Debate

On Sunday, Liberal Democrat Federal Conference will consider a motion about state funded faith schools and is invited to choose from three options regarding religious selection in faith school admissions. Liberal Democrat members should support Option A - which seeks to phase out religious selection - to signal that the party opposes discrimination and support improved integration.

While making many hat tips in the right direction, unfortunately, this was mainly a Budget of half measures and missed opportunities. 

Since the EU Referendum, much of the debate about Brexit has revolved around European freedom of movement. With Britain poised to embark on a ruinous hard Brexit, progressives must not pander to the casual xenophobia and nativism of UKIP and some on the Tory right.

Given the vitriol of the political right towards immigration, it has never been the easiest thing for progressives to defend. However, it is essential that we do defend it. Hard Brexit will do nothing to heal the deep divisions caused by the referendum. If you believe in a free and a fair world then you must support freedom of movement. It boggles the mind how any liberal or social democrat could oppose it.

Introduction

In the course of writing various analytical pieces on Lib Dem electoral performance in recent years, I’ve become rather used to ending up as a voice of doom and gloom. “You’ve rather cornered the market in depressing Liberal Democrats”, observed one colleague. This is slightly different. It’s actually a welcome change of pace to be the bearer of good news. For the Liberal Democrats, the Richmond Park by-election was an unambiguously good result. In an age where expectations are constantly being managed up or down, this pamphlet seeks to put the by-election result in perspective.

Much of this was written in the immediate aftermath of the Richmond Park by-election of December 2016, but held over for release until after the Stoke-upon-Trent Central and Copeland by-elections of February 2017, for revision and reconsideration in light of subsequent developments. In the event, very little needed tweaking, though as I add the finishing touches to this with the next by-election having just been triggered in Manchester Gorton, I am more convinced than ever of the points made about the predominance of by-elections in Labour-held seats

Climate change remains one of the greatest threats to liberalism in our midst. Global greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) continue to rise, albeit at a slowing rate, and their atmospheric concentration marches towards what the global scientific community considers a safe limit for human civilization. Alongside Trump and Brexit, 2016 may go down in history as the year atmospheric concentrations of CO₂ breached 400 parts per million (ppm) for the first time in at least 800,000 years. The absolute limit to have even a 50 per cent chance of keeping global average temperature rises below 2 degrees is 450 ppm although many scientists recommend 350 ppm.  

I am going to tell you a story.  It happens to be true.  But bear with me, there is a point to it.

The “Swinsty cormorant” was usually there, perched on a float around 100 metres out from the dam wall at Swinsty Reservoir in North Yorkshire, whenever I ran round it with my dogs.  I used to be fascinated by the lone bird and would always look out for him to see if he was there.  My imagination ran riot with why he was always there on his own with no mates in sight.  I was captured by the romance of his loneliness, I suppose.

The hopes and dreams of the 21st century have faded away. Britain awaits Theresa May’s hard Brexit, Donald Trump is American President and fear of nationalism is sweeping across continental Europe. The Western world is in the grip of a huge identity crisis. Identity politics is the nationalistic fuel behind both Brexit and Trump. The populist right present themselves as anti-establishment, while traditional social democratic parties sink into the electoral abyss. Decades of market fundamentalist policies have hollowed out our politics and our communities. 

Into this crisis of progressive politics and liberal democracy come social liberals. Internationalism is under attack and British society continues to have vast inequalities of wealth and power. Social liberals have the ability to revive progressive politics, but in-order to do so we must change the political narrative and reclaim our biggest and most radical ideas. 

Whilst the Liberal Democrat Brexit Policy is a good short-term policy, it is one that will have to adapt as the fast moving situation changes. The Liberal Democrats are in danger of becoming a single-issue party with Tim becoming a Brexit bore. 

One of the saddest things about the lurch to extremism and the right wing of the political spectrum over the past few years—and especially these last few months—has been that attention has been taken away from the significant problems with capitalism and its reliance on continued growth that the 2008 crash had exposed.

The Classical Economists, in particular Adam Smith and John Stuart Mill, had already theorised centuries ago that growth could not go on forever and that eventually states would enter the condition of being a “stationary state”.  John Stuart Mill wrote that the “increase of wealth is not boundless….the end of growth leads to a stationary state”.  In addition, John Maynard Keynes thought that economic growth should not be infinite and that eventually we should reach a place where we could focus on more spiritual issues.