I have received a third letter from Ivan Lewis MP. Regular readers will remember that he first wrote to me a couple of months back, criticising me as a Lib Dem for the government’s stance on tuition fees. He copied the letter to the Bury Times. I’m not sure he expected a reply (quite often, I’ve discovered, politicians just write letters for show), but I have nothing to hide on anything so I replied to him, explaining that I disagree with the government on fees. I concluded the letter by asking him what his position on fees was, since he now appears against them despite voting to introduce them in 1998 and then treble them in 2003 as part of the Labour government which did both of these things.

Ivan replied after a couple of weeks, reminding me of various Lib Dem policies and making a few personal remarks which I considered quite inappropriate. But he didn’t answer my question so I wrote and asked him again. You can see Ivan’s original letter here, my reply here, his subsequent letter here, and my reply to that here.

I have now had another letter from Mr Lewis. It’s quite long – too long, I have decided, to re-produce on this blog. It contains various allegations about Lib Dems nationally and locally which I dispute, and gets into policy general policy debates which, whilst interesting, probably aren’t best dealt with on here. If anyone wants me to list the allegations, and my response to them, let me know and I will, but in order to not end up writing a 5,000 word blog post I won’t write them as one!

Crucially though, Mr Lewis still doesn’t answer the question of what he will do about tuition fees. Once again he criticises the government’s policy (and with good reason) but doesn’t say what his favoured position is. I am coming the conclusion that he doesn’t have one, which is odd given the anger with which he denounces the government’s position. I too am angry with the government on this, but at least I am honest about where I stand. Why isn’t Ivan?

Sadly, it’s typical of the Labour party at the moment. All criticism, no contrition, and certainly no alternative policies.

I will continue to await a response from Mr Lewis outlining his position on fees, and will write to him explaining as much. I think we all have a right to know what Ivan Lewis and/or Labour would do on this, if they’ve made it clear that they wouldn’t do what the government’s doing.

Rick