Author Archives: Charles Dundas and Julian Tandy

It’s time to practice what we preach

By Charles Dundas and Julian Tandy | Wed 12th February 2025 - 12:30 pm

Headshot of Julian TandyIt’s not often a motion comes along to Federal conference that is actually about true Federalism. Federalism is a concept synonymous with the Lib Dems. We campaign for it at a national level and we practice what we preach when it comes to the internal organisation of the party. Or do we? There’s a motion coming to Harrogate conference in March which addresses this for candidates – and we are delighted that it points towards a much more progressive and federal approach to how the party operates..

As those responsible for overseeing the approval and selection of Westminster candidates in our respective States – Scotland and Wales – we added our names to support the motion (F10) to implement the lessons of the General Election Review.

You can read the candidates motion here.

For us, this motion is about three key things:

Getting Federalism right for the three States

It gives the three States an equal seat at the table when it comes to setting Westminster candidate selection rules and procedures. Rather than Scotland and Wales being treated as the poor relations expected to follow wherever England goes, all three States will have parity in decision-making, reflecting the views of our respective State committees in Joint State meetings to collectively decide the way forward. This is exactly how Federalism should work – State parity and democratic accountability to members through conference of our processes and procedures.

Diversity and equality

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , , , , and | 16 Comments
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