Tim Farron seems incapable of answering a straight question and has a dodgy grasp of history as well

Liberal Democrat Party President Tim Farron is outmanoeuvred by Andrew Neil and I think says more than he wanted to.

The EU moving the goalposts so as to ensure nobody holds up the rush to full integration

That is the proposal from the senior Lib Dem MEP, Andrew Duff, who wants to amend the EU’s own rules, so that they will be at variance with the norms of international law, by allowing treaties to come into effect before all the signatories have ratified them. His plan is that instead of treaties requiring unanimous approval, as set out very clearly in the Treaty of Rome, future EU treaties would come into effect once just four fifths of member states had deposited their instrument of ratification in the vaults of the Italian government.

Andrew Duff is quite clear about his motives, here's part of his letter suggesting this change that he sent to President Jerzy Buzek

So there we have it, rather than address the concerns of opponents of any future treaties Andrew Duff, Liberal Democrat would rather change the rules so opponents can be ignored.


The EU is a juggernaut heading towards 'ever closer union'; the UK electorate needs to be asked if it wants to be on-board this juggernaut or not. However the opinion polls have made it very clear that the UK population would vote to leave the EU if asked, so that is why we will not be asked.

"We don't need no education"

Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear; poor Liberal Conspiracy's Sam Bumby who has written a piece entitled "Get your Eton hands of my school". I think he might mean "off" but then I had a decent education, although not at Eton.

Apparently

"Sam Bumby is 16 years old with a big interest in politics. He has just started blogging and is on Twitter @sBumby"

A big interest in politics but not in spelling; you can't just trust your spell-checker Sam, it won't differentiate between "of" and "off" or "their", "there" and "they're".




Thanks to Tory Bear for the spot.

Labour just don't do EU democracy

Spotted in the middle of a long piece on Calling England was this

"Labour and Lib Dems thwart attempt to introduce "referendum lock" on future EU treaties. The Conservatives unsuccessfully tried to make an amendment to the Government's Constitutional Reform Bill on 19 January, which would have meant that any future Treaty transferring power to the EU be subject to a referendum. The amendment was defeated by 303 votes to 183."

I would interested as to the reasons Labour and the Lib Dems would give for this anti-democratic stance.

A levy on properties worth over £1 million

Some questions and comments spring to mind about this Lib Dem policy:
How will property values be assessed? At the last rating valuation, at the top of the market, at last purchase, at estate agents valuation (if so which agent), at average for the road, at highest value in the area, at lowest value in the area? Not as easy as it sounds is it oh economic genius Vince Cable?

This policy will unduly penalise Londoners over the rest of the Country. Whilst a nice house almost anywhere in the Country can be purchased for less than £1 million, in London it is not quite that clear-cut; but then a bit of class war rhetoric by the Lib Dems may help shore up their vote against a Labour party also trying to shore up its core vote.

Vince Cable appears to be assuming that everyone that owns an expensive house has high income, what about retired people in large old family homes, say around Richmond Green? Will they be forced to sell their houses as they may not be able to afford the 0.5% "levy"?

The levy is set to start at 0.5%, £5,000 on a £1 million house, will there be a set upper limit on the rate of the levy or will it like stamp duty be hiked ever upwards as an extra "wealth" tax?

Lib Dem inconsistencies of policy get no coverage on the BBC

The BBC are endlessly looking for dividing lines within the Conservative Party: on the EU, the NHS, public spending etc.

Meanwhile a newspaper spots a Lib Dem dividing line that the BBC will ignore. Sam Coates reports that:

"Vince Cable on the Today programme: "One has to look at everything, it isn’t sensible as I think the Conservatives are doing, to say that you know, there are certain areas we cant go anywhere near which of course means that the pain everywhere else is much greater. I think we have to look at everything."

Nick Clegg in the TES (in an article headlined "Lib Dems will ringfence education cash, claims Clegg") the party leader responds to a question about education spending: “We won’t cut. Absolutely nothing could be more important. We’ve got this ballooning structural deficit, which means we will not be able to pay for things in the way we did before. That is a fact and we need to learn to abandon some policies and funding pledges we’ve made in the past. That will be painful for us and painful for all the parties. But one of the things I’m absolutely adamant about is that it would be madness to cut support for schools in order to deal with the poisonous legacy of this recession.”

Other parties would be taken apart if they made this kind of mistake..."

Almost right, although I would argue that in reality only (of the three main parties) the Conservative Party would be taken apart for such differences of policy. Indeed if you look at the coverage of Alistair Darling and Gordon Brown's recent attitude to cuts and the way the BBC have reported it you will see coverage based upon nods and winks and genial good humour as Gordon Brown is carefully lead to his new position.

Nick Clegg on shaky ground

The BBC (in anyone but the Conservatives mode) Faithfully report that:

"Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg is to turn his fire on David Cameron by labelling him the "conman of British politics".

Speaking at the start of his party's conference in Bournemouth, Mr Clegg will accuse the Tory leader of saying anything to win the next election. "

A Lib Dem accusing a politician from another party of saying anything to win an election? Now that takes balls.

I wonder if Nick Clegg will revive the hoary old chestnut "they will put the con back into conservatives". If so maybe someone could ask if that means that the Lib Dems put the "li into Lib Dem"...

Lib Dem MP shows her mettle

Liberal Democrat Lynne Featherstone was accused of wasting fire brigade time for ringing the emergency services when her boiler began making strange noises.

And this is a policy change, how?

The BBC are reporting that

"Youngsters would not face prosecution for minor crimes and anti-social behaviour under a new Liberal Democrat crime strategy for England.

The party said custody for youngsters should be a "last resort" as it was expensive and ineffective.

Instead offenders would appear before panels of local people to apologise, and pay the cost of damage caused."

So there is a political party more limp-wristed towards criminals than the current Labour government...

Delusional or liars?

The Lib/Dems came a distant third in the Crewe and Natwich by-election and yet two days before the by-election the BBC were reporting under the headline "Lib Dems 'can still win in Crewe'" that:

"The Liberal Democrats have said they can win the Crewe and Nantwich by-election, insisting the race is "much tighter" than polls suggest.

A spokesman for Lib Dem candidate Elizabeth Shenton predicted a number of "hardcore" Labour voters would defect to the party on Thursday.

Leader Nick Clegg is visiting the constituency on Wednesday to campaign.

Recent opinion polls have put the Conservatives in the lead, with Labour in second place and the Lib Dems third.

'Positive campaign'

But Ms Shenton's spokesman said the party's own "on-the-ground" data suggested it was "within a few percentage points" of winning.

He added: "The Labour Party is no longer in the race... we have used traditional campaigning techniques - going out and meeting people.

"Elizabeth is very personable and we are trying to run a positive campaign."

...

Ms Shenton's spokesman said: "What I think will happen is that a considerable hardcore Labour vote that hasn't already gone across to us will do, when they realise that to do otherwise could give Crewe and Nantwich a Tory MP for the first time in the seat's history.""

Did the LibDems really have "on-the-ground" data that suggested it was "within a few percentage points" of winning? I would love to see this data if so.

Did the BBC really believe the LibDem campaign's claims or were they trying to boost support for the LibDems, anything to stop the evil Tories from being elected?



Thanks to Right for Scotland for the spot.

Nick Clegg shows consistency of views

Conservative Home report that:

"Over at The Guardian's Comment is free Open Europe's Neil O'Brien has unearthed a great quote from Nick Clegg from before the last General Election:

"The real reason, of course, why the government does not want to hold a referendum is the fear that it may lose ... Nothing will do more damage to the pro-European movement than giving room to the suspicion that we have something to hide, that we do not have the 'cojones' to carry out our argument to the people."

In Neil's must-read article he also dismisses Mr Clegg's argument for an in-out referendum:

"Most people in Britain don't want to see further centralisation of power in the EU - but at the same time they want to reform the EU, not leave it. Only offering people a polarising "in or out" referendum would be a dishonest attempt to push people into positions they don't hold.""


The Lib Dems as two faced as ever.

Political alliances

Last night when I read that Chris Hume had overtaken Nick Clegg in the "battle" for the leadership of the Liberal Democrats I remarked to Mrs NotaSheep that maybe Nick Clegg and his "Orange Book" followers might be more at home in the Conservative Party than in the Liberal Democrats. Today I read in the Observer that "David Cameron today launches an audacious attempt to realign the centre ground of British politics when he offers to join forces with the new leader of the Liberal Democrats and forge a 'new progressive alliance' to challenge Gordon Brown.
In an echo of Tony Blair's talks with Paddy Ashdown a decade ago, designed to keep the Tories out of power for a generation, Cameron calls for co-operation across a range of fronts."

An interesting comment (or lack of) comes near the end of the article "Huhne last night dismissed the offer. 'David Cameron's claims to be pushing the green agenda are just as hollow as Gordon Brown's. In the summer of 2006 we had to break off our attempts to come up with joint policies because the Conservatives were not prepared to talk seriously about green taxes.'"

Not a word from Nick Clegg?!