I’m not saying anything should change. It was not me who wrote of a “niche sandal wearing contingency” who have to be “taken on”. I am noting this and similar comments made recently and during the time of the leadership election. I believe such comments, which hint at the idea that our party’s progress requires engineering a fight between activists and leadership with the leader winning, are damaging.

I am very much opposed to elected politicans in their elected role being subject to any sort of mandate and, contrary to your suggestion, nothing I have written suggests that. However, the role of “Leader of the Liberal Democrats” is not a publicly elected role. Mr Clegg in his position as MP for Sheffield Hallam can do or say what he wants, and I would strongly oppose any attempt to put him under party mandate. Mr Clegg in his role as Leader of the Liberal Democrats, however, needs to have the awareness that he is servant of the members of the party in that role.

Leader and activists should be working together and trusting each other, respecting each other’s roles. Comments about activists needing to be “taken on” do not encourage that necessary trust and good working relationship. If these comments are made by “sources close to the leader” as they usually are, if it was not the leader’s intention to have them slip out in this way, he should deal firmly on those sources. Activists unsettled by such comments may need reassurance, which Mr Clegg may consider giving in some speech at some time.

I believe that an image of our party, put across in its national publicity, which gives more emphasis to its local members and how they are people whose lives are like those of most other Britons, and how being in the party has enabled them to take leadership roles and make changes to their communities, could help us a lot. It would help dispel a lot of the misbeliefs voters have about politics and how it functions. It would make us look different, not the top-down Westminster-centred party which so many people now find alienating.

As I’ve said elsewhere, many of our activists are people with enormous skills. They are people who in many places have taken on the two-party system locally and broken it by their own hard work and good judgment about what works on the ground. Those at the top of the party need to consider that perhaps they have something useful to say, rather than treat them as a burden which must be “taken on”.

I think there are a few problems with some of the new points above, apart from the general tone of victimhood.

First who or what is ‘ordinary’?; and how do you know our activists are that way?

It is surely more a point of liberalism that we are all extraordinary; but that aside, surely you recognise that the difficulty of assessing the ‘ordinary’ views of the ‘man/woman/transgendered person on the Clapham omnibus’ is why there are polling companies?

Going to TRA meetings doesn’t make you any more in touch with what tenants think than being a council officer working in housing or a communications director looking at the housing department’s satisfaction survey, does it… all three have valid points of view and different sources of information informing it. A decent councillor will talk to all of them, before using their own judgement to formulate policy and campaigns.

And that brings me back to the key questions in previous comments:

1) How do you propose the party makes better use of the wisdom and experience of activists on top of what is already done? I don’t recognise your assertions about activists being ignored or marginalised by shadowy cabals or think tanks, I certainly don’t feel that way.

2) And accurately distilled, why do you believe then that that wisdom should be a better guide to the public mood or what the party should do than other credibly researced sources?

3) What’s then wrong with the party’s decision-takers using their judgement on what to prioritise by researching a balanced range of sources?

“Do you not agree with me that the Liberal Democrats is ultimately a private organisation owned and controlled by its members, and that therefore its leader is ultimately its members’ servant and not vice versa?”

It’s a rather strange question with an entirely false point of opposition within it. As a voluntary organisation nobody is anyone else’s servant, we remain involved because we want to, and that’s it, whether you’re the leader or an armchair supporter.

Further we are a representative democracy, both in the party and the country as a whole. Politicians are not wholley-owned subsidiaries of either their local party or the people who pay their campaign expenses. And where they are, it’s usually not a good thing for democracy.

You seem to be bordering on arguing that various levels of the party should be able to mandate and compel their locally elected politicians to do what they say regardless of the views of the local people who actually elect them. But if you are not saying that, what are you saying should change?

That comparison has numerous flaws – firstly with the appropriate adjustments canvass data can be pretty accurate – so no different to opinion polling when it uses different weightings.

Secondly no poll – whether canvassing or opinion polling predicts an election result. See virtually every article Bob Worcester has ever written

Thirdly – canvassing serves an additional purpose besides just giving you an estimate of support. Often it is the feedback from canvassing that gives you the best idea of what messages are striking the biggest chord.

You usually get a rolling picture from canvassing rather than a one day snapshot, and what is often more important in canvassing terms is how votes are moving rather than the absolute figures.

Regarding conspiracy, well, it was not me who wrote about a “niche sandal wearing contingency” who have to be “taken on”. I was reacting to someone else who wrote that. I can only interpret it as a desire to confront party activists and force them to change or leave. Why do we keep getting these snide remarks made about “activists” from certain sections of our party?

I do find comments like this coming from groups like “CentreForum” and “Progressive Vision”. Who are these groups? Who funds them? Why do they and their spokepeople always get quoted in the media? Why is it regarded as “sneering” etc when I am a bit disturbed about the power and influence these groups seem to have? I note they tend towards one end of ideological debates in the party. Why can’t I ask questions about them? Why when I asked one of their directors the actual question “Who pays your salary?” didn’t I get an answer?

I’m all for free and fair discussion, but why is it that one side seems to have access to a lot more funding and influence than the other? Why do you regard it as concocting a “grand conspiracy” to ask questions like this? It seems to me that part of being in politics is that you do ask questions. Do you suppose I should not ask questions about power and influence, and instead sink back to being a little man, content to leave the “professionals” to do the thinking and tell me what I should do?

Sorry, Neil, I am a liberal and a democrat. As part of this, I do believe in power to the people rising upwards and not power to the leader falling downwards. What is wrong with this belief that you should insult me for having it? Do you not agree with me that the Liberal Democrats is ultimately a private organisation owned and controlled by its members, and that therefore its leader is ultimately its members’ servant and not vice versa?

My key point remains that politicians need to use a range of sources to understand the public mood, and I disagree with your earlier assertion that Liberal Democrat activists are a uniquely insightful source versus consulting the public direct through tried and tested mechanisms such as polls, groups, media, stakeholder engagement etc..

I have argued all are important sources, you that the former must be taken more seriously than the latter. I disagree and I find your drift into grand conspiracy theory, sneering at ‘professionals’, and reluctance so far to explain ‘how’ exactly activists might be better consulted or engaged other than through the professional techniques you depise something of a puzzle.

Neither do I see anywhere in what I have written which can be interpreted as a “holy war between the leadership and activists”. I was simply expressing my concern over attitudes which we heard in the leadership election, and have featured again in “Clegg after a year” comments in the media. That is, suggesting that the problem with the Liberal Democrats is “activists” who are denounced as “left-wing”,”tax-raising”, “statists” and the like, and who have to be “taken on”.

Nowhere in what I have written do I see language which warrants words such as “opinion polls as ‘unclean’ tools of the unrighteous”. Nor do I see anything which suggests I regard it as the sole criteria for taking someone seriously that they engage in politcal activism.

All I am doing is expressing concern that there seem to be some in those advising the leader, and it is picked up by the right-wing media because it’s what the right-wing media want to hear, who seem to want to engineer a battle between leader and party activist. Predominantly, these seem to be people who wish to push out party very strongly towards what they call “classical Liberalism” and I call “right wing economics”. I think we should be a bit more generous towards those who work unpaid for our party. I also do feel that our party is firstly a voluntary organisation of its members, not a tool to advance the leader and those who bend his ear.

You are attributing attitudes and views to me which are far more extreme than those justified by my actual words, to the point where I think it brings up serious questions about you and your motivations. Just why are you so worked up that you are unable to see the simple little point I am making and instead paint me as some sort of zealot fighting a “holy war”?

My point remains you need a balance between different sources when consulting people. Being monomanical about the wisdom of polls or activists is not going to give you a full understanding of political issues in any seat.

Further I am a Liberal Democrat rather than a member of a cult, so I cannot relate to your comments about aliens or an ‘evil’ race of politicians, or your fears of a holy war between the leadership and activists.

However I will note that in respect of your concerns about where the ‘big tent’ is going to come from there are many more ‘liberal’ voters out there than those that currently vote for us. But then if you did not regard opinion polls as ‘unclean’ tools of the unrighteous, you would be reassured on this point as well.

I might also add that if your key criteria for taking anyone’s opinion seriously is that they engage in the same sort of political activism and engagement that you do, are you not guilty of wanting to create another kind of political elite to place above others rather than being genuinely concerned with empowering people?

I am not suggesting only relying on what acitvists have to say, but I am saying don’t dismiss them. Treat them as a good and useful resource, rather than some opposition which has to be “taken on”.

And, to be frank, your idea that someone in the Westminster bubble knows oh so much more what works with ordinary people than the combined wisdom of so many people who lives and ordinary humdrum life, and also put in voluntary effort as a councillors or school governors, or do some campaigning work for the party locally is, well …

You ask “why companies spend millions on professional research techniques before launching products”, I reply why is it that so many people are throughly pissed off with politics and think all politicians are an alien race remote from ordinary life? Maybe because it’s too dominated by smart professionals trying to sell it like a consumer product rather than engaging in the LIBERAL vision of people running their own lives through active engagement in politics.

You say “internal consensus … ignores the views of those currently outside the tent who might want to come in”. So, where are those people? Where is that great band of people wanting to come in, and what will make them come in is the leader making activists feel miserable and driving them out of the party? Where’s your evidence that we will prosper so long as we get rid of the people who have made us prosper so far?

You say this looks like “self-indulgent navel gazing”, so you suppose engineering a row between the leader and party activists won’t look like that? You say “reaching out to the public”, and the way to do that is to piss off those who do that on the ground?

You say this debate is “self-indulgent navel gazing”, no, I disagree, it is fundamental that we get this right, and I feel passionate that you are getting it wrong. I can see our party losing put because we have lost our edge, we are seen as just another bunch of that alien race of “politicians”, evil people cut off from real life. We have to change that, and the way we can change it is by radically altering the way we do things, so that there is much more emphasis on us being a movement emerging from ordinary people and going upwards. It is my belief that this is how politics can and should be that makes me a liberal.

On that we must disagree, I would suggest the best informed are those seeking the widest range of good quality independent sources.

Relying only on the wisdom of activists, representing only a small number of liberal democrat supporters in the small number of areas where the liberal democrats are active, and claiming that to be the best quality political information available, such that all other sources should be ignored or treated as suspicious is frankly silly…

If you don’t agree I suggest you compare the accuracy of our canvass returns with those of professional opinion polls as to who gets closer to real election results, and also maybe ask youself why companies spend millions on professional research techniques before launching products rather than just ringing up six people who ‘really get it’ from their own sales force.

I didn’t get your debate point, the inference is your own, but on leadership, the prime goal of the Leader of the Liberal Democrat Party is to lead that party to form a Liberal Democrat Government and represent it as Prime Minister, it is not chairing internal policy debates, for that we have the FPC.

You may though be right that there are times when a more consensual leadership style (e.g. Kennedy) is useful in advancing the party united towards that goal. However the big snags with consensus are two-fold. First not all positions can be reconciled, sometimes one side or another will lose and fudging can be worse than a decision either way.

Second internal consensus is just that, it ignores the views of those currently outside the tent who might want to come in. Such exercises can just look like self-indulgent naval gazing… rather than reaching out to the public… much like this debate really…

Nor do I agree with “if leading activists and the leadership never fell out or there were no fierce debates in the party, we’d either never change or never have anything worth changing”. That would suppose the only way we could change is the leadership imposing change on activists against their will, or vice versa.

Of course if the party is to develop there must be fierce debates, but you seem to be suggesting those debates must always be between the leader and leading activists, and the leader must always be right because he knows better.

I would prefer leader and activists to be working together. There are times when a leader needs to seize the initiative and make proposals. There are times when a leader needs to inform the party from his/her own position within Parliament what will work there and what won’t. But a good leader will know a big part of his/her job is to listen and present and be the champion of those who put him/her there. If there are arguments within the party, s/he should be careful not to be overwhlemingly one one side, but to listen to both, to advise maybe, but in the end to be willing to take up whatever is clearly the party membership’s majority position. Or resign if s/he really disagrees with it. The leader is our servant and not vice versa.

If we start off in a position of mistrust where the leader feels it’s his/her job to “take on” the activists, that activists are strange people whose views will generally be the opposite to what ordinary people want as shown in polls, then we are on a losing streak.

Just to clarify, the point about the Nazis was not on holocaust denial, but the rather more tongue-in-cheek Godwin’s Law and its various corollaries.

I hope my point was that it’s important to get a balance, clearly there is a spectrum of postions between ‘only listening to activists’ and ‘only reading polls’

The issue facing us as we grow though is we need to get dramatically better at the latter without letting the former slide.

As to macho posturing… well again there needs to be a balance… if leading activists and the leadership never fell out or there were no fierce debates in the party, we’d either never change or never have anything worth changing. Thankfully we are not that parorchial.

When you say “there is nothing special about Lib Dems” in regard to “ear to the ground”, you are wrong. As I pointed out, circumstances forced our party to develop by having a better ear to the ground than the others. Where we had it we prospered, where we didn’t, we didn’t. Darwinian evolution means those who have got it right have survived. I am not calling for mindless activism or cynical canvassing, far from it, I have always been quite opposed to that stuff. But I am saying it is a virtue that we have developed a cadre of activists who have come up that way, and for the leadership and those who are close to them to dismiss those activists in the macho “take them on” attitude is to throw away a huge asset.

I agree there is nothing particular about the Liberal Democrats in ideological terms which makes “ear to the ground” uniquely ours. You are quite right that the BNP also use it. We should be really scared if we lose it, and they gain it and develop it. When I have seen some of the BNP’s stuff which is less obviously racist, I may find the underlying message loathsome, but I can see why it works.

When you say “the bulk of politician to public contact is either so brief as to be misleading, or through case-work which provides an entirely distorted and extreme view of the problems local people face” that is an indictment on the whole political system. It SHOULDN’T be like that. The whole point of mass political parties is that politicians emerge from ordinary people, they don’t come from a separate caste of aristocrats who never have contact with the masses. Sure, surveys and polls and research and thinking and discussion are all important for a rounded politician, but life experience and a continued contact with ordinary life is essential. I hope by “politican” you mean MPs and not all of us who are members of the party, otherwise we’re doomed. As Dan says, the problem is ordinary people believe that politicians live in a “Westminster bubble”, or as I’ve put it, that they are an alien race imposed on us. We MUST break that, otherwise we WILL lose to those who are surer in their feeling for life on the street, and I am very afraid one day that will be the BNP or some cleaned up equivalent. MPs and others high up in politics can be kept on the ground and informed and sure about what works if we have a political system where they are kept in touch with, accountable to and scrutinised by, ordinary people who are members of the party.

I wouldn’t be so dismissive about “the party’s amateurism”. If this means an image and way of presenting itself which is refreshingly different from the convention, it may well work. Indeed, the old community politics movement got very good at this – managing to produce literature which looked like it was produced by amateurs (so the punters thought “hey, look, these are people just like us”), but was actually to a format very carefully developed and nationally co-ordinated. Don’t dismiss that way of development just because it isn’t conventional, this is, as you management types like to say, “thinking out of the box” isn’t it? Look, as an analogy, at the way the evangelical house-church Christian movement is booming while the big mainstream denominations are plummeting.

I’m not meaning by this that we should reject ideology. Of course we should have a clear image about what we are for, and I agree that is essential for building core support and attracting reliable activists who will stay with us. I’m also very well aware of the dangers of literature designed cynically to appeal to the lowest common denominator in order to win votes – to the point where I walked out of participation in one recent by-election (Bromley and Chislehurst) because I felt our literature went too far that way. All I’m saying is don’t take the attitude that the only thing that counts is a glossy national image, and that party activists are people who must be “taken on” rather than listened to.

But of course, that was because the Lib Dem vote dropped slightly (by 1%) but the Tory vote dropped by 11%.

As things stand now the Tory vote is up by something like 6% since last time. That’s much more favourable to the Lib Dems than a few months ago, but with the Lib Dem vote down by something like 7% many Lib Dem seats are going to be under severe threat from the Tories.

On the basis of my _initials_??

In any case, if you think I’m a Tory you obviously haven’t read many of my posts. But, to be fair, you’re far from the first person who has found it convenient to yell “Tory Troll!” when he’s read something he doesn’t like.

And even Stockholm has its racial problems. I wouldn’t recommend too many Arabs hanging around Solna just after AIK have lost at home.

London may have its problem areas but on the whole it’s a pretty welcoming place, which is one of the reasons why foreigners flock her in droves to work.

I’m not sure I see how that follows. Or is it your intention that the Liberal Democrats just follow, meekly behind prevailing trends rather than speaking up for what they believe.

There may be debate within the party about what our policy should be, but citing the errors of Labour governments is hardly reason for shutting down Lib Dem options.

Matthew Huntbach is spot on. The fundamental problem with the party leadership (and particularly those advising it) is that they exist in the Westminster bubble – they need to get out more and end the ridiculous fixation with macho posturing. Voters are fed up with this type of politics and want to hear coherent, well argued solutions – not quick fix ‘positions’ designed by so called PR ‘specialists’ to maximise media coverage for 24 hours.