Dick of the year: Nick Clegg
This is a nomination for the Bright Green #dick2010 award from Derek Wall The financial crisis buried free market economics but now, paradoxically, we have a government dedicated to marketising everything. The gains of the 1945 Labour government, ironically shaped by liberals like Keynes and Beveridge, from comprehensive education to the NHS are all under [...]
On Coalition, Compromise, and Cable
So, Vince Cable has ruffled a few feathers by claiming that the Lib Dems have not gone back on a promise on fees. Given that every simple MP signed a specific pledge to vote agaist a rise in fees, this seems a little odd. His argument, put simply, is that the Lib Dems didn’t win [...]
Not democrats, are they liberal? Politics and protest rights
Back in May, we started writing here about how this government is bringing a shock doctrine to Britain. We launched a Facebook page, website, etc. The basic idea of the shock doctrine is that right wing government’s use emergencies to push through their unpopular neo-liberal ideology. As well as the massive cuts to public spending, [...]
Kept your Promises? No you Haven’t.
On Sunday John Hemming, Lib Dem MP for Birmingham Yardley, claimed that not only had the Lib Dems stuck to their pre-election pledge to introduce a fairer system of university funding they had, in fact, scrapped fees for 54.2% of students. The justification for this extraordinary claim was that as around half of graduates under [...]
Now Lib Dems vote against votes at 16
Here at Bright Green we try to avoid partisan attacks. They are pretty boring. But this is quite an impressive hattrick. Less than a week after Vince Cable decided to back the findings of the Browne review, and so support the raising of tuition fees that he had promised he would scrap; a few days [...]
Lib Dem hijack is coming from inside the building…
The National Union of Students is rightly celebrated this morning for hijacking the www.liberaldemocrats.org.uk domain name and pointing it to their video documenting Nick Clegg’s betrayal over tuition fees. But there’s a twist to this seemingly simple tale of cyber-squatting. Eagle-eyed Kris Keane points out that far from being overlooked by the party, allowing the [...]
Save British Science
Amid the fuss this week as the coalition government announced that NHS direct would be scrapped and replaced with the cheaper NHS111, the Telegraph reported that for the second time in three years Jodrell bank is under threat of closure. It’s not clear from their article whether that means their new visitor centre or any [...]
Lack of Care in Edinburgh’s Tendering
UPDATE: See my latest personal blogpost for an update on this – the Direct Payment rate of £15.04 has been scrapped too, in favour of further dialogue and discussion with service users and providers – MC In my role as the sole Green Councillor on the City of Edinburgh Council’s Finance and Resources Committee, I’ve [...]
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