Latest news with #NickClegg
Times
3 days ago
- Politics
- Times
Miriam González Durántez: ‘We never holidayed with the Camerons'
Miriam González Durántez, 57, is an international trade lawyer and the founder of the Inspiring Girls charity. She is married to the former Liberal Democrats leader Nick Clegg, who served as deputy prime minister in the coalition government with the Conservatives from 2010 to 2015 and was subsequently president of global affairs at Meta, the parent company of Facebook. She was born in Spain and divides her time between her home nation and London, where her husband is based. She is the mother of three boys — Antonio, 23, Alberto, 21, and Miguel, 16. I was eight years old when Franco's dictatorship in Spain ended in 1975, and it was only then that a lot of middle-class Spanish families like my own really had enough money to go on holiday and explore our seaside. I remember my parents, brother, sister, uncles, cousins and I cramming into a procession of cars with our pots, pans and bed linen for the ten-hour drive from my home town of Olmedo, in the centre of Spain, to Alicante, where we rented shoe-box-sized flats for a couple of weeks; I spent many happy hours playing on the beach there. In my teens, my family and I drove all over western Europe, including Britain, and I've had an affection for the British Isles since then. The last of those trips was to Austria, just before my politician father, José Antonio, sadly died in a car accident aged 58. After Nick became the MP for Sheffield Hallam in 2005 we got to know the Peak District well and loved going on day trips, walking and climbing in the magical, heather-clad hills around Stanage Edge. But we regularly returned to Spain with our boys in summer. Sometimes we'd visit lush, mountainous Asturias, on the northwest coast; other times we'd visit Menorca, and more recently Catalonia. It took a while for Nick to adapt to Spanish seaside culture. In Britain, if there are a bunch of people on the beach, one usually goes somewhere quieter, whereas in Spain we love socialising and always sit right by the crowd of people. I think he's got the hang of it now. Our holiday habits changed surprisingly little after Nick became the Lib Dem leader. Naturally, security was more of an issue when he was deputy prime minister, but we carried on going to the same parts of Spain that we had always visited. The only difference was that we had two more people with us, though we tried to integrate the security guards as much as possible into the family, which made it nicer for everyone. Did we ever go on holiday with David Cameron or other politicians? No, it never really crossed our minds, and I have only visited Chequers once; indeed, I only met the Camerons three times socially for dinner. As far as I'm concerned, work is work in politics, and it is healthy not to make it a personal affair. In 2017 our eldest son Antonio was diagnosed with lymphoma — thankfully he's now fully recovered —and to cheer him up during the chemotherapy treatment we told him that we'd go on holiday to somewhere of his choice when it was over, and he asked to go to California. We flew out there as a family and visited San Francisco, Los Angeles and Yosemite National Park. So when we told the boys the following year that Nick had been offered a job with Facebook in California, they were keen to go because they thought of it as a holiday destination. We spent the next five years in the US. We didn't have green cards during the Covid years, so we couldn't leave the country. Therefore, we holidayed in America and got to visit everywhere from Arizona's Grand Canyon and Montana to Alaska, where we saw bears — it was a wonderful feeling to be surrounded by miles of nothingness. The UK was going through Brexit so — speaking for myself — it was nice to be abroad and not to have to witness the economic and political self-harm that the Brexiteers inflicted on the country. Around then we started going on activity holidays, which involved things like ziplining, swimming with manta rays, jumping off waterfalls and canyoning. This appealed to the boys, and also to Nick; I always find it a bit challenging, but there is no way I am going to be relegated to the hotel. Nowadays I spend weekdays in Spain leading [the non-partisan political organisation] España Mejor, but I return to our home in London to join Nick and my youngest son most weekends. I know it sounds crazy, but it sort of works. Miriam González Durántez is the founder of the Inspiring Girls charity ( In our weekly My Hols interview, famous faces — from the worlds of film, sport, politics, and more — share their travel stories from childhood to the present day. Read more My Hols interviews here
Irish Independent
7 days ago
- Politics
- Irish Independent
Julia Molony: Nick Clegg is right to say we love gossip — but that doesn't get his former Silicon Valley paymasters off the hook
The international panel discussion circuit is Nick Clegg's natural habitat. His chapter as British deputy prime minister ended in disaster for his party, the Liberal Democrats.
Telegraph
12-07-2025
- Business
- Telegraph
£30bn wasted on failed bid to boost poorest children's grades
Taxpayers have spent £30 billion on an equality drive that has failed to boost the grades of the poorest children, a damning new study has found. Researchers found the scheme, which was launched by Nick Clegg, the former deputy prime minister, has not delivered any meaningful results despite its huge price tag. Under the 'pupil premium' schools are given extra grant cash based on the number of their students who are eligible for free school meals. Introduced by Mr Clegg in 2011, it was designed to help close the attainment gap between children from wealthier and poorer households. But a report by the Centre for Social Justice (CSJ) found that, almost 15 years later, official data shows the difference in grades has 'barely narrowed'. The think tank said its findings raised questions about whether the pupil premium, which will cost another £10 billion by the end of the decade, is 'fit for purpose'. At around £3 billion a year the scheme costs the same as Britain's annual support to Ukraine and is twice as expensive as the winter fuel payment. The CSJ found that, despite the extra funding, the attainment gap at both primary schools and secondary schools was wider in 2023-24 than in 2016-17. It also discovered that disadvantaged pupils at six in 10 schools had worse outcomes on average in 2023-24 than they did before the pandemic. The report said: 'Fourteen years on, the stark reality is that attainment gaps between disadvantaged pupils and their peers have barely narrowed. 'This raises serious questions about whether the policy – in its current form – remains fit for purpose.'
Times
01-07-2025
- Business
- Times
Angela Rayner's new deputy PM office inspired by John Prescott
Angela Rayner will model her new office of the deputy prime minister on that of John Prescott. Rayner is expected to set up her power base a year after Labour entered government, including 30 staff, a new logo and an email address. The Times understands it will take inspiration from Prescott, the last Labour deputy prime minister, and will also draw lessons from Nick Clegg's time in the role. Sources close to Rayner, who has her own mandate through being elected as deputy Labour leader by party members, pointed to Prescott's aim of 'creating sustainable communities' through his office, suggesting it was a key priority that she would emulate. They suggested she would be taking direction from a 2005 document that read: 'The aim of the office of the deputy prime minister is 'creating sustainable communities'.' Whether Rayner would be granted a separate office from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, for which she is secretary of state, has been unclear since Labour took power. In the run-up to the election, there was a plan to give Rayner, who previously described herself as 'John Prescott in a skirt', a fully fledged office for deputy prime minister in the Cabinet Office, with a dedicated team and a cross-Whitehall brief. When that failed to materialise, Sue Gray, the prime minister's then chief of staff, was blamed for blocking the long-standing plans that, it was thought, would co-ordinate Rayner's work across Whitehall. The claim was denied by No 10. The Times reported in January that while plans for a formal office had been shelved, discussions had resumed about a move to No 9 Downing Street. The political blog Guido Fawkes reported on Tuesday that the new office would be announced next week, including room in the Cabinet Office for about 30 staff, a new logo and staff emails using the domain @ A source close to Rayner pointed out that Prescott's official office for the deputy prime minister was not formed until 2002, a year after the 2001 Labour victory. • Angela Rayner: 'Whatever I achieve, people still say I'm thick' They highlighted a description of Prescott's office that put focus on 'sustainable communities', described as being 'about things that matter to people: decent homes at prices people can afford; good public transport, schools, hospitals and shops; people able to have a say on the way their neighbourhood is run; and a clean, safe environment'. It said: 'The role of the office of the deputy prime minister is to help create sustainable communities, working with other government departments, local councils, businesses, the voluntary sector and communities themselves.' The office will be seen by some as Rayner consolidating her power as Sir Keir Starmer's authority has been thrown into question by a series of U-turns. Rayner is seen as a frontrunner to replace Starmer despite having ruled out a leadership challenge.
Yahoo
24-06-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
The plastic bag tax started 10 years ago to stop pollution. But is it actually working?
Ten years ago, the way Britons carried groceries home changed forever, with the dawn of the plastic bag charge, then set at a relatively paltry five pence. The measure, which mandated a charge on all single-use plastic bags in supermarkets, came into force in October 2015. The move had been announced in 2013, with ministers pointing to the fact that seven billion single-use bags were issued in 2012. The adoption of a ban in England followed similar measures in Scotland and Ireland, where ministers said the rule cut the use of bags by 80%. Then-deputy prime minister Nick Clegg said at the time, 'Plastic carrier bags blight our towns and countryside. They take hundreds of years to degrade and can kill animals. 'This is not a new problem. We've waited too long for action. That's why I am drawing a line under the issue now. The charge will be implemented sensibly - small businesses will be exempt. 'We will discuss with retailers how the money raised should be spent but I call on them to follow the lead of industry in Wales and donate the proceeds to charity.' The ban meant that single-use packaging was banned for all shopping, with exemptions for items such as uncooked meat and live fish. The bag ban provoked varying reactions among the public, with one young man taking a £1 supermarket trolley home instead of paying the 5p charge, and commemorating the event with a tattoo, which he said was 'for the bants'. Others fretted that the ban on single-use bags would see reusable bags used once instead, and environmental campaigners felt it did not go far enough, calling for the ban to apply to smaller businesses with fewer than 250 employees. David Powell, senior resources campaigner at Friends of the Earth, said: 'The English charge is a good start, but it makes no sense that it only applies to big retailers. Shoppers will get mixed messages depending on where they shop. This could defeat the main point of the charge in the first place – to change the way people and stores think about over-using plastic bags.' From May 2021, the price of a single-use bag increased to 10p and was applied to all retailers. More than 100 countries have now either introduced fees on single-use plastic bags, or bans on their use. Figures announced in 2023 showed that the ban had prevented seven billion plastic bags entering the environment, with usage at the main retailers dropping 98%. The average person now buys two single-use carrier bags per year, compared to 140 in 2014. But an American study this year was able to quantify the impact of bag bans in the real world, by measuring the difference between areas that have bag bans or fees, and those that don't. The University of Delaware researchers say that around a third of Americans live in areas with plastic ban measures in place. The researchers used data from shoreline cleanup projects, and compared plastic levels in the area from before and after bans or fees were introduced. The researchers found that the introduction of plastic bag policies led to a decrease of between 25% and 47% in the percentage of bags in shoreline waste cleaned up by volunteers. The researchers investigated 600 different bag bans and fees in different areas, which came into force between 2007 and 2023. Associate professor Kimberly Oremus said: "There are so many pathways a bag can take from the checkout line at the store. It's great to see a policy that works in such a clearly measurable way." Strangely, the researchers found that fees are actually more effective than bans in reducing plastic pollution, although they say more research is needed to understand why. Researchers say that even in places with bag bans, plastic bag pollution is increasing. The percentage of plastic bags is increasing everywhere, both in places with bans and without. In places with bans, the pollution is increasing more slowly, the researchers observed. Oremus said: "We're still getting more plastic bags on shorelines as a percentage of all the cleanup items over time. "It's not eliminating the problem, it's just making it grow more slowly." The researchers said that plastic bag policies are effective, but more needs to be done. Despite plastic bans, shoreline pollution is increasing in the UK, with a rise of 9.5% in 2024 compared to 2023, according to the Marine Conservation Society. Volunteers picked up three-quarters of a million items from beaches, with items polluting beaches at a rate of almost two items per square metre.
