Barry Norman on life as film critic and a liberal
For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested...
View ArticleLudovic Kennedy: a man who just missed becoming Liberal leader
For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested...
View ArticleHow well do you know the party’s MPs?
One (and as far as I know, only one) current or former Lib Dem/SDP/Liberal MP has presented a 45 minute ITV programme about venereal disease. Can you guess who it is? (Answer after the jump.)...
View ArticleShirley Williams on the high point of her political career
For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested...
View ArticleTony Greaves: From angry young man to simmering old guru
For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested...
View ArticleHow leaflets used to look: the 1929 Liberal economic plan
With the economy continuing to dominate politics, it is time to take another dip into my collection of old political leaflets and have a a look at how the Liberal Party of 1929 talked about the issue:...
View ArticleHow leaflets used to look: a 1920s Liberal attack leaflet
Earlier this week I blogged about the skilful presentation of the Liberal Party’s economic plan in a 1929 leaflet, but what about leaflets having a go at other parties? Here is how the Liberals of the...
View ArticleEric Lubbock: From Orpington Man to Buddhist Monk?
For many years Adrian Slade has interviewed prominent Liberal Democrats. To mark his recent decision to make his archive of the interview recordings available to researchers and other interested...
View ArticleJo Grimond: Towards the sound of gunfire
A better understanding of Jo Grimond’s life is always a healthy corrective to some of the cartoon caricatures about right-wing lurches and Thatcherite policies that sometimes get thrown around over the...
View ArticleHow leaflets used to look: Sutton, 1972 – no bar chart but a darn good skull
Welcome to another leaflet from the archives, this time courtesy of Sutton Council leader Ruth Dombey who has kindly provided a copy of the first Focus leaflet put out in Sutton back in 1972. It kicked...
View ArticleHow leaflets used to look: a Tory attack on Labour’s economic policies, 1931
Today’s leaflet in my series on old election leaflets is a centrally produced Conservative Party leaflet from October 1931. Ramsay MacDonald had led a Labour administration under August 1931 when it...
View ArticleBook review: William Gladstone – New Studies & Perspectives
Abraham Lincoln, Charles Darwin and William Ewart Gladstone, giants of the nineteenth century, were all born in 1809 yet as Frank M Turner argues in this collection of essays Darwin and Lincoln are...
View ArticleOrder! Order! A Parliamentary Miscellany
Robert Rogers, the Clerk of the House of Commons, is the latest in a long line of distinguished authors to have produced a miscellany of Parliamentary history, information and quirks. His volume...
View ArticleA flagship borough: 25 years of a Liberal Democrat Sutton Council
Look round the room at the next Liberal Democrat event you attend and ask yourself how many people in the room will have their names recorded in places that future political historians can find. A few,...
View ArticleMothers of Liberty: Women who built British Liberalism
For an organisation that looks to the past and to party politics, it is almost inevitable that the Liberal Democrat History Group’s publications are rather dominated with accounts of men. Even now,...
View ArticleHow leaflets used to look: Labour’s Citizen leaflet from 1929
Today’s leaflet in my series on old election leaflets is a centrally produced Labour party 4-pager from 1929. As with the Conservative leaflet from 1931 which I previously featured, the design may be...
View ArticleA longer watch for the weekend: Mothers of Liberty
I blogged last month about the new pamphlet from the Liberal Democrat History Group, Mothers of Liberty: Women who built British Liberalism, a series of biographies of famous women liberals, which...
View ArticleNot all is quite so new in the world of political messaging and behaviour change
On my way to windmill spotting in Lincoln recently, I happened across this example of an 19th century election leaflet for the City of Lincoln’s local elections: It’s a neat example of a point I’ve...
View ArticleWhat the Liberal Democrats believe
“Tell me more about what the Liberal Democrats believe”. Whether it’s a possible new member, a potential council candidate or a new office volunteer asking, I’ve always found over the years that one of...
View ArticleThe 1983 election: highlights and hindsight
I spent more of my bank holiday than is healthy watching the rerun of the 1983 election on BBC Parliament. When I lived through it, I was an innocent and idealistic 15 year old. I really believed...
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