All this week, Lib Dem Voice is publishing the results of our September survey of party members conducted through Liberty Research via our private members’ forum. This is the second of our monthly surveys – if you have ideas for future survey questions, please email me at [email protected].

Today we turn our attention to the performance of Nick Clegg as leader, and whether party members think the Lib Dems are on the right/wrong track.

To try and gauge how representative LDV’s online community might be of the wider membership we first asked: How did you vote in the 2007 Lib Dem leadership contest? You told us:

For Nick Clegg: 46.9%
For Chris Huhne: 46.9%
I didn’t vote / wasn’t a party member at the time / can’t remember etc: 6.3%

An exact tie! And one which reflects the extreme closeness of last year’s leadership contest, when Nick edged Chris by just over 500 votes.

LDV then asked: Do you regret how you voted? The answer was an overwhelming ‘No’: just one person said they regretted their vote; and s/he had voted for neither Nick nor Chris.

And then on to Nick’s performance as leader over the last eight months. LDV asked: Regardless of how you voted, what is your view of Nick Clegg’s performance as Lib Dem leader now?

Here’s what you told us:

Very effective: 13.5%
Quite effective: 51.0%
Quite ineffective: 24.0%
Very ineffective: 9.4%
Don’t know / No opinion: 2.1%

In total, then, 64.5% of party members in LDV’s survey are satisfied with Nick’s performance, compared with 33.4% who are not: a net satisfaction rating of +31%. Given the tendency of party members to be critical – and the more so, it seems, if they are hooked-up to the internet – Nick can probably feel pretty relaxed about this result.

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: 60.4%
The wrong track: 28.1%
Don’t know / No opinion: 11.5%

This represents a net satisfaction rating of +32%, a significantly positive shift from last month’s +25%, and a welcome sign for the party leadership ahead of next week’s Bournemouth conference.