After Ed Davey’s attempt to re-enact a Milk Tray advertising campaign, the Lib Dems now have 72 MPs, their highest number ever. That makes them the biggest third party in the Commons for 100 years . The Tories’ 121 seats makes them the smallest main opposition party after an election ever. The Tories only have just over half of the opposition MPs.

 

With that in mind, the Lib Dems are asking for changes in how parliament operates. At the moment, whoever leads the Tories for a few weeks will get six questions at each session of PMQs. The Lib Dem leader will get just two. The Lib Dems are saying that should be five and three. I would accept six and three as long as the session was extended from 30 minutes to 45. That change might also facilitate guaranteed slots (albeit not every week) for other party leaders.

 

They also want a change to opposition day debates. These have no real relevance apart from letting opposition parties to choose the subject. At the moment the main opposition party gets to set the agenda on 17 out of 20 days. The Lib Dems say tnat should be reduced to twelve. The Lib Dems say they should get the other eight. I would like to see them offering one or two to other parties.

 

Under current rules, the main opposition party gets to choose the subject of each of five days’ debate on the King’s Speech. Not surprisingly, the Lib Dems want to change that too. It is worth noting that the NHS and social care didn’t make the Tories’ list of five priorities.

 

So far, the broadcasters are still treating the Lib Dems as a minor irrelevance rather than a party that won 60% of the number of seats that the Tories won. I hope that will soon change.

They might have won 60% of the seats but as a Lib Dem surely you would argue that votes are more important considering yous always advocate PR or some sort. That’s means you also won half the amount of votes the tories won and 1/3rd of the votes Labour won.

 

Also getting more Q at PMQs seems fair but considering in other parts of the UK parties can only win a certain amount of seats such as 59 in Scotland for the SNP or 18 in NI for their parties seems pretty unfair on the other parts of the Uk that the Liberals should be able to change the rules when at the end of the day they still only won 72/650 seats.

The House of Commons works based on seats won. If we had a better electoral system, the current rules would work a lot better. The Lib Dems are still under-represented, albeit not as badly as in the past.

 

My suggestion that the Lib Dems should accept a 6-3 split at PMQs, with provision for other parties in an extender session, would roughly reflect the Con-LD vote split. I don’t see what is unreasonable about the Lib Dems wanting to avoid a party that won less than one-fifth of the seats dominating time given to opposition parties.

It’s not unreasonable I guess but it does disadvantage smaller parts of the UK where parties have no chance of winning that amount of seats or votes but this is one of my main criticisms of the UK as an entity, it’s dictated by English MPs and we have no say over policy and government.

Ed Davey has taken a break from his extended gap year joviality to announce Lib Dem plans to introduce legislation to fine anyone who plays music on public transport without headphones. I will let the below to sum up my feelings on this -

Not exactly a literally liberal policy (very much an 'in my dictatorship' style policy) but certainly an eye-catching one, I haven't often seen a Lib Dem policy be significant news.

But they ARE a nuisance, and people being afraid to speak up about public nuisances is a weakening of societal bonds...

I would define my philosophy broadly as "My freedom ends where your nose begins". Therefore, I consider the right of the majority of people not to have to listen to someone else's choice of music, or whatever, on public transport to be more important than the right of someone to inflict their choices on others. I only wish it wasn't necessary for any party to have to consider having to legislate to encourage good manners.

Exactly this, I actually posted this in the Lounge thread ‘Things that annoy you’ it’s really frustrating that it seems to be the norm now especially but not exclusively amongst young people it’s simply a lack of respect for others around you. I also don’t say anything to people but do give the odd glare to people to let them know it’s annoying.

Problem is it’s fine passing legislation but pointless as it’s uninforceable imo.

Not just music. Some people watch shows loud as hell or scroll TikTok on full volume. Doesn’t bother me but I’ve seen it lead to a lot of hostile confrontations and reactions so it could prevent a murder. Though it’d probably be less of an issue if AirPods were priced reasonably so greedy apple to blame as per

41 minutes ago, Liam S said:

Not just music. Some people watch shows loud as hell or scroll TikTok on full volume. Doesn’t bother me but I’ve seen it lead to a lot of hostile confrontations and reactions so it could prevent a murder. Though it’d probably be less of an issue if AirPods were priced reasonably so greedy apple to blame as per

While I agree Airpods are ridiculosly over priced, there are plenty of alternatives on the Market which are reasonably priced and even good brands rather than knock-offs.

Agree that having this as a policy is stupid as it's unforceable but I guess it is appealing to lots of people, as my God this trait is annoying. It's a complete lack of respect from others and even when challenged by others, quite often the attitude is one of entitlement.

Bring the gestapo state on I say, people need to understand what respect is. This is what liberalism has led to!!

🤣

I've genuinely never come across people playing things on the bus or train.

If it isn't over the volume of a conversation, I don't really see the issue? I've never understood the British attitude towards a preference for a perfectly silent commute or travel, personally.

Clearly people feel strongly about it though?

And all because the lady loves...

...not having to listen to other peoples music on bus or train

On 28/04/2025 at 20:41, J00prstar said:

I've genuinely never come across people playing things on the bus or train.

If it isn't over the volume of a conversation, I don't really see the issue? I've never understood the British attitude towards a preference for a perfectly silent commute or travel, personally.

Clearly people feel strongly about it though?

Had another one this evening…

It’s for sure a thing, and it’s not restricted to the U.K. either. Happens a lot in Berlin and just yesterday in Genova we passed a young couple walking up the Main Street blaring and half singing along to music from a phone.

It’s unenforceable as a law, but parents should be better at educating their children about respect for others and society. So many problems we have could be solved if people just had a little more respect for each other