Neil Harding missunderstands liberty

The Devil's Kitchen: has an extract from the twat on his attempts to claim that he is infact liberal.

"Proportional Representation for Westminster.
Incentive Voting.
A Citizen's income.
Legalisation of all drugs.
Congestion Charging.
Complete Ban on workplace smoking.
Ban on alcohol advertising.
Amnesty for all illegal workers in UK.
Automatic place at Oxbridge for brightest pupil at each secondary school.
Triple council tax for second home owners.
Re-emphasis on restorative penalties not prison sentences.
Widen council tax bands to make it less regressive.
Free local bus travel for local council tax payers."

Liberalism is about liberty, that is freedom. It is about removing blocks on people doing what they like and choosing the best cause of action for themselves. So lets look at this list to see how it fairs.

Proportional Representation for Westminster.
null, no reduction in liberty there nor any real increase

Incentive Voting.
bad, absention is as valid a choice as any other, this is effectively penalising abstention and so reducing choice (slightly).

A Citizen's income.
Good for liberty

Legalisation of all drugs.
Good for liberty

Congestion Charging.
Bad, you are reducing freedom of movement.

Complete Ban on workplace smoking.
Bad, you are reducing the choice to smoke

Ban on alcohol advertising.
Bad, censorship

Amnesty for all illegal workers in UK.
Good, giving poeple more freedom to travel and work

Automatic place at Oxbridge for brightest pupil at each secondary school.
Bad, reducing Oxbridge's (both are independent institutions) liberty to choose the people that best serve it's needs

Triple council tax for second home owners.
Bad, you are reducing peoples liberty to live where they like when they like and own what they like

Re-emphasis on restorative penalties not prison sentences.
good, prison is by it's very nature a loss of liberty. So so long as the restorative penalties work this is a gain in liberty.

Widen council tax bands to make it less regressive.
null, all you are doing is shifting around taxes with no effect on liberty other than the general loss of liberty over your money that all tax brings.

Free local bus travel for local council tax payers.
bad, when combined with congestion charging. You are forcing people out of the most useful transport network into a worse one rather than letting them choose the one that best serves their needs.

bad 7, good 4, null 2 so not a very liberal list. Unless you decide to twist Liberalism to mean Socialism, since this is a very Socialist list.