Our plan to end rough sleeping

No one should be forced to sleep on the streets. Yet every night, 5,000 people sleep rough across the UK.

More than 700 people die while homeless each year. It is the most shameful example of the failure of our housing and welfare systems.

The Conservatives just don’t seem to care. They are sitting on their hands, failing to protect the most vulnerable people in society.

Number Of People Sleeping Rough Has Increased Under Tory Rule

The latest government figures show that, under the Conservatives, the number of rough sleepers in England on a single night has risen by 31% since 2015, to 4,677.

Tories Have Criminalised Homelessness

In 2018, 1,320 people were prosecuted under the Vagrancy Act, according to the homelessness charity Crisis.

Tories have failed to build enough social housing.

Tories have failed to abolish Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions, despite the evidence that they causes homelessness… and despite promising to do so in April.

Tories blocked Liberal Democrat efforts to repeal the Vagrancy Act…

…a nasty, Dickensian law that criminalises people just for sleeping rough.

Tories Have Increased Poverty For British Citizens

They have made poverty worse by freezing benefits in 2015 and introducing the cruel two-child limit in 2017.

Liberal Democrats will build a brighter future by ending rough sleeping within five years.

The other parties pay lip service to this goal, but only the Liberal Democrats have a clear and credible plan to actually achieve it.

We will:

  • Scrap the Vagrancy Act
  • Introduce a ‘somewhere safe to stay’ duty on local authorities to provide immediate emergency accommodation
  • Abolish Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions
  • Increase Local Housing Allowance payments
  • Provide accommodation and support for survivors of domestic abuse
  • Extend the ‘move on’ period for refugees from 28 days to 56

Through this plan we will build a brighter future, ending rough sleeping within five years, and ensuring that everyone has a decent home so they can live with dignity.

Find out more about our plan to end rough sleeping here.

Lib Dems’ war on plastics

The Liberal Democrats will set out a raft of policies as part of a radical plan to end the UK’s reliance on plastic.

The UK produces 2.26 million tonnes of plastic packaging every year.

Less than half of this is being recycled. 

The Conservatives claimed they will cut plastic pollution. They announced a deposit return scheme in 2018, but it is currently due to be implemented by 2023. 

In reality, all the Tories have done is try to get headlines with piecemeal bans on straws and stirrers. 

The Liberal Democrats demand better for our environment. We need a rapid plan to eliminate plastic pollution if our seas are to recover from the damage we’ve done.

That is why the Liberal Democrats are proposing a radical plan that will end the UK’s reliance on plastic. 

We will ban all non-essential, single-use plastics within the first three years of government. 

Our other policies include:

  • Requiring all retailers to reduce the amount of plastics and non-recyclable packaging they use:
    • The average UK home produces 1.1kg of waste every day. The duty should be placed on retailers to ensure that this is reduced.
  • Implementing a deposit return scheme: 
    • This will aim to end the 15 million bottles that are littered, landfilled and incinerated daily in the UK.
  • Ending plastic exports abroad by 2030:
    • In 2018 the UK exported 0.6 million tonnes of plastic waste. It often ends up in landfill, defeating the purpose of exporting it abroad.

Under the Liberal Democrats, no plastic put into a bin in the UK will end up in our oceans. By declaring war on plastic, the Liberal Democrats will ensure a brighter future for our planet.

Our Commitment to Community Policing

We will invest an extra £1bn a year to restore community policing

Too many people feel unsafe in their own homes and walking down their local streets. So many communities feel exposed and vulnerable.

The Conservatives’ cuts to police numbers have contributed to a rise in violence and decimated community policing. 47% of people say they never see police foot patrols, up from 30% in 2014-15.

The Tories and Labour made big promises on police numbers, but have failed to commit the funding needed to deliver them. Police officers are leaving in their droves because they are not being properly rewarded for putting their lives on the line to keep us safe. We need to encourage experienced officers to stay, as well as recruiting the extra officers we need.

The other parties just don’t get it.

But we do.

We’re committing £1 billion a year to fund our police force. That’s £250 million more than Labour or the Tories…

Every year.

That’s enough for two officers in every ward, and to provide an immediate 2% pay-rise for our hard-working cops.

We’re the only party willing to put our money where our mouth is. We’ll back our bobbies with money, not just words.

We are the only party that will make our communities safer by stopping Brexit. Then, together, we will build a brighter future.

Liberal Democrats launch Plan for Business including £17bn research fund

  • Liberal Democrat Shadow Business Secretary Sam Gyimah will today give a major speech to business leaders in London to launch the party’s plan for businesses. 
  • He will set out why the Liberal Democrats are now the “natural party of business,” with a clear plan to boost innovation and stop the economic damage caused by Brexit. 
  • Neither Labour nor the Conservatives have yet published their specific plans for business during this campaign. The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has criticised both main parties for pursuing policies that are “not credible”, concluding that economic growth would be fastest under the Liberal Democrats due to their commitment to stop Brexit. 
  • The Liberal Democrat plans include a £17 billion research and development fund over the next five years to secure the UK’s position as a “global research powerhouse”. The funding will be used to leverage private investment and ensure that national spending on research and development reaches 3% of GDP as soon as possible.  The additional funding would come out of a £130 billion capital investment fund that would also support vital infrastructure projects across the country. This forms part of a series of proposals to boost innovation and growth across the UK economy including: 
  • Stopping Brexit to maintain access to skilled workers and research funding from the EU
  • Working with European neighbours to ensure tech giants and other multinationals pay their fair share of taxes, so up-and-coming entrepreneurs have a chance to compete
  • Increasing the British Business Bank’s support for venture capital funds to support UK digital start-ups
  • Increasing investment in the Strength in Places Fund, to boost innovation and economic growth in areas outside of London and the South East
  • Setting up creative enterprise zones to grow the cultural output of areas across the UK

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.

Raab admits no-deal Brexit is still on the table

When asked on the Today Programme this morning whether the government is still prepared to crash out of the EU with no deal in 2020, the Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab said, “Yes, absolutely.” 

Responding, Shadow Liberal Democrat Brexit Secretary, Tom Brake said:

Dominic Raab has been forced to admit the Tories’ dirty secret: a no-deal Brexit is still on the table. 

Boris Johnson’s extreme Brexit plan would lead to us crashing out of the EU by the end of 2020, egged on by Donald Trump who wants to exploit a weakened UK.

People deserve better. It’s not too late to stop the damage to our economy, NHS and public finances from a Johnson Trump Brexit.

This election is a chance to stop Boris, stop Brexit, and build a brighter future.

Angie Curwen, Liberal Democrats Candidate for North Thanet said:

Vote Liberal Democrat, if like me, you believe a No Deal Brexit would be disastrous for Kent and for our Country.

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.