Category Archives: Conference

Anything relating to the spring or autumn conferences

Someone likes Liberal Democrat conference…

By Mark Pack | Sun 2nd October 2011 - 9:50 am

Any Conservative, including Iain Dale who attends the Liberal Democrat conference, remarks how impressed they are with the mere fact the conference is where party members openly and robustly confer on policy. The exhibition stands at the Liberal Democrat conference include dozens of party groups as well as the recent deluge of large companies and organisations desperate to suck up to the party they’ve proudly ignored until now. The agenda for conference is focused on policy papers with speeches for and against where the party leadership will frequently get involved in the

…

Tagged gareth knight and iain dale | Leave a comment

Opinion: Catching the Liberal Democrat conference bug

By Paul Childs | Sun 25th September 2011 - 9:40 am

When I first decided to go to Liberal Democrat Conference last autumn, I have to admit I was a little swayed by it being in my home town, but being a Federal Conference First Timer I did have concerns about not knowing anyone. Luckily, a friend who is also a conference veteran (at both LibDem and Labour I must add) took me under his wing and even humored me when going to training sessions.

I also met up with some people in both Liverpool and Glasgow and managed to bend their ears about issues, as well as adding new and interesting …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged erica kemp, nick clegg, paddy ashdown and tim farron | 2 Comments

Conference has invigorated the party!

By Kelly-Marie Blundell | Sat 24th September 2011 - 6:55 pm

Liberal Democrats at grassroots level across the country had been suffering since our landslide defeat in local elections and the defeat of the Alternative Vote referendum in May 2011. This has led, I believe, to a reduction in political engagement across the party at a local and national level.

That is why the autumn conference was both an opportunity to look to the future, and to celebrate Liberal Democratic core values and successes within the Coalition. Phoenixes of a feather flocked together in Birmingham last week, and immediately campaigners felt more at ease and more positive.

Despite valid concerns about levels …

10 Comments

Opinion: Who will keep us safe from the men in black with big guns?

By Maureen Rigg | Sat 24th September 2011 - 4:55 pm

Party conferences are different when you’re in government as we found out at Liverpool last year. I didn’t go to Sheffield in spring but I heard from good friends that some of the demonstrators there were very aggressive and made it difficult for people with mobility problems to safely access the conference.

This year at Birmingham I saw something new again – machine guns being carried by police outside the conference. This wasn’t by officers patrolling the streets outside the secure zone. No, it was inside, where people had already come past 3 separate checks that …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged birmingham 2011 conference | 14 Comments

A messaging mess: what Liberal Democrats are achieving in government

By Mark Pack | Fri 23rd September 2011 - 11:55 am

As I wrote in the immediate aftermath of Nick Clegg’s conference speech, the party was much better at saying what it was not and what it was against – not the Conservatives, not unhappy, against tax cheats, against overpaid under-performing company directors and so on – than what it was for.

In theory the answer should have been found in the conference packs handed out to people on arrival at the Birmingham ICC, for inside them was not only an “In government – on your side” leaflet but also three others from different Liberal Democrat ministers, all promoting the party’s …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged chris huhne, ed davey, featured, lynne featherstone, nick clegg, paul burstow and vince cable | 14 Comments

The most striking statistic from Liberal Democrat conference

By Mark Pack | Thu 22nd September 2011 - 8:50 am

Steve Webb, speaking to Lib Dem conference:

I found out that I was, indeed, the 11th different pensions minister in the last 14 years.

Tagged pensions and steve webb | 2 Comments

What Lib Dem bloggers and tweeters have said about Nick’s speech

By Stephen Tall | Wed 21st September 2011 - 5:59 pm

There’s always a bit of an irony with blogging and party conferences — at the time when the media are most looking for reaction from activists to the leader’s speech most of them are hot-footing it to the train station to return to their normal lives outside the conference bubble.

However, a few Lib Dems have had chance to put finger to keyboard in response to Nick Clegg’s address to close the Liberal Democrat conference in Birmingham. Here are those I’ve spotted so far on the Aggregator…

Go back to your constituencies and prepare for the long haul…

…

Tagged birmingham 2011 conference and nick clegg | 16 Comments

Nick Clegg’s speech to LibDem Conference

By Mark Pack | Wed 21st September 2011 - 3:51 pm

During Liberal Democrat conference someone watching it from home texted me: “I now know what the Lib Dems are against – bankers, top rate taxpayers, tax cheats generally, overpaid directors and energy companies But, with the single exception of gay marriage, I’ve got no idea what the Lib Dems are for.”

Some will – rightly – quibble over the ‘against’ list in that but the essential point is a fair one. Liberal Democrat conference has been a lot about what won’t happen or isn’t the case: the coalition isn’t going to end early, the Liberal Democrats are not the same as …

Tagged collette dunkley, featured, lord mcnally, lynne featherstone, nick clegg, social mobility, vince cable and william gladstone | 16 Comments

Steve Webb’s speech to the Liberal Democrat conference

By Steve Webb MP | Wed 21st September 2011 - 9:25 am

The other day, someone came up to me and said:

“Steve, you’re an above-average pensions minister!”

In a world where praise can be a bit hard to come by, I took that as a compliment.

But he quickly said:

“No, I didn’t mean that you’re good at your job, I meant you’ve survived longer than most pension ministers!”

And when I inquired, I found out that I was, indeed, the 11th different pensions minister in the last 14 years.

So it is hardly suprising that pensions policy has been a bit piecemeal and messy over the years.

Every change with the best of intentions, but put it …

Tagged disability living allowance and pensions | 5 Comments

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Tuesday/Wednesday

By Mark Pack | Wed 21st September 2011 - 8:17 am

What happened on Tuesday in Birmingham at Liberal Democrat conference and what to watch out for today, Wednesday:

Tagged chris huhne, richard flowers and steve webb | Leave a comment

Chris Huhne’s speech to Liberal Democrat conference

By Chris Huhne MP | Tue 20th September 2011 - 10:47 pm

One abiding set of values that all Liberal Democrats share is a respect for our environment, natural systems and sustainability.

With this conference’s backing, we will hold course to be the greenest government ever.

No more, no less.

But are we still on course?

Well, I can hardly pick up a Tory paper these days without a whinge about energy and climate change policies.

It’s been nip and tuck between Vince and me in recent months to win an unpopularity poll – that’s on Conservativehome among Tory activists.

So as we assert Lib Dem values within government, we must be doing something right – or is …

Vince Cable does gloom

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th September 2011 - 4:25 pm

The public’s attitude towards gloomy politicians is a curious one: only too happy to mock politicians who only talk up the positive but also frequently going off politicians who talk up the negatives. It happens across all parties, as we saw in the last Parliament where both Alistair Darling and George Osborne tried talking gloomily about the country’s economic difficulties and, far from being met by public support for their frankness, saw widespread criticism and slipping poll ratings. Journalists may love knocking politicians for not having been gloomier during the 2010 general election, but all the nearly all the signs …

Tagged alistair darling, george osborne and vince cable | 3 Comments

The significant part of Tim Farron’s speech

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th September 2011 - 12:55 pm

Tim Farron is probably the Parliamentary Party’s best funny speech maker (though I’d pay good money to see him head-to-head in a laugh off with Alistair Carmichael), so it’s not a surprise that Tim’s speech to Liberal Democrat conference caught the headlines mostly for his humour and his stress-testing of political marriage analogies to destruction.

Yet there was a significant section about how Liberal Democrat ministers act and his own role:

There are 18 Liberal Democrats who don’t have the luxuries that I do.

They can’t just sound off if they don’t like government policy or trot through the no lobby on

…

Tagged Alistair Carmichael, Danny Alexander, george osborne, michael gove, sarah teather, tim farron and vince cable | 4 Comments

Opinion: I’d rather be boring than bonkers

By Tom Papworth | Tue 20th September 2011 - 9:35 am

Monday night’s Channel 4’s coverage of the Liberal Democrat conference ended with Michael Crick interviewing Ann Treneman and Michael White about the general feel amongst Lib Dems.

Among the usual sniping from a reactionary sketch-writer and the doyen of the urban intellectual elite came a lament that the Liberal Democrat conference did not feel like a Liberal Democrat conference. People were too on message, they moaned; there was not enough rebellion; nor enough eccentricity. Michael White in particular bemoaned the absence of beards and sandals. Lib Dem conference, they felt, had become boring.

Too right.

We are not in the 1970s, when …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged ann treneman, birmingham 2011 conference, michael crick and michael white | 23 Comments

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Monday/Tuesday

By Mark Pack | Tue 20th September 2011 - 7:19 am

What happened on Monday in Birmingham at Liberal Democrat conference and what to watch out for today, Tuesday:

Tagged chris huhne, steve webb and vince cable | 1 Comment

LDVideo at Conference | Clegg & Cable on the economy; Andrew Neil’s take on the conference; and the power of Lib Dem conference reps

By Stephen Tall | Tue 20th September 2011 - 7:10 am

At Birmingham and so missing out on how the Lib Dem conference is being reported? Not at Birmingham and so missing out on seeing Lib Dem MPs and government ministers up close and personal? We hope these videos will help re-connect you…

Clegg welcomes Jaguar jobs boost; Cable warns of economic equivalent of war

(Available on the BBC website here.)

Andrew Neil’s Liberal Democrat conference report

Also posted in YouTube | Tagged andrew neil, birmingham 2011 conference, nick clegg and vince cable | Leave a comment

“All-Women Shortlists May Be Necessary, Senior Lib Dems Accept”

By Mark Pack | Mon 19th September 2011 - 10:23 pm

So reports the Huffington Post:

Senior Liberal Democrats have accepted that the party may need to resort to all-female shortlists or other tough measures to increase the representation of women and minority groups among its MPs…

Tim Farron MP … said that he was “utterly embarrassed” that only seven of the party’s MPs were women.

He said:

“Over the years we’ve had several debates on the crushing lack of women in the House of Commons, and our zero lack of representation from black and ethnic minority communities, and the debates we’ve always had are about the practical way to create equality and the

…

Tagged all-women shortlists, equalities, gender balance, paddy ashdown and tim farron | 20 Comments

Jo Swinson MP writes: Quality of Life – A New Purpose for Politics

By Jo Swinson MP | Mon 19th September 2011 - 8:27 pm

Decade on decade, the UK has been getting richer. For the most part, people today are materially considerably better off than they were back in the 1970s; however, statistics stretching back all those years show that our satisfaction with our lives has barely improved. We have more money and we’re pumping out more carbon emissions – but we don’t appear to be getting much pay-off for our own wellbeing.

Fortunately, the Liberal Democrats have recognised this problem.

For over two years, a working group has been studying the evidence to see whether Government can actually do anything to set us on a …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged Quality of life | 5 Comments

Vince Cable’s speech to LibDem conference

By Vince Cable | Mon 19th September 2011 - 4:39 pm

You can watch Vince’s speech to the Lib Dem conference here…

(Available on the BBC website here.)

Or you can read the text in full here…

Tagged david willetts, ed balls, ed davey, gordon brown and vince cable | 1 Comment

Poverty and achievement: breaking the link – Sarah Teather’s speech to conference

By Sarah Teather | Mon 19th September 2011 - 3:50 pm

Sarah Teather, Liberal Democrat Minister of State for Children and Families, gave this speech yesterday to Liberal Democrat conference:

“Education… beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of men, the balance-wheel of the social machinery.“

The quote is from HoraceMann, the great 19th century American reformer. But it speaks to the instincts of liberals here with as much resonance as then.

The scandal is that though it should be true, it isn’t.

You will hear many people talk this week about the shocking state of the nation’s finances that was Labour’s legacy. I want to talk about another …

Tagged dan rogerson, ed davey, gerald vernon jackson, James Kempton, Joan Walmsley, pupil premium, simon wright and tessa munt | 2 Comments

LDVideo at Conference | Hugh Grant, Nick Clegg and Party Animals

By Stephen Tall | Mon 19th September 2011 - 10:45 am

Hugh Grant presses phone hacking issue at Lib Dem conference

(Available on the BBC website here.)

Don’t forget our LDV caption competition — Nick Clegg meets Hugh Grant — is still open for entries…

Nick Clegg: Immoral to drop 50p tax

Also posted in YouTube | Tagged birmingham 2011 conference, hugh grant and nick clegg | Leave a comment

LibDem Conference passes drugs motion

By The Voice | Mon 19th September 2011 - 10:15 am

From a party press release:

Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference passed Protecting Individuals and Communities from Drug Harms, which calls for an independent panel to review current drug laws.

Commenting, Co-Chair of the Home Affairs Parliamentary Party Committee, Tom Brake MP said:

“Drugs can have a devastating impact on individuals and families and can fuel organised crime. Evidence shows that our current drug policy is costly, ineffective and it is the poor and marginalised who suffer most.

“Today, Liberal Democrats reaffirmed our support for an evidenced based drugs policy, calling for an independent panel to review current drug laws.

“We want to ensure the Government …

Also posted in News | Tagged drugs and tom brake | 6 Comments

Did you miss Tim Farron’s speech? Catch up with it (and the reaction) here…

By The Voice | Mon 19th September 2011 - 9:55 am

Lib Dem party president Tim Farron’s conference speeches have quickly established themselves as must-see events: bluntly honest and genuinely funny, Tim always gets a reaction. And not just from Lib Dem conference-goers if the media reaction is anything to go by…

Coalition divorce inevitable, says Lib Dem Tim Farron (BBC)
Tim Farron lining up as post-election nuclear wasteland candidate (Guardian)
Lib Dem president Tim Farron calls for Nick Clegg to pull plug on coalition with Tories (Mirror)
Farron brings the hall to its feet (Spectator)

If you missed Tim’s speech you can catch up with it here. Full text follows…

Tagged birmingham 2011 conference and tim farron | 7 Comments

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Sunday/Monday

By Mark Pack | Mon 19th September 2011 - 8:21 am

What happened on Sunday in Birmingham at Liberal Democrat conference and what to watch out for today, Monday:

Tagged drugs, ed davey, norman baker, tim farron and vince cable | Leave a comment

Opinion: Why I’m supporting creators but opposing the Digital Economy Act

By Chris White | Mon 19th September 2011 - 7:55 am

Kevin (not his real name) drives his son Danny to the shops. Danny pops in and emerges with various items in a bag, for which he has paid. In his pocket there is a packet of biscuits which he trousered while collecting the other items. CCTV spots the fact that he has done it and he is prosecuted for shoplifting.

A few weeks later, Kevin’s garage makes contact and says that the Government has issued an order that he take his car into the garage to be adjusted so that it can do no more than 30 miles per hour. He …

Also posted in Op-eds | Tagged digital economy act | 10 Comments

Monday, 9am looks rather interesting: Liberal Democrat conference

By Mark Pack | Sun 18th September 2011 - 3:08 pm

On matters of policy and strategy, the Liberal Democrat conference is turning out to be rather more good-natured and unified than journalists were expecting/hoping (as Sky’s Sophy Ridge has had the grace to admit).

When it comes to matters of party business, however, there is rather more spark than usual. It’s not only the attempt to suspend standing orders – related to how the NHS is being discussed at conference – or the passing of a critical motion about the security checks for conference this morning.

There has also been a noticeable surge in questions to party committee and two pieces …

Also posted in Party policy and internal matters | Tagged sophy ridge | 2 Comments

LDVideo | Nick Clegg rallies conference, Danny Alexander clamps down on tax evasion

By Stephen Tall | Sun 18th September 2011 - 12:10 pm

Whether you’re one of the thousands of Lib Dem members busy at this year’s conference, or you’re one of those (like me) who’re having to sit this one out, Lib Dem Voice will try and make sure you don’t miss out on the action. Here’s how Day 1 of the party conference has been making news…

Nick Clegg: Lib Dems ‘imposing will’ on government

(Also available on the BBC website here.)

Danny Alexander: We need to make sure tax is paid

Also posted in YouTube | Tagged birmingham 2011 conference, Danny Alexander and nick clegg | 5 Comments

Nick Clegg’s speech to the Liberal Democrats conference rally

By Nick Clegg MP | Sat 17th September 2011 - 8:30 pm

Welcome to Birmingham, a city with a great, outspoken liberal tradition. The home of Joe Chamberlain, where Gladstone called for Home Rule in one of the most rousing speeches of his life, and where Lloyd George nearly lost his life when he spoke out against the Boer War. Now it’s the home of those great modern day, outspoken liberals – John Hemming and Lorely Burt.

I have spent the last few weeks criss-crossing the country, speaking to as many of you as possible, hearing your concerns and answering your questions. We did what Lib Dems do: discussed, debated, argued – …

Tagged andrew reeves, chris fox, chris lucas, john hemming and lorely burt | 3 Comments

Op-eds

Josh Babarinde writes…The Lib Dem Summer of Strategy (Josh Babarinde)
Mathew on Monday: “We need to be bold” (Mathew Hulbert)
As a party we must be better defined for the 2029 general election (Chris Bowers)
From national averages to local realities: inequality in our communities (Tom Walker)
We do have a two tier system, Part 2 (Neil Hickman)

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Josh Babarinde writes…The Lib Dem Summer of Strategy

Alison Suttie writes: Thank you to our volunteers

What’s going on with party strategy?

A strange but welcome feeling

Category Archives: Conference

Someone likes Liberal Democrat conference…

Opinion: Catching the Liberal Democrat conference bug

Conference has invigorated the party!

Opinion: Who will keep us safe from the men in black with big guns?

A messaging mess: what Liberal Democrats are achieving in government

The most striking statistic from Liberal Democrat conference

What Lib Dem bloggers and tweeters have said about Nick’s speech

Steve Webb’s speech to the Liberal Democrat conference

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Tuesday/Wednesday

Chris Huhne’s speech to Liberal Democrat conference

Vince Cable does gloom

The significant part of Tim Farron’s speech

Opinion: I’d rather be boring than bonkers

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Monday/Tuesday

LDVideo at Conference | Clegg & Cable on the economy; Andrew Neil’s take on the conference; and the power of Lib Dem conference reps

“All-Women Shortlists May Be Necessary, Senior Lib Dems Accept”

Jo Swinson MP writes: Quality of Life – A New Purpose for Politics

Vince Cable’s speech to LibDem conference

Poverty and achievement: breaking the link – Sarah Teather’s speech to conference

LDVideo at Conference | Hugh Grant, Nick Clegg and Party Animals

LibDem Conference passes drugs motion

Did you miss Tim Farron’s speech? Catch up with it (and the reaction) here…

Liberal Democrats Conference round-up and preview: Sunday/Monday

Opinion: Why I’m supporting creators but opposing the Digital Economy Act

Monday, 9am looks rather interesting: Liberal Democrat conference

LDVideo | Nick Clegg rallies conference, Danny Alexander clamps down on tax evasion

Nick Clegg’s speech to the Liberal Democrats conference rally

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Josh Babarinde writes…The Lib Dem Summer of Strategy

Alison Suttie writes: Thank you to our volunteers

What’s going on with party strategy?

A strange but welcome feeling

Category Archives: Conference

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