Archive for featured
The real political battle isn’t Conservative vs Labour or Cameron vs Miliband
Skim the political news – or brace yourself and watch some of festival of braying adults that is PMQs – and you could easily think that British politics is primarily a contest between Cameron and Miliband, Conservative and Labour, to be top dog. You could – and you would be wrong...
Maria Hutchings, Eastleigh Conservative candidate, plays hide and seek with the media
One of my favourite moments from the 1997 general election campaign came when I was stood on a street corner in Harrogate, talking to a report about the challenge from Lib Dem candidate Phil Willis, who was trying to take the seat from the Conservatives. Suddenly, the journalist looked over my shoulder, muttered ‘excuse me’ [...]
Majority back same-sex marriage
From the polling published this weekend: Would you support or oppose changing the law to allow same-sex couples to marry? Support: 55% Oppose: 36% Amongst Conservative voters the results are 44% – 49% (which is a statistical dead heat, when you remember to factor in the margin of error). Interestingly, the majority support comes despite [...]
New university data shows everyone was wrong about tuition fees
May I introduce you to my latest graph? It’s based on the new data just published about university applications in England and compares the application rate for university places from the most deprived parts of the country with those from the least deprived. As you might expect, the least deprived areas see a higher university [...]
Tim Gordon scorecard, 1 year on
Last January I wrote an open letter to the party’s then new Chief Executive Tim Gordon, setting out four priorities. One year on, how are things looking? Here’s what I wrote (with introductory pleasantries skipped), with each of the four points followed by an update and a score. Read on to see how Tim has [...]
Nick Clegg: Time to rethink drugs policy
The Sun running a story about the attitude of politicians to drugs reform is fairly commonplace. A Liberal Democrat politician calling for the drugs laws to be reviewed is fairly commonplace. What is however rather less common – and so all the more significant – is for the former to feature the latter in a [...]
Autumn Statement: the good, the bad and the tricky
It’s been a busy week, so for my take on the Autumn Statement, here is my trio of media hits (featuring that tie):
* Mark Pack has written 101 Ways To Win An Election and produces a monthly newsletter about the Liberal Democrats.
Eliminating the structural deficit is aiming for the wrong target
There is an appealing simplicity behind the idea of having a zero structural deficit. It is the policy the government is committed to, with its plans to eliminate the structural deficit. And it’s also wrong. For all the problems in measuring the structural deficit accurately, the concept is a useful one – to measure what [...]
How to vote – and what to do once you’ve voted
Got an election in your area today? Here are a few key pieces of information for you. Voting in person Polling stations are open between 7am and 10pm today. No votes can be cast after 10pm; it’s not like the shops where being in the queue at closing time is enough. You don’t need your [...]
