Mar
01
Inaugural General Meeting
Saturday 13th Early Evening 18.15 – 19.30
The ICC, Hall 6b
The Social Liberal Forum has been up and running for just over a year now. We always intended to make it a membership-based organisation and that time has come!
At this year’s Lib Dem Spring Conference in Birmingham, we will be holding our first general meeting to agree the organisation’s constitution. Anyone who is a member of the Liberal Democrats and agrees with our aims and objectives is welcome to attend and have their say. The proposal from the current executive committee (to be confirmed at the meeting) is to make membership free, at least for people who are happy to receive all their communications online.
We will be publishing the draft constitution on the SLF website in the next day or two and the final document will be amendable at the meeting. But we don’t just want the general meeting to be about constitutions and standing orders – we also would like a general discussion about where people would like to take the organisation in the future. Hopefully we will also have some exciting news about our first post-general election project.
Joint fringe with One Society Campaign
Saturday 13th Lunchtime 13.00 – 14.00
Crowne Plaza, Room 8
The One Society Campaign has been launched by the Equality Trust, the think tank established by the authors of the best selling The Spirit Level: Why Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. We’ve delighted to be co-hosting this event which will also be used to promote A Wealth of Opportunity a new pamphlet published by Demos, also in association with the One Society Campaign, exploring equality through a Liberal Democrat perspective.
As well as speakers from Demos and the Equality Trust, Jo Swinson MP will be speaking and the meeting will be chaired by SLF Director Matthew Sowemimo.
I look forward to seeing you at both events!
Feb
09
In association with The Equality Trust, Demos have today published three pamphlets focusing on equality from the perspective of each of the main political parties. The Liberal Democrat one, A Wealth of Opportunity, is written by Julia Margo and William Bradley and has a foreword by David Laws MP.
A concern with inequality lies deep in liberal DNA. More than a century and a half ago, John Stuart Mill argued for a cap on inheritance so that wealth might be more fairly distributed in society. His views jarred with Victorian attitudes. Would they be more accepted now?
This pamphlet argues for a renewed liberal equality agenda, based on evidence of the divisive impact of inequality on society and recent findings of the central role that financial security and access to resource plays in life chances and child development.
The Liberal Democrats face a unique opportunity: concern for economic inequality has never been more fashionable or higher in the public mind than in this post- recession era and following the double-scandal of MPs expenses and bankers bonuses. In the wake of the Labour government’s failure to effectively tackle inequality, a radical agenda focused on redistributing resource, capitalising disadvantaged families and improving services would cement the reputation of the Liberal Democrats as the vanguard of the contemporary progressive left.
The book makes three main policy recommendations for the Liberal Democrats to adopt:
- Tax wealth via land value taxation and replacing inheritence tax with an acquisitions tax.
- Introduce a capabilities boost to benefits and services by increasing benefit and tax credit levels for the working poor, additional resources for early years education for children from disadvantaged backgrounds and focusing Sure Start on programmes with a proven impact on child well-being, capability development and parenting.
- Capitalise low income families by raising the minimum wage, entitling low income families to a £500 lump sum on the birth of a child, refocusing child benefit so that it is higher for younger children and encouraging people on low incomes to save via a system of matched funding.
The pamphlet can be downloaded for free on the Demos website. You can also download their pamphlet aimed at Labour, Society of Equals and the Conservatives, Everyday Equality.
Nov
10
As the Liberal Democrats move towards finalizing the party’s manifesto, The Social Liberal Forum sets out the key principles that we believe should be the basis for formulating tax policy and spending commitments:
- The party should commit itself to the goal of reducing income inequality over the next parliament. Proposals to reduce public spending should be assessed in terms of whether they further that objective.
- Tax increases for the richest members of society should take the greater part of the strain in reducing the budget deficit in order to protect vulnerable users of public services, like housing, health services and social care. In 1993 the Clinton Administration faced with a big structural budget deficit expressly chose to use tax increases rather than spending cuts as the major means of deficit reduction.
- We should be the party of fair, redistributive taxation. We welcome the proposal to include a 0.5% property tax on mansions over £1 million and see this as an addition to our reconfirmed policy of replacing the Council Tax and replacing it with a Local Income Tax.
- Immediate action to further the transition to a sustainable, low carbon economy is essential and this goal should substantially influence tax and spending policies. A global climate change agreement should be based on the principles of contraction and convergence.
- Reducing youth unemployment should be another priority for the next government. Academic evidence has shown that youth unemployment generates serious losses in lifetime earnings that can persist up to twenty years after a period of unemployment. In the last two recessions large numbers of people out of work for long periods became stigmatized, depressed and hard to place – a phenomenon known as ‘scarring.’
- The abolition of tuition fees is important so that students from working class communities do not face the re-imposition of barriers at university level. Our policy on fees has been reaffirmed at the Harrogate Conference and by FPC. The policy is right and is popular.
We believe applying the principles outlined above to policy development would make a reality of calls for progressive austerity.
The Social Liberal Forum Executive
Jul
31
Dear friend,
With Parliament now in recess for the rest of the summer, the Social Liberal Forum is gearing up for the conference season. We are also looking to growing our network, especially outside London. But to do that, we need your help. Would you like a speaker for your local party or student group? Would you like to know if there are any other social liberals living near you? Now is the ideal time to get involved.
A Fresh Start – what do you think?
The Lib Dems’ pre-manifesto A Fresh Start for Britain: Choosing A Different, Better Future was published last week. Over on Lib Dem Voice, Social Liberal Forum Director Matthew Sowemimo offers his view.
As this document will form the basis of the party’s next general election manifesto, it is important that it is thorougly and widely debate. If you have a view, send it to freshdebate@socialliberal.net and we will consider publishing it.
Building our network
The Social Liberal Forum has set up a new social network to help us keep in touch, develop activities across the UK and open up the organisation. It is still in the early stages of development but you can help it grow. Please register on it and say hello.
The new social network can be found at: http://socialliberal.ning.com/
Want a speaker?
If your local party or student branch would like someone from the Social Liberal Forum to speak at one of your meetings this autumn, please email speakers@socialliberal.net and we will do our best to meet your request.
Jul
29
Matthew Sowemimo, Director of the Social Liberal Forum, has written a new opinion piece on Liberal Democrat Voice arguing for the party not to be timid in the way it presents its agenda:
The party’s pre-election manifesto – A Fresh Start for Britain – is based around strong themes and ones that have the potential to give Liberal Democrats the distinctive profile we need in 2010. The outline democracy, green economy and fair taxation agenda is something that will be welcomed across the party.
However the impression is being given that many of the spending commitments debated, and scrutinized within the party over a period of years are being indefinitely effectively set aside as ‘aspirational’. The language that has been reported in the media about key commitments, like widening access to university by abolishing tuition fees and expanding social housing, is also derogatory. If we appear to be dismissive of our own policies, how much easier will it be for our opponents to attack them as irresponsible?
You can read the full article here.
Jun
29
This is just a short reminder that our discussion evening with Lynne Featherstone MP will be taking place this Wednesday.
Title: After the recession, a different future
Date: Wednesday 1 July 2009
Time: 7.30pm-8.30pm
Location: Room Q, Portcullis House, Westminster, SW1A 2JR
Full details are available on the Flock Together website. Please confirm if you are likely to be attending on that website so we can keep an eye on numbers.
Our meeting the other week with Danny Alexander MP was very constructive (and well attended!). One of the recurrent themes at that discussion was the need to tackle equality and in particular the findings in The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. Social Liberal Forum council member Rev Chris Brice will be hosting a talk with Richard Wilkinson at St Martins Church, Gospel Oak, on Sunday 5 July and would like to extend an invitation to SLF supporters to attend. Details are available at the Flock Together website.
Mar
17
The new printing of Reinventing the State is now available for sale on the Methuen Bookshop at the special discount price of £10 including postage (RRP £14.99). Get your copy today!
Mar
09
The launch of the Social Liberal Forum in Harrogate was a truly excellent meeting – I don’t think I have ever come across so much enthusiasm at such an event.
Kicking off the discussions, Matthew Sowemimo spoke with great conviction about the importance of tackling child poverty in a far more ambitious way than Labour have done. The main speaker at the event, Steve Webb told his personal story about why he joined the Liberal Democrats. He argued that we all join the party with specific enthusiasms and causes for which we want to fight, and he said that we need to restore some of the passion to the way we tell people what we stand for.
A wide range of contributions came from those attending the meeting. These included: the need to examine the best ways to tackle anti-social behaviour; putting industrial democracy back at the forefront of our economic policies; giving a higher profile to fuel poverty; the need to spend more on social housing; and a desire to talk about policy to those with similar perspectives from outside the Liberal Democrats. Lynne Featherstone made a powerful contribution arguing that in the current economic crisis, we need to articulate a vision which shows we don’t just want to go back to how things were before the crisis, but that we offer a very different, and better, future.
The engagement of party members in the overall aims of the SLF was really encouraging, and in the months to come, we will be working on developing the ideas put forward.
Feb
26
Baroness Shirley Williams will be speaking at a special Fabian Society event on 10 March to answer the question “How liberal is Labour?” in conversation with Newsnight’s Michael Crick.
Tickets are free for Fabian Society members and £10 for non-members. In addition, you can buy a six-month introductory membership for £9.95 which includes a free ticket to the event (do you see what they did there?).
Feb
23
Steve Webb MP, the Liberal Democrat Shadow Work and Pensions Secretary (and Chair of the Social Liberal Forum’s Advisory Board), will be leading a policy discussion at Portcullis House, Westminster, on Wednesday 25 February.
To give people some food for thought, we have also republished Steve and Jo Holland’s article on Communicating Social Liberalism from Reinventing the State: Social Liberalism for the 21st Century on the Social Liberal Forum website (the full Reinventing the State will be back in print next month).
If you can’t attend this Wednesday, Steve has said he will be developing a short talking points briefing which can be adapted for any local party discussion evening. This will be published on the Social Liberal Forum website soon.
Finally, we hope to see you at our fringe meeting at Harrogate Spring Conference, where you can learn more about why we have decided to set up the Social Liberal Forum and our plans for the next few months.
PS Our Ideas Factory is starting to result in some interesting debates. Please do add your own feedback – and send us your own ideas!
