pattern here?

“The implication that David Miliband had the wool pulled over his eyes is deeply embarrassing for the Foreign Secretary,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Foreign Secretary, Ed Davey.

Commenting on the publication of a judge’s criticism of the security services, which stated that some officials ‘appear to have a dubious record when it comes to human rights and coercive techniques’, and that while ‘the good faith of the Foreign Secretary is not in question’, there is ‘an obvious reason for distrusting any UK Government assurance’ on mistreatment, Ed Davey said:

“The implication that David Miliband had the wool pulled over his eyes is deeply embarrassing for the Foreign Secretary.

“However, the suggestion that he acted in good faith means the real questions need to be answered by others in Government. Did former Foreign Secretary Jack Straw sign off on the ‘coercive techniques’ referred to in the judgement?

“The suggestion that there were others in the security services involved in unacceptable practices makes the need for a full judicial inquiry irrefutable.

“But it must be asked how appropriate it is for Jack Straw to remain in charge of this country’s justice system when there are such serious questions laid at his door.”

I am pleased to report that work has now begun on a pedestrian crossing on Laceby Road following a long campaign, and should be completed over the next few weeks

Some readers of my blog may have seen an article in our local paper, the Grimsby Telegraph, last Wenesday about the long awaited start of work on a pedestrian crossing on Laceby Road, in which the Conservative PPC, Victoria Ayling claims that the “effort put in by myself and Kath Norton, lobbying continuously to get this result” has helped the progress of the campaign to its successful conclusion.

In response I have sent a letter to the Grimsby Telegraph in which I have questioned her statement and asked for her to clarify the extent of her work in this important local issue, which was, in truth largely completed before her arrival in Grimsby. 

I would also like to express my appreciation of the hard work that was done by Mr Blanch and his helpers, and congratulate them on a successful campaign!

A copy of my letter to the Grimsby Telegraph is reproduced below for your information:

Dear Editor

I was delighted to be asked to contribute to the article about the start of work on the new pedestrian crossing on Laceby Road which was featured in Wednesday’s Telegraph, but I must admit to being amazed at the comments by the Conservative candidate for Grimsby, Victoria Ayling about her efforts to help the campaign by residents in the area.

Mrs Ayling claims that the “effort put in by myself and Kath Norton, lobbying continuously to get this result” has helped the progress of the campaign to its successful conclusion.

The campaign was led by local resident, John Blanch, and lately supported by Yarborough Ward Councillors over a period of more than two years.  There was no sign of Messrs Goodwill, Norton and Ayling when Mr Blanch and I were out collecting signatures for the petition, no sign of any of them when Mr Blanch and I presented the petition to the scrutiny panel, no sign of them when we arranged for the consultation with local residents, and held site meetings.  I have also had sight of e mail messages from the NELC Officers stating that they have not had any contact with any of the Conservative representatives, and so I would like to ask Mrs Ayling a question:

WHAT DID YOU DO TO HELP?

 I think that the residents of the Ridgeway area are entitled to know the true extent of her “lobbying continuously“  so that Mrs Ayling and her Conservative colleagues  can be given the true credit that their hard work on behalf of these residents deserves!

I claim no particular credit for performing the job that I was elected to do, but feel that Mrs Ayling’s comments are grossly unfair to Mr Blanch and the other residents, who should be given the full credit that they deserve for a job well done.

Les Bonner

Yarborough Ward Councillor

Liberal Democrat Leader, Nick Clegg, has highlighted official figures that show Court cases to recover overpayments of tax credits increased by 750% over the last year to more than 8,700.

Mr Clegg has accused Gordon Brown of making families pay for the defects in the tax credit system which have resulted in overpayments of more than £8.4 billion since 2003.

Figures released by the Treasury following a series of parliamentary questions revealed that there were 8,729 court actions for the recovery of tax credit overpayments in 2008/09, compared with 1,024 in the previous year.

The Liberal Democrats said most of the families claiming tax credits are on low incomes and it can cause severe hardship when they are forced to repay large overpayments.

Half a million families on incomes below £15,000 were overpaid an average £555 and more than 600,000 families were overpaid more than £1,000.

The Liberal Democrats have promised to fix tax credit awards for six months, in order to avoid the situation where entitlements change frequently because of changes in income, hours worked, relationship status and childcare arrangements.

Mr Clegg said:

 ”Families are paying the price for the failings of Gordon Brown’s tax credit system.

“This complex system was meant to help hard-pressed families, but instead the Government is actually taking increasing numbers to court to claw back money from the families who can afford it least.”

At the National Farmers’ Union annual conference today, Liberal Democrat Shadow Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary, Tim Farron set out plans to reform the farm payments system and use the savings to support farm apprenticeships.

Read the rest of this entry. Read the rest of this entry.

Nick Clegg addresses voter apathy by answering your questions

The Leader of the Liberal Democrats this week responded to questions posted to Facebook and Twitter in his latest online Q & A session with voters.
Watch his video response here >

“The Government has implemented these new regulations without making sure that they will actually work on the ground,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary, Norman Lamb.

Commenting on today’s report by the Royal College of Surgeons, which reveals that the chaotic introduction of new child safeguarding regulations is leading to cancelled operations for children, Norman Lamb said:
 
“This is a disgrace. The Government has implemented these new regulations without making sure that they will actually work on the ground.
 
“When top surgeons have already been CRB checked, it’s madness to restrict them to one hospital when they are needed all around the country.
 
“Protecting children must always be a top priority, but the situation has descended into complete farce with potentially dire consequences for patients and NHS staff.
 
“Ministers have buried their heads in the sand despite mounting evidence of how badly flawed this system is.
 
“We need a simple but effective system to protect our children. Once you’re CRB checked for one Trust, that should be enough to mean you can work in any hospital.”

“Banks are failing to meet their lending commitments, starving businesses of capital needed for investment,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Business Secretary, John Thurso.

Commenting on today’s figures from the ONS showing that investment by British businesses was 24.1% lower at the end of 2009 than at the start, the worst decline since records began, John Thurso said:

“This dramatic slump in business investment bodes ill for economic recovery.

“Banks are failing to meet their lending commitments, starving businesses of capital needed for investment.

“The Government needs to get a grip and make sure the banks’ lending agreements are more concrete and better policed so that recovery doesn’t peter out.”

The Leader of the Liberal Democrats today responded to questions posted to Facebook and Twitter in his latest online Q & A session with voters.

You can view a short video of Nick Clegg answering some of the questions at :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCofgfwUm5A

Questions covered: Support for carers, voter apathy, voting Lib Dem, military pay, the ‘Robin Hood Tax’, democratic accountability, Scottish independence; the hunger strikers and rights of children at Yarl’s Wood detention centre and whether he prefers tea or coffee.

Keep your questions flowing for Nick as he is keen to answer them as often as possible in sessions just like this.

Ask your questions on: Facebook and Twitter.

“The abolition of exit checks by Conservative and Labour Governments means that we can only guess at the numbers coming in and out,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne.

Commenting on today’s Office for National Statistics migration figures, Chris Huhne said:

“Public confidence and trust in the migration system has been shattered by decades of mismanagement.

“The abolition of exit checks by Conservative and Labour Governments means that we can only guess at the numbers coming in and out.

“People over-staying on short-term visas are probably the biggest source of illegal immigration and we still cannot say whether they are leaving when they are meant to do so.

“Exit checks must be reintroduced immediately.”

The rate of teenage conceptions in North East Lincolnshire are reducing faster than in many other areas of the country. 

Statistics released today for data relating to March 2008 indicate that conception rates in young girls aged 15 - 17 have dropped in the borough by a significant 17.6% since 1998.  This compares to a 10.9% reduction in the Yorkshire and Humber region and a 13.3% reduction nationally. 

The figures since 2007 are equally impressive with a 13% drop in teenage conceptions locally.  This compares to a 2% reduction in the Yorkshire and Humber region and a 4% reduction nationally. 

North East Lincolnshire Care Trust Plus is committed to reducing the teenage conception rate in the borough further and has established a number of programmes jointly with North East Lincolnshire Council including:
MASH & MASH+ (Multi Agency Sexual Health) programmes of Sexual Health & Relationships Education and Aspirations Building
Access to quality contraception and sexual health advice and support, including a Condom Card Scheme
Targeted work with Vulnerable Young People 

Teenage mothers are more likely to suffer from post-natal depression, experience unemployment and live in poverty.  Children born to teenage mothers are more likely to have a higher infant mortality rate, are to have accidents or behavioural problems and become teenage parents themselves. 

Councillor Tony McCabe, portfolio holder for children and family services said, “I am delighted that these figures reflect the ongoing work that agencies across the borough are doing with young people.  It is tough to raise a child at any age, but it can be particularly challenging to raise a child when you are a teenager.  It is important too that parents spend time talking to their teenagers about the choices that are available to them.”

The Government has set every force a target to raise public confidence that the police and local council are dealing with the anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter locally.

The proportion of people surveyed in each of the following areas agree that the police and local council are dealing with the anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in their area.

Area Proportion

Safer and Stronger Communities Partnership(This covers the North East Lincolnshire area) 65.3%

Safer Neighbourhoods(This covers the NorthLincolnshire area) 65.0%

Safe Communities Partnership (This covers the East Riding of Yorkshire area) 65.9%

Hull Citysafe(This covers theKingston upon Hullarea) 64.6%

Humberside Police Force area 65.2%

These are the results of a telephone survey that was conducted in these areas which asked local people whether they agree that:

“The police and local council are dealing with the anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area”.

Care should be taken in making comparisons in local indicators that have used different survey techniques.

The survey is based on a quota sample of people in the local area. The use of a quota sample seeks to ensure the results are broadly representative of the local population. Quota samples may inadvertently introduce unknown sources of statistical bias.

For answers to someof the frequently asked questions about why the Home Office is requiringforces to measure public confidence please click here.

“RBS rewarding individual bankers is like a football team paying their striker for scoring when they’ve just been relegated,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable.

Commenting on the announcement of RBS’ losses and bonus pool, Vince Cable said:

“It’s hard to understand why £1.3bn is being paid out in bonuses when RBS continues to make losses.

“RBS rewarding individual bankers is like a football team paying their striker for scoring when they’ve just been relegated.  

“While it is good news that RBS is meeting its mortgage lending target, its lending to business has fallen.
 
“The Government has to get a grip and explain how it will exercise its 84% shareholding in RBS to benefit the taxpayer. At present we are seeing very little. Part nationalised banks are for lending, not bonuses.

“Stephen Hester seems to think that his only goal is to push up the share price. But RBS has made a commitment to support recovery by ensuring that viable businesses are not starved of capital.  If RBS doesn’t lend to businesses they will go bust and people will lose their jobs.

“The lending agreements for 2011 need to be more concrete, long term and better policed.”

“Liberal Democrats will change the rules so that fuel bills reflect fuel costs and consumers are not ripped off again and again,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Simon Hughes.

Commenting on the huge increase in profits announced by British Gas, Simon Hughes said:

“These massive profits show that the energy companies are out of control and their regulator is out of action.
 
“The six big beasts of the energy jungle must be tamed immediately – to stop their predatory activities which are so dangerous to the public.
 
“Liberal Democrats will change the rules so that fuel bills reflect fuel costs and consumers are not ripped off again and again.”

It has been revealed that while many of it’s customers went cold through the winter because they were uanble to pay for the cost of heating their homes, British Gas made profits of £595 million last year an increase of 58% on the 2008 figures.

Centrica said that British Gas, which is the largest residential energy supplierin the UK, made the increase in it’s profits due to the addition of 141,000 gas and electricity customers and following operational improvements.

The result comes amid  concern that utility firms did not fully pass on reductions in wholesale gas prices last year.

Centrica said it realised 2009 was a “difficult year for many of our customers”.

Industry watchdog Ofgem said that energy firms have boosted margins by £30 for each typical dual fuel customer in the last three months as wholesale energy costs fall. British Gas claimed the average dual fuel customer paid £23 more last year, which offset a 7% decline in gas demand as the recession affected households and businesses.

GMB union spokesman Gary Smith called on the Government to redirect some of the profits to help vulnerable and needy energy users, saying:

“There should be lower tariffs for these consumers.”

The latest crime figures for North East Lincolnshire have just been released by Humberside Police.

The figures show that, in the three months to the end of January compared with the same period last year:

• the average number of crimes in this area has decreased from 80.7 to 57 (-29.3%)
• The average number of burglaries in this area has decreased from 11 to 9.7 (-12.1%)
• The average number of robberies in this area has increased from 0 to 0.3
• The average number of vehicle crimes in this area has decreased from 6.7 to 5.3 (-20%)
• The average number of violent crimes in this area is unchanged at 13.7 
• The average number of anti-social behaviour incidents in this area has decreased from 28 to 24 (-14.3%)

Figures for other parts of N E Lincs can be found at http://maps.police.uk/view/humberside/

Earlier today I received a message from Ian Thompson, who is organising a campaign group against loan sharks which I thought you might like to read:

Hello!

Thanks to your help, we now have 100+ members of the campaign to stop unfair APRs for short-term loans and ‘payday’ lending.

Because you decided to click a button on Facebook, together we’ve created a campaign that has already won the support of its first elected representative - NE Lincolnshire LibDem councillor Les Bonner - AND featured on MSNMoney.co.uk’s Frugal Blogger site yesterday.

And all you have to do now is - well - nothing really.

Simply by staying connected with the Group, you’ll be making a difference.

And if you choose to share anything that’s posted on our page with your friends - well that would be great.

(Oh, go on then, invite all your friends to join the Group…)

And here’s my promise: I’m not going to bug you with messages too often. Maybe once every 10 days?

Thank you so much for joining in
Ian

Ian has started a group on Face book called “Let’s STOP 2356% APR loans” 

Please show your support by joining the group by clicking on http://www.facebook.com/#!/group.php?gid=342090537931

Compulsory Purchase Orders have been used to get homes back into use.

  Five Grimsby properties which have been left for several years in an unsightly state of disrepair are to be sold on the open market after North East Lincolnshire Council obtained them using Compulsory Purchase Orders.

The properties, on Ainslie Street, Highfield Avenue and Lambert Road, Grimsby, will become the possession of the council on March 1 this year, after which time they will be sold to homebuyers or investors for renovation.

The council took action following several attempts to negotiate with the owner of these properties to have them refurbished to make them habitable once more.  Negotiations with owners of other properties in a similar state of disrepair have been successful, and in 2009 three former vacant eyesore properties in Park ward were returned to housing use with the council’s help.  However, properties at 86 and 90 Ainslie Street, 34 and 35 Highfield Avenue and 98 Lambert Road remained untouched despite the support being offered, and the council began proceedings to force their return to the housing market.

Through the council’s Empty Homes Strategy, the council applied to the Secretary of State for five Compulsory Purchase Orders in June 2008.  A public inquiry in July 2009 saw support for the CPOs from several members of the public, with objections from the owner of the properties.

Following confirmation of the orders the council made a General Vesting Declaration on February 1 this year the effect of which means the council can enter and take possession of the properties. For those who purchase the properties, financial assistance may be available from the council in relation to the cost of repairing them.

Councillor Geoff Lowis, Liberal Democrat portfolio holder for regeneration and strategic housing, said:

“I’m very pleased to see the end of a long legal process and I now look forward to these eyesore properties being renovated and occupied. Tackling dereliction is a priority for the council and we have committed extra funds in next year’s budget to continue this good work.”

Anybody requiring advice about an empty property can do so by contacting the council’s Empty Homes Officer at Strategic Housing, Private Sector Renewal, St James’ House, St James’ Square, Grimsby, DN31 1EP. Alternatively, you can call (01472) 324749 or email privatesectorhousing@nelincs.gov.uk.

“The idea of a bank which is still propped up by taxpayers paying out over a billion in bonuses is offensive,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Scotland Secretary.

Commenting on reports that RBS is set to pay out over £1bn in bonuses despite expectations of poor performance to be announced tomorrow, Alistair Carmichael said:

“The idea of a bank which is still propped up by taxpayers paying out over a billion in bonuses is offensive. There should be no rewards for failure.

“With people across the country having to tighten their belts, bankers are living on another planet if they think they deserve millions in bonuses.

“RBS is effectively owned by the public. If Gordon Brown really believed in fairness he would intervene to stop these bonuses going ahead.”

“Slashing spending now could push the economy back into recession and inflict further structural damage on the UK,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor.

Commenting on George Osborne’s Mais Lecture, Vince Cable said:

“Osborne’s latest economic commentary shows just how out his depth he is when it comes to the important economic issues.
 
“Slashing spending now could push the economy back into recession and inflict further structural damage on the UK that will make it harder to sustain our credit rating.
 
“He is at odds with his leader on when cuts should come and fails to appreciate that what the markets are looking for is a credible plan to reduce the deficit, not a willingness to slash regardless of economic conditions.
 
“In the current climate it is essential that decisions about the speed and timing of tackling the deficit are based on the state of the economy, not political dogma.”

The Government has set all police forces a target to raise public confidence.  In order to help Humberside Police achieve this, we sought your views in response to key questions asked locally in your area:

In North East Lincolnshire, 65.3% of people agreed that the police and local council are dealing with  anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area.

When the same people were asked about the police alone 69.9% of people agreed that the are dealing with anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area. For Humberside Police Area as a whole 65.2% of people agreed that the police and local council are dealing with anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area.

For Humberside Police Area as a whole 69.5% of people agreed that the are dealing with anti-social behaviour and crime issues that matter in this area.

The Force is particularly pleased to receive a ‘good’ grading in the recent Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) inspection of our delivery of the Policing Pledge to you. 

For more information on this click here

“The Government’s obsession with targets was responsible for the neglect of patient safety at Mid-Staffordshire,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary.

Commenting on today’s report on Mid Staffordshire hospital, Norman Lamb said:

“This damning report confirms the appalling neglect of patients at Mid-Staffordshire hospital. 

“This report makes clear that the Government’s obsession with targets was responsible for the neglect of patient safety at Mid-Staffordshire.

“It’s a disgrace that patients were subjected to these horrendous conditions in an NHS hospital.

“The need for a full public inquiry is now overwhelming and many people will remain concerned that the truth is still being kept behind closed doors.
 
“We owe it to those who lost loved ones to ensure that this never happens again. We need a single regulator in charge of keeping patients safe so that everyone knows who is responsible.”

Energy firms would have to print the amount of profit they make on every fuel bill under an amendment to the Energy Bill tabled by the Liberal Democrats to be debated by MPs today.

The amendment is one of a series of proposals tabled by the Liberal Democrats to improve consumer rights.

Energy firms would be prevented from exercising a veto over regulatory changes to their operating licences under a further amendment to be debated as the Bill reaches the end of its passage in the House of Commons.

Commenting ahead of the debate, Liberal Democrat Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Simon Hughes said:

“Customers should have a right to know how much of the bills they pay end up in energy firms’ coffers.

“Both Labour and the Tories talk a lot about the need for people to make informed choices. Today is a chance to show they mean it.

“It’s unacceptable that energy giants have so much control over the body supposed to police them.

“These simple steps would lead to fairer fuel bills through greater transparency and much-needed regulation.”

“Instead of chasing headlines, the Government needs to show how it intends to improve care,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary, Norman Lamb.

Commenting on today’s report by the Royal College of Nursing which highlights the role of specialist nurses, Norman Lamb said:
 
“There is a real danger that the NHS will respond to the financial crisis by taking a slash and burn approach to its essential staff and services that make a real difference to patients with chronic conditions. This is a false economy and will be devastating for patient care.
 
“Cuts are already taking place in marked contrast to the Prime Minister’s commitment for cancer patients to get personal support at home from specialist nurses.

“Instead of chasing headlines, the Government needs to show how it intends to improve care.”

“Decisions of when to cut Government spending must be based on economic principles not political games,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor, Vince Cable.

Responding to the IMF study and its assertion that the weakness of growth in the British economy means that tax increases and spending cuts should be delayed until next year but that action to reduce the deficit is inevitable, Vince Cable said:

“This is a clear endorsement of the Liberal Democrat approach to the deficit and the re-privatisation of the state owned banks.
 
“Decisions of when to cut Government spending must be based on economic principles not political games.
 
“Both the public and the markets have a right to know how the parties plan to tackle the deficit, but gung-ho spending cuts while the economy is barely recovering is simply reckless.

“While Labour buries its head in the sand and the Tories change position according to the prevailing wind, only the Liberal Democrats have produced a credible and coherent plan for dealing with the deficit. 
 
“The Tories must also realise that the taxpayer will have to have a stake in the state owned banks for a considerable period of time if we are to get good value for money when they are re-privatised.”

“Only the Liberal Democrats are committed to giving all schools the extra money they need to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with individual support,” said the Liberal Democrat Shadow Schools Secretary, David Laws.

Commenting on the Government’s ‘chain schools’ announcement, David Laws said:

“This is another top-down gimmick from a tired Government desperate to divert attention from its failure to raise standards in our schools.

“New providers can help to turn around long-term failing schools, but do we really want Ed Balls to be handpicking all 500 of them?

“Only the Liberal Democrats are committed to giving all schools the extra money they need to cut class sizes and provide children who are struggling with individual support.

“We will make sure all schools have the freedom to provide an excellent standard of education, without the constant interference of Whitehall politicians.”