Author Archives: Roderick Lynch

Roderick Lynch

Alderdice, Thornhill and Turner spoke. Were you listening?

By Roderick Lynch | Fri 15th May 2026 - 9:01 am

I read Rob Blackie’s post on Tuesday. Well written, but none of this is new. The difference now is that the warning lights are flashing everywhere, especially in London.

Let’s tell it straight. The party has a serious problem in urban Britain, and pretending otherwise will only make it worse.

We keep branding the Greens as “extreme” because they are attracting attention and energy we can currently only dream about in many inner-city areas. The Greens spoke to communities in plain English. One word summed up their offer: change.

Meanwhile, too often we sound cautious, managerial, and disconnected, speaking largely to the same narrow demographic. That is not enough in modern London.

What struck me most during the recent elections was the diversity of Green candidates across London, particularly in Lambeth, Southwark, and Lewisham. They looked like the communities they wanted to represent. That matters. Representation matters. Visibility matters. Engagement matters.

The 2020 General Election Review led by Baroness Thornhill could not have been clearer. It warned that failure to genuinely engage minority communities would eventually cost the party dearly at the ballot box. Yet years later, in too many boroughs, we still concentrate activity almost exclusively in affluent white areas. Tower Hamlets and Kensington & Chelsea are obvious examples where we have only campaigned in the more prosperous wards.

At the same time, we have the usual keyboard strategists insisting we can win here or there while effectively bypassing large sections of the non-white vote. It is an omni-shambles when viewed across the major cities.

Lord Woolley of Operation Black Vote said over a decade ago that if Black and brown communities were better organised and recognised the collective value of their vote, they could reshape the outcome of numerous elections. The Greens understood that. They listened. Then they acted on it across London and other urban centres.

Now some people call the Greens “extreme” for doing what every serious political party should do organise, engage, and include.

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Roderick Lynch

Britain is adrift, and the silence is deafening

By Roderick Lynch | Tue 20th May 2025 - 5:32 pm
I didn’t plan to write this. I’ve just come through an intensive weekend, much of it spent in hospital. And it’s from my bed, in the quiet hours between the beeping monitors and the routine checks, that I’ve had time to reflect not just on health, but on the health of this country. This is after I have witnessed two Filipino nurses spoken to and treated like something under a shoe. They did not deserve to be racially embarrassed in public, simply for stating they finished their shift three hours ago.

Racism in Britain isn’t always loud. It’s often quiet, strategic, systemic. It’s in the job you don’t get. The voice you’re asked to lower. The opportunities that somehow never arrive. I’ve seen it play out in boardrooms and back rooms, on doorsteps and in data. And I’ve watched how it’s brushed aside by a political class that either doesn’t care, or pretends not to see it.
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Roderick Lynch

Spring conference fringe: Building a more diverse and representative party

By Roderick Lynch | Tue 18th March 2025 - 9:05 am

The Liberal Democrat Campaign for Race Equality are taking active steps to ensure greater diversity within the party, both in its membership and among its candidates. This is about engaging with communities we haven’t spoken to before and breaking down barriers that have historically limited representation.

Why is this important?

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Roderick Lynch

Abuse victims to get chance of legal redress

By Roderick Lynch | Wed 5th February 2025 - 4:17 pm

Today I’m proud of the work I have been doing for the unheard, marginalised ignored and abused members of our society. Read on.

During the last few years I have admired the work of Shirley Oaks Survivors Association (SOSA).

They represented hundreds of people who were abused whilst in the care of Lambeth Council.

SOSA was able to get over £140m from Lambeth Council in compensation paid to those affected by the Shirley Oaks abuse scandal.

I sat and listened to the stories of those affected by sexual abuse. A friend of mine told me at the age of 35, that he was abused by one of our teachers at school, one by one others came forward. I felt pig sick that I never knew anything about it. They suffered in silence.

I was determined that people who committed crimes like this should not hide any longer.

Working with SOSA in their endeavour to get the 3 year time bar status lifted was time consuming, however, made easier by knowing that perpetrators could no longer hide behind the three year rule.

Those police officers involved in avoiding justice and the families who were kept out of the Lambeth legal redress scheme can now have their day in civil court.

Whilst I must thank the hard work of Dr Raymond Stevenson & Ms Lucia Hinton of SOSA, it has been a cross Party affair.

The agenda is not pretty or fashionable, a lot of people stay clear of it, however, when you know close friends who have been abused and not been able to communicate it to you for over 20-25 years it focuses your mind.

I must also thank other people that made this ground breaking day happen:

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Roderick Lynch

Alderdice 6 years on: Where are we now? Join LDCRE at Conference

By Roderick Lynch | Tue 10th September 2024 - 2:06 pm

The Liberal Democrat Campaign for Racial Equality will be holding a very important fringe meeting  on Sunday 15th September at 7:45 pm in room 1D in the Brighton Centre.

We will be discussing progress on implementing the Alderdice Review, six years after it was published.

The event is being held in association with Liberator and the Social Liberal Forum.

The speakers are:

Dr Mark Pack, Party President

Meral Hussein Ece, Lib Dem member of the House of Lords

Rt Hon Sir Vincent Cable , former Lib Dem Leader

Janice Turner

Victoria Collins MP

As a young black man born and raised in the London Borough of Southwark. I came to the Liberal Democrats via Jonathon & Veronica Hunt and Sir Simon Hughes. I had issues around my business. My company was a a victim of alleged fraud. My company the third largest employer in my borough behind Southwark council and Kings College Health Care Trust  employing 800 people and completing 10,000 trips for disabled people every day across 26 London Boroughs.

Those remarkable Lib Dem MPs councillors and activist took up my case and I won back my contract that my company had won in a bonafide OJEU tender process which had been illegally removed.

I was hooked, those Lib Dem people I came in to contact with I believed spoke for me. I joined the Lib Dems in Southwark over 22 years ago.

As time went on I got involved in an  equality SAO / AO because our local party  did not look like the people the party wished to represent.

I was determined to do something about it. I spoke with former Lib Dem Leader Nick Clegg in 2009. He told me that we will do something about the lack of race equality in this party. We need to be quick as we could be seen to be “worse than the Tories.”

Well we have seen the Cameron A list in all their glory at dizzying heights in the Conservative Party and in government.

In 2018 I had my arm twisted by Merlene Toh Emerson to do something on race equality within the party. I became the founding Chair of LDCRE along with Vice Chairs Janice Turner and Dr Mohsin Khan.

We welcomed a review that was being carried out Lord John Alderdice. A lot of my colleagues did not have any faith in the process whatsoever. I persuaded my then colleagues to give the man a chance.

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Roderick Lynch

Celebrating Windrush 75th Anniversary

By Roderick Lynch | Fri 23rd June 2023 - 1:57 pm

From left: William Houngbo, Cllr Rachel Bentley, Bishop of Southwark, Roderick Lynch and Sir Simon Hughes at the  service at Southwark Cathedral

I commend Lib Dem Diversity Leader William Houngbo for putting on an event in Parliament (Floella Benjamin marks Windrush Day with event in Parliament) with Nicole Turner, the Diversity Manager from LD HQ.

Baroness Benjamin, a Liberal Democrat, gave an emotional yet powerful speech. She is a true Windrush veteran with an evil wicked racist story to tell; a story that moved me to tears.

Floella told members of the black business community the benefits of becoming a member or a supporter of the Liberal Democrats. I concur with all what she had said. However, where I depart from what was rightly glowingly said, I am scornful of the lack of engagement with the minority communities across the United Kingdom, especially the black community.

Members of the black community are looking for a political home, they need an alternative. We as a party are not engaging with them in meaningful numbers.

Lord John Alderdice and Baroness Dorothy Thornhill chaired two recent reviews, and recommendations were made. What has happened since then? You tell me if you have taken on board any of those recommendations locally. Somehow, after listening to the chatter of some of the party  activists, I don’t think so.

If we wish to look like the people we wish to represent then we also have to talk and listen to them.

The General Election Review of 2019 had 240 submissions and after the reading of 22,000 emails it was quite clear from the responses that lack of engaging with the minority communities is costing us dearly at the ballot box. That came across loud and clear.

The 75th Windrush Anniversary has shown the contribution that Afro-Caribbean people have made to the United Kingdom since the Empire Windrush Docked at Tilbury Docks in 1948.

The King and Queen have shown what engagement with the black community means by attending various events..

Numerous events across the U.K. have been held in commemoration of the Windrush black community.  What has been our official input? – none. Or nothing I’m aware of.

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Roderick Lynch

Will our next leader demand all-BAME shortlists? Ask them, at the Race Equality Hustings

By Roderick Lynch | Thu 30th July 2020 - 12:29 pm

In 2016, after decades of blocking all-Women shortlists (while doing little else that worked), the party finally caved in and accepted reality. All-Women shortlists work, we didn’t have enough women MPs, and so we resolved to use all-Women shortlists.

Nobody today could reasonably claim it didn’t work – the parliamentary party is chock-full of excellent women MPs, and with them came the shared experiences of 50% of the country that we didn’t have before. Our party is truly, deeply, better for the diversity they bring to the table.

So why aren’t we now demanding the same for BAME people? A question for the candidates, maybe.

The reality is that the party did agree to do this. In that same motion, we resolved to:

Campaign to amend the Equality Act 2010 to remove the restrictions on shortlists for candidate selections for people from under-represented groups.

No matter – while we wring our hands, Labour are now taking a lead. Sir Keir Starmer is demanding all-BAME shortlists, and he seems determined to bring his party with him. Is our next leader going to honour Conference, and stand up for race equality, by working with him on this?

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Roderick Lynch

Announcing the Liberal Democrat Campaign for Race Equality

By Roderick Lynch | Fri 13th April 2018 - 3:49 pm

Saturday 9th June is the day when a new campaign to end racial disadvantage within the Party begins. It will replace Ethnic Minority Liberal Democrats and operate as the Liberal Democrat Campaign for Race Equality.

This move has been inspired to some extent by the work done by Lord John Alderdice which states starkly that the Party has so far failed to properly ensure that it is representative of all the racial groups in our country. The new name demonstrates a new sense of purpose and direction and gives a clear indication that the organisation welcomes membership from everyone in the party who recognises that more needs to be done to enable the party to reflect the diversity of our communities at every level.

For those of us – and there are many in the party – who have spent decades campaigning against racism, it is shocking to comprehend that what we are still fighting to achieve, in the year 2018, is genuine equal opportunity and integration.

As the Alderdice Report points out, there is much to be done at every level in the party to make the organisation more inclusive and bring in a diverse new generation of activists. Tomorrow’s leadership is created from today’s new recruits and so we intend to create a positive plan to assist local parties in diverse areas to reach out to communities that are currently under-represented. We will be keen to talk to successful, integrated local parties to distil their experience.

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