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Like many MPs, Jo Swinson joined her chosen political party at
University, but unlike many this wasn't very long ago. She was
elected at 25 and is currently the youngest MP in Westminster. The
Liberal Democrats stance on education, particularly a penny on tax
for education was one of two key issues that drew her in. "I was in
education at the time and I believed now as then that it was the
key to solving so many problems in society." Proportional
representation was the other draw, growing up in Milngavie which
was in a constituency with Clydebank: "it seemed like we were never
really going to count, Labour was always going to get in," and so
she signed up at the Freshers Fayre.
She first stood for election in 2001, in Hull against John
Prescott, and then for the Scottish Parliament in 2003, this time
in the area that she grew up in. It was from her home constituency
that she was elected to Westminster in 2005 and this is hugely
significant to her; "what's most important is that I'm representing
people in an area that I feel passionately about."
Life expectancy of someone in her constituency is 8, 9 or 10
years higher than someone two miles down the road in Drumchapel she
explains, and "this is exactly the kind of inequality we want to
stamp out by improving the outcomes of those in more deprived
areas." She believes education is key here alongside various
healthcare initiatives and a "much more simple tax system". On
taxation she goes on, "Our policy is to reduce [tax] by four pence
in the pound. That actually makes it more sensible for people to
get out of unemployment and get into work, and you can pay for that
by changing the tax at the higher end of the tax system and indeed
taxes on wealth that has just been accumulated or passed down."
Although she doesn't think she is always in touch with what
today's young people are thinking she has been a strong advocate on
their behalf, particularly on ending the unfair discrimination on
the minimum wage which sees young people aged 16 or 17 having to
work 5 hours more on a typical 8 hour shift to earn the same as a
22 year old on the minimum wage. She is also strongly supporting a
Private Member's Bill to lower the voting age to 16. When asked
about the positive insights she brings as a young MP, she
ruminates, "I suppose I do have a different background and a
different set of cultural reference points. I'm very involved in
campaigning for Parliament to open up and use new technologies to
become closer to people and I've begun podcasting and use Facebook,
I've just signed up to Twitter recently, which is sort of,
mini-blogging. I try to use different ways to connect with my
constituents, I've got more than 600 constituents signed up to a
regular email consultation, which is something that you just
wouldn't have the resources to do using old technologies of
post."
She alludes to her "geeky" political sensibilities a number of
times and on the new government in Scotland she is philosophical,
"it's interesting to see a new form work, to have a minority
government, so that it's not engrained that it always has to be
some sort of formal partnership, you know, as an almost experiment
to show that with devolution you can have different types of
political outcomes and that you get that with a proportional
system. That can hopefully reflect more people and of course, the
Scottish Lib Dems, like the other parties, are working with SNP on
issues where we agree, which is entirely sensible. And then on
issues where we don't, robustly hold them to account."
Holyrood and Westminster can be a bit apart she admits, and it
can be difficult to retain relationships and communication because
of the Parliamentary timetable but she sees the establishment of
the Constitutional Commission as something very positive that has
come out of joint working between Westminster and Holyrood. "It
needs the support of Westminster politicians and ideally the
support of Scottish politicians, not necessarily undermining it
with strange u-turns."
She is also very positive about the joint working that goes on
in the select committee of which she is member, the Environmental
Audit committee. "You take an issue that you are interested in and,
rather than go to a position immediately, you look at all the
evidence … If the public thought more about what goes on at select
committees, they'd possibly have a higher opinion of politics
generally … it's 100 miles away from the yah boo politics that you
see at Prime Minister's Questions, which I suppose has its place as
entertainment, but doesn't further the political understanding in
the country very much."
She believes Government does listen to what select committees
say: "we had a report on bio-fuels in January which was very
concerned about the food implications across the world, and also
indeed the environmental implications - whether or not
deforestation was happening to plant bio-fuel crops - and the
Government is now reviewing its own bio-fuels policy, partly as a
result of the Report".
As a Liberal Democrat Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs, she
sees Climate Change as one of the key issues facing the world as it
is the poor who are going to feel it first and getting an
international agreement by the end of 2009 is vital. On her role
she jokes, "It's one of the things about the job, it's the entire
world that you've got to know about!" She mentions Afghanistan, "We
are making some headway, but it's going to take a very long time
for us to rebuild the country, because that's basically what we
need to do."
She has been receiving email updates from a constituent with a
colleague in Zimbabwe and is sickened by the images from there:
"it's one of those situations that is just so horrendous, and
actually so difficult to know what the solution is because the
British Government doesn't have very much influence in Zimbabwe. It
can try and influence other partners in the region."
But the first issue that she mentions is Iran, "I think there's
a lot of concern about Iran's nuclear development and the American
reaction to that. We hope we will have a President of the US who's
perhaps less hawkish after the elections. I don't think that will
be the case if McCain wins."
Aid is important, particularly in the wake of natural disasters
but, as she argues and discusses in more detail, the wider issues
of trade must be addressed. "What's also important is about trade,
about giving countries the tools and economies, the opportunities,
to develop so that they can stand on their own two feet." This
means removing protectionist policies at EU level because at the
moment "we are having a very uneven playing field for developing
countries when it comes to trading with them and that really does
damage their economies."
She is aware of the work of the churches in this area,
particularly in the fair trade movement in her constituency and,
although she believes in a separation of church and state, she is
very positive about the churches' role in politics, particularly
bringing together people who have shared views on certain issues
and "rightly using that collective voice to be heard by their
elected representatives."
When asked for her best piece of advice she says, "keep smiling,
there's always a way of finding something good in the situation"
and this optimism shines through. As well as being the youngest MP
she is also the only female Scottish Liberal Democrat MP and she is
Chair of the Campaign for Gender Balance. She doesn't dwell on the
Lib Dems' poor record on gender equality and looks to the future:
"we've got great talented women out there and we just need to make
sure we get them elected".