FRED in the news
April 9th, 2009 by Will Horwitz Posted in Livelihoods
Yesterday the media and the blogosphere met FRED. And most people found something they agreed with in the changes she was proposing.
Mark Easton wove FRED into some thoughtful comments on the role of charities in campaigning, after talking about it on the Today programme (07:37) It led to an interesting debate about the nature of poverty in the UK from some of those commenting on his blog, and there were a couple of good articles on the BBC website.
Don Paskini on Liberal Conspiracy and Duncan’s economic blog were supportive of our proposals, and again there’s an interesting debate going on in the comments to Don’s blog.
Tom Watson MP had some nice things to say about Oxfam’s role in pursuing this agenda. Living with Rats has a neat comparison with the other Fred (Goodwin). And Nicola Smith at the TUC takes a look at the importance of attitudes to FRED.
Meanwhile the Adam Smith Institute (who Antonia argued with live on BBC TV!) support our proposals on tax, but are less keen on more spending to support FRED – as are a host of less savoury blogs that FRED would prefer we didn’t mention.
In the papers, FRED got a mention in the Telegraph, the Guardian, and the Daily Record, and FRED was featured on Good Morning Scotland, BBC Five Live, BBC Radio 4, Sky News and BBC News channel, as well as loads of local commercial and BBC radio stations, and a host of local newspapers.
We’re hoping the debate can continue in the coming weeks and months. If you’re not following FRED on twitter yet, or following this blog, then please do so. Unfortunately, we think FRED will be around for a good while longer, but the budget in a couple of weeks will be the first test of whether the government is looking out for FRED.
