We in the Liberal Party are dismayed, but not surprised by the
Conservative Parties proposal to allow property of up to £1 million be
free of any inheritance tax on the basis that is is 'a basic human
instinct' to provide for your children.

This is a disgraceful attempt to cloak a socially devisive policy with
the warm glow of family values.

In reality such a policy will only ensure that the rich stay rich and
the poor stay poor, especially in the South East of England, where
house prices have run out of control.

The Liberal Party believes in equality of opportunity for all and thus
proposes a system of 'Universal Inheritance' whereby all inherited
wealth is taxed at 10%, in order that all can recieve an inheritance
of £10,000.

That way we can ALL provide for ALL of our children - not just the
privillaged few.

The Liberal party notes the media coverage of the closure of the UKs last deep coal mine at Kellingley Colliery, in North Yorkshire.


Once the corner stone of the emerging industrial revolution, Britain's once flourishing coal industry has been systematically run down over recent decades. This has regrettably often been with little regard to the fate of local communities and livelihoods.

Although open cast mining remains active in this country, King coal has been overwhelmed by a combination of cheaper foreign imports, the phenomenon of shale gas, as well as environmental concerns over fossil fuels contribution to rising CO2 levels.

It is arguable that even when an industry is in terminal decline, such as the coal industry, politicians have a duty to minimise the damage and facilitate a managed withdrawal whatever their views on the industries merits.

Workers and their families need to know that even if one industry closes, livelihoods and communities will continue to be supported as far as is feasibly possible.

We in the Liberal Party have read through the Conservatives manifesto
pledge to extend home ownership under the right to buy scheme to a
substantial number of private housing associations tenants.

What is none too clear from media reports is how the Conservatives
intend to replace the depleted housing stock,the level of compulsion
applied to private housing associations to sell, and the rights of
those who chose not to participate or can't obtain even a modest mortgage.

The damage to the finances of the current Housing Associations budgets
would be irresponsible if they were forced to sell properties at the
level of discount envisaged by the government without full and fair
compensation.

Home ownership is not for everybody, and carries with it an open ended
commitment to maintenance which does not suit everybody and there will
always be those who's low wages or social circumstances precludes home
ownership.

A stock of affordable homes and council housing will always been
needed, no more so than today, where the bedroom tax has driven many
into the private rental market, that many can ill afford. Many of the
south east authorities can not house low paid and key skills employees.

The estimated cost of the right to buy scheme, suggested to be in the
region of 6 billion pounds, could be equally spend on refurbishing the
excessive number of properties, possible in excess of 800000, which
are currently empty and represent an unrealised source of desperately needed homes.

I read with interests this week the outline of the SNP election manifesto, and its spending commitments.

Unfortunately although many of the ideas taken individually and in unison are sensible, together they potentially represent a unaffordable wish list both in the manner they are portrait and the funding expectations that go with them.

We do in fact have the accumulated wealth in this country to meet many of the manifesto commitments, but we have two factors inhibiting this.

The first is our an obsession with often punitive upper tax levels, which potential discourage investment and hard work.

Secondly as a society we have developed a singular blindness to the huge amount of wealth moving from generation to generation via loopholes and exemptions in our inheritance regime. This is often accrued and not earned wealth.

As a result  we are simply failing to make the countries wealth work for all to create the  opportunity society which the Liberal Party believes is wholly affordable and in step with our constitutional commitment to a
society where all its citizen shall possess liberty, property and security, and none shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.

As the election campaign nears it final week, I see that Ed Miliband,
the leader of the Labour Party, has chosen to revisit his earlier
suggestion of rent controls for the private sector.

Although that may be welcome news to tenants, it does nothing to
address the obvious cause of higher rents, that of a scarcity of
supply.

This country has not built a sustainable number of homes for decades,
and is struggling to even reach the pre-recession peak of 183000 news
starts. This is still far below the estimated 225000 new homes needed
annually just to keep pace with normal demand.

The Conservatives have proposed building 100000 affordable homes, a
target later doubled in size, but this is a one off plan, when what we
need is this number year on year almost indefinitely.

And simply selling off the countries housing association stock at a
discount without like for like replacement, as the Conservatives are
suggesting, will simply compound the scarcity of supply.

A new homes initiative which includes a concerted effort to return
900000 empty homes to the market would both provide affordable
accommodation, as well as provide a spur to economic activity and
employment at the economy struggles to maintain headway.

May 2015 has indeed seen an historical Conservative win in the general
election, but a dispassionate analysis of the results shows something
remains amiss in our first past the post electoral system.

The conservative parties slender parliamentary majority, is actually
based on just 36.9% of the national vote. That equates to 32244 votes
per elected MP.

By comparison the populous, insurgent UKIP, which took third place in
the general election with 12.7% of the national vote, needed 3.8
million people simply to elect one MP. The corresponding figured for
the Green Party was over 1.5million, yet the figures for Labour and
SNP were 40292 and 25972 respectively

The fairest solution to this issue is an advanced form of proportional
representation termed the Single Transferable Vote. Existing single
member constituencies would be replaced by multi-member constituencies
returning 4 or 5 MP's. Each constituency would be based on natural
communities, rather than unnatural constituencies that happen to be
the right size to return one MP.

Moreover, electors would no longer vote with an inflexible "X" - the
mark of illiteracy - but would number their candidates in order of
preference and the ballot would be counted in a way that would ensure
that their votes would be utilised as fully as possible.

That is an electoral system in which the Liberal Party would like to
see all voters believe their vote matters, and is not 'wasted' on any
party who national popularity is crowded out locally.

I read with interest your correspondents recent musings on the
creation of an new centre-left political entity(Radical idea
for a new party, 13th May).

In fact a centrist, mildly Eurosceptic alternative, explicitly
promoting an opportunity society by the modest redistribution of
wealth already exists. That alternative is the Liberal Party.

When the Liberals and SDP voted to merge in 1988, they created a fresh
party and registration with the electoral commission, initially as the
Social and Liberal Democrats. Remember that?

In fact many members of the two parent parties resisted the merger,
and my understanding is that within a year, the Liberal Party had
relaunched itself and we can claimed with considerable justification,
to be the continuation of that radical, centrist Liberal tradition.

The political experiment that is the LibDems, a compromise between
Liberals and Social Democrats, now appears to be drawing towards its
inevitable conclusion. It was a dead-end which seems to think it can
re-invent itself by simply calling its Liberal.

That is a name and philosophy the real Liberal Party will never
surrender and where out constitution explicitly states  that the
Liberal Party exists to build a Liberal Society in which every citizen shall
possess liberty, property and security, and none shall be enslaved by poverty,
ignorance or conformity.

Your recent piece on the perilous state of the LibDems(“Not Dead
Yet”,May 16th) speculated that the party may fall back on a change of
name to the Liberal Party. Unfortunately for them that name is already
taken.

When the Liberals and SDP voted to merge in 1988, they created a fresh
party and registration with the electoral commission, initially as the
Social and Liberal Democrats. Remember that?

In fact many members of the two parent parties resisted the merger,
and my understanding is that within a year, the Liberal Party had
relaunched itself and we can claimed with considerable justification
to be the continuation of that radical, centrist Liberal tradition.

The political experiment that is the LibDems, a compromise between
Liberals and Social Democrats, now appears to be drawing towards its
inevitable conclusion. It was a dead-end which seems to think it can
re-invent itself by simply calling itself Liberal.

That is a name and philosophy the real Liberal Party will never surrender

I have read with interest the latest proposals from the Conservative Party to raise the threshold for paying inheritance tax and exempting homes valued less than 1 million pounds. 

Although the Liberals Party does not begrudge people earned wealth, these proposal do nothing to address the corrosively increasing and much talked about inequality of wealth in our country.  The top 10% of our society have reputedly accumulated 40% of our nation’s wealth, transferred from generation to generation beyond the visibility of the inheritance systems.

The far sighted traditional constitution of the Liberal Party, unlike the cobbled together Liberal Democratic Party, calls for ‘Liberty, property and security’ for all.  It is the only UK political party to adopt a proposal for the reform of capitalism to bring about genuinely greater equality. 

 Some inherit billions of capital free of tax, due to exemptions from an Inheritance Tax which is charged on what is left or given, while others never inherit any capital at all.

The Liberal Party proposes that the taxation of inheritance should be reformed by reducing Inheritance Tax rates and exemptions while introducing a progressive tax charged on cumulative lifetime totals of what is inherited or received. This in turn would help finance a gradually increasing capital endowment for all UK-born UK citizens at the financially responsible age of 25.

The Liberal Party prides itself on supporting the creation of an opportunity society with the widest benefit for all of society.

I read with interest your correspondents letter in the Newbury Weekly(30th April) expressing his anguished disappointment with the Libdems in West Berkshire prior to the national and local elections.

As it is my initial draft response has been over taken by an election result which has decimated what I presume
was their former party. Unfortunately your correspondent made the all too common mistake of
incorrectly calling his former party by the name Liberals, when there remains fundamental differences between the two parties.

When the Liberals and SDP voted to merge in 1988, they created a fresh party and registration with the electoral commission, initially as the Social and Liberal Democrats. Remember that?

In fact many members of the two parent parties resisted the merger, and my understanding is that within a year,
the Liberal Party had relaunched itself and we can claimed with considerable justification to be the continuation of that radical, centerist Liberal tradition.

The political experiment that is the LibDems, a compromise between Liberals and Social Democrats, now appears to be drawing towards its inevitable conclusion. It was a dead-end which seems to think it can re-invent itself by simply calling itself Liberal.

That is a name and philosophy the real Liberal Party will never surrender as we strive for a better society, and where our chief care is for the rights and opportunities of the individual and where in all spheres we set personal freedom first.