Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
Political parties - 2.2 - Liberal Democrats/Liberalism & Smaller…
Political parties - 2.2 - Liberal Democrats/Liberalism & Smaller parties debate & The Green Party:
Liberalism:
Principles:
Individualism
Tolerance
Freedom
Positive(supporting you do things) and negative(nothing stopping you) freedom
Justice
History of UK Liberals:
During WW1 - Conservative and Liberal alliance - divided party
After 1922 - lab party took advantage of division
1981 - Lab party was very left-wing - some MPs left and formed SDP (social democrat party) lead by Roy Jenkins with the Liberal party
Liberal Democrats - 1988
2005 - 62 seats - most
2010-15 - coalition - tory scapegoat for failed policies - reversal of tuition fee policy - failure of 2011 AV ref
2015 - lost 51 seats
Gladstone, Lloyd George - both liberals - set up framework of welfare state
2019 - 13 MPs
Liberal Democrats:
Beliefs:
Liberalsim and Social Democracy
Liberty = very important
State shouldn't interfere with people's personal lives - privacy and freedom should be protected
Equality of opp through: reduction in inequality of income, improved opp
welfare state = very important to set people free
big social reformers - champion rights of disabled, ethnic minorities, LGBTQ+
Policies:
The Economy:
Balanced budget needed but the austerity enacted by tories= too far
Fair austerity - doesn't disadvantage one section of soc
Poor should be protected and wealthy should take brunt of it
Taxes should be fair - progressive taxation
Law and order:
Emphasis on rehabilitation rather than prisons as prisons hinder civil liberties too much
Crime has social cause
Human rights should never be threatened
Welfare:
Education and health should be protected
Spending on benefits should be controlled
Poorer people should be protected
Foreign policy:
Keep UK in EU-immediately withdraw invoking article 50 and reintegrate
Keep spending 0.7% of GNI on foreign aid
Lib Dem factions:
Orange Book Liberals:
2004 - Orange Book published by leading members of the party, included Ed Davey
Suggested liberals should return to their liberal roots
Should support Neo-liberal economic free market policies
Encouraged party to promote policies that enhance individual liberties
Social Liberals:
Many members are former members of Labour Party e.g Vince Cable (former leader and business secretary in coalition gov)
Presses for policies targeting social justice - proposing redistribution of wealth from rich to poor - through progressive taxation and welfare
Social liberals and orange book liberals are at odds as social justice implies greater state intervention to promote social change
Are small parties important?
Yes:
Influence policy
As smaller parties gain votes or seats - forces larger parties to react and adapt policy - e.g UKIP and EU ref - Greens forced all major UK parties to adopt green policies and those to tackle climate change
Gain seats and join coalition gov
Lib Dems in 2010 (act as kingmakers) & SNP won 56/59 seats in 2015 - have roughly sustained that large majority (48/59 in 2019)
confidence and supply agreement between Tories and DUP - £1bn in NI
Take away votes from establish parties
2015 - rise of UKIP ensured Labour lost election as wc voters defected to UKIP over immigration
Increase amount of marginal seats and reduce amount of safe seats - promotes democracy by increase participation from parties in constituencies
No:
do spend time attempting to shape the political agenda, a lot of their time is spent on scrutinising the government and they often fail to shape the whole political debate e.g despite Brexit Party pushing for Brexit 2019 ge was about tory policy of 'get Brexit done'
Coalition was anomaly e.g current gov enjoys 80 seat majority - doesn't need external help
although they do take away votes from the 2 main parties - the system remains 2 party e.g 2019 ge labour still gained 3 times more votes than Lib Dems and 4 times more than SNP - tories had more votes than the lab, snp and Brexit parties combined
The Green Party:
Forced all major UK parties to adopt green policies and those to tackle climate change
Leaders: Carla Denyer & Adrian Ramsay
see policies in mind map on 2.2.1
seen as one policy party and not broad church