By Stephen Tall
| Tue 22nd September 2009 - 12:25 pm
Over the last few days I’ve been uploading the results from Lib Dem Voice’s members’ survey, completed by c.250 party members – you can catch up on the results published to date by clicking here.
The survey was conducted in association with the Institute of Public Policy Research (ippr) in advance of today’s lunchtime fringe, The end of politics as we know it?. Full details here:
Liberal Democrats Conference: The end of politics as we know it?
22 September 2009 –
13.00-14.00
Dorchester One room, Marriott Highcliff Hotel
Here are the three main lines promoted by the party from conference to the media in the last 24 hours:
Liberal Democrat Autumn Conference unveils plans to increase the pay of Britain’s lowest-earning troops by £6,000, improve the condition of forces’ housing, and ensure proper medical provision for all personnel. The proposals, which would mean that no service personnel in the Army, Navy or RAF would receive less basic annual pay than a new-entrant police constable or development-level firefighter, would be funded within the MoD’s existing budget.
Liberal Democrat Conference has demanded an independent, public inquiry into allegations of British Government complicity in
By Alex Wilcock
| Tue 22nd September 2009 - 9:27 am
Bournemouth 2009’s big dust-up hurtles towards us on Tuesday morning – the debate on A Fresh Start For Britain: Choosing a Different, Better Future. And, as is ever the case when a paper taking the whole of our policy and priorities in the round comes up for debate, rather than taking in the big picture, everyone’s focused on just one relatively tiny issue that barely appears in it: last year, tax cuts; this year, tuition fees.
Just to confuse matters, when people address A Fresh Start For Britain, there are actually three separate publications they might mean – the motion printed in the Conference Agenda, the pdf / website which was launched in July with the key commitments, and the, er, other bits stuffed in at the back of the policy paper which no-one outside of the Conference hall will ever see. The most important bit is the version published on the website, because that’s the bit that’s the actual cast-iron policy for the General Election Manifesto: everything from page 10 onwards in the full paper comes with the caveat that it may be dumped in the run-up to the General Election (and so, implicitly, why bother?). This positions the Liberal Democrats as making the tough choices up front about public spending that the other parties are petrified of admitting out loud. The reason why people are furious about tuition fees is, of course, because that’s in the back end, and it’s the bit of the back end that Nick’s been drawing attention to in interviews, to prove we’re serious about tackling the economic black hole by saying we can’t afford something we really like as well as cutting back Labour projects we never liked in the first place. But there’s a lot of other stuff there that you should argue about cutting or not, too.
By Alex Foster
| Mon 21st September 2009 - 7:45 pm
Whilst the LDV team is out tonight enjoying, in our various abstemious ways, the Liberal Drinks event at Bournemouth’s Goat and Tricycle tonight, we thought we’d bring you the tape of last night’s BOTY ceremony.
Sadly the audio version can not to justice to the range of visual feasts the evening provided. Stephen’s milliner will be most disappointed; the ice sculptors know their art is fleeting; and we have really only just rounded up all the flamingoes.
But it was a striking evening for a number of reasons, as we hope the …
By Alex Foster
| Mon 21st September 2009 - 6:00 pm
There are now many ways of getting your brain around Vince Cable’s keynote speech. Read it on the party website. Hear our podcast below. See what ePolitix thinks – or the Guardian, for that matter.
There was much that was really important that jumped out at me from the speech – here are my favourite bits:
We should not be taken in by the hysterical nonsense about the country being bankrupt. It isn’t.
The Tories are currently getting a free rein to slash budgets. Tories like …
The crowds are flooding through the doors. The good news is that they are leaving the hall … because it’s a sure sign of a party’s financial state whether people are coming or going. Bad times: people come in. Good news: people leave.
The vote: motion is overwhelmingly carried.
Pete Dunphy summates on the motion: points out the increase is only a recommended one, and people can pay the same or less if they wish. However, it is important to raise funds for the general and local elections.
Maureen de Beer: also opposes the increase, particularly in a time of recession and given …
By Stephen Tall
| Mon 21st September 2009 - 5:15 pm
Evening Standard blogger Paul Waugh has the story:
Work and Pensions spokesman Steve Webb has indeed put his foot down to kill off Nick Clegg’s suggestion (floated in the Guardian on Saturday) that the party could means-test child benefit.
Webb made plain his feelings at a Fabian fringe event.
By Alex Foster
| Mon 21st September 2009 - 3:00 pm
It does seem this year that the hashtag has landed this year. Hundreds of people are using twitter from conference. Hundreds of them are using the hashtag so that their thoughts can be shared with other similar users.
But it’s wider than that. People from other organisations are trying to use the hashtag to influence us, either from the voluntary orgs with stands at conference or from other parties trying to bait us into engaging with their views.
Here are some examples from the conference. RNID are using twitter to entice delegates to their stands – but …
By Alex Foster
| Sun 20th September 2009 - 5:45 pm
Just over an hour ago, our fearless leader Nick Clegg left the stage to tumultuous applause following a frank Q&A with delegates.
Below is the audio recording made by our intrepid reporter by sitting in the audience with a MP3 recorder. And with access to a loaned MacBook, I’ve been able to process the sound much more quickly.
If you hear whispering and shuffling in the recording it’s because a group of media delegates were chattering to each other all through the recording. How nice, then, that one of them subsequently pronounced positively on Clegg’s performance. (At least, I think …
By Alex Foster
| Sun 20th September 2009 - 4:15 pm
After a day of Linux updates on an incredibly elderly IBM Thinkpad, we can now finally bring you the audio recording of last night’s highly successful fringe meeting with Mark Pack, James Graham, Neil Fawcett and Lynne Featherstone MP.
And most unusually for fringe meetings in general, and definitely a first for an LDV fringe – our meeting got written up in the Guardian’s Comment is Free.
By Stephen Tall
| Sun 20th September 2009 - 2:54 pm
Nick has rung the changes for this year’s traditional leader’s Q&A in front of the party conference – out goes the usual interview between Nick and a friendly lefty-liberal journo, and in comes the improvised ‘Town Hall’ format of audience questions.
First up, Nick’s asked if the Lib Dems will take part in political programmes if the BNP are invited to take part by the broadcasters. Yes, we will, he says: quite simply it’s too late to ignore the BNP. Look at what happened in Burnley, he notes – once forecast to be the first BNP council, now a prime Lib …
Separate vote (on name blank employment): lines overwhelmingly retained
Motion as a whole: passed overwhelmingly
Lynne Featherstone (summating on the motion): concentrates on name-blank employment and on air-brushing. Draws parallel with exam marking where names are removed in order to stop some forms of bias and highlights evidence from Department of Work and Pensions of the impact that name-blanking can have. On air-brushing – it’s about tackling conformity and not accepting the values of global industries. It’s about making the operation …
Running rather against the modern trend of reorganising events to suit the media, this autumn’s Liberal Democrat conference is starting and finishing a day earlier. With a Saturday start and a Wednesday finish, that means one weekday (better for media coverage) has been sacrificed for one extra weekend day (worse for media coverage, but more convenient for party members to attend).
What to expect on this Saturday of conference then?
Highlights are likely to include:
The Real Women policy paper debate in the afternoon, which includes proposals related to the airbrushing of women in magazine photos and the like. That particular aspect of
By Alex Foster
| Sat 19th September 2009 - 8:45 am
Just a quick reminder that there will be an official conference twitter feed, available here: www.twitter.com/LibDemConf. Conference staffers and stewards will be updating the account with information as it happens at conference – who’s speaking, when sessions start, and how Conference votes.
If you’re using twitter at conference yourself, don’t forget to liberally sprinkle your updates with the hashtag #ldconf – this will help other people find the messages you send.
And if you want to see those messages for yourself, whether or not you’re a signed up twitter user – click here.
By Issan Ghazni
| Sat 19th September 2009 - 8:30 am
If you have been reading your papers for conference, you might have noticed something new. Tucked away at the back of the policy papers is a page headed ‘Policy Equality Impact Assessment’. If you work in the public sector, you may already be familiar with these, as they have been compulsory in schools, hospitals and other public institutions for some time now. As a political party, we are not expected to complete such assessments as a matter of course, but have started to introduce them as a sign of our own commitment to the principles of diversity, equality …
Which? is producing supplements for this year’s party conferences, providing people with a one-stop guide to surviving Bournemouth, Brighton and Manchester…
In the build up to the next General Election, it’s important that the consumer voice is heard as each party develops its policies. All 45 million voters are also consumers, so each supplement includes the issues Which? wants to see on the political agenda – from better protection for savings to simpler energy bills and access to good quality dental care.
Michelle Smyth, public affairs manager at Which? says:
The Real Women policy paper which we’ll be discussing on Saturday afternoon at Lib Dem Federal Conference is, on the whole, a very good one. It contains lots of proposals which will help make women’s lives better, covering issues like safety, childcare, health and discrimination.
But there is one significant part of the policy motion which is flawed and that’s in the sections covering body image. Basically, the problem is that it seeks to use state legislation and regulation to tackle issues which can only really be addressed through processes of cultural change. As a result, its proposals …
By Alex Foster
| Thu 17th September 2009 - 1:04 pm
Here’s my absolute, most important top tip for people attending conference – pack sensible shoes. I cannot emphasise this enough. You will be spending much of your time on your feet, and you will be schlepping wearily from venue to venue. Bits of Bournemouth are hilly, so you will also be trekking up a small cliff to switch from conference hall to fringe meetings. If you just pack strappy shoes, or dress shoes, or the ones that look good with your suit but are murder on your toeses, you will spend the week in agony. …
This is perhaps the area where I am least qualified to speak, since I have never given a speech to Conference in the eight or so years I have been attending.
By Alex Foster
| Wed 16th September 2009 - 11:38 am
I apologise from the outset, but this is going to be one of those posts that not everyone understands. If you’re not technical, or if your diary is still entirely paper based, look away now.
Neil McGovern, a Cambridge City councillor, has grepped the conference directory so that you don’t have to. He’s written a program that scrapes the information about the training and fringe events (including LDV’s fringe fiesta) and plugs them into a Google Calendar.
This means that if you use GCal yourself, you can import all those events into your diary – and from there, straight into your …
We’re just putting the finishing touches to our plans for covering the Bournemouth federal conference (Security pass? Check. Emergency chocolate rations? Check. Peruvian dancing band booked for fringe? Check.)
Now that we’ve been around through several conferences, there is always the risk of doing things just because that’s what we’ve always done. So any last minute suggestions for what we should do in addition to or differently from our previous conference coverage?
It’s been a big task, and a fun one, to distil so many excellent examples of Lib Dem blogging and e-campaigning into lists of the five best.
Congratulations if you’ve been shortlisted, but if you haven’t: remember that the shortlists are based on the judges’ subjective opinions. The awards are intended to be a fun way to celebrate the talent in the Lib Dem blogosphere, whilst introducing you to some blogs you might not have read before.
First, a reminder that the winner of the Best non-Liberal Democrat politics blog category will be decided by a public vote here on Liberal Democrat Voice, so please have a read of the nominated blogs and then head on over to the sidebar to cast your vote.
Next, a plug for the awards ceremony itself. If you’re coming to party conference in Bournemouth, do head along to Old Harry’s Bar in the Marriott Highcliff Hotel from 9.45pm on Sunday 20th September.
Now, without further ado, here are the shortlists: (Drumroll, please)
By Alex Foster
| Thu 10th September 2009 - 4:29 pm
A piece in the Bournemouth Echo underlines just how important party conferences are to the resort’s economy – and just how huge an event conference is, even for the smallest of the three main parties:
It is estimated the event could boost the resort economy by £6.5 million, as delegates spend money in hotels, bars, restaurants and shops.
“That’s really working on the basis of about 6,000 delegates staying for an average of four nights,” said Peter Gunn, director of the BIC and Pavilion.
A few seconds with a calculator and those figures suggests delegates will be spending an average of £270 …
Today’s tip is for those planning to attend conference, who are not voting members of conference.
Many local parties have not elected as many conference representatives as they are entitled to. Even those local parties that have both a full complement of reps and reserve reps may find themselves in the situation that not all of their representatives are able to make it to conference.
By Alex Foster
| Tue 8th September 2009 - 12:07 pm
Here’s a handy hint if you live near the conference centre in Bournemouth: you do not need to be a registered delegate to attend many of the fringe and training events.
The “Access” rules as set out in the Conference Directory (available for download here) say:
Access to all areas of the Bournemouth International Centre (BIC) is possible only with a valid, visible conference photo pass worn with the official lanyard. You will be asked to show your pass when you enter the BIC and you are required to wear the pass with the lanyard visible at all times within the
By Prateek Buch
| Mon 7th September 2009 - 7:02 pm
With a harsh economic recession continuing to bite, with Westminster politics remaining in the doldrums and with a global climate change summit fast approaching, legal action taken against a science writer may be far down your priority list as party conference season approaches. And yet, the British Chiropractic Association’s attempts to silence Simon Singh’s critical comments reveal fundamental flaws in Britain’s libel law, and threaten to undermine the freedom of expression that insulates us from the very worst consequences of public and private sector failures.
It is in this context that I invite all Lib Dem Voice readers to attend a fringe event I’ve organised at this year’s conference. The event is entitled Defending free speech – keep libel laws out of science, and will take place in the Marriott Highcliff Hotel’s Blandford Syndicate room 3 at 13.00.
We will hear an illustrious panel of speakers discussing how legal threats are being used to suppress scientific debate, and how Britain’s libel laws must be reformed:
Just a quick reminder that all the main documents relating to Lib Dem conference in Bournemouth – now less than fortnight away – are now available directly from the party’s website.
These include the main hall agenda, the policy papers to be debated and fringe and training guides.
It’s also worth noting and commending that the information is available in a variety of formats, from the printed books, the PDFs of those, and also simply as plain text – which is good and accessible for those with disabilities and also very handy for PDAs, phones …
Earlier this afternoon, Jonathan Calder unearthed video footage from the first blog awards in 2006, which reminds me that I should plug the still-available recordings of our awards ceremonies in 2008.
Party members not going to the Bournemouth conference still have a chance to input to some of the discussions. The conference features three Q&A sessions:
Sunday 20th September (afternoon) – with Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats
Monday 21st September (morning) – Crime Policy: Panel including Chris Huhne MP (Shadow Home Secretary), Jan Berry (Independent Reducing Bureaucracy Advocate), Juliet Lyon (Director, Prison Reform Trust) and Professor Larry Sherman (Wolfson Professor of Criminology, University of Cambridge)
Tuesday 22nd September (afternoon) – The Economy: Panel including Vince Cable MP (Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer), Jeremy Purvis MSP …
Hywel @Jeff
There should then be a lot of evidence of people increasing working hours/finding better paid jobs in 2010-2015. How did that compare to people doing th...
Peter Martin Can I suggest an experiment with social housing? We'd need to find a local council who will be willing to co-operate.
The government will need to lend out, s...
Jeff Daniel Walker 17th Jul '26 - 11:41am:
Not the EU though, which covers much of Africa under the Everything But Arms program, and some of the rest, inc...
Jeff Peter Hirst 24th Jul '26 - 5:16pm:
This country certainly needs something tangible that demonstrates to the world that it is becoming a different co...
Peter Hirst What is it that we want the media, the public and the world to take as the defining message of this conference? Most are not interested in the intricies of our ...
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Hywel 
Peter Martin 
Jeff 
Peter Hirst 