Jeremy Browne: off his trolley

The Times’s interview with Jeremy Browne today (link to the Guardian because it doesn’t have a paywall and there’s nothing in the Times original that you’re missing) highlights for me the inherent contradiction of the Lib Dem right wing. They’ve always veered between two modes. One is that the wicked left of the party have… Continue reading Jeremy Browne: off his trolley

Why Charlotte Henry’s purity test of “real” liberalism is misguided

Charlotte Henry has a curious article on the Total Politics blog, suggesting that Clegg’s speech on a more participatory form of industrial democracy will help us to seperate the “real liberals” from the “SDP-statist-sandal wearers”. There are several problems with this diagnosis. For one thing, the famed “sandal wearers” and the SDP members are very… Continue reading Why Charlotte Henry’s purity test of “real” liberalism is misguided

Speech: Where we are and how we got here

Note: I got into a bit of a state preparing for my speech at the Social Liberal Forum Conference on Saturday, staying up the previous night writing and angsting about it: for some reason I found the prospect of sharing a platform with Neal Lawson, Will Hutton and Simon Hughes (who ended up replaced by… Continue reading Speech: Where we are and how we got here