You Know Where I Stand: Fighting Crime and Preserving Ancient Liberties

Like all Liberal Democrats, I am appalled at the increasingly authoritarian drift of the Labour Party. Michael Howard and the Tories don't have a good track record on this issue either.

I am fundamentally opposed to ID cards as a massive transformation in the relationship between the individual and the state. ID cards would excessively increase the power of state and could potentially be misused to coerce ordinary citizens. There is little evidence that ID cards would improve security sufficiently to justify the loss of ancient freedoms.

As a social liberal I strongly support civil partnerships for same sex relationships, am pro-choice on abortion (but prepared to look at reducing the time limit), totally against capital punishment and in favour of a fair asylum and managed immigration policy.

Fear of crime can be a major limit on the freedom of decent citizens. Lawlessness should never be tolerated for it increases the power of bullies and those who would intimidate over the law abiding and weak. I would campaign for more bobbies on the beat in Shepway. Scrapping ID cards could free up resources for this.

We need to incentivise non-violent criminals to turn away from a life of crime. Many of them have few or no skills, are illiterate and have low self-esteem. Prison should be tougher with a strong emphasis on training and education to give non-violent criminals a greater chance of getting a legitimate job through skills training. Non-violent criminals should also be given community sentences so that they clean up our area. It would have to be an improvement on Shepway's current performance!

Violent criminals should still be locked up and life sentences for the most violent criminals should mean life.

I believe in a firm but fair immigration and asylum policy. Legitimate asylum seekers should always be welcome. There are still massive human rights abuses going on in the world and genuine refugees should not be turned away. Illegal immigrants should be deal with quickly. As the husband of an immigrant I am worried that rapidly rising fees for visas are turning into a stealth tax on those with non-EEA spouses and incentivising illegal immigration.

As a Liberal first and foremost I believe that people should be free to do as they please as long as their actions do not hurt others. The state should have constitutional limits placed on its powers so that individuals do not have their lives intruded into needlessly. I will always campaign to preserve hard won and hard fought for freedoms.