My Rollercoaster Year

Those of you who know me ought to be aware that I love a big, fast rollercoasters. I really need to go back to the States and experience some of the new rides since last I was there (1996). However, this year has certainly been one hell of a rollercoaster ride with its highs and lows, switchbacks and unexpected turns.

This time last year I was sitting in Bathgate, looking forward to kick starting the local Lib Dems into the General Election year, then onwards to the Scottish Elections and the council elections beyond. The same old routine as laid out by the election cycles. Or so I thought.

Sure enough the year started out in just that manner. On St. Patrick's Night I was selected as the Prospective Parliamentary Candidate (PPC) again for Linlithgow and East Falkirk, with Charles Dundas once again my colleague in the other seat for the local party, Livingston. In the end I came third once more, was agent to Kieran Leach in neighbouring Falkirk (in which campaign I met some new friends). But I was very disappointed on the night that Kevin Lang in Edinburgh North and Leith and Fred MacIntosh in Edinburgh South had done exactly what the party thought was required to win only to no get elected as MPs.

Well eight days after the General Election I had my CV in to start the selection process for the Edinburgh Central seat  for the Scottish elections next May. So there wasn't any real rest between the elections cycles as I started to plot and plan just what I would have to do, first for the seat and then for the list. In the end after another solid 2/3 months of planning and canvassing local members it wasn't to be, but Alex Cole Hamilton had been selected.

So as I started to work for Alex and was settling down to work on the list selection process, which overlapped with the end of Edinburgh Central, I was brought to a sudden halt. Somehow in all the activity of the previous months I had managed to not notice that certain bills were not being paid, kind of major expensive ones. I tried to get finance from the bank but that wasn't happening. I then felt that the only way to deal with this was to return to Northern Ireland and proposed to work that I could continue to work for them from here. With time running out and me having a letter of notice to hand over if there was no decision on that day I was finally given the go ahead to be a home-worker.

So with that then came the task of packing up 9 years accumulated stuff and with the help of Michael completed Operation Evacuate at the end of August. I'd a week to settle in before I started work, but I was also looking for something a little more permanent over here because work, as close friends can attest, was getting me depressed in a major way, even before I moved over.

There then came an email from a friend saying "Have you seen this job?", I applied and found myself up against Michael for what were probably the most angst ridden two weeks in either of our lives. Until I finally was told the position was mine within an hour of a Nationwide conference call for Yes to Fairer Votes as the Northern Ireland Organiser. I just had time to talk to Michael before that call, and he has been a great help and support from that time on.

Since I've got back I hadn't been completely politically inactive, along with Michael we as local Liberal Democrats wrote a couple of responses to consultations from government departments. I've also been involved in the LGBT consultative forum, help establish Delga within the local party, been back across for Scottish conference. As well as attending two party conferences and meeting with others as part of the Yes to Fairer Votes drive.

This year I attended three Pride Parades Edinburgh, Glasgow and Foyle. Somehow I found the time and a person to fall in love with, though sadly that didn't go as I'd hoped. I've also been elected unto my new local party's executive committee as well as keeping up my record of being a conference rep, Sheffield and Birmingham here I come.

So what does 2011 hold?

For a start there is an referendum on May 5th, not the campaigning I expected to be taking up every waking and quite a few of the sleeping moments of my life. But there you are I'm working towards that and looking forward to getting back into the phonebank as people carry on talking to people across Northern Ireland about fairer votes.

After May, who knows. I have no idea what comes next.

Last year I felt that I'd love to find someone I could really connect with that didn't abhor the time I spent with politics and maybe settle down. Seeing as how intermittent my love life has been in the last twelve months it is almost like I am saving myself for that person. Maybe I might get lucky this year and find what I'm looking for in that department. My love life has been a bit of a roller coaster in recent years maybe I just want it to be a gentle punt down life's river from here on. But then knowing the passion I put into things maybe not.

After May I'll be looking for a new job. No idea that that will actually be yet, have an idea what I'd like it to be just need to see if there are openings that I can fill, it may mean a move once more, it may mean staying right here, I just don't know and nobody is able to tell me the answer to that right now. So it looks like 2011 might be another roller coaster year as well.

Stay tuned I'll return to blogging full time in May.

Guest Post: Andy Williamson: Mid-Terms of Engagement

There is nothing that a blogger more that somebody giving them stuff to put on their blog. Yes, even if that blogger is as prolific as I can be. Therefore earlier today I received an email from one of my Edinburgh friends and fellow campaigners containing his overview of the American mid-term elections and how it relates to us in the coalition. I am therefore of course happy to share it with you all.

The US midterm results are in, and the results seem bad for Obama. Even though the Democrats held the Senate, many of the Senators who survived the Republican onslaught did so only by standing as anti-Obama Democrats. Joe Manchin, elected Democratic Senator for West Virginia, produced a campaign ad showing him shooting the President’s ‘Cap and Trade’ legislation. But whilst partisans in the US are spinning the results faster than an Ann Widdecombe polka, it remains to be seen what the impact will be for UK politics. However, the lessons that can be learned by the UK coalition government must not be ignored.

Firstly, however, we must put the result into context. Yes, it was a clear bloody nose for Barack Obama, as a galvanised Republican party led a vociferous, and successful grass-roots campaign against him. However, government split between president and Congress is extremely common in US politics. In the last twelve years, Republican and Democrat presidents have had both hostile and friendly Congresses to work with. Indeed, the US public seem to regard a partisan division between President and Congress as a strengthening of the separation of powers.

Although the success of the ‘Tea Party’ should not be downplayed, we should also not read too much in the resurgence of the right in the US, particularly given the relative nadir they reached in 2008. Global trends do not seem to suggest a rise of the right. The French regional elections this year saw a victory of the Parti Socialiste (the Socialist Party), and despite the victories of the right in Hungary and mixed messages in Italy, there does not seem to be an overarching global trend towards the right as there was in the 1980s. In Britain, the inability of the Conservatives to gain a clear majority is indicative of an absence of a rise of right-wing vote.

What must be understood is that many Democrats and swing voters who backed Obama in 2008 feel disillusioned with the President’s consensus-based approach. Despite the passage of health care reform, the President has not used his Congress majority to his full advantage, even before Scott Brown and the Republicans ended the filibuster-proof Democrat majority.

Obama, more than any world leader in recent history was given a personal mandate for boldness. In this he has failed, or at least is perceived to have failed. (In politics perception is nine tenths of the law). As Machiavelli wrote:

"it is better to be bold than too circumspect"

Obama is guilty of giving the people consensus, when they wanted audacity. He has managed, not led.

The lesson of last night for David Cameron and Nick Clegg is simple: play to your mandate. Cameron and Clegg have exactly the reverse mandate to Obama – in Britain, consensus reigns. The mandate of consensus is a difficult one, although it suggests that policy should be aimed at the middle ground, rather than the core voters. Obama has paid the price for ignoring his core supporters. It is the dilemma which faces every executive upon gaining power – whether to govern for your supporters, or for the country. Ultimately, this is the decision which must be made. Machiavelli again provides the words, “it is better to be feared than to be loved, if you cannot be both”. Obama is neither.

Time will tell for Cameron and Clegg, although the nature of the coalition suggests that they should strive to be ‘loved’. They will underestimate the mandate at their peril.

Tuition Fees – An open letter from the Liberal Democrat grassroots

Reproduced below is the Open Letter as sent to Vince Cable (Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills) and responsible for the implementation or not of the Browne Report. It has also been sent to every single Liberal Democrat MP. It is signed by myself and other key influencers, I'll try and provide as many links as possible from the signatories. (I know there are more links I will add them when I can)

Dear Dr Cable,

On the 12th of October, Lord Browne published the findings of his report into higher education funding, which contained some good points and some very bad points.

One of the bad points was to remove the cap on tuition fees meaning that some courses could end up leaving a student in debt by over £36,000. This is an utter disgrace and cannot be allowed to happen. Vince Cable himself has said the level of personal debt is too high. Why should we force students to take on this kind of personal debt before they even buy a house?

The Liberal Democrats have, since 2001, pledged to scrap tuition fees. And while we are aware that this is not a Liberal Democrat Government, it does not warrant an abstention. We urge you to honour your pledge to fight any increase in fees.

Our party has always been one of fairness, but judging by Mr Clegg’s and Mr Cable’s responses to the suggestions it appears that we are moving away from that.

Please support us and help to retain the party’s identity within the coalition.

Regards

Kelly Panter (8612609) Birmingham Selly Oak)
Christopher Fenton (Birmingham Selly Oak)
Paul Wild (8630704)
Duncan Moore (Oxford East) 8616515
Jonathan McCree (Haringey Lib Dems)
Fraser Nesbitt (Bristol East)
Rachel Smith (Sheffield Hallam)
Dr. Richard Davis (Battersea and Tooting)
Caron Lindsay
Benjamin R Lille (8428808)
Elaine Bagshaw
John Fraser (Westminster South & City of London)
Charlotte Galpin (8271607)
Daniel Sear (Guildford) 8640319
Mike Dixon (City of Birmingham Organiser Lib Dems)
Cllr Chris Ward (Guildford)
Robert Howell – Southend
Stephen Mullen (membership no 6039944)
Chris Wilson (Kingston & Surbiton)
Duncan Borrowman FE member, PPC Old Bexley & Sidcup, former National Campaigns Officer
Susan Gaszczak – Watford
Cllr Fiona White, Leader, Lib Dem Group, Guildford Borough Council
Matthew Doye (Somerton and Frome)
Irfan Ahmed (lead campaigner in the Pendle parliamentary campaign in 2010)
Stephen Glenn (2010 Westminster Candidate for Linlithgow and East Falkirk)
Michael Carchrie Campbell, Chair, Northern Ireland Liberal Democrats; sometime convenor LDYS NI.
Nikki Thomson (2790866) Edinburgh Central constituency
Hannah Arnold (8686785)
Cllr Season Prater, Sandgate, Kent. Former LDYS Exec Officer.
Keith McGrellis (Northern Ireland Lib Dems member)
Darren Briddock (South East Region Chair Elect 2011)
Mr Matthew Burton (8570027)
Cllr Martin Hunt – Colchester
Cllr Nick Barlow – Colchester
Luke Bosman – Preston
Cllr David McBride – Bromley
Simon Green Borough Councillor (LB Brent) and Ex Vice President, University of Leicester Students’ Union 2005-6
Nima chatrizeh – Student
John Doran, ex Surrey County Councillor and deeply ashamed member.
James King Please sign me up as well. Ordinary member in Southport, and student activist in Oxford.
Michael James Yates (Preseton)
Merlene Emerson (Chair Chinese LibDems & candidate for London Assembly 2012)
Cllr Daisy Cooper
Andy Pickwell
Richard Huzzey (Oxford West & Abingdon)
Cllr Sam Potts (6644139)
Martin Hunt (Leader Libdem Colchetser Borough Council)
Craig Brown (8587094)
Colin Ross (4902826)
Kai Page
Lisa Harding
Lynne Beaumont, Lib Dem Group Leader, Shepway District Council
Val Loseby, Shepway District Councillor
Bev Rolfe, Shepway Lib Dem Local Party Chair
Maggie Sheldrake, Folkestone Town Councillor
Bill Sheldrake, Shepway Liberal Democrat Executive Member
James Shaddock
Cllr Stewart Golton, Leader of Leeds City Council Lib Dem Group
Cllr Jim Spencer, Leader of Otley Town Council
Cllr Ben Chastney, Leeds City Councillor
Cllr Jamie Matthews, Leeds City Councillor and PPC for Pudsey
Cllr Martin Hamilton, Leeds City Councillor
Cllr James Monaghan, Leeds City Councillor and PPC for Morley and Outwood
David Hall-Matthews, Leeds Central Member and Chair of the Social Liberal Forum
Adam Pritchard, Leeds North West Member
Chris Lovell, Leeds West Member and President of Leeds Liberal Youth 2008-2010
Stephen Sadler, Chair of Leeds Central Lib Dems
Peter Wrigley, President of Batley and Spen Lib Dems (personal capacity)
Ian Howell, Leeds Central Member
Christina Shaw, Leeds North West Member
Cllr John Cole, Bradford City Councillor and Chair of Shipley Lib Dems
Cllr John Watmough, Bradford City Councillor
Cllr Steve Smith, Leeds City Councillor
Cllr Alan Taylor, Leeds City Councillor
Matthew Burton
Chris Ward
Ramon Chiratheep
Hugh Bailey-Lane
Chris Lovell (Chair of Leeds Liberal Youth 2008-2010)
Chris Gurney
Richard Davis
Caron Lindsay
David MacDonald
David Parkes
Harriet Ainscough
Rachel Olgeirrson
Allan Window
Jason Lower (Secretary, Tonbridge and Malling branch)
Paul Freeman
Jenny Marr
Tim Prater
Kirby Meehan
Alexandra White
Michael Yates
Margaret White
Stephen Mullen
Christopher Leslie
Stephen Rule
Sara Bedford
Cllr Katie Ray
Becky White
Emma Page
Claire Berwick
Cllr Keith Legg
Martin Veart
Gareth Epps
Keith Nevols
Nikki Thomson
Cllr Terry Stacey
Cllr Susan Buchanan
Ramis Azer
Nick Blake
Marie Jenkins
Dominic Mathon
Kristian Chapman
Mark Whiley
Henry Vann
Cllr Ross Carter
Vanessa Hubbard
Sophie Bertrand
Seth Alexander Thévoz
Simon Courtenage
Tim Holyoake
Nick Edgeworth
Andrea O’Halloran
Luke Shore
David Warren
Gary Glover
Will Miéville-Hawkins
Fiona James
Jordan Kleiner
Laura Webster
Hywel Morgan
Christopher Mills (East Hampshire)
Ray Khan

That’s 135 signatures. A thank you from the whole team involved in this to everyone who signed.

Busy Day for Northern Irish Bloggers

Considering that both Michael and I were taking a 'break' from blogging over the weekend (somehow we still managed the odd one here and there). Today was almost as if we were unleashed back unto the world with a vengeance or possibly it was displacement theory while we're both waiting to find out who may have got a certain job. I'd also managed to wake up three hours before my alarm clock.

Anyway speaking of the job Michael and myself both managed a post about the Alternative Vote, hmm, I wonder why? On the subject of AV Michael also had an issue with Nick Clegg and Simon Hughes' email to members yesterday evening, I know I heard his disgust as he read it. I on the other hand looked at what Nick said, or rather didn't say about the emails that had gone to him about tuition fees. I'd also blogged about prisoners being given back the right to vote. While Michael blogged about getting another Golden Dozen, so I guess I need to up my game again or else he might just overhaul me.

Northern Ireland formed the remainder of the blog posts, firstly the bomb alert in North Belfast affecting the community where Michael lives, some waylaid campaign literature of mine. However, the most pertinent question after the discovery of the body of another of the 'disappeared' what effort to find the perpetrator or this and other disappearances?

Last night I did blog that I was off to "rescue a friendship, hopefully" well a peace treaty was signed in the Pizza Hut at Victoria Square. However, I was truly concerned at one point on Sunday. Although we have also just had another pleasant evening after an LGBT Consultation Forum meeting.

PS By the way this is also a post from Michael as indeed is this.

Blogged Elsewhere about a #MailFail

If you want to find out why these two campaigning postcards somehow managed to end up back on my desk, then I suggest you scoot on over to LibDemsNI and find out.

What do you mean you're not following LibDemsNI on Twitter? That's how you get all this stuff first.

Where are the Answers Nick?

I see that my friend and colleague Michael Carchrie Campbell has taken to task one of the email Lib Dem members received last night. I'm going to take to task the other.

Nick Clegg, after the announcement of the Browne Report inviting comments to be sent to him. Apparently according to last nights email the special email address that was set up received over 1000 responses. Yet only five points were raised in the response all carefully worded to sound supportive:

• concern that the proposals would result in a free market in higher education
• some key progressive elements of Browne’s report, particularly the repayment system similar to the concept of a graduate tax, and highlighted the need for Liberal Democrats to emphasise the positive aspects of the report, while ensuring that the most vulnerable are protected
• suggestions we should make savings elsewhere and increase taxation to fund higher education
• need to focus on Further Education and apprenticeships as well as higher education
• concern that those from disadvantaged backgrounds wouldn't be able to go to university under Browne’s proposals

I'm amazed that in those 1000 emails there wasn't a response to the unrest amongst many candidates like myself who raised the promise from our manifesto (emphasis mine):

"We will scrap unfair tuition fees for all students taking their first degree, including those studying part time, saving them over £10,000 each. We have a financially responsible plan to phase fees out over six years, so that the change is affordable even in these difficult financial times, and without cutting university income. We will immediately scrap fees for final year students."

and how this grinds instead with an increase in the tuition fee cap. If we were promising responsibility with our financial account how can we say we have allowed for even these difficult times yet are doing the opposite. It wasn't just a NUS pledge than many of us signed it was a manifesto commitment that "even in these difficult financial times" we would not need to burden our students further.

All we got under the question of making savings elsewhere was the same old drivel we were hearing from Cameron pre-Election not the bold, fairer, progressive language that the issue of tuition fees has raised through every conference debate we have had on the issue down my 22 years within Liberal Democrat circles.

I for one not am not going to be a shrinking violet on this one. Nick if you are going to be writing to members cut the drivel and actually answer our concerns. As Jennie Rigg put it so eloquently the other day "it would help if it was not worded as though giving a lecture to the hard of thinking".

Prisioners and the Ballot Box

The opening paragraph of the preamble to the Liberal Democrat constitution states (emphasis mine):

"The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community, and in which no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity. We champion the freedom, dignity and well-being of individuals, we acknowledge and respect their right to freedom of conscience and their right to develop their talents to the full. We aim to disperse power, to foster diversity and to nurture creativity. We believe that the role of the state is to enable all citizens to attain these ideals, to contribute fully to their communities and to take part in the decisions which affect their lives."

So therefore the fact that for the first time since 1870* that prisoners are to get the right to vote restored in the UK, is enshrined in our party constitution. The resultant change is not being brought about solely by the good nature of the new Government but as a result of a 2005 ruling the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). It was sort of there in our manifesto under the coverall line

"Ensure that everyone has the same protections under the law by protecting the Human Rights Act"

Everyone having the same protections should include the right for everyone to have the right to decide who makes those laws.

No doubt the Daily Fail will be up in arms about this, but the prison population that will be affected by the change in this law is only 70,000 people. Assuming that they will each be entitled to vote in the address where they were last resident, rather than where they are detained, it comes to an average of 117 votes per each of the proposed 600 constituencies.

Juliet Lyon, director of the Prison Reform Trust, said a "historic decision to enfranchise serving prisoners" would bring to an end the "archaic punishment of civic death". She said:

"In a modern prison system you would expect prisoners to have rights and responsibilities and politicians to take an active interest in their constituency prisons. People are sent to prison to lose their liberty not their identity."

While each country has the right under the ECHR ruling to decide what offences would carry voting restrictions, rather than the blanket ban that exists as present. If we believe in a restorative prison system, then surely we must believe that anyone serving a conviction no matter for what crime may serve a useful role in society at some point. Even some of those that are serving life sentences without any hope of remand may still be restored and serving useful functions within the walls of their confinement, passing on lessons in whatever way is possible to others that re-offending is not the way to go.

I'm glad to be a member of a party that enshrines the right of the individual. That stands up for each and every one of the citizens of the UK. While standing up for the rights of some individuals may seem hard and a tough thing to do at times, it is important that the rights of all are defended. Of course course imprisonment of some is required for the greater good to society as a whole, but those convicted are still individual citizens.

* The Forfeiture Act (1870) upheld in the Representation of the People Act (1983)

Former Labour Equality Minister in Gingerphobic Attack

There was always one chant I always felt uncomfortable with in the stands at Scottish football stands. It was the one attacking the poor unfortunate ginger player on the opposition team, and how his natural colouring was unacceptable. The reason being that being in Scotland there were plenty of ginger fans in our own section, heck the majority of what are now my grey hairs on head or in beard once were ginger.

Therefore to stand at your parties Scottish conference and make a ginger gibe can't not have gone down too well, one of the people sat on the platform looks rather uncomfortable as she applauds, the former Women and Equalities Minister, for it is her. She went futher and called him a rodent. Actually seeing a beavers are rodents and stem the torrent of resources washing away maybe we should use that. Danny Alexander Chief Dambuilder to the Treasury.

There is one other thing, my Lib Dem colleagues in Scotland haven't mutated into Tories and more than they mutated in Labourites during eight years of coalition Government in Scotland. Harriet in Scotland the people understand coalition is the coming together for a common cause, it does not take away from either party what makes them fundamentally themselves.

When will Labour start to talk policy rather than hurl insults? If they want to win seats they have to say what they will do, rather than merely saying, "Oh no! You can't be doing that."

Grow up Labour. Get back into politics and out of the playground name calling.

Update: Here is the Twitter comeback from Danny Alexander:

"I am proud to be ginger and rodents do valuable work cleaning up mess others leave behind. Red squirrel deserves to survive, unlike Labour"

Equal Marriage: Why I'm a Member of the Lib Dems not Stonewall

Stonewall have finally come out with a statement 'supporting' equal marriage:

"We seek to secure marriage for gay people as a civil vehicle on the same basis as heterosexual marriage, available in a registry office but without a mandate on religious organisations to celebrate it.

"We seek to retain civil partnerships for lesbian and gay people recognising their special and unique status."

But hang on, this is not what I or the Liberal Democrats are saying. Merely keeping is a civil vehicle ignores some of the LGBT community. People like me who are of faith and LGBT and want a church wedding, and certain religious groups The Quakers, some liberal Jewish synagogues etc want to carry out same-sex marriage in their faith, if we can but allow it.

Yes the Liberal Democrats also are not mandating every religious group to celebrate same-sex marriage. We called for allowing those "that wish to do so" to be allowed to. Five small words but a world of difference from what Stonewall are now saying. If they have consulted on this who have they consulted, clearly not widely. Clearly they are getting a statement out to appease some.

Also as you would expect from Stonewall they miss out the whole area of difficulties facing those people of transgender. Their existing relationships need to be allowed to carry on if they wish. Yet the failure to extend civil partnership to hetero-sexuals along side gay marriage and civil partnerships leads to an issue there. What if a partner in a same sex-couple undergoes gender reassignment, what happens to their marriage? Stonewall are not allowing them to have a civil partnership.

The Liberal Democrats have introduced a fully inclusive equal marriage policy, even allowing humanist celebrants in England and Wales to conduct weddings (as they can in Scotland), Stonewall are still failing to see the whole picture. Although this first step is to be welcomed there still is a lot of catching up still to be done to be where most of us are.

Sheffield Hallam Man Speak with Forked Tongue

In the run up to the general election the Institute of Fiscal Studies (IFS) said this about the Liberal Democrat manifesto:

"The highly respected Institute for Fiscal Studies, in its analysis of the parties' financial plans, said the Lib Dems had the smallest black hole of the main three in their funding schemes, and that there were no hidden tax rises on top."

Obviously we as a party were jumping up an down with delight with such a judgement in the week before the election. The great and the good of the party Vince Cable, Chris Huhne and of course Nick Clegg were all over the headlines expounding the wise judgements of the analysts at the IFS.

The IFS has called the comprehensive spending review "more regressive than progressive" and "unfair" saying the poorer families with children would be the "biggest losers" of the cuts. Excluding the wealthiest 2% of the population, who the IFS assesses will be the hardest hit, it says the poorest 10% of the population will, on average, lose about 5.5% of their net income compared with roughly 4.5% for the top 10%.

So these very sage like analysts from April/May should obviously be taken seriously by Nick Clegg. Not a bit of it, in today's Guardian he says:

"It goes back to a culture of how you measure fairness that took root under Gordon Brown's time, where fairness was seen through one prism and one prism only which was the tax and benefits system. It is a complete nonsense to apply that measure, which is a slightly desiccated Treasury measure. People do not live only on the basis of the benefits they receive. They also depend on public services, such as childcare and social care. All of those things have been airbrushed out of the picture by the IFS."

Yes Nick. But we are making fundamental cuts that are going to affect some of those other services to if we are not careful.

Vice-Chancellor Warns of Privatised University Education

A stark warning has come from the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Ulster in light of the Browne Report.

Professor Richard Barnett says what he brands a small group of "elitist" English universities lobbied and got a lot of their own self interest included in the Browne Report. A point that if true should send alarm bells ringing amongst those of the Liberal Democrat MPs who seem to have so whole-heartedly switched to accept the recommendations. Recommendations that we were wary of back in May enough to allow us to abstain if we didn't like them.

The view of these elitist institutions he says is that University Education should essentially be privatised. That would appear indeed to be what the lifting of the cap on Tuition Fees would allow, Oxford and Cambridge already competing on the international stage for best performers in academic achievement would be able to increase their funding without increasing the student base.

Professor Barnett said:

"This is a case of not wasting a good crisis to push through that agenda.

"Fortunately for us higher education is a devolved responsibility, it will be a decision for the assembly to decide.

"But, the scale of the cuts here do not justify the scale of the increase of fees.

"As we re-balance the economy it's skills that matter. This is an investment in our future and it's important that all sections of our society be part of that new economy. Every country in the world is investing in skills and in universities."

However, the agenda of Browne seems to be to privatise the institutions of Higher Education. That will make it a case of ability to pay not ability to learn that will be the differentiating factor.

Alex Cole-Hamilton on Tuition Fees

Edinburgh Central's Liberal Democrat candidate Alex Cole-Hamilton has produced this video to speak about students and tuition fees.



You can subscribe to his Alex4Central for more updates during his campaign for the election to Holyrood next May.

Posted Elsewhere and the Story Rolls On - Northern Ireland Education

Over the weekend here in Northern Ireland we've had a First Minister Peter Robinson calling for an end to education apartheid then a response from the Catholic Church. Which are two stories I have posted about on Liberal Democrats in Northern Ireland.

The Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness has accused his colleague of "taking on" the Catholic Church about it's provision of education. But Mr Robinson is not taking on the provision of the provision but the state funding of them to church schools. This would apply to all church schools, though the largest group would be the Catholic schools.

McGuinness has said:

"If Peter thinks taking on the Catholic Church, the Catholic bishops and indeed the Protestant churches for that matter and other interest groups is a sensible route to go, I think that is a big mistake.

"I think what we have to do is try and achieve and continue to build a consensus within our society about the need to develop shared services.

"If you go for a head-on collision with the so-called vested interests, that is a collision course which will lead us into a total and absolute mess."

Now I do think it is heading for a collision course, indeed I've said down the years how ludicrous the provision of new dual schools on one site sectarian primary schools in Scotland have been built. The separation of children for education purposes builds in difference, a barrier, a sense of otherness.

Donal Flanagan, chief executive of CCMS (Council for Catholic Maintained Schools) added to McGuinness's comments with:

"He is certainly not speaking as an educationalist because everybody knows that ethos adds value to education.

"If Peter Robinson wants an open, honest and inclusive debate on the future of education in Northern Ireland then why would he choose a platform at the installation of a DUP mayor in Castlereagh to launch this so I have to question his motive."

Well my mother is a educationalist. What's more she is someone who was involved in that most divisive of Northern Irish board curriculum items Religious Education. Earlier today she was telling me about the Education for Mutual Understanding (EMU) element which first came into Northern Ireland in 1983.

She was saying that there are some education establishments some are in the Catholic sector, some are in the state sector in staunch loyalist areas, who only paid lip service to EMU provision to their pupils. The education equivalent to break down that barrier wasn't and isn't working. She wishes that other children could have been like me and my brother, playing with our catholic neighbours outside of school time. Learning from an early age that there is no difference in them as individuals, rather than as some have to do after a separate education and housing system only learning that when they enter the workplace.

What Peter Robinson has done is to ask us in Northern Ireland to look deep within ourselves. To ask what is the problem? Where does it stem from? Is there anything we can do? It is a bold move. It is one that is not meant to devalue educationalists but to build up our children, build up our future and make the generations to come ones that Northern Ireland will be proud of.

We haven't fully dealt with the age old problems, isn't about time that we did?

Too many words often a sign of running to hide - LibDems.org.uk

Hat tip to James McKenzie for saving this:



Today that has been replaced on the website by this emphasis mine:

Liberal Democrats believe university education should be free and everyone who has the ability should be able to go to university and not be put off by the cost.

In coalition the Liberal Democrats are looking at proposals to ensure the bottom 30% of graduate earners will pay less for tuition than they do at the moment.

Following the Browne Review into Higher Education, Business Secretary Vince Cable is working on a system of repayment for tuition designed to make the highest earning graduates pay more than those who earn less.

He has also secured the raising of the payment threshold from it’s current £15,000 to £21,000.

The coalition agreement says:

UNIVERSITIES AND FURTHER EDUCATION

The Government believes that our universities are essential for building a strong and innovative economy. We will take action to create more college and university places, as well as help to foster stronger links between universities, colleges and industries.

• We will seek ways to support the creation of apprenticeships, internships, work pairings, and college and workplace training places as part of our wider programme to get Britain working.

• We will set colleges free from direct state control and abolish many of the further education quangos. Public funding should be fair and follow the choices of students.

• We will await Lord Browne’s final report into higher education funding, and will judge its proposals against the need to:

- increase social mobility;
- take into account the impact on student debt;
- ensure a properly funded university sector;
- improve the quality of teaching;
- advance scholarship; and
- attract a higher proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds.

• If the response of the Government to Lord Browne’s report is one that Liberal Democrats cannot accept, then arrangements will be made to enable Liberal Democrat MPs to abstain in any vote.

• We will review support for part-time students in terms of loans and fees.

• We will publish more information about the costs, graduate earnings and student satisfaction of different university courses.

• We will ensure that public funding mechanisms for university research safeguard its academic integrity.

Can be please now allow the arrangements to be made for our Liberal Democrat MPs to use their judgement over the vote? Rather than telling them to support these findings, and trying to convince members to do likewise.

As for the impact of Browne on these areas:

- increase social mobility;
- take into account the impact on student debt;
- ensure a properly funded university sector;
- improve the quality of teaching;
- advance scholarship; and
- attract a higher proportion of students from disadvantaged backgrounds.

While it is ensuring points 3 and 4 I feel it is lacking in providing for the students. Degrees are not merely a priced commodity, that should be free to vagracies the market forces and available to those who can afford it. Look at the opening line that remains from the previous education page.

"Liberal Democrats believe university education should be free and everyone who has the ability should be able to go to university and not be put off by the cost."

I still believe. I do not believe Browne allows for that or enables that.

Elaine Bagshaw's response to Nick's tuition fee email

Elaine Bagshaw a former Chair of Liberal Youth posted her response to Nick Clegg's email on Facebook. I felt it deserved a wider audience and therefore with her permission I am publishing that response below.

My response to Nick's tuition fee email

Dear Cowley Street staffer/poor intern that's been given this job,

Thanks for your email. I note it's the exact same one you sent to MPs last night, that many had already seen and reacted to. The fact that you haven't acknowledged a single point about debt and trust and the hundreds of others that have been made by people since we all saw that email, shows how little you now respect the membership of this party. If you want an "open dialogue", start by opening your ears and listening.

You keep referring to this dire financial mess argument. The problem here is that we had a fully costed and affordable manifesto - I know, I helped formulate the thing in FPC, in which a 6 year plan to scrap tuition fees was included AND costed. I have to ask whether you will now be using this as an excuse to drop all of our other pledges? Have you started a review of our manifesto and the policies in the coalition agreement, to see if we can afford them? Have you started a process internally to make sure we never produce a manifesto that, in hindsight, contains pledges we simply can't afford? No, didn't think so.

You may not have made any detailed decision but you and Vince both publicly endorsed the broad themes in the proposal. Vince did so on Tuesday morning before the ink on the Browne report was even dry. It is not an open dialogue when you have already decided privately and said publicly what you are going to do.

There are some good points in the Browne report, the extension of support to part-time students is an excellent move, but all it proposes is to tinker with the system. I agree that major reform of the system is needed, but Browne simply isn't it. It was a narrow review that hasn't tackled many of the major issues in HE, and hasn't looked widely enough at the alternatives.

But the biggest issue here is trust. I have been a proud member of this party since I joined at Uni because we are not like Labour and the Tories. It was us who could during the expenses scandal could hold our heads high and say that not a single on of our MPs had flipped their homes or overclaimed on a mortgage. Now, we sit in the same ditch as every other politician and political party that said one thing to get votes and did another once in power. I believed that over the next five years we could get a lot out of the coalition, and that we wouldn't be wiped out at the next election. Now, I'm not so convinced. You and Vince over the past two days have shown yourselves to be just like every other power grabbing politician, and frankly you have treated the membership with disdain. I supported you in the last leadership election, but if happened again today I wouldn't be able to. I am seriously reconsidering whether to stand for any publicly elected position whilst you are leader of my party.

You have let thousands of party members and voters down. You may be enjoying government now but it is us who will have to pick up the pieces of this party when you are gone. The legacy you are leaving us is not one I will be proud of.

Yours,

Elaine

Former Lib Dem Leaders Will Vote Against Rise in Tuition Fees

Two former leaders of the Liberal Democrats have come out in opposition to the Browne Reports call to raise the cap on tuition fees and have said they will vote against it. Charles Kennedy Rector of Glasgow University and Sir Menzies Campbell chancellor of St. Andrews University.

"The Browne report is big and important and there is a lot in it that needs to be studied and still a lot to be discussed and debated.

"But as rector of Glasgow University, I will be standing by the NUS pledge I made on tuition fees before the general election."

The proposals could have a knock-on effect in Scotland because they could reduce finance from Westminster through the Scottish grant.

This would leave institutions north of the border facing competition from better-funded English ones and Scottish students would face the same fees regime if they followed a degree course south of the border.

Ming BBC Radio 4's World at One yesterday:

"Not only did I sign a pledge, I was photographed doing it.

"My credibility would be shot to pieces if I did anything other than stick to the promise I made.

"As for others, they must make their own judgment depending on their own circumstances."

Lord Browne’s review recommended abolishing the existing £3,290 cap on tuition fees. This would allow universities to charge as much as £14,000 a year.

The move should be accompanied with a real rate of interest on student loans, a higher threshold for loan repayments and a more generous system of grants, he said. Thus penalising twice with the extra per annum and higher repayment rates.

In Which I Disagree With Nick a Lot

Over on Lib Dem Voice there is a letter which Nick Clegg has sent to all MPs on the subject of Tuition Fees. In it he writes:

Like you, I am painfully aware of the pledge we all made to voters on tuition fees ahead of the General Election. Departing from that pledge will be one of the most difficult decisions of my political career. It means doing something that no one likes to do in politics – acknowledging that the assumptions we made at election time simply don’t work out in practice. With the benefit of hindsight, I signed a pledge at a time when we could not have anticipated the full scale of the financial situation the country faces now and the absence of plausible alternatives for students to the arrangements we are now advocating.

Actually NO Nick I don't agree with you. The Browne report is looking at removing the cap on tuition fees. This means that only the wealthiest of our young people, those from a privileged back ground will be able to go to our finest institutions of learning. This is not the fairness for students that we stood for.

As well as promising not to increase tuition fees we did say we would seek a fairer alternative. One thing we suggested in the past to do it was a penny on income tax. Income is a fairer way of paying for University education than tuition fees (which now will be paid back at commercial rates of interest). It is also fairer that a graduate tax, expecially as some graduates will be working alongside people in the same payscale who will not have a degree, though the graduate will be paying 9% more.

The Browne report is not seeking a fairer alternative laissez faire pricing of education does ensure that our brightest get a fair deal. The rich already pay to ensure their young go to the best schools, to get the best results, to go to the best universities. To then ensure that we also price smartest A Level students from the state sector out of the course of their choice, which meets their abilities, is not liberal and is not democratic.

Those who manage to get to Oxford or Cambridge from the state sector already do so at a great disadvantage. To place them at a further disadvantage as the Browne Report allows, is not why I stood for election. This is battle I have been fighting since the Thatcher Government of my undergraduate days moved to bring in loans rather than making the maintenance grant a fair and workable system. The campaign for fair student finance is one that runs through my political veins as deeply and any Lib Dem policy thread, if not deeper.

I signed the NUS Pledge as did every Lib Dem MP. I am standing by my promise to the students of Linlithgow and East Falkirk and I will continue to ensure that Liberal Democrat MPs do the
same.

The Browne report far exceeds what was envisioned when the coalition deal was signed. A lifting of the cap on tuition fees was one thing, a removal of it all together is not what we envisioned. The goalposts have moved and with it the game. Our Lib Dem MPs should take this on board and do the right thing and vote against allowing the removal of the cap. This is how we show we mean to give a Fairer Deal for Students.

There is now a Facebook Group called Lib Dems Against Scraping the Cap, in which I have joined other PPCs, AMs and others.

A short story set in a browne brick thatched college...

...and I hope a work of Fiction.

Cross posted on Liberal Democrats in Northern Ireland

Sitting in his rocking chair in 2050 Stephen Glenn is talking to his eldest great-nephew about to head up to Belfast Metropolitan College rather than Cambridge University or Oxford University, where 40 years earlier he would have been smart enough to go.

It was Thatcher what started it you know?

I was there a fresh-faced young student back then, with hair, stop your sniggering. No where was I? Oh yes I was a fresh-faced student. Back then there was what was called a maintenance grant.

No. That wasn't what paid for your education that was actually what was given to students dependent on your parental income to actually help you afford to live away from home at the University of your choice.

Fees? Oh they were all paid for you didn't pay a sausage everything that was required to teach you was paid for by the Government. The only requirement was that you had the right results at school to prove you were smart enough for the course. It was the learning power that was good enough to determine where you went not you parent's earning power. How do you think Granda and Granny and Great Aunt Jacqui managed to get to St. Andrews?

Me? No I went to Kingston.

No, it wasn't because I wasn't smart. I was pretty smart I just didn't dedicate all myself to academic achievement. I was smart enough to get by at a top-level, if I'd done less extra-curricular stuff I'd have achieved a lot more. Anyway we're digressing.

Any way Baroness Thatcher. Yes she is still around. Maybe there is a painting of her somewhere that keeps her hanging on. But she wasn't a Baroness then, merely the Prime Minister. Her Government, sorry Her Majesty's Government, of which Thatcher were head, Mícheál would kill me if he were here for such a slip, decided to bring in student loans instead of grants.

So your great-uncle. No me! Not your other great-uncle, and thousands of others marched on Westminster shouting 'Grants not loans."

Why? Well we knew that if we started to give out loans to fund people's higher education it was just the top of the iceberg. For starters the richer students would not take out loans anyway, mater and pater, would see them through with their silver spoons in their mouths since birth. So it would only be the poorer students who would end up accumulating debt.

Also although they were only going to limit loans initially to a certain proportion of the maintenance grant amount and at a rate below commercial rates of interest for repayment, this would slowly be eroded. There was also going to be the incentive that once people borrowed money to feed, clothe, accommodate and transport themselves, some government would then make them also pay for the education.

We shouted that at the time. We? Oh the National Union of Students and students in general. Oh yes Students were Unionised back then, before the riots of 2011, when David Cameron decided he couldn't allow political activity on University Campuses outside of the Oxford and Cambridge Unions*.

Haha. No on the pretence that the other Universities weren't capable of engaging in sensible civilised political debate.

Anyway slowly but surely changes happened. First there was the removal of grants altogether and all the maintenance coming from loans or parental contribution. Then they brought in Tuition Fees, which again could be paid for by loans. Then the Liberal Democrats helped get rid of Tuition Fees in Scotland.

Yes, I was part of that. You've seen the pictures. Me with Charles Kennedy, Nick Clegg and Jo Swinson the first Liberal Democrat Prime Minister for 100 years.

Anyway then came the Browne report. Instead of merely increasing the cap on tuition fees it called for the removal of it altogether. Mere months after all the Lib Dem MP and other candidates including me had signed a pledge that we would vote against any rise recommended by Browne when his report was published. My Cameron had asked those same MPs to promise to abstain, rather that vote against if after decades for some of campaigning against this movement to the rich being able to afford the best education carried on.

They were good men and women. Initially it was only 30 but their number grew as the pressure from the party faithful grew. It grew large enough that with all the opposition parties we would have beaten the raise in Tuition Fees but then Ed Miliband told his troops to march through the aye lobby. Many did but a few hung back and joined the Lib Dems in the noes lobby. Sadly it was heavily won and since then smart kids like you, and your dad have found it really hard to get to a good University. Indeed you are the first Glenn family member in 4 generations not to go to University, despite you being smarter than all of us, with the possible exception of your granny. Simple because we cannot afford to send you to Queen's and the University of Ulster sadly got absorbed into it during the worse days for Higher Education.


Update: There is now a Facebook Group called Lib Dems Against Scraping the Cap, joining other PPCs, AMs and others.

* Nice subtle play on words here as these two institutions are not unions in the sense of the common man's vernacular.

Open Letter to Lib Dem MPs

Dear Nick Clegg and Lib Dem MPs,

Like all of you I signed a pre-election pledge to vote against any increase in tuition fees and to seek to introduce a fairer alternative.

Like most of you I probably had a picture taken signing it. As you can see from the picture I signed it right next to the name of the Deputy Prime Minister up in Perth at conference.

I'm pleased that in light of the Browne proposals at least 30 of our Liberal Democrat MPs are prepared to honour the pledge that they signed before the election by voting against. I am ashamed that Vince Cable last night tried to persuade them otherwise and neglect what the people who voted for them said they wanted.

Greg Mulholland has said:

"I am trying to make it clear to government that we simply wouldn't accept a rise in tuition fees. I hope that the government will heed the message and will come up with a proposal that isn't an increase to fees."

That is what we agreed to. We have delivered on fairness to students here in Scotland and again at the weekend decided to maintain that is a challenging debate to change, I which Tim Farron also spoke strongly in favour of student. We have stood by this principle for a long time and now is not the time to compromise on such a long held position. Indeed this sort of standing up for our principles might just be the sign that tells the media we are not the Tories lapdogs, we are not Tory-lite, we are our own party.

Student funding is something we have long been distinctive on. I'm proud of that fact and that students and their families recognise that. We're now the ones to fight that corner. Let us stand up and be counted in doing just that.

Stephen Glenn
2010 Westminster Candidate Linlithgow and East Falkirk


Update: There is now a Facebook Group called Lib Dems Against Scraping the Cap, joining other PPCs, AMs and others.

Speech to Conference - Intercity Express Programme

On Saturday I made a speech to Scottish Liberal Democrat conference on the issue of the Intercity Express Programme. I was especially speaking on lines 11-13 of the motion.

1 Conference notes that that the UK Government is due to take a decision on whether to
2 proceed with the Intercity Express Programme, intended to provide 882 new carriages
3 for a series of intercity routes, following the completion of the comprehensive spending
4 review in October 2010.

5 Conference welcomes the environmental, social and economic benefits of an efficient
6 and accessible public transport service, and supports the long-term electrification of the
7 railways as part of a modern rail network.

8 Conference recognises the importance of cross-border transport links between England
9 and Scotland and that direct rail services connecting London to the north and the north
10 east of Scotland bring direct economic benefit to these regions.

11 Conference is therefore concerned at the report of the Review of the Intercity Express
12 Programme by Sir Andrew Foster which suggests that long distance routes to Inverness
13 and Aberdeen could be served by connecting trains rather than through-services.

14 Conference believes that the loss of the through-service from London to Aberdeen and
15 Inverness would be a significant deterrent to train travel for these regions and would
16 represent a serious reduction in the quality of cross-border services, with a resultant
17 negative impact on Scottish business competitiveness.

18 Conference therefore calls on the Secretary of State for Transport to protect the
19 economic value of the north and north east regions of Scotland by maintaining direct rail
20 services between London and Aberdeen and Inverness and to reject any other
21 diminution of cross-border public transport services between England and Scotland.

I started by saying that although through the years I had always addressed conference as a Northern Irish man this was the first time I have addressed them as a member of the Northern Irish party. It was as a result that travelling from Northern Ireland and many long cross country trips that I had learnt one important issue about connecting services, they do not always connect you to you final destination on the same day you started out.

A previous speaker had already pointed out the access issues and this is true for all passengers. This is true for all passengers but can affect those that are elderly and infirm the most. If you add in a rail replacement service at the same time as a non-though train this can slowly lead people to not want to let the train take the strain.

As I concluded I pointed out that in 2003 we stood to increase the rail service in Scotland including the Bathgate to Airdrie extension which means so much to the people of West Lothian. We should similarly be working to increase provision not reduce it, therefore I urged conference to accept the motion.