The money speaks

Jock — Sun, 29 Jan 2006 01:59:00 +0000

Apparently there's a story going around (in another Murdoch rag) that certain "important funders" of the Lib Dems are threatening to withdraw financial support for the party if Simon wins. They say he is "unfit" as a result of his leftward stance and his supposed "dishonesty" about his sexual identity.

I find this pretty nasty stuff. My reaction is "do your worst, we're bigger than the odd individual, whatever you are worth".

That it costs so much to "play at the top table" is one of the worst aspects of modern politics and it seems to me driven by people who want more influence than they warrant in a democracy. Whilst I'm not likely to be voting Simon at number one, this certainly makes me want to put him ahead of Ming in my preferences, and I would be very pleased to see us eschew such undue influences very publicly in an attempt to reposition ourselves in the public eye as the decent party.

I have some respect, moreso than most in the party I suspect, for the "economic liberal" argument, or at least my "unorthodox" economic outlook permits me to find a way in which freedom of economic life can be maximised whilst retaining a strong social safety net democratically run and managed, but if this is the game the main proponents of "economic liberalsim" within the party want to play, they are welcome to take it elsewhere.

As to Muslim members who are supposedly threatening to resign if Simon were to win because of his sexual history, I say to them, if they are any more than a figment of the Sunday Times's imagination (and we already know that the 20 they claim in Birmingham Hodge Hill are absolutely nothing to do with this but inter-Muslim community politics), I don't want to be in the same party as you. And on this I believe I am the liberal. So find a way to accommodate your faith within liberalism or find an illiberal party to support - there are plenty of them.

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The money speaks