At the start of the week, Lib Dem Voice emailed the members of our private forum (open to all Lib Dem members) inviting them to take part in a survey, conducted via Liberty Research, asking a number of questions about the current state of British politics, especially as they affect the Lib Dems. Many thanks to the 177 of you who completed it.

Today we look at Nick Clegg’s leadership of the Lib Dems. I approach this survey question with some trepidation, as last time we published these results – showing 65% of LDV-reading party members satisfied compared with 33% who weren’t – the Daily Mail decided to splash on the one-in-three figure, and ignore the two-thirds who were content. No surprise there, I guess.

And no surprises, too, if they decide to ignore this month’s poll results which show a big boost for Nick Clegg’s leadership among members following the party conference in Bournemouth. LDV asked: what is your view of Nick Clegg’s performance as Lib Dem leader now?

Here’s what you told us:

Very effective – 16%
Fairly effective – 58%
Fairly ineffective – 21%
Very ineffective – 3%
Don’t know / No opinion – 2%

In total, then, 74% of LDV-reading party members are satisfied with Nick’s performance, compared with 24% who are not: a net satisfaction rating of +50%, considerably up on last month’s figure of +31%.

(The survey also asked members to declare how they had voted in the 2007 leadership election. Last month our survey included an exactly even number of previous supporters of Chris Huhne and Nick Clegg. This month, for whatever reason, the survey’s weighting was slightly tilted towards previous Huhne supporters, with 48% having voted for Chris compared with 44% for Nick).

And, finally for today, LDV asked: Do you think, as a whole, the Liberal Democrats are on the right course or on the wrong track?

You said:

The right course: 71%
The wrong track: 19%
Don’t know / No opinion: 11%

Again, this represents a big upwards shift in satisfaction with the general direction of the party, with a net satisfaction rating of +52%. Compare this with September’s +32% and August’s +25%, and it can be seen the party conference certainly appears to have succeeded in persuading a large number of Lib Dem members that, not only is Nick doing good stuff, but that the party itself is moving broadly in the right direction.

* You can catch up on the result of all previous LDV members’ surveys by clicking here.