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Tag: Tim Farron

  • Tim Farron – 2022 Loyal Address Speech

    Tim Farron – 2022 Loyal Address Speech

    The speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 10 May 2022.

    This really does feel like a Queen’s Speech from a Government who have run out of ideas and are not capable of dealing with the very serious times in which they find themselves. It is an awful lot of press releases and no plan. We desperately need a plan.

    I heard reference in the Queen’s Speech to Bills that might be introduced to deal with the cost of living crisis. We do not need parliamentary Bills to drive down people’s household bills. We need action that could be taken today. The Government could decide to use one of the rare Brexit benefits and reduce VAT today. They could decide in the next day or three to do what we have been calling on them to do for some time—bring about the windfall tax on the energy companies that have made profits that are unearned, unnecessary and unexpected, and give that money to people who desperately need it. They could give it to people across my constituency in Cumbria and across the rest of the country who literally cannot afford to put food on the table and pay their rent, their mortgage and their bills. No amount of smart-alec culture war ruses will pay anybody’s children’s food bills. This is what we are seeing from a Government who have lost touch with any idea they ever had of what it is to be serious about governing at a serious time.

    As you might imagine, Mr Deputy Speaker, I want to talk specifically about rural communities and particularly issues of agriculture and housing. There is nothing for us in this Queen’s Speech—nothing that remembers the rural communities of this country, particularly in England, which have so very obviously been neglected and taken for granted by this Government.

    Let us look at farming. I make a plea to all hon. Members in the House who do not represent rural constituencies that rural communities should matter to them, for two principal reasons. First, if they eat, they should be grateful to the farmers who live in my constituency—and indeed yours, Mr Deputy Speaker—and who put the food on our table. No country serious about its own security would be in any way reckless about its lack of food security.

    We should also care because our farmers are on the frontline of tackling climate change and providing environmental restoration. Some 70% of England’s land mass is farmed, so if we care about tackling climate change and the biodiversity crisis, the reality is that the greenest thing that any Government can do is keep Britain’s farmers farming. They are the only people who will make even the greatest plans come to fruition, because the greatest plans in the world will remain just plans in a drawer without farmers to introduce them.

    The Government are making a disastrous mess of the transition from the old farm payment system to the new system. If I had been asked a few years ago to list potential advantages of the UK leaving the European Union, I would have given a very small list, but being outside the common agricultural policy would have been on that list. Yet again, here is a potential benefit that the Government have grasped and are miserably failing on, as they botch the transition from the old basic payment scheme to the new environmental land management schemes.

    In my constituency, every single farmer has lost at least 5% of their basic payments and will lose at least 20% this year. All of the hundreds of farms that I represent are in that position. This year, 13 of the farms that I represent—a tiny proportion, little more than 1%—will be getting anything from the new sustainable farming incentive. The Government’s botched transition to the new scheme is costing farmers thousands of pounds a year, with nothing to replace it. So what will happen? Farmers will either go bust or go backwards. We will lose hundreds and hundreds of small to medium-sized family farms right across our country, many of them tenanted, costing us in biodiversity and food production. If they do not go bust, they will go backwards and give up on doing any environmental work whatever; they will just get more stock, because that is the only way that they can keep food on their own table.

    The Government are making not just accidental mistakes with farm transition, but deliberate ones. Parts of the landscape recovery and local nature recovery schemes give a clear incentive for landowners—and, indeed, investment companies that want to become landowners—to get huge tracts of land, evict tenant farmers and get massive cheques from the Government for doing nothing and letting the valleys go to seed. These are outrageous, state-sponsored lakeland clearances; we must not stand for them. There is nothing in this Queen’s Speech that gives any clue that the Government understand the damage that they are about to do.

    There is nothing for the uplands. Our upland communities in the Lake district, in the dales and in places such as Cornwall and Devon, Northumberland and North Yorkshire have enormous cultural significance, yet nothing in the farm payment scheme recognises that. The tourism economy of the Lake district and Cumbria is worth £3.5 billion a year under normal circumstances, yet there is nothing to compensate the people who create the backdrop that makes so many people come to visit our beautiful part of the world. That is why I am calling for a cultural landscape payment as part of the new farm payment system: to make sure that we value and reward our upland farmers.

    It is absolutely ridiculous that we have a farm payment scheme—a Government agricultural policy—that has a strategic aim of reducing our capacity to feed ourselves and actively taking land out of food production. That is not only stupid when we are trying to protect ourselves in a grave international situation, but immoral, because it means that we will now be fishing in markets where developing countries are seeking their grain and their commodities. We are pushing up the prices for the poorest people in the world because we have a wrong-headed farm payment system that is taking land out of food production. That is stupid and immoral.

    Let me now say something about housing, and the impact of the last two years on the housing crisis in rural communities. This has become a catastrophe. We have too few houses that are lived in permanently, and communities are dying as a consequence. During the pandemic, 80% of house sales in my community have gone to the second-home market, and at the same time there has been a 32% increase in the number of properties that have gone into the holiday-let market. In Devon, this has meant a 70% reduction in the long-term private rented sector.

    What do those two developments mean? First, there is excessive second-home ownership. No one wants to be beastly about second-home owners—we want to be generous and welcoming to people who wish to spend their time in our communities; it is nothing personal—but the fact is that this has a massive impact on the communities that I am privileged to serve in Cumbria. It means that communities are hollowed out of full-time occupation, so they lose the school, they lose the post office, they lose the pub—they lose community itself. Secondly, there is the huge and very speedy transition from long-term lets to vast numbers of holiday lets. What does that mean? It means that people who have lived in an area for years are expelled —evicted through the section 21 notices that the Government said they would abolish and have not. That was not in the Queen’s Speech, and it should have been.

    These people who are being ejected from their communities are people in work and with children at local schools. They have nowhere else to go in a place like the lakes or the dales, so they have to leave altogether, uprooting their kids and leaving their work. That is outrageous. The impact on our communities is devastating, and the Government are doing pretty much nothing about it.

    One proposal in the Queen’s Speech has been floated—for the Government to borrow something of the Welsh Government’s proposals to double council tax on second homes. I thought “great” when I first read about that, but now I have seen the detail, and it is rubbish. What will happen is that council tax will be doubled for a second-home owner who never goes to their home. That is a tiny minority of second-home owners. The proposal takes no account of the fact that, for instance, 90% of second homes bought in my constituency are bought for investment and then let out for 70 days a year. What does that mean? It means that this not a second home; the owner is a small business, and this is a holiday let. It means that the small business will pay no council tax and no business rates either, and that people in Kendal, Penrith, Appleby and Ambleside who are going to food banks are subsidising wealthy people with second, third and fourth homes. The Government, who know that for sure, having undoubtedly listened to their own Back Benchers representing rural communities. have chosen to do nothing meaningful to tackle the outrage.

    Let me finally say something about planning. If we want to tackle the second-home crisis, the holiday-let crisis and the affordable-housing crisis, we should change planning law to make second homes and holiday lets different categories of planning use so that national parks and councils can just put a lid on it. That would be the easiest and most straightforward thing to do. Why have the Government not chosen to do it? We talk about building more houses, but the problem in areas such as mine is that while those who build houses will sell them, we are building for demand and not for need, and it is time to build for need.

    Earlier today, I was talking to some of my local councillors—Jenny Boak, Pete Endsor and Sue Sanderson, who represent Grange & Cartmel. Just outside Cartmel, in Haggs Lane, 39 properties are to be built, only eight of them affordable. Why? Because the Government do not give planning authorities the power to say to developers, “Get knotted unless you are going to build for local people and families and make those places affordable.” So I am angry, not just on behalf of my community but on behalf of communities across rural areas of our great country, that there is so little, if anything at all, for us in this Queen’s Speech.

    It seems to me, looking at it from the inside in Cumbria, that this Conservative Government are doing to rural communities in this decade what a Conservative Government did to urban communities in the north in the 1980s. The difference is that Margaret Thatcher had a plan—I will give her due for that—while this Government, shambolically, through neglect and through taking rural communities for granted, are devastating those communities. They will not be excused for that, and they will not get away with it. We have seen the results of last week’s elections in Cumbria and Somerset, and I hope we will soon see the result of an election in Devon. We will see that rural Britain will not be taken for granted.

  • Tim Farron – 2022 Speech on Sewage Discharges

    Tim Farron – 2022 Speech on Sewage Discharges

    The speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 19 April 2022.

    I beg to move,

    That leave be given to bring in a Bill to provide for mandatory targets and timescales for the ending of sewage discharges into waterways and coastal areas; to make provision about the powers of Ofwat to monitor and enforce compliance with those targets and timescales; to require water companies to publish quarterly reports on the impact of sewage discharges on the natural environment, animal welfare and human health; to require the membership of water company boards to include at least one representative of an environmental group; and for connected purposes.

    It is such a privilege to be in this place to speak for the people of the lakes and dales of Cumbria. Cumbria is one of the most beautiful places on earth. It is also, on occasion, one of the wettest. It needs to be; how else could we keep the lakes, tarns, meres, waters, rivers and becks filled and flowing? Cumbria is home to two national parks and two world heritage sites, yet its waterways are shamefully often polluted by sewage discharges, and those discharges take place legally and without sanction. Our lakes and rivers are our natural treasures, yet water company bosses are degrading those natural treasures to keep a hold of their own treasure. Last year, the water companies made profits of £2.7 billion and paid out £27 million in bonuses. Their chief executives earn seven-figure sums, yet they are free by law to preside over enormous numbers of dangerous discharges that damage our environment and our wildlife, and are a threat to human life, too.

    This Bill aims to stop the water companies putting their personal treasure ahead of our natural treasure. The Government choose to let them get away with it, but this Bill will stop them. In 2021, raw sewage was pumped into the River Lune near Sedbergh in my constituency for 5,351 hours—the equivalent of 222 continuous days. This is not just a problem for me and my constituents; it is a colossal crisis affecting the entire country. Water companies pumped sewage into rivers nationwide 772,000 times in the last two years—more than 1,000 discharges each day. Some of those discharges lasted almost a whole year, and all of them were legal. Sewage discharges happen far too frequently and for far too long for the Government and the water companies to be able to credibly hide behind the excuse that they are caused only by exceptional rainfall. As a result of these discharges, only 14% of England’s rivers now meet the criteria to be defined as ecologically good.

    It is true that our sewerage systems are shamelessly out of date, but the water companies responsible for improving them have little impetus to do so because the Government are barely holding them to account. The British public pay these companies to not just provide us with clean water, but ensure safe and clean processes for waste water and sewage. Too often, it feels as though the companies forget about half of that bargain, and this Government let them. United Utilities, our local water company in the north-west, was the culprit in four of the 10 longest sewage discharges in 2021—the most of any water company in the country. Meanwhile it posted profits of £602 million and dished out £6 million in bonuses—also the most of any water company in the country. Far from being punished or held accountable for the degradation of our waterways, the water bosses, it appears to the public, are being rewarded for it. Those 772,000 discharges were legal. They happened under the Government’s nose while the rest of us had to hold ours.

    The water companies are also guilty of emissions that have broken the law, but they are rarely held to account. That is, of course, something of a theme for this Government. Between 2018 and 2021, only 11 fines were issued to water companies for pumping sewage into our lakes and rivers. Only three of those fines were over £1 million, and four were less than £50,000. The Government make it cheaper for water companies to pay a fine than to take action to stop the discharges. It is no wonder that the companies do not invest enough in cleaning up our lakes and rivers.

    I can confirm that I left the lakes this morning without a coat, because spring is here. The visitors are with us in Cumbria, and summer is around the corner. The UK’s waterways will soon be teeming with swimmers, dippers and paddlers, nowhere more so than in the English lakes and most of all Windermere, at the heart of the most visited part of the UK outside London. Windermere has three designated bathing sites, all of them ranked as being of good standard. It is currently a safe place to visit, but the Government’s weak regulation is putting that at risk.

    United Utilities legally dumped sewage into Windermere on 71 days in 2020. How can that be considered anything other than outrageous? The Government allow such discharges because they are considered to be storm events. Well, Cumbria has more rainfall in a month than many places have in a year. Things that might strike Ministers in London as storm events are actually mild drizzle for those of us in the lakes. By allowing the water companies to hide behind storm events as an excuse to pollute our lakes and rivers, the Government show their ignorance of communities such as ours in Cumbria and allow the water companies to pollute Britain’s wettest places the worst.

    Tourism and hospitality employs 60,000 people in Cumbria. It is by far our biggest employer, being worth £3.5 billion a year to our local economy. I do not want the Government to put that at risk by allowing our lakes to be polluted. I want them to protect the wellbeing of everyone who visits and lives in the lakes.

    As well as the human impact, there is an ecological impact. Maintaining the quality of our rivers, streams and lakes is crucial to protecting biodiversity for centuries to come. The Environmental Audit Committee has reported that

    “rivers in England are in a mess.”

    The population of 39 of the 42 main salmon rivers in England are categorised as at risk or probably at risk. When one part of the complex interconnected life of a river is damaged, the whole ecosystem is hurt, from duckweed and dragonflies to otters and trout.

    We must not be duped into thinking that the Government took action to deal with this in the Environment Act 2021. We remember they had to be dragged kicking and screaming by Members of the other place into moving an amendment, but that amendment is essentially meaningless. It sets no timescales or targets. It is a wish list, not an action plan.

    This Bill would put that right by ensuring that action is taken. It would provide for mandatory targets and timescales for the ending of sewage discharges into waterways and coastal areas. It would also strengthen Ofwat, the Water Services Regulation Authority, to hold water companies accountable. Furthermore, it would take the radical step of placing representatives of local environmental groups on the board of these companies so that executives have nowhere to hide from the impact of their practices on our waterways, on the wildlife that depends on them and on the economies and communities they underpin.

    The Bill would also help to get to the heart of the problem, not just the headlines, by making sure we get the right information. The Government tell us how long discharges happen and how often they happen, but not the volume of sewage discharged into the watercourses. Without that information, we cannot know the scale of the problem. In small rivers and becks, or in the confined space of a lake, volume has a much bigger and more damaging impact on humans, animals and ecology.

    Both the Government and the water companies hide behind asking inadequate questions, and therefore getting inadequate answers. For instance, the Government’s Environment Agency has to test for nutrients and chemicals in the water, but it does not have to test for bacteria, yet bacteria are the greatest health concern. Unless a watercourse is designated as bathing water, and barely any rivers are designated as bathing water, bacteria is tested for only by concerned citizens such as the marvellous people I recently met on the River Kent in Staveley. Testing for bacteria must become compulsory.

    The River Kent in Cumbria is designated as a site of special scientific interest. Among other things, it hosts protected species such as pearl mussels, which are rarer than the giant panda, yet sewage is being legally discharged into this protected river almost every day.

    The House can see why this Bill matters to my community and the whole United Kingdom. The Bill would require water companies to produce accurate and comprehensive quarterly reports on the impact of sewage discharges on animal welfare, human health and the environment. The public have a right to know what our water companies are being allowed to do. With the cleansing impact of public scrutiny, and the literally cleansing effect of water companies spending their money on upgrades rather than bonuses, hopefully the public will soon see encouraging signs to give them faith in our waterways and renewed faith in our political system that the polluters will actually be held to account for dumping sewage into our lakes and rivers, that they will no longer be permitted to do so, no matter how powerful they may be, and that companies making billions in profit will no longer be protected by a Conservative Government who permitted them to discharge sewage 772,000 times in two years.

    What, then, shall we protect: the inflated profits of water companies, or the safety and beauty of our lakes and rivers? It is time for all of us in this House to take action and to pick a side.

  • Tim Farron – 2022 Comments on Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak Being Fined for Breaking Rules

    Tim Farron – 2022 Comments on Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak Being Fined for Breaking Rules

    The comments made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, on 12 April 2022.

    I have just been speaking with a group of local elderly people who spent long lonely months isolated during lockdown. They made huge sacrifices to do the right thing. The PM and Chancellor thought they were above those people and above the law – of course they must resign.

  • Tim Farron – 2021 Speech on the Integrated Rail Plan

    Tim Farron – 2021 Speech on the Integrated Rail Plan

    The speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 8 December 2021.

    It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for High Peak (Robert Largan), who made a thoughtful contribution concerning his constituency.

    The integrated rail plan for the north is a real disappointment to many people, not least people from Cumbria, the furthest north-west county in England. When we leaf through the 162 pages of that document, we find not a single mention of the county of Cumbria. That is a reminder that when we talk about the north and levelling up the north, it feels to many of us that the rural north—rural communities generally, but specifically those in the far north-west of England—is not thought of and is very much overlooked.

    The cancellation of part of HS2 is deeply troubling, but of course the more troubling cancellation is that of Northern Powerhouse Rail. If one understands the north of England, one understands that what we really need is not to get to London a bit quicker, but to have greater capacity and to get from east to west more quickly. That has been overlooked by the Government. It is a betrayal of the north, yes, but more than that it is a betrayal of their lack of understanding of the north, which is more telling.

    I want to focus on a couple of things in my community. First, we appreciate that the HS2 line is not going to go further into Lancashire and into Cumbria, but nevertheless the trains will. I am deeply concerned that there are no plans for any of those HS2 trains to stop in the biggest visitor destination in the country apart from London, namely my constituency—the Lake district. That should be put right.

    We have a railway line from the main line at Oxenholme that takes us to Windermere—the Lakes line. It is a very short line, and it would be one of the cheapest electrifications in the country if only it were done. Sadly, the Government have cancelled that. I am, however, encouraged by recent conversations with the Rail Minister about the possibility of a passing loop at Burneside, which would give us the opportunity to effectively dual the line again—that was our Beeching cut back in the ’60s and ’70s. Doing that would double the capacity on the Lakes line and massively increase the number of people who could come to the Lake district and not come by car. That would be a huge positive.

    It is worth bearing in mind that there are many small things that are huge to us. At Staveley, the first station in the Lake district, there are 42 steps to get up to the station. Friends of mine who have disability issues, are elderly or need to use prams simply cannot use their local station, so I call on the Government to consider very carefully funding access to Staveley station.

    We have a world-class visitor destination in the Lake district, with what feels at the moment like a third-class rail connection. That is why I ask, finally, that the Government reconsider the electrification of the line from Oxenholme to Windermere, and of the Furness line from Lancaster to Barrow through my constituency. That would be a positive, carbon-neutral thing to do, and it would be a massive boost to tourism and to local communities. It would be a good, effective use of public money after this disappointment.

  • Tim Farron – 2021 Comments on Food Standards

    Tim Farron – 2021 Comments on Food Standards

    The comments made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, on 29 April 2021.

    Today Liberal Democrats are launching our new campaign to protect British farmers and maintain our food standards.

    I am deeply concerned that family farming businesses are at risk as the Tories continue to botch our transition away from the EU agricultural system.

    Some farmers even risk losing up to half their entire income as the Government is blundering their way towards a new Environmental Land Management scheme.

    Liberal Democrats support this new scheme, but the Tories are being much to slow – they are stubborn and out of touch with farmers.

    Meanwhile, they’re failing to commit to maintaining our high animal welfare and environmental standards for imported foods.

    This would allow foreign imports to undercut responsible British farmers.

    Farmers are the guardians of our landscape, they are the stewards of our countryside and vital allies in tackling the climate and ecological crises.

    The Liberal Democrats are committed to maintaining the beauty and biodiversity of our countryside which is why we want to ensure public money goes towards public goods like restoring our peat bogs, creating new natural flood protections and managing land to encourage species recovery.

    But the Tories risk forcing our family farmers out of business meaning we lose the very people who need to deliver these public goods.

  • Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on Bus Fare Data

    Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on Bus Fare Data

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 16 June 2020.

    I am very grateful, Madam Deputy Speaker.

    I support the spirit of these regulations. We must have equity of access to public transport across the country, and the collection of data to build an accurate picture of services is an essential part of that. However, I must warn the Minister that she will have a hard task collecting data on bus services in many towns and villages in Cumbria, because on most days there aren’t any, or at least it is so far that it will be a very short job and hardly worth the journey—which, in case I have not already made myself clear, she would not be able to make by bus.

    I acknowledge that the Government have gone some way towards recognising the crisis in bus services, such as by laying these regulations, and indeed earlier this year there was an announcement of additional funding and the unveiling of a national bus strategy, of which I am sure this forms a key part. But the new funding turned out to be peanuts, and while having a strategy is definitely better than not having a strategy, it was still a far cry from the claims of the press release and light years off providing the solutions needed in communities like ours, where we would like these regulations to apply in practice.

    So, to be clear, the whole of Cumbria received a total of £383,887, which, split roughly six ways between six constituencies, means about £65,000 for my constituency. My constituency could contain geographically every single one of the 73 constituencies in Greater London, and London—where these regulations will definitely apply —sees an annual subsidy to its public transport of around £700 million a year. And we must not forget that our £65,000—just less than a thousandth of 1% of the London subsidy—is just a one-off, and a one-off will not do.

    Ministers surely know that research shows that in order for a community to trust a bus service enough to rely on it as part of their regular routines—enough to use it, basically—that service needs to be functioning ​reliably and affordably for two to three years. I am sure that the data collected as a consequence of this regulation will show that and prove it, but we know it already.

    So this short-term puddle of cash does not even wet the feet of the problem. We will find a way of spending it wisely, and we are not ungrateful, but as we dare to hope for a time beyond the covid crisis, people in my communities want to believe that we have not sacrificed so much, endured such hardship and suffered such shattering loss just to go back to how things were beforehand.

    The mission must be to build back better, and that must include a refusal to leave communities behind. Rural, more isolated communities such as ours in Cumbria are at risk. Those communities are also often older, and while the majority of people, even in their 80s and beyond, will make some use of the technology we are talking about here, a higher proportion than in other age groups will not, and they are the people I am most concerned about in terms of the application of these regulations.

    The average age of the population in South Lakeland is 10 years above the national average. It cannot be right that we forget the generation that has borne the brunt of this virus, yet we will do that if we acquiesce over the isolation that so many of them endure. Many I know have found themselves alone and disconnected in their later years, with the loss of bus services leaving them stranded in places that are utterly beautiful but utterly isolated. Many in these towns and villages rely on buses for the basic tasks of daily life—shopping, going to the doctors, making appointments, seeing friends or getting to work. Buses, when they exist, provide those people with the ability to look after themselves, be independent, protect their physical and mental health, and stave off the loneliness that isolation can bring. Technology can help to underpin that, but only if there is a service that it can be underpinned by.

    There is no doubt that more of us have become acquainted with isolation over the last few months, but what is someone who lives in a small village and is unable to drive supposed to do if their one transport link is removed? At the same time, they witness the closure of accessible services as a consequence of the technology that is available in other parts of the economy. With few neighbours and fewer local services, the loss of buses constitutes the loss of connection, which risks leaving many more people even more isolated and vulnerable.

    Building back better must mean that we learn from the improvement in air quality and the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions throughout this time, and public transport is key to preventing a return to pre-covid carbon emissions. Bus services will be central to that, as part of an integrated public transport system. That is why I continue to urge the Minister to double the capacity of the Lakes line by introducing a passing loop, as well as electrifying the line to significantly reduce its carbon footprint.

    Many of us are excited for a time when lockdown has eased and we are able to see friends and family and visit the shops without unnecessary restrictions and caution. But the Government must recognise that the end of the lockdown will not bring that relief to everyone. In fact, for many isolated people in Cumbria, the official lockdown has not looked very different from the growing isolation ​that they have suffered due to a lack of services and transport links. In the 10 years between 2008 and 2018, the north-west lost 888 separate, distinct services, and that does not include the services we have lost in the last couple of years. We have not taken this lying down. We would love those services to be traced by an app and part of a technological solution, but as I say, there is no point having the technological solution if there is no bus service to underpin it.

    It is not only the elderly in our communities who suffer from reduced bus services. Young people’s access to public transport is also under threat. Free school transport is provided for young people up to sixth-form age, but after that, the support is not available. It makes no sense for the Government to demand that young people carry on in education until 18 and then deny them the ability to afford to do so—a generation that clearly is technologically competent and able to make use of the apps we are talking about. In places like Sedbergh and Coniston, it is often impossible to gain access to sixth-form provision at schools or colleges by public transport. That is why, alongside these regulations, there needs to be a statutory responsibility for local authorities to guarantee home-to-school transport for 16 to 18-year-old students, in the same way there is for under-16s.

    There must also be buses available to deliver that transport in the first place. In many of our towns and villages, if the Minister did agree to subsidise sixth-form bus travel alongside this technological innovation, there just are not any services to be subsidised. That has been emphasised during the covid crisis, as many families with free school meal vouchers have not been able to use them because the vouchers are not for the local supermarket in their town—

    Madam Deputy Speaker (Dame Rosie Winterton)

    Order. The hon. Gentleman is going way off the scope of the regulations. If we are discussing regulations, that is what we are discussing. We cannot not have a general speech about everything that is happening in his constituency, as important as that is. This debate is about the regulations, and I urge him to return to them ASAP.

    Tim Farron

    I will do so instantly. I make the point, though, that the whole point of having the technology that is rightly rolled out through this statutory instrument is that it should apply to services that exist, not imaginary ones that we wish existed. My community is suffering under covid like anywhere else, but the hospitality and tourism industry is vital to us. We are the second biggest visitor destination after London, and yet our public transport infrastructure means that this instrument may as well not exist for many of the communities that I represent. While I support the regulations and will not oppose them, I want to send the Government the message that they should ensure that there are sufficient services in rural communities like mine, so that these applications actually have some application in a county like Cumbria.

  • Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on Local Government Finance

    Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on Local Government Finance

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 5 February 2020.

    I will characteristically endeavour to behave, Mr Deputy Speaker. It is a massive honour to follow the hon. Member for Orpington (Mr Bacon). I hope that he is now feeling the relief that he was looking forward to earlier. The combination of Orpington and nerves rings a bell with me. I spent the night in Orpington before Blackburn Rovers won the league in 1995, and I could not sleep. I got the train back home, and the rest is history. I am also, by the way, the sixth-great-nephew, by marriage and adoption, of Charles Darwin, so it is a delight to know that I had a famous relative in the hon. Gentleman’s constituency. It was also a delight and an honour to listen to the maiden speeches of the hon. Members for North Norfolk (Duncan Baker) and for Jarrow (Kate Osborne), and to engage in some ginger solidarity with the hon. Member for Keighley (Robbie Moore). I wish them all the very best for their time in this place.

    Turning to the matter in hand, local authority funding cuts are the easiest for any Government of any colour to make. They make the savings, then someone else gets the blame. It is a transparent tactic, but I am not sure that it is as politically risk-free as Governments tend to think it is. It has certainly caused serious harm to families and communities right across the country. In my time serving in this place since my maiden speech—which I think was recorded on Betamax—our county ​council, our district council and our two national parks, the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales, have suffered significant cuts. It is worth bearing it in mind that national parks unofficially form part of the local government family, although they have no council tax-raising powers. The Lake District is the national park with the biggest population of any in the country, and it acts as a local authority in relation to some housing, planning and environmental matters for anyone who lives there. With that lack of ability to raise money of its own, those cuts are felt more keenly, to the extent that the Lake District national park is even talking about selling off iconic pieces of land.

    Cuts are not without consequence. Our police service also has to live with the cuts that have effectively been imposed upon it. Our police and crime commissioner has been forced to raise additional council tax just to prevent the Conservatives’ cuts from getting any worse over recent years. Our police are left increasingly vulnerable, with a mere handful of officers—sometimes as few as six at any given time—left to protect my constituency, which covers an area the size of Greater London.

    Owing to the Conservatives taking money away from our councils, most head teachers in South Lakeland have had to lay off staff, reduce teachers’ hours or merge classes. The Conservatives take advantage of the fact that heads want to be professional, disguise their financial hardship and protect children and parents, so those cuts are often safely hidden, but they hurt. They hurt children with special needs the most, but that is apparently okay so long as the Government can find a way to escape the blame and pass it on to local government.

    Like the constituencies of all today’s maiden speakers, my constituency is stunningly beautiful, but it is also vast, and its communities are dispersed. Public transport is vital to keeping people connected, preventing isolation and loneliness, and ensuring that people can get to work, school or college or, indeed, go shopping. Government council cuts mean that Cumbria no longer has any subsidised bus services. We recently successfully fought to protect under-threat services in Arnside, Levens and Cartmel, but we should not have to fight tooth and nail to save every single route. We should have a settlement that underpins a vibrant, affordable and reliable bus service right across the south lakes and Cumbria.

    The Government have even slashed funding in areas where they promised investment. Just over a year ago, having loudly proclaimed their commitment to preventive health care in the NHS long-term plan, the Government then cut public health budgets by £85 million within a matter of weeks. That means that Cumbria’s spending is now set to drop to just £36 per head. That is barely half the national average of £63 per head and ridiculously lower than the £241 per head per year that the City of London receives.

    The impact of that has been tangible. With the loss of school nurses, children have been left vulnerable to slipping into bad mental, dental and physical health, and the Government’s cuts mean that Cumbria now spends only a pathetic 75p per child per year on preventive mental health. We know that proper investment in public health budgets would allow us to place a mental health worker in every school, which is key to young people being resilient and healthy and to ensuring that problems do not become so severe further down the line. ​This is also the Government who promised a specialist one-to-one eating disorder service to the children and young people of south Cumbria, but they have still failed to deliver that service four years on.

    The motion rightly mentions both adult and children’s social care. As we speak, a 96-year-old constituent of mine has been stuck in a care home for more than 10 months because the council has been unable to put a care package together. At his advancing age, he is being denied the ability to live out his time in familiar surroundings with the ones he loves. Social care is now threadbare. A lady who had life-changing injuries, rendering her severely disabled, has sought my help on many occasions when carers have not turned up, leaving her completely unable to access food or water. It is, of course, always the most vulnerable who are hit first and hit hardest by the loss of services. The omission of deprivation from the Government’s calculation of funding seems to be a case of the Conservatives looking at the injuries that they have caused and then choosing to throw insult on top of them.

    According to the usual metric, my constituency is not the most deprived. We have unemployment at less than 1%, although 2,300 children are living in poverty, which is a reminder of the growing number of people in work and in poverty, and other parts of Cumbria, especially in the west, will be hugely hit by the Government’s choice to ignore deprivation. But the Government have made a choice, and it is to be cloth eared to the needs of rural northern communities such as mine. Local government funding is not some dry municipal concern; it is about the people who need care, the children in our schools, and the safety of our communities. That is why fairness matters. The Government must do a U-turn on their cuts to rural northern communities, because Cumbria deserves better than this.

  • Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on a Green Industrial Revolution

    Tim Farron – 2020 Speech on a Green Industrial Revolution

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tim Farron, the Liberal Democrat MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, in the House of Commons on 15 January 2020.

    It is always a massive joy to follow the hon. Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart). It is also great to see you back in your place, Mr Deputy Speaker; congratulations on your re-elevation.

    It has been a genuine privilege to sit through the maiden speeches by the hon. Members for Coventry South (Zarah Sultana), for East Surrey (Claire Coutinho) and for Birmingham, Northfield (Gary Sambrook), to whom I pay tribute. I wish to single out my new neighbour, the hon. Member for Barrow and Furness (Simon Fell), who made an excellent maiden speech and referred in particular to the need—I say this in hearing range of the Secretary of State for Transport—to strip Arriva Northern of its franchise, to make sure that we have a local train service that actually runs some trains.

    I remember giving my maiden speech; the terrifying fact is that I have a copy of it on a VCR tape in the garage. That is a reminder that I am indeed an old git, Mr Deputy Speaker.

    The green industrial revolution is nothing if not an ambitious title, and so it needs to be if we are to head off the existential threat of catastrophic climate change. Ambition is indeed what we need, but although we can give something an impressive and ambitious title, it is unlikely to earn a lasting legacy unless it actually delivers. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s new deal is not still invoked today because of its catchy title, but because of the good it achieved. We marvel at the Victorian expansion of the railways not because the Victorians did good spin, but because the network was actually built. Nations are never built on public relations stunts.

    Members can call me a glass-half-empty person if they like, but my fear for the Government is that they will make two significant mistakes as they decide how they are going to use their new majority. First, in order to mask the damage that the UK’s leaving the world’s biggest market will inevitably do to our economy and public sector, it is likely that the Government will max-out the credit card on revenue spending in a way that makes the recent Labour manifesto look fiscally conservative by comparison. Secondly, they will talk about big infrastructure investment, both the green and the not-so-green varieties, but in reality their fear of big government means they will not deliver anything that will make a true difference. In other words, the Government will show largesse when they should observe restraint, and restraint when they need to be ambitious. I hope I am wrong, because what we need is to be wise on revenue spending and ambitious on capital, particularly when it comes to green infrastructure. We must make the big strategic decisions needed to fight climate change.​

    In South Lakeland, we see nature changing before our very eyes, as climate change takes place with horrific consequences. Our communities are still reeling, four years on, from the devastating floods of Storm Desmond. Indeed, in the past decade or so we have been hit by three floods, each one of them classified as a one-in-200-year event. Storm Desmond flooded 7,500 homes and more than 1,000 businesses. We have to mitigate the impact of climate change on families and businesses while building the infrastructure to prevent a climate catastrophe. That is why Kendal’s flood prevention scheme must be delivered. All three phases of the flood scheme are now fully funded and I am glad that, after much pressure, the biggest concerns about the scheme have now been answered. In the place of every tree that must be removed as part of the scheme, six new ones will be planted in the town, and many of them will be semi-mature at the point of planting.

    I was there the morning after Storm Desmond, and in the weeks after. I saw people’s lives ruined; families left destitute; and businesses wiped out. Even today, there are children who still unable to sleep any time it begins to rain. I could not look people in the eye on Appleby Road, Shap Road, Sandylands, Ann Street or Mintsfeet Road if I did not do everything in my power to deliver them some kind of protection and some kind of peace of mind. After four years of promises—four years of fear whenever it pours; four years of incalculable strain on mental health for the old and young alike—how dare I claim to represent them if I do not see the flood defences delivered? The reality is that we are too late to prevent climate change, but we have perhaps a dozen years to avoid a major climate catastrophe with even more appalling human consequences.

    The main issue that I wish to focus on in the next few moments is the revolution that we need in public transport. Over the past 30 years, Governments of all colours have allowed funding for bus provision to evaporate. Our communities in South Lakeland have done a spectacular job in putting together community bus services to plug some of the gaps caused by this attrition of Government funding, most notably the Dales bus service in Sedbergh and Dent, which does a wonderful job connecting those Dales communities with Kendal and the surrounding communities. We have fought recently to keep the 552 and the 530 bus services. These are great victories. I am immensely proud of them, but they are short-term solutions at best. They are sticking plasters, when what is needed is ambitious change.

    It is utterly ludicrous that bus services in London receive a £722 million annual subsidy, when in Cumbria we receive nothing at all—not a single penny. The lack of subsidy has a catastrophic impact on fares, and the extortionate prices make commuting by bus a massive challenge, especially for lower-paid workers. How is it right, Mr Speaker, that the 5 mile journey from Ambleside to the neighbouring community of Grasmere costs £4.90, while a journey of equivalent length in London costs £1.50? If we are to entertain any hope of revolutionising public transport, the Government need to look beyond the M25—well beyond the M25. Indeed, it may come as a surprise to some in Government that the north does not stop at junction 32 of the M6.

    There is much to recommend the northern powerhouse, with two slight caveats: first, it is not much of a powerhouse; and secondly, it is not very northern. The transport ​spend in the north-west per head of population is still barely half that in London, despite the promises that were made when the northern powerhouse was first established. I will continue—I will have to continue—to fight the cuts to individual bus services. I will continue to stand with, and work with, the community to find alternative solutions, just as we are currently doing for Arnside, Levens, Cartmel, Hincaster and Kendal where we have replaced the 552 and the 530 services, but let us be honest, all that will do is lessen the decline.

    Bus services are essential to life for rural communities such as ours. They are also key to Cumbria’s vibrant tourism industry. No one could or would deny that the Lake District and the surrounding communities are utterly awesome. It is a national treasure and a source of joy to many more than just those of us who are privileged enough to live among those lakes, mountains and dales.

    Cumbria’s Lake District is Britain’s biggest visitor destination outside London. Some 16 million people visited us last year alone, but 83% of tourists travel to us by car. However, we know that, with the right interventions and conditions, our visitors will travel sustainably. Public bus transport is a key component of that, alongside rail, boats, bikes and, of course, walking in the hills. Improved bus services could alleviate pressure on the roads that become clogged with the cars of those visiting.

    The Government keep ignoring the plight of rural communities. A so-called green industrial revolution in London or Manchester simply will not do. We would love it if they stopped ignoring us, and instead commission a truly ambitious and comprehensive rural bus service to exceed anything that we have seen before, even 35 years ago before the deregulation which started to decline. It will be an investment not only that revives rural communities and sees a huge reduction in the use of cars locally, but that boosts our economy and increases access to jobs.

    My proposal today is that the Minister should ensure the direct commissioning through Transport for the North of a comprehensive, affordable, reliable rural bus network in Cumbria—a network that will be a substantial step towards ensuring that the northern powerhouse actually serves the rural north.

    Finally, if our efforts to tackle climate change are going to come anywhere near something that could be classified as a revolution, we need to transform public transport interconnection and that connection between buses and trains. The main public transport route to the Lake District is the Lakes line. Back in 2017, the Government cancelled the planned electrification of the Lakes line on the basis of a massive and flawed overestimation of the project costs. This was and remains a huge let-down for communities around the lakes, and yet electrification of the Lakes line is the easiest electrification project in the country. The 12-mile route carries hundreds of thousands of passengers each year, but it could carry four times as many if we introduced a passing loop at Burneside so that we could run a half-hourly service, and if it were electrified, it would significantly reduce its carbon emissions.

    If the Government are serious about tackling climate change, they need to undo their foolish cuts to the electrification project, and the Lakes line is the perfect place for the Government to begin a green U-turn to reverse their mistakes of recent years. The Lakes line is short, but it is iconic. It carries significant numbers and could carry so many more. I plead with the Government ​to make their actions match their words. They should not just plug the gaps in public transport, but instead revolutionise the system. They should speak not of subsidies, but of investment that multiplies its value in the economy of the rural north. Targets are dangerous if they are simply a fig leaf to cover up a failure to act in the present. The Government must act now, and we will wait to see whether they do.

  • Tim Farron – 2017 Speech to Liberal Democrat Party Conference

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tim Farron, the former leader of the Liberal Democrats, at the party’s conference in Bournemouth on 18 September 2017.

    I was at Euston the other day and a lady came up to me, half my size but still somehow able to look down her nose at me.

    She said ‘well, I’m not surprised you stepped down! Never trust a man who wears Doctor Marten shoes!’

    If only we’d known. I’d have worn the boots instead, cherry red with yellow laces up to my knees. And that would be the only thing I’d change.

    I’m not giving up, so this won’t be a giving up speech. And I’m not retiring, I mean I turned down celebrity Dancing on Ice! Because Lembit Opik is a friend. Not a blueprint.

    Look, I’m not going to give you a long list of advice – I’m not Paddy.

    Just one bit of advice really, it’s this:

    If you have joined this party as a fast track to a career in politics, then your careers officer wants sacking.

    This is not the place if you want an easy life. It is the place to be if you want to make a difference.

    31 years ago I joined the Liberals.

    Like the rest of you I chose the tough route in politics, I chose that tough route knowingly.

    Any old mediocrity can join Labour or the Tories, hold office, be someone for a bit, but do exactly the same as any other careerist would have done.

    But I also know you can only make a difference if you are brave enough to be different.

    When I first got elected, getting lost on the parliamentary estate was pretty much a daily event. Its like going to big school for the first time. One night Greg Mulholland and I were trying to find our way out of parliament, and we got lost, its just possible that we might have had a pint.

    Anyway, we wandered into the house of lords lobby by mistake and Greg whispered to me ‘I think we’re in the wrong place’ to which the policeman on the door responded ‘not in the wrong place sirs, just 30 years too early.

    Which tells you something about how folks see the comfortable trajectory of the career politician.

    Anyhow, about a week later I decided to join year 6 of Dean Gibson Primary School from Kendal on their tour around parliament. Everything I know about what’s where in parliament I got from that guided tour.

    As the tour progressed we ended up again in the House of Lords lobby, and I got distracted by Geoffrey Howe moving rather slowly out of the chamber and into the lobby.

    I don’t mind telling you, I was rather star struck, I mean he was chancellor of the exchequer when I was at school!

    One of the kids saw who I was looking at, and she said ‘who is he?’ and I said ‘that’s Geoffrey Howe, he brought down Margaret Thatcher’ and she said, ‘who’s Margaret Thatcher?’

    Which goes to show that, you know, there is some justice.

    Margaret Thatcher love her or not, was a great leader, immensely significant, and, apparently… forgettable.

    Those whose driving motivation is a glittering career, the fulfilment of personal ambition, are not only vain, their efforts are in vain.

    Careerism is futile. But changing people’s lives isn’t. So winning elections isn’t.

    These last two years, we have begun to win again.

    And we have a great, new leader in Vince.

    He is exactly what we need, just when we need it – and I still aim to encourage, inspire and support you as we seek to win, in councils and in parliaments, in your community, and across our country.

    To me, the Tories aren’t the enemy, Labour aren’t the enemy, defeat is the enemy.

    Because defeat robs us of the ability to make people’s lives better.

    The Women’s Hour survey last week showed that the South Lakes is the best place in the north for women to live… and it was pretty clear why, because of housing, affordable housing.

    And that’s down to us. Having built something like a thousand social rented properties, the liberal democrats have halved the housing waiting list.

    It wasn’t rocket science: you have a vision, a plan to make people’s lives better, you inspire your volunteers you inspire the voters, you win, you change people’s lives.

    I joined this party because I agreed with it. I stayed in this party because I fell in love with it. Because this is the party that is in no one’s pocket. This is the party that lets you think for yourself.

    This is the party that treats people like people, not pawns in an ideological game. This is the party riddled with compassion, and we are terminally infected with optimism. And guided by rational thought, by a refreshing wisdom in the face of extremism and dogma.

    Given that we are now led by the wisest person on the planet, it’s probably a good time for me to tell you that it is this party’s wisdom that I love the most. Wisdom is not always popular, but wisdom is what any country needs, especially this country and especially now.

    You can win elections and win power by being crafty and clever. But you only do any good by being wise.

    But choosing wisdom over populism can leave you pretty lonely. Just look at our record of being right, but standing alone. We spoke out about climate change decades before anyone else. And we were right.

    We spoke out about the impending banking collapse before anyone else. And we were right.

    We called for Britain to join Europe from the start. And we were right.

    We opposed the illegal Iraq war. And we were right. We called for Britain to take our fair share of refugees. We were right. We are right.

    And we said that leaving the EU is the biggest mistake we have made in a hundred years and that we should resist it. And we are right.

    But I am fed of being right and getting beat.

    And when I took on the leadership of this party, we had been beaten beyond our worst nightmares.

    It had been an honour to see Nick Clegg and our team in government put liberalism into practice for 5 years in coalition, but in July 2015 the question was not whether we would return to government it was whether we would survive at all.

    Our challenge wasn’t ‘trust’ or defending our record in government, it was far bigger and more basic than that.

    Our challenge was basic relevance.

    We simply didn’t matter.

    And because of the disaster of 2015, I was the first and hopefully last lib dem leader to fight a general election when we weren’t even the third party.

    90% of our MPs defeated, 50% of our councillors defeated, 50% of our members departed. Ejected as the 3rd party.
    Dismissed as irrelevant.

    The day I took over as leader one journalist predicted confidently that ‘the party that began with Gladstone will now end with Farron’.

    So that was cheerful.

    Well, not cheerful, but utterly motivating to me. I saw those assumptions that we were dead and buried and I resolved that we were going to survive and we were going to grow and we were going to matter and we were going to win again.

    The Liberal movement that gave us the welfare state, the old age pension, freedom of religion, the health service, LGBT equality, council housing.

    The Liberal movement of Gladstone, Lloyd George, Shirley Williams, Jo Grimond, Nancy Sear, Charles Kennedy – the movement I joined as a 16 year old, was not going to die on my watch.

    And so 2 years ago, in this very hall, I set you a challenge and you rose to that challenge, you picked a ward and you won it, we had the first local election gains for our party in 8 years, we grew our membership, we took risks, we made ourselves matter.

    We saved the Liberal Democrats and I am proud of every single one of you.

    In the early hours of the 24th June 2016 I took our biggest risk. A considered risk.

    You see, unlike David Cameron, I had made a plan as to what we would do if the EU referendum was lost.

    It was a simple plan, and it was to stick to our principles.

    It was to defiantly say that the Britain we love is a Britain that loves the world.

    That the Britain we love is open, tolerant, united, it is not insular, suspicious and divided.

    That to be a patriot is to do what is best for your country what is best for your children’s future.

    I respect the majority, because I am a democrat.

    But I resist Brexit and I want the people to have the chance to change and rescue their future, because I am a patriot.

    June 24th 2016 was a long day, but it was a day we turned a corner, with a conviction and clarity that meant for the first time in ages we actually seemed to matter.

    It was an especially long day if you worked in the Lib Dem membership department.

    When I arrived at HQ that morning everyone’s eyes were fixed on a TV screen, not BBC, ITV, Sky, no, the screen that displays the party’s current membership figures.

    That number was rising at the rate of a new member every single second, and it went on, and on and on and we grew and grew and grew.

    We made a risky call that morning, but since then our membership has doubled to 100,000, the highest it has ever been in the history of our party.

    We had the best run in council by-elections for more than a generation, we had Witney and then we had Richmond Park.

    We experienced something we had hardly experienced for years: winning, and the joy and energy and momentum that comes from winning, which leads to more winning!

    And for all the challenges of the June election, for the first time in four general elections, our party came back with an increase in MPs and our most diverse parliamentary party ever.

    I said during the campaign that my motivation for fighting the madness of Brexit was that I wanted to look my children straight in the eye in the years to come and say that I did everything, everything to prevent this disaster.

    And that is still my motivation.

    It is not too late. The Britain we love can still be saved. Do not give up.

    We will be mocked, we will be vilified, we will be snarled at as enemies of the people, remoaners, losers and it will feel easier to walk away, to keep your head down, to change the subject.

    Believe me, since the referendum there were times when I was tempted to do that.

    But I remembered Charles Kennedy.

    I remembered Charles Kennedy stood in the Commons speaking wisdom and reason as Tories and Labour ganged up to take us into that illegal war in Iraq, I remember Charles being screamed at for being a traitor, and hounded for daring to stand up to Bush and Blair.

    And I remember public opinion against us at first. I remember Charles determination to keep going all the same, he was right, he knew it and he wasn’t going to let it go.

    And as the months went by and our cause was proven right and just, the mood changed and Britain agreed that Charles Kennedy was right.

    We need to follow Charles example today.

    We are right, we will be proven right, we must not give up.

    But lets not fixate on the disaster that is Brexit, let us build the positive case for a Europe that is Britain’s home.

    Back in 1977, at the height of the Cold War, Jimmy Carter sent a recorded message up into space on board the voyager spacecraft.

    He said we are trying to survive our time so that we may live into yours.

    Well, Voyager has now left the solar system and so far we have survived.

    When he recorded those words the nuclear arms race was at its most terrifying. Six countries who are now members of the European Union had nuclear weapons on their soil, pointed at us. But today, instead of plotting one another’s annihilation we are friends who trade and share a destiny…or at least we did.

    The European Union is flawed, imperfect, in need of reform…for sure… but in its sinews and veins, in its very existence, it remains beyond compare the world’s most successful peace process.

    That is why I will not let it go, get over it, suck it up.

    Patriots are never populists. Because patriots tell their country the truth, it is a treacherous act to tell lies to your country, Boris ….. or to be a coward, acquiescing while lies gain a foothold, Jeremy.

    So we must tell the truth. Britain’s exit from the European Union will make, is making, my country poorer, my country less safe, my country less powerful… and it is damaging the future for our children.

    Of course there is one promise that Brexit will fulfil. It will reduce immigration, without changing a single law. Because if you turn Britain into a poorer, meaner, insular place, no one in their right mind will choose to come here.

    So the Tories are breaking Britain to repel the immigrants. And they do it with Labour’s shameful connivance. What a disgrace!

    You want to know why we need Liberals?

    That is why we need Liberals.

    You can be a Corbyn or a May and change your mind on Europe to suit the weather.

    Too afraid of the people to ever deserve to lead them.

    Leadership requires courage…not cowardice.

    We stand between two parties led by cowards.

    We stand between two parties leading Britain to disaster.

    And people know it.

    They vote for one because they’re terrified of the other.

    We must give people hope to vote for not fear to vote against.

    Britain deserves something better. Liberal Democrats are that something better.

    Theresa May. With whom in the early 1990s I once shared a ballot paper, and a hairstyle, Rick Astley’s hairstyle to be precise. We wore it well.

    Let me say this about Theresa May. When she and I fought North West Durham in 1992, she did actually turn up to the debates!

    It didn’t do her any good mind, not that it did me any good either – But today she embodies perfectly the bankruptcy of the Tory party.

    People act surprised that her manifesto was a vacuous disaster.

    Why the surprise?

    Why would the Tories bother with a serious manifesto – the only conviction they have is that people like them should run the country.

    Holding office is more important than wielding power. Policies are mere details, why would you bother with those?

    Theresa May, is still in number 10 because the Tories think that however dreadful she is, everyone else is worse.

    And you can see their point.

    You see, once upon a time, Michel Barnier would have croissants and coffee for breakfast, now he has David Davis.

    Every flipping day.

    Its embarrassing because my kids future depends on this circus, in which our representatives are the clowns and the rest of Europe is the audience, not sure whether to laugh at us, shout at us, or increasingly to just to walk away and spend their time on something less boring.

    Because this is what this Conservative government is really doing.

    Its making Britain weaker, smaller and less important.

    Its making Britain smaller overseas, and its making Britain smaller at home.

    Diminishing our schools as this summer, most head teachers had to lay off staff because of budget cuts.

    Letting our NHS shrink, demoralising clinicians, betraying patients.

    Pushing those who were just about managing into poverty and family crisis.

    After the dementia tax disaster, going from a bad plan to no plan for the future of social care.

    Turning its back on affordable and social housing.

    Cutting rail investment.

    Downgrading the green energy revolution that Nick and Ed delivered in government.

    Brexit was never just about being out of Europe, it was always part of a wider plan: to shrink the state, cut the green crap, small government, weak citizens, everyone for themselves, a small Britain, a weak.

    Britain, a mean Britain.

    But that is not our Britain.

    And this menace to our future is multiplied because the official opposition is a joke.

    The party of Atlee, Gaitskell, Wilson, Callaghan, Blair and Brown… is now run by the kind of people who used to try to sell me newspapers outside my students union. A party which now has more in common with Class War than they do with the Fabian Society.

    But Labour’s election result in June was better than expected.

    Labour MPs won who had expected to lose. And so we have the born again Corbynistas.

    Those who fought to get rid of him then, but who are happy to support him now.

    I say this to the majority in Labour who are social democrats.

    You may have saved your seats, but you have lost your party.

    I’d argue that Labour’s most effective leader was actually Neil Kinnock. Blair would never have won without him.

    Kinnock took a party in the grip of the extreme left, and he transformed it -he made it a social democratic party not a hard left socialist party.

    Hard left socialism is an assault on our economy, an assault on our internationalism, an assault on our liberty. If you are social democrat in labour today, you know that.

    and if you’re breathing a sigh of relief that you held on in June, you need to have a good long look at yourself.

    You do not belong now to the party that you joined. You know that Labours leadership would keep us apart from Europe, trash our economy and lead us to the worst austerity in living memory.

    And you know that the people who would suffer the most wouldn’t be the rich it would be the poorest.

    It would be those who most rely on strong public services, health, social care, schools, welfare, pensions.

    Those who would suffer from extreme socialism would be the many and not the few.

    But for the thousands of labour members across the country who know this, its too late to do a Kinnock now.

    You have lost your party for at least a generation.

    Your party has left you, so its time for you to leave it.

    Because it is now clear if there is to be a realignment of progressive forces then it can only be around this party.

    Liberal Democrats, we should embrace that role, seize this moment, lead that movement.

    So our job is to do good, not to attempt to leave vain personal legacies.

    Careerism is futile. But there is nothing wrong with ambition, so long as your ambition is to do the right thing.

    For me, I joined the party at 16, I’ve been a student activist, union President, councillor, parliamentary candidate in a winnable seat…that I lost, and then won, so then an MP, shadow cabinet, party president, party leader.

    I guess if I had personal ambition, then I’ve done everything I realistically could have done.

    So now is the time to do what I love to do.

    And with a bit more time on my hands, I have done a bit more running, seen a lot more of my kids… and I co-authored a book with JK Rowling.

    Well, sort of.. we both wrote chapters in the RAM album book which came out a fortnight ago.

    She wrote about the Violent Femmes and I, as you know, wrote about NWA’s straight outta Compton having now established myself as the party’s leading authority on gansta rap.

    Which is a niche position.

    As, some would say, is our position on Brexit.

    Indeed despite all the challenges we have faced it is true to say that we’ve 99 problems but the niche ain’t one.

    But doing what I love, means being here.

    I love being a campaigning MP, and I love being part of the lib dem family I have belonged to for 31 years.

    So if its alright with you, then I’m here for at least the next 31 years too. Which would put me in my 70s… which is of course the perfect age to run to be party leader.

    We’ve got a brilliant leader in Vince. A uniquely impressive leadership team in Vince and Jo. I’m very very proud to fight under their banner. Just as you have fought under mine, and for which I am so grateful.

    And so I want to focus my final words on the most important people in our party. You.

    This week, you are here, giving up your time and money.

    All year, your work in your communities, fighting elections, running the local party, building our campaigning infrastructure on the ground is what really saved this party.

    Half of you joined in the last 2 years, but you are the movement that forces this party through its dark times and which has now filled it with its greatest ever purpose and mission.

    You make sacrifices for our cause, you are selfless in your commitment, you are all that stood between this party and oblivion and I salute you all.

    And now I rejoin your ranks, proud to march alongside you.

    Because activist I was since the day I joined, activist I was as leader, activist I remain until the day I die.

    On the desperate plight of refugees,; on the dishonesty and calamity of Brexit; on the tragedy of homelessness; the horror of climate change; the chaos in care.

    You are the people who will not walk on by, because you cannot walk on by.

    That is why you are different and that is why I love you

    And that is why our ambition matters.

    Britain needs the Liberal Democrats, sanity in economics, compassion for all, a plan for the long term, an exit from Brexit… what’s not to like?

    And there’s no one else in our market.

    Of course celebrate our survival, but if we love our country then our ambition cannot now just be to survive, it must be to grab this moment, take that space and fill it with all that we have.

    When I needed you, you were always there.

    But your country needs you now.

    It needs you to win, it needs you to grow, it needs you to get behind our outstanding leader and it needs you to believe that you belong to the only movement that can rescue our country and the generations to come from the disaster it now faces.

    That is the ambition we all share, that is the ambition that burns within when personal ambition fades, that is the ambition that gives clarity to our mission, purpose to our campaigns, a reason to fight.

    We have made our party matter, now we must make our party win.

  • Tim Farron – 2015 Speech on the Future of the Liberal Democrats

    Below is the text of the speech made by Tim Farron, then standing in the leadership of the Liberal Democrats, at the IPPR on 25 June 2015.

    Thank you, David, and thanks also to IPPR for inviting me to deliver this talk. IPPR has always been one of the leading think tanks on the progressive wing of British politics. I welcome the interest you’ve shown in Liberalism, and I hope that in the next few years you will further develop the arguments in your 2007 book on Liberalism, Beyond Liberty.

    Now let me be frank. The election on May 7th was an utter disaster for the Liberal Democrats. In terms of our vote and number of MPs we are back to the level of the 1970 general election, when the Liberal Party won six seats on 7.5 per cent of the vote, compared to this year’s eight seats and 7.9 per cent.

    Compared to the last election, in 2010, we lost almost two-thirds of our vote and over 85 per cent of our MPs. There is no other occasion in the entire history of the Liberal Democrats or the Liberal Party, stretching back to the early nineteenth century, on which we have lost such a high proportion of our vote or our seats.

    It’s therefore entirely reasonable to ask the question: what is the point of the Liberal Democrats? Do we have a role to play in a country which appears to have rejected us so comprehensively?

    It won’t come as a surprise to you that I think we do! And I’m not alone. Since the election Party membership has surged by more than 30 percent, we are the fastest growing political party in the UK – that 18,000 people have, without being prompted, had the same thought, at the same time, and then done something about it… well that’s a phenomenon, indeed it is a movement. That’s more than just encouraging – it’s a signal that there are so many people out there who are Liberals at heart, who understand the threat that Liberalism faces, who think Liberalism’s worth fighting for and who see the Liberal Democrats as their vehicle and their voice.

    Even The Guardian has now reached that conclusion. Having compared us during the campaign to ‘rinse aid in a dishwasher … probably useful, surely not essential’ – they decided after the election just three weeks later that, ‘in the absence of a liberal party, one would have to be invented – and indeed … one will now have to be reinvented and rebuilt’.

    The result on May 7th might have been a rejection of the Liberal Democrats, but it was not a rejection of Liberalism. Rather, it was a consequence of our decision in 2010 to enter into coalition with our historic political enemies. We did the right thing by our country, and I am proud of Nick and all that we achieved, but our party was hugely damaged by the perceived submerging of our identity and by the tuition fees issue which undermined the electorate’s trust in us. Our election campaign did not help too much either: a campaign which seemed to say that we were desperate to get back into government and didn’t much mind with whom, while wholly failing to communicate what we stood for and what we believed. We said something about what we would do, but we did not tell people who we are.

    I want to be very clear, though: I am not repudiating the coalition. We were right to enter into coalition in 2010 and can be proud of what we achieved. Indeed, we proved that coalition government can be stable and successful and that people should not fear coalition in the future. But I spoke about all this at length to the Gladstone Club a couple of weeks back, so you’ll forgive me for not repeating myself here.

    In fact we achieved a lot for Liberalism in the coalition. The Agreement included: a rise in the income tax threshold to £10,000; the pupil premium to give extra resources for children from disadvantaged backgrounds; restoration of the earnings links for the state pension; a banking levy and reform of the banking system; investment in renewable energy; the immediate cancellation of plans for a third runway at Heathrow; an end to the detention of children for immigration purposes; the dropping of plans for identity cards; agreement to reach the UN target of 0.7 per cent of GNP for overseas aid by 2013; the introduction of a fixed-term parliament of five years; and reform of the House of Lords.

    With the exception of Lords reform, every single one of those objectives was achieved. And we managed more in the five years that followed: same-sex marriage, the world’s first Green Investment Bank, the triple lock for pensions, two million apprenticeships, free schools meals for the youngest pupils, and much more. I don’t believe any of that would have happened without Liberal Democrats.

    And that’s just the positive things we achieved; I don’t have time to list all the Tory commitments we blocked. Over the next five years people will see exactly what a difference we made. In fact, the last six weeks have shown pretty clearly what an outstanding job Nick Clegg and his team did.

    So why did we do so badly in the election? Ask random members of the public what they remember about the coalition, and will they list any of those achievements? While we were sweating over our best policies, people weren’t listening. Tuition fees created a barrier – like those force fields in Science Fiction films. We fired our best policies and achievements – and they were brilliant policies and achievements – and they just glanced off the electorate because the tuition fees barrier – that lack of trust – was too strong.

    So we need a fresh start. We have to prove, from first principles, why Liberalism in Britain still matters. So I’ll start by defining what I mean by Liberalism – what are the underlying beliefs and values that underpin our approach.

    All political philosophies rest on a view of human nature. The Liberal view is an optimistic one. We are not naïve about human beings, but we are not cynical and negative either. We believe that people do not need an overbearing state to help them do right. When afforded the freedom, dignity and respect that is due to all individuals, people generally show an enormous capacity to use their talents for good.

    We believe that, as rational beings, individuals are capable of judging their own self-interest. Indeed, they are the only ones able so to judge; no one else, whether politicians, priests or officials, can do that so well. The enabling society is therefore one in which each individual has the freedom to pursue their own ends as they judge best.

    My first core value, therefore, is liberty – the right of people to make the most of their lives: free to develop their talents, to say what they think and to protest against what they dislike according to their own values, free of a controlling, intrusive state and of a stifling conformity, and free to choose their own occupation or to set up their own business. A diverse society is a stronger society.

    This liberty must be protected with a framework of law. We have a steadfast commitment to human rights, because there are some things no government should ever be allowed to do to anyone, because the rule of law is the bedrock of freedom and prosperity, and because people are entitled to be treated with dignity and respect whatever their nationality or background.

    Since Liberals believe that every individual is of equal value, we are internationalists from principle. We believe that the free movement of people and the free exchange of ideas, goods and services across national boundaries enrich people’s lives, broaden their horizons and help to bring nations together in shared understanding. We believe that immigration is a blessing and not a curse.

    My second core value is democracy – but by democracy, I mean much more than just a mechanism for counting votes. I mean a spirit of equality, openness and debate, a coming together to decide our future fairly and freely, without being dominated by entrenched interests or financial power. A state that supports freedom has to be a democratic state, with power dispersed as widely as possible and built up from below, in which politics is not an activity confined to a tiny elite but something everyone can take their part in, as and when they choose. And we believe in the decentralisation of power – both political and economic – to the lowest level consistent with effective government, because the more locally an institution operates, the more responsive and transparent it can become.

    My third core value is fairness. Every individual is entitled to respect, whatever their income,

    way of life, beliefs or sexuality. That means that the state must treat citizens fairly – whether in the way police officers deal with young people on the streets, the way Jobcentres treat benefits claimants, or the way the tax authorities treat small businesses. It means fairness in other aspects of life, too, such as employees having a say over their conditions of work.

    But liberty and democracy and fairness alone are not enough, because people’s ability to realise their own goals is critically affected by their circumstances. Nothing robs you of your liberty more than poverty, ill-health, poor housing, or a lack of education.

    This isn’t just about high-quality public services and an effective welfare safety net, vital though they are. An unequal society – and Britain has one of the most unequal in the Western world – is weaker not just for those at the bottom of the pile but for everyone. The citizens of a less equal society suffer from poorer health, lower educational attainments, higher crime rates, and lower levels of trust and co-operation than their more equal counterparts. Government therefore needs to act to reduce inequalities in income and wealth. Inequality is not just immoral, it is impractical – it wastes the talent of the diverse people and places of our country.

    My fourth core value is environmentalism. Climate change, pollution and the degradation of the natural world pose one of the biggest threats to our welfare, to our economy and to our freedom that we have ever seen. We have to act both at home and internationally to promote green technologies, producing clean energy and transport, stopping the waste of natural resources, and protecting nature. The market by itself cannot achieve this; government action is needed across the board to set standards, provide new infrastructure and promote innovation – and in the process build a competitive economy and improve everyone’s quality of life. If we are going to defeat climate change, we need bold action. What the Green Party don’t get is that we won’t create and sustain the positive action we need on climate change with a message of doom and gloom. We need to communicate hope – because going green can bring a better quality of life for everybody, whether they’re climate wonks or not.

    This leads on to my fifth core value: quality of life- because some things, like the beauty of the natural world, or music and poetry and art, or spending time with friends and family, should never be sacrificed on the altar of profit or growth. A society in which people feel happier and more satisfied in life is one which is answering the needs of its citizens.

    Where else in the political spectrum are these core values represented? Is there another party that fights for liberty, democracy, fairness, internationalism, environmentalism and quality of life?

    It shouldn’t take too long to dismiss the Conservatives. David Cameron’s attempts to present himself as a liberal Tory, hugging huskies, hugging hoodies, building the big society, are long gone. Whether he really believes in any of that I strongly doubt – but if he does, he shows no signs of reining in Theresa May’s introduction of the so-called snoopers’ charter that we blocked.

    He stands behind George Osborne’s assault on the welfare state, with £12 billion of cuts to who-knows-what benefits to come – a Chancellor who could with a straight face claim that ‘we’re all in it together’ while cutting the top rate of income tax. Cameron fought the election on a manifesto that simultaneously promised to cut ‘carbon emissions as cheaply as possible, to save you money’ and to end all public subsidy to onshore wind, the cheapest form of renewable electricity – therefore ensuring that the average cost of renewables will go up, while losing jobs and investment.

    He has no interest in reforming the electoral system that gave his party a majority on 37 per cent of the vote. He will block any attempt at reform of party finances or election spending limits, to make sure that the bankers and hedge fund managers who fund his party can buy future elections too.

    He won the election not on a story of optimism, of a plan for ensuring better times for families and communities, but on a narrative of fear, of a Labour government propped up by Scottish Nationalists – in the process claiming that a vote for the SNP was illegitimate and thereby fanning the flames of Scottish separatism. When it comes to a choice between the good of their party and the good of the country Conservatives always put their party first.

    What about Labour? Liberal Democrats have tended to see the Labour Party as closer to our own progressive aims, partly because we have more of a history of cooperation with Labour governments – in Scotland from 1999 to 2007, in Wales from 2001 to 2003, or in the Lib-Lab Pact in the 1970s.

    And I think they score a little better than the Tories on some of my tests: the last years of the last Labour government saw positive developments in environmental policy, they fought the last election on a redistributive package that nicked one of its main planks – the mansion tax – from us, and they’re generally supportive of UK membership of the EU.

    But just remember what they were like in government. Even ignoring taking Britain into an illegal war, their record in other respects was unimpressive. Income inequality actually rose during New Labour’s term in office, while the seeds of the banking crisis were sown in their failure to regulate effectively the financial services sector.

    Their record on civil liberties was shameful; they were just as eager as the Tories to encroach ever more on freedom in the name of the war on terror. Even their cheerleader in the quality press, the Guardian, recognised, in an editorial on 15th May, that the Labour Party ‘is just as authoritarian as it is libertarian, and – with the impressive exception of the early Blair years – has been constitutionally conservative through much of its history’. The Guardian obviously forgot, incidentally, that Blair’s constitutional programme was set for him by the Cook-Maclennan Agreement, drawn up with the Liberal Democrats. In the last Parliament Labour joined with the Tories to block reform of the House of Lords and were at best lukewarm, and often hostile, over the AV referendum.

    What about UKIP? I’m not aware we share any value with them; they are the polar opposite of everything we stand for. And while the SNP is unlike UKIP in many ways, in one way they are the same: they exalt the race over the individual, they value people in terms of their nationality, not their character, they foster intolerance of others just because they are different.

    Finally, the Greens. I admire their dedication and their commitment to environmental aims, but at base they value the planet over its human inhabitants, which leads them into authoritarian and illiberal territory. It’s attractive to some because it promises a short cut to solve the huge problems of climate change, or inequality. But it isn’t rooted in a reality that understands how people behave – emotionally or politically. Policy by wishful thinking or authoritarian dictat ultimately doesn’t work – and I fear that many of their policies haven’t been rigorously thought through . Ultimately though, my concerns with the Greens are that they simply aren’t liberal. Free choice isn’t an inconvenience – it’s a fundamental part of what it means to be human, yet for the Greens it’s treated almost as an add on.

    So my conclusion is clear: while there may well be other parties with whom we can agree on particular policies, with whom we could cooperate in campaigns – for example for a yes vote in the EU referendum – there is no other party that is remotely Liberal in its basic philosophy, that shares our beliefs and values. So if Liberalism is worth fighting for, then logically the only course open to us is to rebuild the Liberal Democrats into a force than can fight for it effectively.

    And in turn that means building a campaigning movement, not just a political machine. It means ensuring that all of our campaigns – to stay in the EU, to retain the Human Rights Act, to defend the pupil premium because it attacks inequality, to oppose the Tories undermining the welfare states and selling off housing association homes, to promote green energy instead of shale gas – must be underpinned with a positive message of belief in this country, in its citizens and their communities. Our policy must be not just about what we will do but whom we are.

    This has always been the great cause of Liberalism, a creed which is now needed more than ever – an optimistic confidence in the capacity of ordinary people to make the most of their lives, fulfil their talents and realise their dreams, and the belief that it is the duty of government – active, ambitious, liberal government – to make this possible, to create the conditions in which people and their communities can flourish.

    I want to lead a party that motivates people to care about great causes, not dull managerialism. To inspire the movement that has come about since May 8th.

    I want to argue that inequality is wrong because every individual is equally precious, because inequality crushes the spirits of those at the bottom of the pile, because it creates a poorer society where the bonds between people count for less, because it is a stupid waste of talent, effort and resource. It is a brake on prosperity and work.

    I want to campaign for a bold environmental policy, not just because I believe that climate change must be tackled, though I do, but because green energy and transport means cleaner air and water, because green products and green exports will be the ones that succeed in global markets, because, as David Attenborough put it, ‘the natural world is the greatest source of excitement; the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living.’

    I want to persuade people to vote for the EU, not just because of jobs and trade, important though they are, but because the European Union is the most successful peace process in human history, because we do not resent our neighbours, we love them; because open societies allow the human experience to widen and the human spirit to flourish, because it is better to treat foreigners as sisters and brothers, not as people to be feared or scapegoated when things go wrong.

    None of this will be easy, it will be a long hard slog, but I am confident that it’s possible. Remember, there was only seven years between David Steel taking over the Liberal leadership in 1976 after the devastation of the Thorpe scandal and the Alliance’s record-breaking vote in 1983. I don’t see why our recovery shouldn’t be much more swift than we fear, but it is not a given, we will have to earn it.

    We’ve done it before, in the 1950s and ’60s, when the Liberals under Jo Grimond recovered from near oblivion to challenge the Tory-Labour stranglehold on power; in the 1970s, when we adopted the approach of community politics, building on our local roots, fighting alongside local campaigners to make life better in a myriad of little ways for individuals and their communities; and in the 1980s, when I was a proud foot soldier as Paddy Ashdown and colleagues rebuilt the Liberal Democrats from the ashes of merger to argue the case for a fairer, freer, greener Britain.

    In each case we recovered because we knew that there was a cause worth fighting for: Liberalism. Liberalism is unique, it belongs to no other party. I am not about to allow the movement of Gladstone, Lloyd George and Grimond to die on my watch. Britain needs Liberals, it needs Liberal Democrats. Our cause must be fought for. I hope to lead that fightback.