Tim Farron

Tim Farron MP
Leader of the Liberal Democrats
Incumbent
Assumed office 16 July 2015
Preceded by	Nick Clegg
Liberal Democrat Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs Spokesman
In office 7 January 2015 – 16 July 2015
Leader	Nick Clegg
Preceded by	Ed Davey (2010)
Succeeded by	Tom Brake
President of the Liberal Democrats
In office 1 January 2011 – 1 January 2015
Leader	Nick Clegg
Preceded by	The Baroness Scott of Needham Market
Succeeded by	The Baroness Brinton
Liberal Democrat Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs Spokesman
In office October 2008 – 11 May 2010
Leader	Nick Clegg
Preceded by	Steve Webb
Succeeded by	Dan Rogerson (2015)
Member of Parliament for Westmorland and Lonsdale
Incumbent
Assumed office 5 May 2005
Preceded by	Tim Collins
Majority	8,949 (18.3%)
Personal details
Born	Timothy James Farron (1970-05-27) 27 May 1970 Preston, England, UK
Political party	Liberal Democrats
Spouse(s)	Rosie Farron
Children	2 daughters 2 sons
Alma mater	Newcastle University
Religion	Church of England

Timothy James "Tim" Farron (born 27 May 1970) is a British politician who became Leader of the Liberal Democrats in 2015.^[1] He was elected the Member of Parliament (MP) for Westmorland and Lonsdale in 2005 and re-elected in 2010 and 2015, and was the President of the Liberal Democrats from 2011 until becoming leader in 2015.^[2][3]

Early life and education

Farron was born in Preston, Lancashire, and educated at Lostock Hall High School and Runshaw College, Leyland,^[4] before going on to Newcastle University where he gained a BA in Politics in 1992.^[5] He was president of Newcastle University Union Society, the first Liberal Democrat to hold the position, in 1991,^[5] having joined the Liberal Party at the age of 16.^[4] In 1990, he was elected to the National Union of Students' National Executive.^[5]

Before his election to Parliament, Farron worked in higher education at Lancaster University from 1992 to 2002,^[5] and St. Martin's College, Ambleside, from 2002 to 2005.^[6]

Political career

Positions beginning prior to 2005

Farron contested North West Durham at the 1992 general election, where he finished in third place, behind the sitting Labour Party MP Hilary Armstrong and Conservative Party candidate Theresa May.^[4] He then served on Lancashire County Council from 1993 to 2000 and was also a councillor on South Ribble Borough Council from 1995 to 1999.

Farron was selected to contest the Labour/Conservative marginal constituency of South Ribble at the 1997 general election, and again finished in third place. Thereafter, he was a Liberal Democrat candidate for the North West region in the 1999 European Parliament elections.

At the 2001 general election, Farron contested the Westmorland and Lonsdale seat and finished second, reducing the majority of the sitting Conservative MP Tim Collins to 3,167. He then served as a councillor for the Milnthorpe ward on the South Lakeland District Council from 2004 to 2008.

Westmorland and Lonsdale 2005 win, through 2009

At the 2005 general election, Farron again fought Collins in Westmorland and Lonsdale, and this time won this election by a narrow margin of just 267 votes.^[6] He made his maiden speech in Parliament on 25 May 2005.^[7] As a new MP, he became a member of the Education and Skills Select Committee and was appointed as Youth Affairs Spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats.^[4] From this time, he has been the Chair of the All Party group on Hill Farming.

During Menzies Campbell's period as the Liberal Democrat leader, Farron was Campbell's Parliamentary Private Secretary.^[4] In 2007 he was made Liberal Democrat spokesman for Home Affairs.

Farron resigned from the front bench of the Liberal Democrats on 5 March 2008 in protest at the party's abstention from a parliamentary vote on the EU referendum. However he later returned to the party's front bench as spokesperson for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.^[8] He is a member of the Beveridge Group within the Liberal Democrats.^[9]

2010s

In the 2010 general election, Farron achieved an 11.1% swing from the Conservatives, winning by a majority of 12,264 in his historically Conservative seat. This result was against the run of the rest of the party, making Westmorland and Lonsdale one of the few Liberal Democrat strongholds.^[10]

On 27 May 2010, Farron announced he would be standing for the position of Deputy Leader of the Liberal Democrats, made vacant by the resignation of Vince Cable. On 9 June, Farron lost the competition to the former party President, Simon Hughes. Hughes won by 20 votes; having had 38 nominations from the parliamentary party, compared to Farron's 18.

Farron in 2008

Farron speaking at a Liberal Democrat conference in the Clyde Auditorium, Glasgow, 2014.

Farron in March 2014

On 16 September 2010, Farron announced he would be standing for the position of President of the Liberal Democrats following The Baroness Scott's decision not to seek re-election. He won the election with 53% of the vote, beating fellow candidate Susan Kramer on 47%.^[11]

In March 2012, Farron was one of three MPs who signed a letter sent to the Advertising Standards Authority, criticising their recent decision to stop the Christian group "Healing on the Streets of Bath" from making explicit claims that prayer can heal. The letter called for the ASA to provide indisputable scientific evidence that faith healing did not work; Farron subsequently admitted that the letter was not "well-worded" and that he should not have signed it "as it was written".^[12]

Farron was one of only eight Liberal Democrats elected nationwide at the 2015 general election. He was considered a favourite to succeed Clegg as Leader of the Liberal Democrats.^[13]

In May 2015, Farron confirmed his bid for the Liberal Democrat leadership on BBC Radio 4.^[14]

On 16 July 2015, Farron won the leadership election with 56.5% of the vote, ahead of Norman Lamb who achieved 43.5%.^[1] Farron's first speech at the Liberal Democrat September 2015 Conference in Bournemouth was praised in the press.^[15]

Political positions

Among political observers, Farron is widely seen as being of left-leaning political position.^{[16][17][18][19]} In a September 2016 interview, he identified the Liberal Democrats under his leadership as being centre-left.^[20]

Policy as Lib Dem Leader

In August 2015, Farron identified seven campaigning priorities for the Liberal Democrats. These were rural affairs, the EU referendum, mental health, immigration, civil liberties, the green economy, and housing.^[21]

Under-occupancy penalty

Farron was one of only two Liberal Democrats to vote against the under-occupancy penalty (also known as the bedroom tax) in 2012.^[6]

Education

In December 2010, he voted against increasing the cap on undergraduate university tuition fees from £3,000 to £9,000.^[22] Referring to Nick Clegg's earlier pledge not to raise fees—and the previous long-standing Liberal Democrat policy of abolishing them—he said: "Integrity is important. You must not only keep your word but be seen to keep your word. You can say no."^[23]

Migration

He was the first senior British politician to back the EU proposal for a quota to take in refugees during the Mediterranean crisis. He called for the UK to accept up to 60,000 non-EU refugees to help with the influx. He attended the Refugee solidarity march in London in September 2015 and gave the opening speech.^[6] In the 2016 Liberal Democrat Spring Conference, Farron accused the government of cowardice and heartlessness over their current refugee policy.^[24]

Representation of women and minorities

Farron has said that 50% of target seats will be represented by women and 10 per cent of target seats will be represented by black, Asian and minority ethnic (BME) candidates.

Farron's appointment of party spokespeople was applauded for its diversity with 12 women and 10 men given positions. Women also took high ranking roles such as defence and economics spokesperson.^[6][25]

LGBT rights

He voted in favour of allowing marriage between two people of same sex at the second reading of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill but he voted not to timetable the debate on the Bill, which would have made it much more difficult to pass had the House of Commons agreed with his position;^[26] and he was absent for the vote for gay marriage on the third reading of the Bill.^[27] In 2014 he voted in favour of extending the right to same sex marriage to Armed Forces personnel outside the United Kingdom.^[28] He currently holds a 90.4% rating on the issue of same sex marriage according to the website Public Whip.^[28]

During an interview with Cathy Newman for Channel 4 News in 2015 (following Farron's leadership success), Farron avoided a question from Newman on his personal beliefs regarding same-sex relations, saying that his "views on personal morality [didn't] matter", adding that to "understand Christianity is to understand that we are all sinners".^[29] In response, Labour MP Ben Bradshaw said that:

For a Liberal, I thought his position seemed incredibly illiberal. Look, I don't think you should condemn someone or feel they're not fit for office just because they have religious faith. I'm a practising Anglican. I happen to be a liberal kind of Anglican, rather than a conservative evangelical, which it appears Tim Farron is. It seems to me he's pretty out of step with his own party even though they've just elected him leader.^[30]

In 2007 he voted against the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations, which for the first time imposed a general restriction on businesses discriminating against people on the grounds of sexual orientation.^[31] However, in May 2015 he defended a court ruling which found that a Belfast bakery had acted unlawfully in refusing to carry out an order for a cake in support of gay marriage – saying "If you’re providing a service, that’s the key thing – you need to do so without prejudice, without discrimination against those who come through your door."^[32]

Defence policy

He voted against replacing Trident with a like-for-like submarine-based nuclear weapons system.^[33]

European Union

Farron strongly supports the UK's membership of the European Union,^[34] but criticised David Cameron's renegotiation as "about appealing to careerist Tory MPs, who were selected by Europhobic party members, to persuade them to vote to remain".^[35]

In June 2016 following the United Kingdom European Union membership referendum, Farron stated that if the Liberal Democrats were elected in the next parliamentary election, they would not follow through with triggering Article 50 of the Treaty on European Union and leaving the EU ("Any Member State may decide to withdraw from the Union in accordance with its own constitutional requirements") but would instead keep the UK in the European Union.^[36]

Saudi Arabia

Farron has criticised Britain's close ties with Saudi Arabia. He said: "It is time to shine a light onto the shady corners of our relationship with Saudi Arabia. It is time we stood up for civil liberties, human rights and not turn a blind eye because the House of Saud are our 'allies'."^[37]

Cannabis regulation

He supports the complete legalisation of marijuana for both medical and recreational purpose, saying that "The Liberal Democrats will be releasing a report in due course that lays out the case for a legalised market for sales of cannabis. I personally believe the war on drugs is over. We must move from making this a legal issue to one of health."^[38]

Personal life

Farron married Rosemary Cantley in July 2000 in Lancaster. The couple live in Milnthorpe, within the constituency Farron represents, with their two daughters (Isabella and Gracie, born in September 2001) and two sons (Jude and Laurie, born January 2004 and January 2006), the younger son being born since Farron's election to Parliament. He is a committed evangelical Christian and says that "becoming a Christian at the age of eighteen [was] the most massive choice I have made."^[39]

He is a life-long fan of the East Lancashire football club Blackburn Rovers.^[40]

References

Further reading

• "Tim Farron MP – MP for Westmorland and Lonsdale, Party President". The Liberal Democrats. 13 November 2010. Retrieved 18 September 2013. 

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Tim Farron.

• Official website
• Tim Farron for Leader, official 2015 party leadership campaign
• Profile at the Liberal Democrats
• Profile at Parliament of the United Kingdom
• Contributions in Parliament at Hansard 1803–2005
• Current session contributions in Parliament at Hansard
• Voting record at Public Whip
• Record in Parliament at TheyWorkForYou
• Profile at Westminster Parliamentary Record
• Articles authored at Journalisted