Beveridge Group

Beveridge Group

The Beveridge Group is a centre-left group within the Liberal Democrat party in the UK. It was set up in 2001 by MPs Alistair Carmichael, Paul Holmes, John Barrett and John Pugh to promote debate within the party regarding public service provision.

The group was set up largely in response to a perceived rightwards drift in Liberal Democrat thinking, typified by the economic liberalism of Lib Dem economic spokesman Vince Cable and former Home Affairs spokesman Mark Oaten.

In its first article, the group questioned the claim in the Liberal Democrat policy paper Setting Business Free that the party should "start with a bias in favour of market solutions”:

"Should the party of Beveridge and Keynes approach issues with a prejudice in favour of the free market system? Should we enter every policy debate with an underlying belief that private is always better than public? I certainly do not think so. That was the approach which led the Conservatives to undertake the disastrous privatisation of British Rail in the mid 1990s." (Alistair Carmichael, 2003)

The role of the Beveridge Group has been brought into focus with the rise of Nick Clegg, another leading market liberal and Orange Book contributor, to the leadership of the party in 2007, and moreso after his decision to lead the Liberal Democrats into a Coalition government with the Conservatives following the hung parliament result in the May 2010 general election. It has been noted that along with Clegg (now serving as Deputy Prime Minister) MPs who contributed to the Orange Book or are otherwise associated with the market liberal faction have occupied many positions in the Coalition Cabinet, including Vince Cable (Business Secretary), David Laws (briefly Chief Secretary to the Treasury), Danny Alexander (Chief Secretary to the Treasury), with others such as Ed Davey and Steve Webb also in ministerial posts, while it has been speculated that the more socially liberal Beveridge Group members are underrepresented in the Cabinet, perhaps signalling a 'takeover' of the Liberal Democrats by the so-called "Orange Bookers" . Out of the five Liberal Democrats in the main Cabinet, Chris Huhne (former Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change) is both a member of the Beveridge Group and a contributor to the Orange Book. However, Group members Norman Baker and Alistair Carmichael each hold ministerial ranks in the government, as Parliamentary Under-Secretary for Transport and Chief Deputy Whip for the Liberal Democrats in the government respectively, with Mark Hunter assigned as an Assistant Whip. Furthermore, in 2010 Group members Simon Hughes and Tim Farron were elected Deputy Party Leader and Party President, respectively.