Leading LibDem councillor joins Liberals
A leading Liberal Democrat city councillor in Liverpool has just defected to the Liberal Party. Here's the story from today's Liverpool Echo: http://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/liverpool-news/local-news/2008/04/03/second-lib-dem-councillor-quits-ahead-of-elections-100252-20714895/ Second Lib Dem councillor quits ahead of elections APR 3 2008 A SECOND Liberal Democrat councillor today defected to a rival party weeks before Liverpool’s council elections. West Derby’s Ann Hines resigned from the group and joined the minority Liberal party. She was deselected by the Lib Dems two weeks ago, despite having a 1,650-vote majority the last time she went to the polls in 2004. Cllr Hines will now stand for her new party, led by town hall veteran Steve Radford, against a new Lib Dem candidate in the May 1 elections. Her decision follows the defection of fellow Lib Dem Beatrice Fraenkel to Labour. And it comes just days after education chief Paul Clein quit the council’s executive board. It reduces the Lib Dems’ majority at the town hall to just six going into the most crucial elections for a decade. The former teacher, a councillor for 14 years, said: “After a prolonged period of reflection and discussion I decided to join the Liberal party and stand in my community of West Derby for re-election. “Not a year goes by without another green space, playing field or park being built on. “I believe the Liberal party is the best vehicle to defend our parks, environment and heritage. I look forward to putting my record of 14 years’ dedicated public service to my neighbours in West Derby.” Cllr Radford, whose group also holds three seats in Tuebrook, claimed Cllr Hines’s deselection by the Lib Dems made “no sense”. He said: “Most parties cull their weakest councillors. “But in Ann’s case they deselected one of their strongest. “Ann has been absolutely first class when it comes to tackling issues important to our group such as derelict housing, problems on the Boot estate and the youth service. “We have a good, practical working relationship.”

Hard luck. Maybe you'll recover.

It'll be interesting to see whether Ann Hines can hold this seat as a Liberal candidate on 1st May. Not easy in a ward where the LibDems have always enjoyed big majorities. On the other hand, a) She is well-known locally, having represented the ward for the last 14 years. b) Last time all three seats in the ward were contested simultaneously (in 2004) she was the top-scoring candidate out of the three LibDems elected. c) Her ward (West Derby) is in the constituency in which Steve Radford regularly wins 10%+ of the vote at general elections. The Liberal Party is therefore even better known to local residents there than elsewhere in Liverpool. d) The Liverpool LibDems are in all sorts of trouble, with resignations and infighting. Their administration in Liverpool was recently rated the worst in the country by local government inspectors (it gained one star, which means "inadequate"!). They aren't generally looking forward to May 1st with much zest.

Article from the Liverpool Daily Post from the end of last month http://www.liverpooldailypost.co.uk/liverpool-news/regional-news/2008/03/25/election-08-councillors-who-could-decide-how-the-city-is-run-64375-20668533/

Obvious question is how exactly Cllr Radford wants to expand the housing available in Liverpool. I have no idea what the answer is (if there is one).

This probably isn't a full reply to your question, but glancing rapidly down the most recent page of postings of the Liverpool Liberals blog, I see the following: Sunday, December 16, 2007 Liberals Challenge Housing Associations over derelict homes in Fairfield Having run a campaign to get Housing Associations to develop or sell long term vacant houses and land in Tuebrook and Anfield, the Liberal Party is lobbying housing associations from Riverside, Pierhead and LHT to look at their houses and land such as 15 Balmoral Road, 15 Geneva Road, 29 - 33 Onslow Road This follows progress selling previous sites in Judges Drive led by Cllr Steve Radford working with Friends of Newsham Park author: Steve | 12/16/07 21:20 | comments City Council forced to admit negligence over Dereliction in Fairfield on Radio http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/youandyours/items/05/2007_50_wed.shtml the Times interested a couple of weeks ago, if you want to link to this. http://property.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/property/buying_and_selling/article2966606.ece The Liberal Party has been supporting the Friends Newsham Park on this issue author: Steve | 12/16/07 14:50 | comments

Just clicked the Times link in my last posting (it is a report from last November). Interestingly, among the comments posted at the foot of their article, I see this one by 'Jonathan' in Liverpool. I have absolutely no idea whether what he says is true, but thought I'd reproduce it here cos it seems relevant: Liverpool City Council is by some way the worst offender in the country - 16,000 homes across the city are empty (7% of total properties) despite a housing waiting list of 20,000 people. Even more scandalously, 34% of the empty properties are owned by the council itself, and its Social Landlord partners. Most are being boarded up for demolition under John Prescortt's hated 'Pathfinder' clearance programme so that land deals can be done with four big developers. Ironic that Prescot Drive is the example in your article - two Jag's Liverpool legacy! Jonathan, Liverpool, England

I'm not a fan of Liverpool Lib Dems. It was the film censorship thing that got me. My interest in Liverpool's politics is limited (I appreciate that it's more significant for a member of your party since it's the principal concern of your President). I am concerned that the council is undermining the Lib Dem message nationally by acting in a way which is incompatible with it. One of these days I'll have to write another email to Nick Clegg.

I was attracted to the Liberal Party by its national policies, but it is a very locally focused party, and it has very little activity where I live, in London. Therefore in taking an interest in its activities, I've found myself suddenly becoming concerned by the intricacies of local politics in Liverpool, Exeter etc, which is an unlikely turn of events. Still, I suppose it is better than hanging around on street corners sniffing glue. I am concerned that the council is undermining the Lib Dem message nationally by acting in a way which is incompatible with it. Believe it or not, I do sympathize. I didn't imagine that the LibDems elsewhere were as hopeless as the Liverpool ones seem to have become. There is a lot of sense in letting local branches of a party do their own thing when it comes to local politics, but the downside is that it probably makes it tricky to intervene if things go haywire somewhere.

Yesterday's Guardian has a piece of the local elections in Liverpool. Includes some positive coverage of the Liberals! http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/apr/21/localgovernment.localgovernment Football passions may clash with politics in Liverpool Michael White The Guardian, Monday April 21 2008 Article history Half a mile from Liverpool's rival stadiums, an Everton supporter speaks for much of the city: "Politics, what's politics? What we're interested in is football." But if the Liberal Democrats lose control of the council on May 1, and opponents of Everton's proposed new stadium win a lot of votes in nearby Kirby, politics and football may clash. By general consent Liverpool is a much better place than it was 10 or 15 years ago, when the clash between Thatcherism and the Militant-led Labour council was fresh in scousers' memories. Politics then was as lively as an Everton-Liverpool derby. It's on the up again. Ugly pockets of poverty and unemployment persist amid the new housing association homes which punctuate the Victorian red-brick terraces in Toxteth and Walton. But it is easier to spot the big money. Brash posters and flags proclaim "Liverpool European Capital of Culture 2008" throughout the city. Downtown there are cranes and scaffolding everywhere, high-rise luxury flats, offices and swish hotels rising to 40 storeys above the old docks. Behind the Liver building, penthouse suites are going for £1m or more. Round the corner, the Duke of Westminster is poised to open phase one of the Grosvenor Estate's £1bn Liverpool One shopping centre. Coutts Bank has opened a branch. Are voters grateful to the Lib Dems, who restored some normality to civic politics after ousting Labour in 1998? Of course not, this is Britain 2008. Even the long-running programme to replace ancient sewers and drains - "the big dig" - annoys voters fed up with holes in so many roads. People talk of the "two Liverpools", rich and poor. And besides, the Lib Dems have had their share of trouble with the standards board and policy failure too. The popular Mathew Street music festival had to be abandoned last year. As community projects close to fill gaps in the Euro-cultural budget, voters on estates also ask why it is costing so much when their neighbourhood regeneration remains on hold. Council tax this year is going up 4.9%. The Audit Commission recently declared Liverpool a one-star financial basket case, and there are familiar worries about immigration and crime in a city where uneasy memories persist of Rhys Jones, shot dead at age 11 in a Croxteth pub car park. Rhys's sports coach, Steve Geoghegan, is standing there as a Lib Dem on May 1. It is unlikely to be enough to save council leader Warren Bradley's town hall regime from slipping into no overall control. Labour, which has been winning byelections against the Brownite national trend, even hopes to become the largest party again - back in power. Party HQ in London has high hopes here. But the Tories too are fighting to recover a slender toehold, now the 2004 Ukip bubble has burst. The BNP is contesting 11 wards. Uncertainty and voter apathy could suddenly make a tough-talking local councillor called Steve Radford important as the man who can deliver a majority to either of the big parties courting him: Labour or Lib Dem. "I've been approached by both sides," admits Radford, one of those Liberals who rejected the Lib Dem merger of 1987. A well-respected councillor for 28 years, his four-strong group outpolls local Tories and Greens. For his support, Radford will demand sound financial control, an end to building on Liverpool's plentiful Victorian parks and a tougher stand by the council against big building firms. That is where football fans may have to pay attention. If the First for Kirby candidates, who oppose cash-strapped Everton's plans to move from Goodison Park to a new 50,000-seat stadium in Kirby, do well against Labour on May 1, those plans may have to be called in. Liverpool FC's plans to rebuild Anfield next door in one of those threatened Victorian parks are more advanced, but hobbled by the noisy feud between the club's American owners. In a city where religious sectarianism has long since given way to football sectarianism between its Premiership rivals, some citizens think the discarded ground-sharing option would be best for the city and its football fans, if not for club boards. Knocking heads together could be just the right sort of challenge for strong civic leadership in a city bouncing back from near-terminal decline just a generation ago.