Our commitment to reducing child poverty

Lib Dem policies would mean 600,000 fewer children in poverty

The Resolution Foundation, an independent think-tank, has released a report on child poverty. You can find this here.

It found that our policies would mean 600,000 fewer children in poverty by 2023-24.

This makes ours the most progressive policies of the three main parties. That’s not all the report found. 

Child poverty risks reaching a record high under Conservative plans. 

It is a damning indictment of the Tories’ heartless welfare policy.

As the Resolution Foundation recognises, Lib Dems have the most progressive policies here. We would scrap the cruel two-child limit, benefit cap and bedroom tax. We would also invest in free school meals and childcare for millions of families.

We will ensure that everyone has the same opportunities regardless of where they come from.

The Tories are hell-bent on continuing their backwards economic policies. They are ruining the lives of millions of people, young and old.

Our manifesto helps the most vulnerable in our society. 

We are deeply proud of that fact.

We are the only party that is committed to helping the next generation get ahead in life.

Only the Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit and build a brighter future for those struggling in our society.

The Problem With Boris Johnson

Boris Johnson cannot be allowed to win a majority because he simply does not care about Britain or her people enough to be truthful. About anything.

When Jo Swinson meets children and teenagers in schools, they often ask her what you need to be good at to become a politician.

And her answer is always this:

Being able to write a press release and understand legislation is important for the job. But you can learn all of that.

What matters the most – and is almost impossible to learn – is caring.

Caring about the people in your community and in your country, so that your decisions are based on what you genuinely believe to be best for them.

Boris Johnson only cares about Boris Johnson.

And he will do whatever it takes, sacrifice whatever is needed, to get what he wants.

This is a man who decided which side to support in the EU referendum by game-playing whether it would get him the keys to Number 10.

His life has been about becoming Prime Minister. Not out of some deep-seated desire to make people’s lives better, but out of some sense of Etonian entitlement. Because it’s what people like him get to do.

And you cannot trust a word Boris Johnson says – the man will say anything if it means getting what he wants.

Boris Johnson’s Lies

He lied to the 3 million EU citizens in the UK when he told them he would guarantee their right to stay.

He lied when he said that no Conservative Prime Minister would ever put a border down the Irish Sea.

He lied to the Queen to unlawfully shut down our democracy.

He lied when he said over and over that we would leave the European Union by 31 October.

He lied when he said he would rather be dead in a ditch than ask for an extension to Article 50.

There may not be a ditch, but Boris Johnson has dragged the office of Prime Minister through the mud.

Johnson cannot be allowed to win a majority.

We have a different vision for our country. The Liberal Democrats are the only party that will build a fair, open society for both our generation and the next.

We are the only party that can win seats off Johnson and Farage’s hard-right cabal.

Together, we can prevent a damaging Tory majority.

Together, we can build a brighter future.

5 things Lib Dems will do to build a brighter future for young people

What the Liberal Democrats are offering children and young people in our manifesto.

Every child deserves the best start in life.

That’s why children’s charities have asked every party leader how their policies will help children and generations to come.

Here are five things the Liberal Democrats will do to build a brighter future for every young person:

1. Stop Brexit

Brexit is a disaster for our young people. It limits our ambitions and our horizons.

Outside the EU, the UK can no longer take part in the Erasmus student exchange programme for schools, colleges and universities.

Brexit makes our children less safe. The European Arrest Warrant lets us track down people accused of crimes against children if they move abroad.

Brexit will make us poorer. If Boris Johnson wins this election, his ‘die in a ditch’ Brexit policy means we could crash out of the EU’s trading bloc in 2021. That would harm our economy and increase debt – meaning we have less to spend on our children and young people.

Only the Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit so we can spend our £50 billion Remain Bonus on public services, like our schools, and tackling child poverty.

2. Free childcare

Under the Conservatives, the gap between the performance of richer and poorer children at nursery school is widening.

They’ve turned their backs on families. Working parents can get 30 hours a week of free childcare, but only when their child turns 3 – and it doesn’t cover the school holidays. It’s been so underfunded that some providers have had to close.

Liberal Democrats will provide free, high quality childcare for every child from when their parents go back to work to the day they start school.

The Liberal Democrats’ plan includes 35 hours a week, 48 weeks a year, for every child from 9 months to school age.

We’ll pay childcare providers properly, so that every child has a high-quality place.

3. Reverse school cuts

Our schools and colleges should be world-class. But instead, they’re falling behind.

Teaching assistants are being sacked. Cash-strapped councils struggle to help children with complex needs. Some schools aren’t keeping their doors open for a full five-day week.

The Conservatives are failing our children. They have cut school budgets to the bone.

By stopping Brexit, Liberal Democrats can use the Remain Bonus to reverse school cuts with an emergency cash injection.

By 2024, we’ll spend £10 billion a year more on schools, so we can employ 20,000 more teachers.

Children should come home from school happy, healthy and with all the skills they need to succeed.

4. Invest in Children’s Centres

Local councils’ budgets have been slashed – but more children than ever need their support. Councils are spending more on helping children in crisis, so they’ve got less to spend on stopping children getting into crisis in the first place.

Children’s centres provide vital support for children and their families in the first years of life. They give advice to parents on how to manage behaviour. They give free post-natal checks for new babies. They’re a safe space for toddlers to play.

Liberal Democrats will support our most disadvantaged young children, by spending an extra £1 billion a year on children’s centres.

5. Support children in poverty

Under the Conservatives, almost 30% of children were in poverty in 2017/18.

The Tories botched the roll out of Universal Credit and they made brutal cuts to benefits in 2015.

Liberal Democrats will support children in poverty. We’ll scrap the two-child limit and the benefits cap and let families where both parents work keep more of their money.

That’s why the independent Resolution Foundation says that our manifesto does more to help child poverty than both Boris Johnson’s Conservatives or Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour Party.

Under the Liberal Democrats, 600,000 fewer children will be in relative poverty than under Boris Johnson.

The Liberal Democrats is the only party that can win seats from both the Conservatives and Labour, so that we can stop Boris Johnson, stop Brexit, and build a brighter future for our children.

Want to help us?

The Lies Of Brexit

The lie on the side of a bus

Perhaps the most famous of the Brexit lies, Boris Johnson championed an outlandish, fraudulent promise on the side of his Vote Leave bus in 2016.

The claim that we send £350 million a week to the EU is just not true, let alone the idea that this imaginary money could instead be used for the NHS.

Johnson knew it was a lie, but he put it on a bus anyway. In the words of the Head of the Office of National Statistics, it was “a clear misuse of official statistics”.  

Many people voted Leave in the hope that it would help the NHS.

Unfortunately, Brexit is very dangerous for the NHS. Here’s why:

  • The economy will be negatively affected, so the government will have less to spend on the NHS.
  • We’ve already lost 5000 EU health workers, and more will go.
  • The Tories are planning on taxing EU doctors and nurses.
  • The NHS could be up for grabs in a Trump trade deal.

We’ll stop Brexit, give the NHS £35 billion, and fix our broken mental health services. That’s the sort of Christmas present the NHS needs and deserves!

The easiest trade deal in human history

“The free trade agreement that we will have to do with the European Union should be one of the easiest in human history.” – Liam Fox

This statement hasn’t aged well. Brexit has claimed two Prime Ministers so far, and potentially a third.

It has proved impossible to get a Withdrawal Agreement that everyone is happy with, let alone a free trade deal.

Philip Rycroft, who was the Permanent Secretary for Department for Exiting the European Union said; “it’s going to be a huge negotiation, probably four or five times bigger than the withdrawal agreement negotiation, and will absorb a huge amount of government effort.”

This is the reality of the situation. A trade deal would take years to negotiate with the European Union. Our economy would suffer in the meantime, as will our public services.

The Liberal Democrats wouldn’t embark on negotiations that will take years and leave our country worse off at the end of them.

We will Stop Brexit immediately, and spend the £50 billion ‘Remain Bonus’ on our public services.

We will work to solve the problems in our society that led people to vote Leave, rather than waste time in pointless negotiations with the EU.  

The UK economy is performing strongly

“The UK economy is performing strongly,” said Kwasi Kwarteng, Conservative Business Minister, “much more strongly than [the] doom-mongers and naysayers have suggested.”

Unfortunately, Mr Kwarteng was lying. Brexit has already caused a vast amount of damage to the UK economy.

The Centre for European Reform have said that Brexit has cost the UK economy £70 billion. That’s the equivalent of £840 for every house hold each year.

Our economy is 2.9% smaller than it would have been if we’d remained in the European Union.

And we haven’t even left yet. If Brexit goes ahead, there are varying predictions of how bad it will be, based around the way in which we leave. But it will be bad.

Brexit has already been an appalling waste of money that we could have invested to make Britain a better place.

Whilst the Tories and Labour are preoccupied with ideological fantasies, the Liberal Democrats produced the only manifesto that the IFS called ‘credible’.

The Liberal Democrats would stop Brexit, and invest the £50 billion Remain Bonus in public services.

No Single Market For Services

This disinformation comes courtesy of Michael Gove. He claimed on Radio 4 that “At the moment we do not have a single market for services, even within the European Union.“

This is just plain wrong. Services account for 80% of the UK economy, 45% of exports, and companies and customers alike enjoy single market access.

In our current deal, we have 25 per cent of typical barriers for services than if we were outside the European Union.

If we leave the European Union, barriers will be placed for trade in services, and the UK economy will take a massive hit.

In the words of Alan Winters, Head of the UK Trade Policy Observatory…

[after Brexit] It’s going to be way worse. It looks as if there is very little that is being seriously negotiated on services.

We will also sacrifice the opportunity to expand trade within the single market if we leave the European Union.

Britain is incredibly strong in financial services, technology and education. It’s vital that we run the country in a manner that maximises the opportunities for these sectors.

The Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit so we don’t jeopardise our economic development.

Jo’s Message for International Day of Persons with Disabilities

Jo Swinson’s message of fairness and openness on the international day of persons with disabilities.

3rd December is the International Day of Persons with Disabilities. A day set aside to promote the rights and well-being of people with disabilities.

Let us use today to increase our understanding of disabilities, which can be physical, mental, sensory or cognitive.

People with disabilities play a crucial role in the development of our communities. Yet, disabled people are one of the most marginalised groups in our country. Discrimination, isolation and injustice are an everyday reality for many. This is not good enough.

As a Party, we are clear: people with disabilities must have the opportunity to fully participate in every aspect of society. We cannot accept cuts in the support available to disabled people. We cannot sit back while our villages, towns, and cities remain inaccessible. And we cannot stand by as disability hate crimes continue to rise.

We must be relentless in our efforts to build a more inclusive country, because we are all better off when everyone can realise their full potential.

Let us build a brighter future for disabled people everywhere.

Human Rights Act on the line in this election

The Liberal Democrats have vowed to defend the Human Rights Act, after the Conservative manifesto pledged to “update” the legislation.

Liberal Democrat Shadow Home Secretary, Christine Jardine said:

We’ve known for years that the Conservatives want to undermine the Human Rights Act that safeguards our individual freedoms, and their manifesto confirms it.

When the Tories say they will ‘update’ the Act, there’s no doubt that they mean weaken it.
 

The top 5 steps in our plan for Britain’s future

Jo Swinson holding the Liberal Democrat manifesto.
Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit, and invest in our mental health services, give free childcare to working parents, put 20,000 more teachers into classrooms, and take ambitious action to tackle the climate emergency.

The Liberal Democrats have officially launched our 2019 General Election Manifesto! 

In it, we have outlined a clear plan to build a brighter future, where every person, every community and our planet can thrive. 

Don’t have time to read the full manifesto right now? Here, we explain our top 5 steps:

1. Stop Brexit

Liberal Democrats' Stop Brexit poster, showing police officers in hi-vis jackets.

Labour and the Conservatives can’t offer the country a brighter future because they both want Brexit.

The national humiliation of Brexit puts so much at risk; we know that it would be bad for our economy, bad for our NHS and bad for our environment.

Jo Swinson is the only candidate for Prime Minister who unequivocally believes that the UK is stronger as part of the EU.

By keeping the UK in the EU, we can get on with tackling the real issues facing our country, and we can do this by investing the £50 billion Remain Bonus in public services and tackling inequality.

2. Tackle the climate emergency

LibDems climate emergency campaign poster, showing a man fitting solar panels to a roof.

We are the first generation to know we are destroying the environment, and the last generation with a chance to do something about it before it’s too late.

Liberal Democrats offer a new plan to innovate our way out of crisis. To mobilise every community in the country, and the resources of both the public and private sector to achieve it. To turn the birthplace of the industrial revolution into the home of the new Green Revolution.

This starts by generating 80% of our electricity from renewables by 2030 and insulating all low-income homes by 2025.

3. Give every child the best start in life

LibDems' campaign poster to give every child the best start in life; showing Jo Swinson, a teacher, and a pupil in school.

Our schools should be world class, helping every child make the most of the challenges ahead. But instead, they are trailing behind.

The Conservatives have cut school funding to the bone and children have paid the price, especially those with the most complex needs.

Liberal Democrats will build a brighter future for every child. By stopping Brexit, we can spend £10 billion of our Remain Bonus on reversing school cuts and hiring 20,000 more teachers – so that pupils can leave school happy, healthy and with the skills they need to succeed in life.

This is an investment in our children’s future.

4. Build a fairer economy

Liberal Democrat skills and training poster, showing British money.

In an ever changing workplace people often need to develop new skills, but the cost of courses and qualifications shuts too many people out.

Liberal Democrats will create a new era of learning throughout adult life with Skills Wallets for every individual, providing them with £10,000 to spend on education and training at various stages of their lives.

With Skills Wallets, we will empower people to develop new skills so that they can thrive in the technologies and industries that are key to the UK’s economic future and prosperity.

Another key factor in building a fairer economy is by providing free, high-quality childcare for every child aged two to four, for 35 hours a week, 48 weeks a year. This offer is extended to children aged between 9 and 24 months where their parents are in work. 

This offering will finally give parents more choice about when they return to work and unlock their untapped potential for our economy.

5. Transform our mental health services

Liberal Democrats' improved mental health campaign, showing a counsellor speaking with a patient.

Approximately one in four people in the UK will experience a mental health problem each year. But for too many, treatment is a postcode lottery.

No one should be forced to travel unreasonable distances away from home, and that’s why Liberal Democrats will invest £11bn into mental health to provide parity of urgency with physical health.

We want to break down the barriers of stigma and shame, which leave those suffering, alienated and isolated, and we want to make the UK a world leader in keeping our nation well with our push for greater emphasis on wellbeing.

Only Jo Swinson and the Liberal Democrats have a plan to stop Brexit and build a brighter future for everyone.

Angie Curwen’s Top 3 Priorities for North Thanet

Homes for All

Angie is fighting for everyone to have a safe, affordable home as a basic human right.  She is actively working with local communities to deliver community-led housing.  She is working to develop locally affordable housing for local people.

If elected Angie will challenge the national formula that dictates 17,400 homes must be built on Thanet by 2030.  Angie firmly believes this should be between 9,000 – 12,000 homes. 

Angie will also challenge the current planning system whereby local councils and residents have very little power over what type of homes are built, where they are built and what infrastructure needs to be put in place to support existing and new homes.

Protect our NHS

Angie will support Save Our NHS In Kent (SONIK) in their fight to keep stroke services, A&E and Maternity services at both QEQM and KCH.  She agrees with their statements that to remove these services will cost lives and is not supported evidentially to improve outcomes, especially in North Thanet where we have a growing elderly population and areas of deprivation which naturally makes it harder for people to access services.

Tackle Climate Change

Angie will FIGHT for GREEN energy, GREEN transport and GREEN investments.  Climate change and air pollution threaten our lives now! 

We have known that air pollution blackspots exist in North Thanet for far too long and nothing has been done.  This is adversely affecting people’s health now.

If elected Angie will fight for affordable green transport to be introduced locally and on a national basis for diesel engines to be phased out.  We have the green technology, it is now up to government to legislate for it to be put into use. Angie supports the Campaign for Better Transport in their aim to launch a programme to replace the entire bus fleet with zero emission vehicles by 2035 and all new buses being zero emission from 2025 ..

Nationally The Liberal Democrats proposal is to expand renewable energy generation to 80% in just ten years and to insulate 30 million homes within 10 years from a standing start and to achieve carbon neutrality for the UK by 2045. The 2045 date is in line with many environmental groups, such as WWF and Friends of the Earth, it’s also in line with existing technologies available to us.