3 ways you can try to save #isamuaza's life

I am reeling from the fact that a government with Liberal Democrats in it is on the brink of crossing a major humanitarian line. Not content with standing by while Isa Muaza starves himself to death in protest at his treatment within an immigration detention centre, tomorrow morning they are planning to deport him. He can barely stand, and as this report from the Guardian states, he has numerous health problems. If he survives the flight, what are they going to do to someone in such a weakened state? Dump him in the arrivals lounge and head back home? What reputable airline would do that? This one, Air Charter Scotland, apparently.

Lord Roger Roberts wrote a heartbreaking post on Liberal Democrat Voice yesterday describing his visit to Isa, who has now not eaten for 90 days, and making the case for clemency.

Even before this protest began – and before he ever came to the UK – Isa Muaza was a deeply vulnerable person. He fled Nigeria fearing for his life at the hands of the terror group Boko Haram, a group he says have already killed several members of his family and as he told me yesterday, if returned this week he will have no one to meet him off the plane. He is penniless, blind and incapable of standing on his own. In his current state this on its own is a death sentence.

In deporting Mr Muaza on Friday the Home Office seems to be seeking to avoid another death in immigration detention. But the Home Secretary cannot – and should not – escape responsibility for her actions. In this case, for forcibly detaining a man the system so evidently could not care for. Those held in the thousands of beds in immigration detention centres across the UK are some of the most vulnerable people in the country. Striking out at them is not the sign of a strong immigration system, but a desperately weak one.

So what does a fair society do when faced with someone on hunger strike? There are some people, like Theresa May, who think it's just a way of playing the system. For three months? To the point of a long drawn out horrible death? For me, it's the sign of a very sick system that nobody going through it has any confidence in it to treat them fairly.

We need to be working on prevention. Isa originally started his hunger strike because his clinical and dietary needs were not being met. Taking someone's liberty is drastic enough. We don't need to have their dignity too. If someone is being detained, which should not be a common thing at all, they should have all the support and health care that they need and the respect as a fellow human being that they deserve.

We generally are pretty helpless in these situations, but that doesn't mean we should sit and do nothing. There are times when we should make our voices heard and this is one of them. Here are 3 things you can do:

1. Sign Julian Huppert's and Roger Roberts' e-petition.

2. Tweet or email Air Charter Scotland and ask them not to transport Isa Muaza.

3. If you are a Liberal Democrat party member tweet or email Tim Farron, Party President, to ask him to continue to press Nick Clegg to intervene. He has met with Nick's team today and urged them to do so and he has also signed Julian and Roger's petition. The more people he can say are annoyed about this, the stronger his case will be. Although, bluntly, it shouldn't take us being annoyed to move Nick to action on this.

We already knew that the asylum system was inhumane and put people through horrid indignities while not giving vulnerable people enough time to get representation and present their evidence properly. It was bad enough under Labour, and the Conservatives have, seemingly unchecked, made it worse. What are we there for if not to stand up for those who can't stand up for themselves? We need to start making a tangible difference, and soon, to the way people are treated. It's already bad enough that a Liberal Democrat minister has been restricting access to Legal Aid so that women can't get legal representation, for example, if they are trying to get a place in a mother and baby unit. That's heartbreaking enough, but we're talking about a matter of life and possibly imminent death here.

Liberal Democrats are there to protect people from the excesses of the state. I accept that there are limits to what we can do when we make up just a fifth of the Government and I know that Labour and Tories have no such concern, but we need to do it firstly because nobody else will and secondly because it's right.

So, who's been briefing against Tim Farron, then?

The Liberal Democrats' spell in government has been characterised by very little hostility and disunity on a personal level. Whatever arguments there may have been behind the scenes have not spilled over into the pages of the press very often. That's actually quite remarkable given the pressure we are under as a party. Sure, we've had our disagreements on policy, with more to come, but we've kept it civil.

Politicians have been secretly briefing the press about what goes on behind the scenes as long as there has been politics. I remember being shocked when, as a very young and naive political activist, I overheard a very senior figure doing just that. This stuff fills newspaper columns, but when it gets personal, and toxic, it becomes a massive problem.

There have been two recent examples of unpleasant, personal unattributed attacks, and both have come from the establishment side of the party. First of all, we saw the clumsy, inept and inaccurate hatchet job done on Vince which apparently sparked an enquiry in leader's office. Now, the Independent tells us, "one figure very high up in the party" has crossed a big line with a pretty vicious personal attack on Tim Farron:

Which bit of the sanctimonious, god-bothering, treacherous little shit is there not to like?

Tony Blair and Gordon Brown spent years doing that sort of stuff about each other. So did John Major's "bastards". That ended well, didn't it?

This sort of stuff undermines the efforts Nick has made in terms of his relationship with the party in recent months. He's put loads of time and effort into it, from phoning and writing to activists and members to thank them for their efforts to putting in lots of appearances around the country (and the Conference fringe) and chatting to members in a relaxed, friendly and funny way.  When people within the leadership bubble attack those who are very popular within the party, it really doesn't help. He needs to tell them to wind their necks in, and fast.

Tim Farron has taken his role as President extremely seriously. The President is supposed to be the grassroots' Ambassador to the Leadership and he's performed that role extremely well. I can't think of another politician who engages so well with their party members.  As a member of the Federal Executive, I've seen how effectively he works and how prepared he is to listen to people. He has also, on things like nuclear power and the economy, helped the leadership get stuff through Conference, so it's not like they never get anything out of him. As well as that, he's a superb and pithy media performer who's fought Nick Clegg's corner in many a television studio.

To have this come out on an important weekend for Nick Clegg is highly unhelpful. Nick's on the Andrew Marr show tomorrow where I am led to believe he's going to have something new and interesting to say. That's where the focus needs to be, not on someone associated with him detracting a popular figure.

They didn't learn after the Vince debacle. Let's hope that this is the last we see of this type of briefing. 

When this party pulls together, we are magnificent, as we saw in Eastleigh. That's how we need to be  all the way through to 2015.

Another couple of quick points from the Independent piece. They mention that Tim has been denied ministerial office. As party president, it would have been completely inappropriate for him to have been a minister at the same time, so that's a deliberate thing.

There's also his description of party activists:

Your average activist is an environmental, social liberal. If anything, the people who have stayed with the party are hard core: and you know what hard-core liberal democrats are like.

So much better than cockroaches, don't you think?

Lib Dem Federal Executive report - 28 October 2013

Last night's Federal Executive meeting was a little strange. It must have been even stranger for Tim Farron who had to chair a meeting of 30 or so people when some were in the room, some were on the phone and a few more were on the internet, their webcams being projected onto the screen in Liberal Democrat HQ. Which was fine until I put my iPad down for a minute and it slipped down the back of the sofa amid, no doubt, all sorts of rubbish. I hope nobody was watching too closely.

Last night's agenda was busy. We talked about membership - increasing, in some areas exponentially, diversity engagement, the coming year's budget. Don Foster, the new chief whip, came in and gave the political update, telling us that Liberal Democrat MPs and peers are working hard to deliver Lib Dem priorities on the Immigration and Lobbying bills. We also fed back to him that we felt more needed to be done for people on low incomes who were really struggling and he took that on board.

One good thing to come out of a Twitter conversation we were having on engaging membership is a plan to do a skills audit of our members in the first part of next year. We have some very talented people in our party and we maybe need to invite them to share their knowledge and experience with us. For example, I know someone who has experience in video production, something that could be very useful to us in the months ahead.

I created a Storify thingy of (mainly) mine and Daisy Cooper's tweets. If you have any questions, ask away.

What the hell are the Home Office playing at - and why are Liberal Democrats letting them get away with it?

So, it seems that officials from the Home Office have been showing up at tube stations in London and demanding to see proof of people's immigration status. That would be non white people's status, by the way. The Independent has more...

Witnesses who saw the operations in London claimed the officers stopped only non-white individuals, and in Kensal Green said that when questioned, the immigration officials became aggressive.

Phil O'Shea told the Kilburn Times: "They appeared to be stopping and questioning every non-white person, many of whom were clearly ordinary Kensal Green residents going to work. When I queried what was going on, I was threatened with arrest for obstruction and was told to 'crack on'."

Another witness, Matthew Kelcher, said: "Even with the confidence of a free-born Englishman who knows he has nothing to hide, I found this whole experience to be extremely intimidating. They said they were doing random checks, but a lot of people who use that station are tourists so I don't know what message that sends out to the world."

This is horrible. The idea that people are being asked for their papers as they go about their business and if they can't provide them, they are bundled up in a van, to be another statistic in a Home Office tweet, is horrible. I strongly suspect many of them will be innocent anyway - I mean, who thinks they have to take their documents with them if they are simply taking a tube ride?  Tube stations are pretty cramped anyway, so being confronted with a dozen burly Border Force types is going to be pretty intimidating.

And what if you are arrested in full public view, maybe in front of your neighbour, or the local shopkeeper, or the woman who does your eyebrows? They aren't going to necessarily know when you've been released, with no action taken, by the Home Office. They may well assume that you have done something wrong.

So why are the Tories doing this? The obvious answer is to say that they are pandering to UKIP, being seen to be doing something about this vast underworld of illegal immigrants the Daily Mail says we have. But I think that there may be more too it. They're not just trolling us, they are trying to toxify us. If they can get our voters thinking that we have abandoned our belief in civil liberties, then that's a job well done for them. They know we'll be guilty by association and the nice liberal minded people who read about it in the Independent in some of our rural England Tory facing held seats might just decide to vote Labour, or Green, or stay at home come 2015. If our voters do that, then the Tories could win some of our seats.

This is where Nick Clegg really needs to kick off. Tim Farron has already said the right things as he usually does:

@caronmlindsay @colingale @markpack I think the BF should police the borders and not our buses and tube stations.
— Tim Farron (@timfarron) August 2, 2013

We need Nick to be obviously fighting the civil liberties corner and being robust about it. The Tories don't care for civil liberties, but they have a vested interest in tarnishing our USP. We can't let them do it.

What bothers me is that there's too much emphasis on what our "electoral market" thinks. Nick's done quite well in the past few days saying what sorts of things need to happen on immigration, like exit checks and spoken out against these god awful vans. However, the language he's using is still a little too "crackdown" rather than "fairness" for me. When things like the vans or the tube station checks happen, every liberal collectively retches. However, you'll get a part of the electorate, and some of them might vote for us, feeling in some way reassured that something is being done. We talk of the importance of policing by consent. What happens if a good proportion of people consent to policing of others by intimidation? For me, it's back to first principles every time. We're liberals, and we don't agree with that sort of thing. Nick,I am very politely asking you to get your arse into gear and get these heavy-handed, authoritarian Tory tactics stopped. Now would be nice. Thanks.

Oh, and if you are fizzing mad about this, and you haven't already, for the love of goodness join Liberal Democrats for Seekers of Sanctuary. They are brilliant. It'll be the best tenner you ever spent.

Autumn Statement gloom.....

I never look forward to George Osborne getting up on his feet in the House of Commons. It's not entirely his fault, and I do know that he's not getting to give the statement that he would like to because Liberal Democrats won't let him, but the economy is still incredibly fragile and there's every chance of a triple dip recession. 

We know that Osborne would love to taking Housing Benefit from under 25s, or restricting benefits to large families. He won't be doing these things because Nick Clegg has put his foot down. That doesn't mean, though, that I'm going to like everything Osborne is going to come out with. 

Stephen Williams MP emailed Lib Dem members last night and his message was one of compromise which smacked of us being prepared for things we don't like. Williams said:

I can’t yet reveal to you the contents of the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement.

But I do want to share with you the context in which the discussions around the statement have taken place.

Both parties in the Coalition agree that delivering a strong economy and growth is the top priority right now. 

We also agree that Britain needs to balance its books so we don’t saddle future generations with a debilitating national debt.

But it’s no secret that when it comes to balancing the books, the Liberal Democrats have different instincts to most Conservatives.

Let’s be clear, there will be some difficult decisions in tomorrow’s statement. That would be the case no matter which party was running the country right now.

Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander have been negotiating hard with David Cameron and George Osborne to get the best possible deal for ordinary families across Britain.

Tomorrow we will see the results of those negotiations and the compromises they reached in the Autumn Statement.

Our key objective was to ensure the burden of clearing up Labour’s mess is shared fairly. Everyone needs to make a fair contribution, and that must include the richest too.

Whether they have done enough remains to be seen. I really will be furious if benefits aren't raised in line with inflation, for example. I also want to see more measures put on the wealthiest, individuals and companies, to ensure that they pay their fair share.

While Williams' email unsettled me a bit, Tim Farron was a bit more reassuring when he spoke to BBC News this morning.

He talked about our "battle with the Tories" to make sure that those on the lowest incomes are protected. He said that the figures today weren't going to be  glorious but it was important not to over-react in either direction, demanding either deeper austerity or an end to austerity. He said that economically the things that matter moving, if slowly, in the right direction in that we have low interest rates and falling unemployment.

He said there was a need for demand led measures which matter to people - like building schools, and he hoped to see some today. That's been trailed in the media so I suspect that he's on a safe bet there. I doubt he'd allude to something that definitely wasn't going to happen. Tim does not like to disappoint.

We'll know in an hour or so exactly what we're looking at. I'm not expecting to hear anything that lifts my mood, though.

Writing to members about election results - what Nick needs to learn from Tim

Friday was not an easy day for the Liberal Democrats. This was not a surprise. I doubt many of us expected any good news at all. There was, though. We gained five Council seats and held on to three - and some of them were even up north where we're told by Labour and SNP types on social media, nobody will ever vote for us again.

Electing police commissioners was one of these ideas the Tories brought to the Coalition and for a time, the English Liberal Democrats, astoundingly, weren't going to stand any candidates. It's a shame we didn't have a candidate in every seat, but I can understand why paying the £5000 deposit when there wasn't even the opportunity of a freepost to put your case over each vast area might have been off-putting.

Nick Clegg has sent out another of his Letters from the Leader this week which in the main was very good. I'll cover that in a separate post. However, I think he needs to work on his wording when he talks about election results. His team doesn't seem to have learned anything since the poor effort in May. All we got was a brief paragraph at the top:

In a week when we saw a set of disappointing elections - with hard working Liberal Democrats not getting the results they deserved and turnout slumping to a new low - it's worth remembering what we're achieving in Government.

And that's it.

No "thank you" to all our candidates and campaign teams. No recognition of their efforts in the cold November wind and rain. No "this is mid term - it will get better". No "what you've been done is worthwhile." No "when I did my phone banking, I could tell that people are ready to listen to us again." Now, I know perfectly well that Nick is grateful to people. The emails that go out in his name, which I'm not convinced he ever sees, need to reflect that. I can't hear the Nick Clegg I know speaking to me from that paragraph.

Compare and contrast with Tim Farron's missive on Friday. A big tick, by the way, to the people who didn't send it to me because I live in Scotland so it didn't apply. I had to get it from that fount of all knowledge, Lib Dem Voice.  Not that I'm biased about that, of course.

Tim nailed it. And I can hear him say every word of this.

I wanted to put on record the party’s thanks to our candidates in yesterday’s PCC elections, by-elections and Bristol mayoral election.

We had many excellent candidates and teams who worked very hard to fly the flag for our party. I thank them all and I’m sure you would like to do the same.

It was a tough day, and whilst we may not have gained anything the hard work we’ve put in lays the foundations for the challenge ahead.

However I would like to add special congratulations to the teams who helped us hold three local council seats and gain five more yesterday.

I knew when I became a Liberal Democrat I wasn’t picking the easy route in politics. I joined because I believe in liberal values like fairness and justice. I joined because no other party was going to fight for those values.

It’s on tough days like this, I think it’s good to remind ourselves that none of this has changed.

Being in Government has clearly meant that we can get hit by protest votes, but it also means we can deliver meaningful change.

I’m proud of what we’re doing on cutting tax for average workers, creating work opportunities for young people and getting more money into schools that need it the most.

None of that would be happening if we were not in Government.

We need to learn the lessons from painful days like today. We also need to learn how we update and improve our campaigning (there may be some pointers from President Obama’s re-election on that).

That’s the mission ahead for us. The challenge I’m setting today is that in next May’s English local elections, we have something to celebrate again.

Over the years I’ve seen some amazing campaigns fought in this party. I’ll back Liberal Democrat candidates and campaigners in a fight with anyone! We’re the only party with liberal solutions to the problems facing our country.

There are brighter days ahead if we stay strong and fight hard.

Best wishes,Tim Farron MPPresident of the Liberal Democrats

PS Please do take a moment over the weekend to send your wishes to our colleagues who worked so hard on yesterday’s elections. It will make a real difference. And remember, next week the fightback begins.

It was full of empathy, an assurance that the hard work folk had put in was not in vain, and ended with a challenge to get going and work for the elections next May.

Nick couldn't have got all that in, but he could have elaborated a bit and at the very least said thank you. He could have included the Council by-elections, too.

A bit of empathy, gratitude and recognition of people's efforts with a bit of "I'd be interested to know what you did on the ground and what worked and what didn't" would not go amiss. I hope that we don't have to have many more of this kind of email, but if we do, in the future, Nick's team really need to learn from Tim.

Page 3 is the tip of a huge iceberg which threatens our society #nomorepage3

The No More Page 3 Campaign hurtles towards 50,000 signatures, and has attracted the backing of some more Liberal Democrat MPs, MSPs and councillors.

Julian Huppert, Tom Brake and Stephen Williams have signed up, along with Alison McInnes MSP, Sarah Ludford MEP and Ruth Dombey the Leader of Sutton Borough Council.

I asked Julian Huppert on Twitter why he supported the campaign and this was his reply:

I'm pleased to see this - but there are still a good 50 Lib Dem MPs who have yet to sign. If you know any of them, why not contact them and tell them about the campaign and invite them to sign.

Tim Farron has not signed the letter, but he did tell me on Twitter the other day that he was not a fan of Page 3:

There are a couple of things I'd like to make clear, though. I might support the campaign to end Page 3, but that it doesn't mean I have either a hang up about nudity or sex. What I do object to is the exclusivity of one particular group of people being set up to be leered at, especially when that one group of people does not have an equal share of power.

There have been a few intelligent articles against the Page 3 campaign written by people I respect. Martin Robbins suggests the page 3 campaign is sinister and  makes it more difficult for mothers to breastfeed in public. I beg to differ with that one. I think that the presence of Page 3 actually encourages the idea that breasts are only for sex. I was almost thrown out of a tea room for breastfeeding Anna when she was 4 months old. The manager failed to see the irony of providing the Sun to read for her customers.

Iain Roberts wrote on Liberal Democrat Voice recently that:

So what’s really the problem? I suspect the Page 3 debate may be asking the wrong question. It isn’t Page 3 (or indeed pornography in general) that’s intrinsically good or bad. The problems we see may be caused by a society that sends out all sorts of mixed messages about how men and women should be and behave.

It's all a bit which came first, the chicken or the egg. We have to look, I think, at who has the power in society and we find that, even in a developed industrialised, educated society, men have more than their fair share. Martin and Iain write from a position of privilege. I wonder how they would feel if the gender situation was reversed. If Page 3 showed pictures of men's backsides or worse every day, never any women at all. How would they feel if everywhere around them, there were women leering at these pictures of men saying "Ooh, I'd like a bit of that.". You'd also have to imagine that there were a majority of women in Parliament, as judges, that men were predominantly cast in caring roles and seen as responsible for domestic tasks. Add to this a situation where their female colleagues are paid around 15% more than. And then pile on top of that every magazine being filled with pictures of what men should look like, what weight they should be and how they have to stay looking nice for their wives or they'll be left for a younger, more compliant model. In short, a world made for women by women. 

That's a bit how it is for women. It's not a mindset, it's an actual cultural phenomenon that needs to change. Page 3 is a symptom of the patriarchal nonsense that rules our world, not its cause. Nobody's arguing about that. Getting rid of it would be a huge step forward. Things have changed in the last 40 years, but not enough.

The 70s were the age of Benny Hill, of scantily clad women on beer cans, of Carry On films, of Miss World, of leering men with medallions. I grew up in that environment, bombarded with all these images and it certainly left me with a sense of injustice that women were treated as playthings just because they had breasts. 

Things are a bit better now - sexual harassment, if not eliminated, is not tolerated and there are healthier expectations of appropriate behaviour at work. But there are vestiges of that very sinister culture which give out the same messages. Page 3 is one of them. Iain argues that there is no evidence linking Page 3 or porn to abuse. That's not what the Deputy Children's Commissioner told Parliament earlier this year. Young people are acting out what they see in pornography where often women are portrayed as mere receptacles, in subjugative roles. How much easier is that for young boys to think that sex is there to benefit them and them alone if they are brought up in an environment where women are depicted, in everyday publications, as sexual playthings? A whole generation of kids is growing up with some very harmful ideas about appropriate behaviour within a relationship and that way lies the potential for abuse to just get worse. Maybe the reason some sexual abuse doesn't get reported is because girls are growing up thinking that's the way things are. If that's the case, then that's a massive step backwards from the fair and liberal society we want to deliver. 

Not only do we have the Deputy Children's Commissioner's evidence to go on, but Laura Bates from the Everyday Sexism project wrote an extremely disturbing article about the way young women are treated at university freshers' events and beyond. Particularly gut wrenching is the practice of "slut dropping."

The process, they explained, involves driving around town with friends in the early hours of the morning and offering a lift home to a young woman they deem a “slut” (usually a woman in a “post-club state”). After asking her address, they drive as fast and as far as possible in the opposite direction before forcing the woman out of the car and using a camera to film her “standing by the side of the road as they drive away”.  It’s difficult to know how widely this has occurred but the concept is reminiscent of a disturbing new trend of ‘slut-shaming’. On one occasion, the first-year added, it had taken the girl eight hours to get home. When asked how he knew, he explained that they were ‘friends’ on Facebook.

So, a young woman making her way home is subjected to a terrifying ordeal and left in a vulnerable situation at the hands of someone she vaguely knows. Can you imagine how she must have felt, how she must have feared for what was going to happen to her? The idea of decrying a woman as a slut just for having been at a nightclub and deeming she must somehow be punished should be repugnant to all. I have no doubt that some people will have a go at me for not being able to take a joke but I'm sure most people will consider it distasteful at worst.

On Saturday night's X Factor, Tulisa described one of contestants as a MILF - a term commonly used in pornography. It means "Moms I Like to F***". When did that sort of language and idea become appropriate for a family show? And don't tell me that it was ok because it was after the watershed. It's a show watched by families and there were bound to be children around. The half hearted apology given by presenter Dermot O'Leary "that's why we love her" showed that ITV really didn't get it.

When you are getting the Police called to schools because of Facebook pages giving the names of the establishment's "sluts and players", you know it's high time for some serious action on the issue. Education is always the key and it appears to me that kids need to get a few strong messages about what is appropriate behaviour.

I wasn't best chuffed to see Nick Clegg's take on the Page 3 debate as reported in the Guardian. He seems to have misunderstood what the campaign is trying to do, which is to get the Sun to realise that it's inappropriate for modern society and withdraw the feature itself. Nick is right that banning Page 3 would be illiberal, but it's not what the campaign is about. He said himself that he wouldn't have it in his  house around his 3 young boys. I was going to write a piece specifically around Nick's comments, which gained him the Sun's accolade of "Hero of the Week", but my colleague Paul Walter has done so admirably so I don't need to.

It's very clear to me that there are very frightening and worrying things going on as regards the treatment and portrayal of women and girls. This is very unhealthy and needs liberal action, urgently. Page 3 is a small but significant part of what's wrong. If that tumbles, it would be a symbol of progress being made. I actually think that the pressures on young girls have got much worse since I was that age - and as I have a teenage daughter, that worries me greatly.

If you agree with me and haven't already signed the petition calling on the editor of the Sun to remove the Page 3 feature, you can do so here.

Nick: Just say no to the Tories on more welfare cuts

My stomach is churning already and the Tory Conference has barely started. It makes me feel sick to my core to hear the way that the Prime Minister of this country is scapegoating benefit claimants. The focus of the attack at the moment, according to the Daily Fail, is those out of work people who have large families and under 25s who claim housing benefit.

After all the furore over abortion this weekend, we have to remember that Work and Pensions secretary voted in favour of a reduction of the time limit for terminations to 12 weeks. I'm fairly sure if he could have voted to outlaw them altogether, he would. What, exactly, is he suggesting a woman on benefits who find themselves expecting another child should do? The best of contraception fails sometimes.

And as for the idea that Housing Benefit should be removed from the under 25s - many don't have families to support them, and they may have children themselves. All this will do would be to shift the cost on to dealing with homeless young people. And if you are homeless, you have even less chance of getting a job than if you have a permanent address. 

"Tories war on workshy" screams the headline in the Daily Fail today. I suggest that if you are tempted by the line that we are allowing these people to scrounge off us and live lives of luxury that you do three things before you open your gob:

1. Actually try and live on the amounts of benefits that you get. For a whole year. All the amounts you can get are here. £70 in Job Seekers' Allowance and Housing Benefit won't help you if your cooker breaks down. How do you feed your family and meet the costs of looking for jobs.

2. Look at the jobs that are available in your area and compare it to the number of people who are unemployed. And look at the type of jobs, too. There's no point in suggesting that a single parent takes any job that requires any work outside business hours. They just will not be able to get childcare. 

3. Imagine you are an employer, and you have jobs going, who are you going to pick? Someone with a long  employment record who's just been made redundant, or someone who hasn't worked in their entire life? Are you really going to take a chance on someone with no track record? See some of the barriers that these people face?

This is not the time to be putting the squeeze on people who are already poor. On people who have already been failed by the education system and who have been left languishing, trapped on benefits, for years. One way to guarantee that these people have opportunities for employment is for the state to actually to give them jobs and pay them a decent wage so they can get an employment record . That's way too radical for the current climate, though.

What troubles me is that there are many reports in today's press that the Liberal Democrats have agreed to further welfare cuts and there are no Liberal Democrats denying this. Let's be clear. The Tories' proposals on curbing benefits for large families and taking housing benefit for the under 25s are batshit crazy and should not be entertained by reasonable people for one instant.

Instead, we should be looking at seriously taxing the wealthy. That may not bring in an extra £10 billion, but it would be a start. Then we need to take bus passes and Winter Fuel Allowance off people like us who don't need them. 

The road the Tories suggest is cruel, inhumane and will lead to hungry children and homeless young people - which will cost society more in much more than financial terms in the long run. The very fact that this goes down with Daily Mail readers is something that Liberal Democrats should run from.

Nick has said that there will be no further cuts to the top rate of tax in this Parliament. He has also said. I was encouraged in June by reports that he was stopping the Tories' future plans for welfare cuts. I am now more concerned by reports like this in today's Guardian that suggest a deal has been done. However, the BBC reminds us that Nick told conference that these were "wild suggestions" just 2 weeks ago. 

I am hoping that the reason that the Tories are creating such a scapegoating stink at their conference is because they don't have our agreement and they are trying to build up public support for such moves. Cameron has been pandering to his right wing all Summer and they'll love this kind of stuff. It's all very unsavoury, though. It is important to remind ourselves that these Tory ideas are not new. They'd have brought them in, along with a few more even nastier things, in the last Welfare Reform Bill. Many Liberal Democrats thought that Act was a giant step too far. 

There is, frankly, no point in spending £2.5 billion on a pupil premium for disadvantaged kids if they are not going to be able to learn because they are hungry, or because they're under stress because their 24 year old mother has been evicted because she can't get housing benefit. I am sure that our Liberal Democrat ministers get that point entirely. I am sure that there are some interesting discussions being had in Government at the moment but I expect our lot to stand firm against these crazy, unfair proposals. 

What we can do as Liberal Democrat members is make our views on this clear. And I'm going to suggest that we fill newly re-elected President Tim Farron's inbox again. It's tim.farron@libdems.org.uk, or tweet him on @timfarron. I am sure he will pass on the general gist of messages he receives in his inimitable style. 

Having spent a week at a Conference that was a completely different world than the one written about in the press, I'm not going to assume that our lot have agreed to these welfare cuts just because it's written in the press. A senior government insider told me a few weeks ago that they never believe anything written in the newspapers because they no so much of it to be inaccurate. 

Some categorical assurance on welfare cuts from one of our ministers would not be unwelcome, though. Today wouldn't be too soon. 

East Midlands chair slams Press Officer's call for Clegg to go

East Midlands Press Officer Mathew Hulbert called for Nick Clegg to be replaced as leader in a BBC interview today. His view will be no surprise to anyone  who has ever read what he writes on Liberal Democrat Voice in the comments threads.]

However, East Midlands Regional Chair Tony Rogers was not, shall we say, best pleased with his colleague.  He told me:

"I am very disappointed to hear that the East Midlands Press Officer has made a statment attacking Nick Clegg. I hope Mathew made it clear that this was his own personal opinion and is not the view of the East Midlands region.

We Liberal Democrats are so pleased that out of the three party leaders, Nick Clegg is ours."

Rogers added that he was very impressed with Tim Farron as President.

Why Farron rocks - Party President says he'll stop using "hard working families"

Well, who says politicians don't listen?

Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat Party President, has said he will stop using the term "hard working families" after a few of us expressed our concerns about it. I had a bit of a rant earlier and Jennie Rigg also wrote about why she finds the term deeply offensive. She said:

The phrase Hard Working Families purposefully excludes and marginalises anyone who doesn't have a job, and anyone who doesn't have a traditional family. This goes across well with the general public because they are used to anyone who doesn't have a job and anyone who doesn't have a traditional family being demonised. It fits into their worldview. It's a dog whistle to the sort of person who says "I've worked hard all my life and paid taxes and why should my taxes go to pay for wheelchairs when I haven't got a new car this year?"

So, off I went for a day's campaigning in sunny (really) East Dunbartonshire and was thrilled to bits to see this in my Twitter mentions when I got home:

I'm well impressed that he's listened and responded so positively to us His ongoing mission, should he choose to accept it, is to try to persuade the others who use it that there are better, more inclusive, alternatives.

That awful "hard working families" phrase....

If there was one phrase used by politicians, including Liberal Democrats, I could choose to put in Room 101, it would be "hard working families."

This is partly because it doesn't reflect all those who have been helped by the Liberal Democrats' tax and pension measures. All basic rate taxpayers, whether they have children or not, have been helped by the raising of the tax threshold to the tune of around three or four months' council tax, or a month's rent.

The anxieties of living on a low wage in an insecure job are just as strong if you are single or part of a couple with no children. In fact, it's petrifying if you're single because there's only your income to fall back on. If you're on a low income, you don't have the chance to save much for a rainy day and if your car and washing machine break down at the same time, you're a bit stuffed. Having not enough money is a nightmare whatever your family situation. Life is a perpetual struggle.

The other reason I don't like the phrase is because it has more than a whiff of judgement about it. I don't go for the deserving and undeserving poor thing. It implies that if you're out of work for some reason you are somehow at fault. My husband, with an unblemished employment record, took almost a year to find a job when he was made redundant in 1994. It was horrendous and he had the best support imaginable in terms of getting job applications done - the services of British Coal Enterprise in Mansfield. He went there every day as though he was going to work and completed hundreds of job applications and went for many interviews and for a while ended up coming second all the time.

You can't talk with one hand with understanding at the horrors of long term unemployment and the effect it can have on someone and then rub salt in the wounds by making it sound like hard working families are the only people worth helping.

It was Party President Tim Farron who set me off on this train of thought late last night when I read the email he'd sent out highlighting Nick Clegg's call for an emergency tax for the very wealthy in which he used that phrase. I told him on Twitter that it made me feel like crying and, as he always does, he responded almost immediately and said he'd "try to make sure it doesn't happen again." He might have a hard job ahead of him given that it's one of the MP's bingo card things that they are supposed to say all the time, along with "as a Liberal Democrat", "coalition government", "cleaning up Labour's economic mess" and "doing the right thing."

I was talking to Mark Pack about this last week and, while he doesn't mind "hard working families", he told me that in Australia that the phrase used to describe those struggling with financial adversity is "the battlers." That's a bit more inclusive so maybe we need to find an equivalent - or just nick theirs. Certainly "hard working families" doesn't cover the woman caring for her husband, disabled after a Stroke, or the retired couple struggling to make ends meet, or the redundant factory worker desperate to find another job to keep the wolf from her door.

I am impressed, by the way, that Tim replied so quickly. It's been a feature of his presidency and not something he just turns on and off at election time. Even when the party is fed up with him for some reason, he listens to all the points made to him and replies courteously and promptly. He might not always say what I want to hear, but nobody ever will. He is up for election this year and I will definitely be supporting him for a second term.

Tim used the opportunity within his email, by the way, to invite everyone to Conference. He was a bit tame, though, saying people should go because: "we will now debate real ideas to fix our economy and to make sure we build one based on fairness". We will, but we'll also do shedloads of training, learn so much from the organisations who have fringes or stalls and just catch up with our Lib Dem family. As Party Conference is the most fun you can ever have, naked or clothed, I'd recommend that you take him up on that invitation to Conference if you possibly can. There are cheaper options available if money is an issue - going as a steward for example. Register here for Brighton in just 3 weeks' time.

The Police are letting me go to Liberal Democrat Conference

Last night I was reminded by e-mail that the deadline for registering for Autumn Lib Dem Conference in Brighton at the cheapest rate runs out at midnight tonight. Seriously, it's cheap if you do it now, so don't bother reading the rest of this post right now - go ahead and do it here.  It is literally the most fun you could ever have with or without clothes. It's wild, intense, it's like a family reunion, there is just everything to love about it. I missed it for 13 years and now I'm back. You can even hear Tim Farron sing the same song and Paddy Ashdown tell the same joke every single year. All this and you get to make policy for the leadership to ignore if they feel like it to shape our party's future. 

Yes, accreditation sucks. It is offensive to any liberal soul. I take the view that I don't want our policy making to be confined to only those who are ok with it. Good old fashioned liberal bloody-mindedness insists I go.

I am particularly annoyed that the only reason I get to go is because the Police say I can. What surprised me was that the process was so fast this year, though. It literally took weeks for the Police to give me the all clear last year. This time it took hours. And the accompanying e-mail was a bit more tactful. Last year I literally heaved as I read that the Police had approved me. This year, somebody's learned a lesson. The e-mail simply says:

Dear Caron
Thank you for registering for conference. We are emailing you to let you know that your registration has been fully processed and the accreditation process has been completed.If you haven't booked your accommodation yet click here to book via our accommodation partner Visit Brighton.

The conference agenda and directory will be sent to you in two separate mailings in August. Your conference pass will be sent to you in late August/early September. Please contact us on the email address below if your pass has not arrived by Wednesday 12th September.

A bit of me is disappointed though. I wanted to see what would have happened if I'd been turned down. Would the Three Wise Men, Farron, Wiseman and Gordon, have let me in? Would you lot have run a campaign to get me admitted? Or would I just have had to stay at home and watch it on the telly, crying into my chardonnay?

The accreditation controversy is not over yet, not by any stretch of the imagination, but I'm looking forward to lots of fun in Brighton, but also lots of intelligent, passionate and reasoned debate about where our party should be going. 2015 will be upon us before we know it and we'd better be prepared. If you're a party member, come and join in and be part of that. Them in the Bubble need to listen to and take note of the party grassroots - and we need to listen to them too and try to grab their ankles and gently pull them back to reality when they need it. Conference is where we do that and we need you there. Don't forget the cheap rate ends at midnight.

Cut Tim Farron a bit of slack over accreditation!

As you know, I am very much opposed to accreditation for party members for our Conference. When I had the chance to vote on it as a member of FFAC, I opposed it and would do so again - every time. This afternoon, Tim posted on Liberal Democrat Voice that he had secured exemptions for those who had "identity related concerns". this would include transgender colleagues & people who needed to be sure previous identities were not revealed. I will let you into a little secret. I knew this was planned. When I was told about it, he very first thing I said was that people would have to out themselves & that the idea should be run past LGBT+. I was assured that it had been & they were happy with it. I was a bit surprised, but what do I know? LGBT+ will always know better than me and if they were happy, who was I to argue? It turns out that people are just as opposed, if not more, to this proposal, which is fair enough. Please, though, give Tim a bit of credit for trying to come up with something that would help the people who felt that accreditation would be dangerous for them. He didn't just pull the idea out of thin air. He consulted extensively with the organisation which is the party's expert on this. He may well have to go back to the drawing board, but he did the right thing. I was also much happier with the tone of today's article. Tim had the decency to apologise for Monday's which was well out of order.

Firstly let me say sorry for the tone of the original Lib Dem Voice article – reading it back last night and reading everyone’s comments for the second time in a week (I have to say I like reading but not commenting myself!) it really did strike me that the tone was very off; so let me apologise for that.

That's pretty unequivocal. Not everybody would acknowledge their mistakes (and it was only a third his) and say sorry. I'm impressed. We're not done with the accreditation process & I expect Tim will be having further discussions with people over the next few days. Watch this space. I wish we could just ditch the whole thing but I'm not hopeful of that.

Accreditation: the aftermath

I'm sure Duncan Greenland, Andrew Wiseman and Tim Farron were under no illusions that their announcement on Liberal Democrat Voice that accreditation has been approved would be met with universal acclamation within the Party. If they were, they'll probably be crying into their beer now. The lack of sensitivity, the inference that those of us who oppose accreditation don't care about the safety of staff came straight from the Jeremy Clarkson School of Charm. It was only ever going to outrage people.

So, a few observations.

However livid I might be with Tim Farron for putting his name to that deeply hurtful LDV article, you can't deny that when there's flack going round, he doesn't hide. He was out there facing his critics last night. And given that he'd just chaired a meeting of the Federal Executive, you have to admire his stamina. There was one fairly robust exchange with my fellow Federal Committee accreditation refusenik, Justine McGuinness.

He did, however, sit on there for hours and hours answering people and asking them to e-mail him.

Elsewhere on  the blogosphere:

Dan Falchikov does not mince his words;

Gareth Epps is as shy and retiring as ever. He also points out that some FCC members were not happy at the decision being made by FFAC and FE. They had expected to consult and then make the decision themselves on Saturday. I had thought that FCC had kicked it on to FFAC which could be seen as a wickedly clever move. Why make an unpopular decision when you can get the least accountable Committee in the Party, which has more MPs than elected representatives, to do it for you? Maybe I was being unfair in that assumption. However, I am in no doubt that if FCC had decided not to implement accreditation, somebody else, whether FFAC or FE, would have become involved.

That Saturday meeting of FCC seems like it's going to be interesting. Will there be resignations? We'll have to wait and see.

Complicity argues that the need for accreditation could actually put some people in danger.

Liberal England is not impressed by the insinuation in the LDV article.

Jennie remembers the words which brought her into the party.

A View from Ham Common says that Tim Farron is playing the Shirley Williams role.

Stephen Glenn says the case for accreditation is unproven.

Nick Barlow says that this issue is worth taking the time to consider.

The Widow's World laments "a disappointing decision made in an unsatisfactory fashion"

And, finally, I made up a Storify thingy which took the best of the comments on both sides from Twitter last night.

Tim Farron urges support for equal marriage

Party President Tim Farron has e-mailed members tonight to ask them to respond positively to Lynne Featherstone's consultation on introducing equal civil marriage in England. As you'll no doubt remember, I spent much of the last 3 months of last year urging people to respond to the Scottish one. We've yet to find out whether the SNP will wimp out on this. I hope not and that they will allow civil marriage and religious marriage on a voluntary basis.

The Equality Network up here managed to drum up 24000 supportive responses. The Churches are pretty effective at getting their people to put in anti messages and people with our view can be a bit lazy sometimes. It's fabulous to see that both he and Willie Rennie have championed this issue and are very comfortable talking about it.

We'll find out soon what the SNP Government up here intends to do. I hope that they don't wimp out, fearful at losing support for independence, which seems to be the only thing  they care about. I think they should legislate for both civil and religious equal marriage, but not to compel any religious organisation to carry out ceremonies. It's the most liberal solution that I can see.

I'd have liked the English consultation to include religious ceremonies - but if enough people respond and say they'd like to see that, then it might change their mind.

I think what's also good is that there seems to be a bit of co-ordination going on between Tim's office and LGBT+ Lib Dems.

A slight niggle, though, to report to the wonderful internal comms people. I know I complain all the time about  Scots not being included in things, but we probably shouldn't have got this e-mail. Although we can't respond ourselves, though, we can nag our friends south of the border to do so. Consider yourself nagged. You have until 14th June to make your voice heard.

Here's Tim's e-mail in full:

Dear Caron,

One of our fundamental values as a party is our firm belief in equality.

This is why I need you to join the campaign for equal civil marriage.

We have always stood for individual liberty and the right to choose how we lead our lives. This is why I am member of our party and why I am so proud to be your President. It's why we came into being in the 19th century to protect the rights of religious minorities. It's why we led the support for equality for women and why we decided before any other major party that civil marriage should be open to same-sex couples equally.

The Liberal Democrats in Government are now delivering on that. There's an ongoing consultation on how best to deliver equal civil marriage, which will lead to new legislation in this Parliament. The Government consultation asks about the best way to implement equal civil  marriage, and our party conference agreed that the best way to do that is in the context of full equality of marriage and civil partnerships.

It's important that you, and as many people as possible, respond to this consultation now.

LGBT+ Liberal Democrats have prepared a guide to the consultation, what it means, and how to respond to support the Liberal Democrat policy of equality.

Local parties can also order leaflets from LGBT+ Lib Dems to distribute around local venues - not  just ones specific to the LGBT+ communities, since equal marriage affects everyone! Simply email info@abouttime.org.uk

Best wishes,

Tim Farron MP
Liberal Democrat Party President

Conference accreditation rears its unacceptable, illiberal and not very pretty head

You kind of expect motions passed at Federal Conference about Federal Conference to be taken seriously by Federal Conference Committee. Especially in a year when they're up for election. Unfortunately the message from the motion on Accreditation for attendees at Conference does not seem to have got through.

This motion condemned the system and called on Parliamentarians to work with the Police to question the need for such a system. After all, we should not tolerate a situation where the Police dictate who can engage in the political process and how they can do it. That's completely unacceptable in a liberal society.

The FCC was told to negotiate security arrangements which respect members' privacy and the party's constitution.

So, what do they do when the Sussex Police demand accreditation for this Autumn's Brighton Conference? They decide to launch a consultation. Of one week's duration. In the middle of the local election campaign. It is important that people have the chance to put their views to FCC, especially as last year's measures prevented some people from attending Conference on principle, but the timing is well and truly off. They could easily have anticipated the demand and decided to consult at Spring Conference in Gateshead, for example.

FCC want our views by this coming Saturday and they should be e-mailed to conferenceinformation@libdems.org.uk and a decision will be made a week today.

Don't miss your chance to have your say on this.

I find the case for accreditation very weak. FCC members tried to scare us all by telling us terrorists wanted to kill us all. That would be why we put our belongings through airport style security at the door, then. I find that line of argument lazy and insulting and I don't want to hear any more of it. Let's face it, I have enough of an instinct of self preservation to want to get home to my family in one piece, as well as all my dear friends who will be there. Any assertion that we would be putting staff at the venue at risk by refusing to implement an accreditation process is utterly ridiculous.

This is the Police case as outlined in the Liberal Democrat Voice piece:

Two senior officers of Sussex police attended an FCC meeting in late March and outlined the reasons they are asking the party to use accreditation. It is their clear view that party conferences, including ours while we are in government, attract people who wish to cause serious harm and violence to conference-goers (and also to those working in the venue and other residents of Brighton, whom they also have a duty to protect). 

 For sure. Although this is not new. I grew up in the 70s and 80s when the IRA committed a number of violent atrocities. One such was the murder of Conservative MP Airey Neave by car bomb in the underground car park to Westminster. I've been to Parliament a few times now and all I've had to do is have a photo taken for my pass and go through security scanners.

My contention is that an accreditation system does not of itself make anyone safer. Every single major atrocity has been committed by people who were who they say they are and who had the correct paperwork.

This includes large international terrorist organisations, but also individuals who are able to make bombs or other equipment. They gave some examples of lone individuals who have caused serious violence, or attempted to, ranging from the 1984 Brighton bombing to the Norwegian gunman at a youth political event.

I will never forget waking up to the horrific scenes of the Grand Hotel in ruins when the Tory Party conference was bombed by the IRA in 1984. It was horrible, even from 700 miles away. That bomb was planted weeks before the event. Are hotels in Brighton having all their guests accredited by the Police months in advance? I suspect there would be an outcry if they were. The answer, of course, is no, they aren't.

As far as the awful events in Norway are concerned, physical security at the camp would have prevented Breivik from getting onto the island and carrying out his murderous plan.

Because of the particular attraction that major public events which are heavily covered by the media have to people who want to cause serious violence, they believe that in order to protect the security of everyone at conference, attendees should go through accreditation.

Attendees at football cup finals, the Grand National, the Olympics, pop concerts, festivals, Wimbledon or Pride don't have to go through Police accreditation. I went with my sister and niece to see Paul McCartney in Liverpool last December and the Police did not have to approve my trip. Why should our Conference be any different? The security services want the power to snoop on all our private communications. The Police wanted to bang people up for 3 months without charge. Those requests were unreasonable because they infringed civil liberties, as this one is.

The police are extremely clear, as are FCC, that preventing any other difficulties or embarrassment for the party are not part of their remit. They are focused only on specific information which might indicate that someone may pose a serious security threat to other conference-goers.

Anyone can join the party for as little as £12 and can then attend conference as a party member.

It weighs heavily on my mind that two people were barred from attending conference last year because they didn't pass accreditation. These people could easily have been completely innocent. I don't think it's the business of anyone in the party, no matter how much I trust them, and I do trust Tim Farron, Andrew Wiseman and Tim Gordon, should have the right to ban a member from attending conference without proper evidence. It's a really serious step to take. Especially when it doesn't stop any member of the general public with malevolent intentions from standing in the security queue. You don't need to be accredited to do that. The Sunday morning at Gateshead, I joined the queue half way up the hill to the Sage.

Just as an aside, we had five Cabinet Ministers at our Scottish Conference in Inverness and the Northern Constabulary didn't see fit to ask for any of this. Why should it be different at UK level?

I do not think accreditation is a sensible way of managing risk to people attending their conference. The Police case for it is far from compelling. I don't see how one single person will be made safer by this demand. I hope that party members give FCC a strong steer that they should not put up with these unreasonable and illiberal requests.

Whatever happens, I will be in Brighton, because I don't want our policy to be made by people who are ok with this sort of thing. If we fall at the first hurdle when civil liberties are challenged, who on earth else is going to fight for them?

I appeal to FCC to have the courage of their liberal convictions and find a way through that does not involve an accreditation system that is absolutely wrong in principle.

Background Information:


This is the crux of the motion passed at Conference in Birmingham last year. You can read the whole thing here on page 20.

Conference therefore condemns the system of police accreditation adopted for this conference  which requires party members to disclose personal data to the police and which is designed to enable the police to advise that certain party members should not be allowed to attend.
1.The Parliamentary Party and Liberal Democrat Ministers to question the current policeguidance on accreditation and to seek to persuade the Home Office to change guidance on  current practice to reflect the rights of association and assembly and the internal democracy  of all political parties.
2. The Federal Conference Committee to negotiate security arrangements for futureconferences which protect the privacy of members’ personal data and which respect theparty’s constitution and internal democracy.
3. The Party President to ensure that conference arrangements respect Article 6 of the federal constitution which provides that Local Parties elect representatives and that no other body within or without the party has the power to exclude in advance their attendance at conference.

This is part of what I would have said in that debate if I'd been able to be there on time. My whole draft speech is here.

 Now, I have a very strong personal interest in this conference being safe and secure. Some of the people I care most about in the world are here. My beloved family are 400 miles away - I want to return to them in one piece. I am also one of the most over anxious people on the planet.

Despite that, I do not see how this expensive accreditation system is going to make one person safer. It seems to me to be a wasteful exercise in bureaucracy. We have airport style security on the way in and lots of vigilant security people around the place. That's enough to protect us. Nobody is going to be able to get in here with anything that could cause harm. 

Those of us who were around the last time an atrocity was carried out at a party conference will remember the feeling of numbness and shock and nausea  as we watched events unfold. That bomb, though, had been planted a month before.

In recent acts of terrorism, everyone involved has had the correct paperwork.
There is simply no need for accreditation. And since when did we fall for the line that the Police say they need it? They said that about 90 days detention as well and as a party we didn't flinch in our opposition to that.

The FCC will say that it all comes down to insurance. I am far from convinced that this is the case. My understanding is that they've gone to the usual provider who has said that if we don't take police advice, it'll invalidate our insurance. They tell us that if we don't accept accreditation, there will be no Conference. 

I think we need more imagination here.  If festivals can get public liability insurance when they have, frankly, even more A-listers than we have wandering around, then I'm sure we can find someone who is prepared to see that the physical security arrangements suffice.

Face cream and Farron

They say be careful what you wish for, because you might get it. I wonder if that's how Jonathan Calder is feeling today. Way back last September he said he wanted to hear much beloved Party President Tim Farron make an unpopular speech.  I disagreed with Jonathan at the time because I felt that Tim was hardly a shrinking violet at saying what he thought, especially as he'd waded into the most controversial debate at Scottish Conference when he was seeking election.

Well, our Beloved President has really been and gone and done it now. He's only teamed up with another couple of Christian MPs and written to the Advertising Standards Authority demanding that they overturn a ban on an advert claiming that God heals. Total Politics have printed the letter in full, and it contains much which makes me cringe:

You might be interested to know that I (Gary Streeter) received divine healing myself at a church meeting in 1983 on my right hand, which was in pain for many years. After prayer at that meeting, my hand was immediately free from pain and has been ever since. What does the ASA say about that? I would be the first to accept that prayed for people do not always get healed, but sometimes they do. That is all this sincere group of Christians in Bath are claiming.

It is interesting to note that since the traumatic collapse of the footballer Fabrice Muamba the whole nation appears to be praying for a physical healing for him. I enclose some media extracts. Are they wrong also and will you seek to intervene?

If I were a betting woman, I'd put my money on Muamba's life being saved due to appropriate and immediate medical attention we know is crucial in cases of cardiac arrest rather than divine intervention for a start. And media reports that some people were praying for the footballer are not advertisements. The worst bit of the letter for me, though, is the idea that because healing is faith based, there should be less of a burden of proof on claims made by religious organisations. Surely rules, or the law, have to treat everybody equally and if your claim can't be proved, it shouldn't be made in the context of an advert.

Face cream and baby milk companies are serial offenders when it comes to getting advertisements banned for making misleading claims. Jo Swinson has had a hat trick of victories against cosmetics giant L'Oreal and Nutricia and Danone have both had to change ads for formula because of claims that cannot be verified. Changing the paramters to allowing adverts based on the belief that something worked would deny the public the protection from unscrupulous advertisers that it deserves.

If I buy something that claims to work in a certain way, I expect it to work in that way. Not even the most passionate advocates of faith healing would suggest that if you ask for healing you would get it. If it were, we wouldn't need to spend billions on health care. There currently exists absolutely zero proof that even if God exists, this supreme being can heal the sick. And the onus is on the person making the claim to substantiate it. That's how our justice system is based - the prosecution has to prove that the accused is guilty of the crime, it's not the job of the accused to prove that they didn't do it. I worry, too, that lack of healing might lead people to think that they were in some way inadequate, that it was their fault for not being good enough, or faithful enough. You have to also take note of evidence from the New York Times that prayer can actually make things worse for the person being prayed for, even if it makes the people doing the praying feel better.

So, we've established that I think Tim and the other members of the All Party Christian Group are talking mince, to put it politely, on this. Jennie puts it so much better, in her own inimitable style. Martin Robbins in the Guardian is really quite cruel about it, but it's undeniable he has a point.

I was not impressed to see, however, people basically saying that Tim should not say these things because he's Party President. Don't get me wrong, if he'd done it as Party President, in my name, I'd have been first in the queue at his office door in a blind fury. But he didn't. He was doing it in a completely different capacity.

We say that we don't like identikit political clones who never say anything interesting - but then we jump down the throat of anyone who comes out with something controversial that we don't agree with. We really can't have it both ways. I would much rather my politicians to be human beings who speak their mind - even if they occasionally, in my view, get it hopelessly wrong.

In some ways, it's good that Farron and Co have brought this up - because it draws attention to the issue and the huge amounts of material out there refuting the idea and showing it to be based on no evidence whatsoever.

The controversy should have no bearing on his performance as President, which is pretty darned good. Mark Valladares over at Lib Dem Voice raised the issue of Tim's CARE interns. I will do my utmost to argue against any organisation which has any truck with the idea that gay people can or should be "cured", but there's something about showing them the sort of tolerance they fail to show to others that makes me wonder if it's so bad to engage with them in that way. I think that a spell in the liberal, questioning environment of a Lib Dem office and the exposure to Lib Dem ideas might just be good for the young people involved. That said, I don't feel comfortable with the idea at all.

And, finally, Mr Calder has realised he's finally got what he wished for and made some very wise observations on the issue of faith healing.

And, really finally this time, amid all the talk of face cream, this article on the BBC News website, entitled "Chocolate 'may help keep people slim'" amused me. It's a balanced piece of reporting, with fruit and vegetables not mentioned until the end. Clearly I'm not eating enough of the stuff and Mark Pack is. 

My unhappiness with Danny Alexander....

...or his diary secretary, whoever they may be, knows no bounds right now.

Not that this is any of their fault, but I want to have a moan.

Right now, I should be out having dinner with my husband while Anna is at the cinema with her friend watching a preview screening of the Hunger Games. This is the latest teen sensation movie. Its subject matter is very, very dark and a reminder of why you need liberal values and people willing to fight for them. The kids have read all 3 books in the series and are engrossed in it.

So, Bob took them down in time for the start at 7:45 because I was busy listening to Danny Alexander's brilliant webinar on the Budget.  It had never occurred to me that the kids would need ID. They're obviously 12, Anna was wearing her school uniform still - and you can't get into secondary school up here unless you're 12. They were accompanied by an adult who could vouch for their age, but they still weren't allowed to go into the cinema unaccompanied. So, poor Bob, who hasn't had anything to eat, had to go in with them.

Now, if that Danny Alexander webinar had been an hour earlier, I'd have been able to take the girls down and I would have had Anna's passport in my handbag because we're off to Cardiff tomorrow for the Doctor Who convention. Her friend had her Young Scot card with her so she'd have been fine. And Bob and I would have been sitting together in Wagamama now over a yaki soba and some white chocolate chilli cheesecake.

Yes, I know that this is down to my own incompetence. I guess I'm just not used to this whole ID thing. She's seen 12A films before, but always with me. It's not a mistake I'll be making again, you can count on that.

On the upside, Danny was really good tonight. Relaxed, friendly, insightful, informative. The Party has to do more of these sorts of events with different ministers and key figures. Why not one with Lynne Featherstone during the Equal Marriage consultation, for example? Or with Shirley Williams just because she's her?

The other star of tonight? If Helen Duffett does not replace Dimbleby on Question Time, I'll be very disappointed. She was very good at making the whole thing sound exciting - and I liked the interactive polls that went on through it.

Seriously, if you think that this week's efforts on internal comms have been good, please let the people in the party who influence such things know. Farron would be a good place to start as would Chief Executive Tim Gordon (tim.gordon@libdems.org.uk). Fill their inboxes up with happiness.