A chance for all those at home listening to Nick Clegg’s speech on the radio or BBC News 24 to have their say, before all those who were actually there get home and start weighing in.
In previous years, conference representatives have arrived home to hear very different spins being applied to the words they heard, so it’s always interesting to compare how speeches come across in person and mediated across the ether.
UPDATES: You can read his speech here (part one) and here (part two). Coverage so far includes:
Sky News – Clegg: ‘Donations Cap To Save Britain’
Politics.co.uk – Clegg attacks ‘establishment’ Labour and Tories
and you can watch Ed Davey’s reaction here:
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21 Comments
Yay, he mentioned the Europe thing: “It’s not that long ago that if 13 MPs wanted to rebel, we’d have to borrow them from the other parties!”
Richard Gadson is live-twittering at twitter.com/po8crg
Nice nod to the West Wing – “We’re in favour of winning and against the other guy winning” – as Josh warned John Hoynes before switching camps.
“Crime, health, eduction – the top three issues concerning people – they have been for years”
Hmmmm….
http://www.ipsos-mori.com/polls/trends/issues12.shtml
“Crime, health, eduction – the top three issues concerning people – they have been for years”
That private educAtion was clearly a good investment 🙂
The media (well, the BBC anyway) are running with the potential tax cut story, and also Nick pushing for wider constitutional change and not just fair votes – plus him apparently ruling out coalition deals with either party.
Didn’t see the speech in full as I didn’t know where to find the live feed, but I am pleased with the reports.
As ever, reading the comments on the BBC’s Have Your Say is depressingly predictable – but then again it always is.
P.S. What’s so wrong about standing behind a lecturn? I might start a ‘Bring back the Lecturn’ petition on the Number 10 website.
Couldn’t that escalator behind Ed Davey be switched to that mode where it only moves when there’s someone on it? It would save energy!
The BBC News site now has the video available.
One thing the general News24 viewer may not notice is that BBC News 24 (at least on the analog service) is NOT SUBTITLED. Sure, highlights of The Leaders speech are flashed up on the screen from time to time but its no substitute for getting the detailed service available on Ceefax 888.
So I (as a deaf viwer) rely on reading the transcript on the web before I can absorb digest and possibly comment.
This was a steller five star speech.
I was particularly impressed by the radicalism of what he said, and the amount of attention he gave to those living on the margins of society.
A speech taylor made for social liberals like myself.
Not only that, really well delivered, lasted more than 50 minutes and without notes!
I agree with Geoff – I was pretty impressed by what I saw & heard.
(Yes Mark – it is me and not an imposter on my account 🙂
Not quite the best as I’d still rate Charles’ post 9/11 speech warning about not giving up civil liberties above it. But that’s setting the bar pretty high.
As to speaking without notes its all a bit artificial IMO – more a test of memory than anything else.
Are you quite sure that’s you Hywel?
I was seriously impressed too. I never doubted Nick could give a good speech in presentation terms but I had concerns about content. This speech was really excellent. He certainly pressed all of my buttons and this is from a Huhne supporter who thought Nick was a bit too far to one side of the party.
The move from the supportive lectern is a good thing when done well. I admire Nick’s ability to give that speech, including a lot of details – names and facts, without any notes.
“But that’s setting the BAR pretty high.” (my emphasis)
Er… Hywel? You said this in connection with CHARLES KENNEDY?
just seen the speech in full on cable tv – am very pleased indeed, we needed a sense of direction and this way forward is distinctive and just right.
I’ve read the speech carefully, and my feeling is too much shallow gimmickry and feel-good stuff for Liberal Democrats. I’m not convinced he has the real deep grip on what’s wrong with society and why so many people are giving up on politics that I’d like to see. I suspect the reaction from the floating voter we need to attract would be more “this is a Liberal Democrat leader saying the sort of things we’d expect a Liberal Democrat leader to say” rather than “Wow, this guy’s really convinced me”. I’m happy to accept from this speech that Nick’s heart is in the right place, but he hasn’t really enthused me. The speech does the job, that’s all, I wouldn’t give it the superlatives others have here.
Can we kill this ‘no notes’ nonsence once and for all.
Julia Goldsworthy’s speech was also delivered ‘without notes’, but I was sat near the front and nopticed she kept looking to the right and the left rather than straight ahead. When I turned round I could see why – there were two ‘autocue’ monitors on either side of the hall!
I’m sure Nick would have used the same technology in his speech. I’ve no problem with it, though when he first did thia it seemed a bit ‘Cameronesque’.
Lets not pretend speakers have a multi-gigabyte memory chip in their brain just because they can read an autocue…
I remember Simon making reference to the fact that the autocue had worked well, so why is there the surprise that it was used?
I also thought the speech impressive. It may not stand up to line by line scrutiny to seek evidence of the purity of thought, but that is not the point. Come on folks…..it was a speech…..to engage with our emotions….to make us feel: “yes”; “yes”; “yes”…….to motivate us in many ways…..to give us a warm glow when we are facing the cynacism and negativism that we need to overcome.
I was impressed.
The autocue approach does seem to encourage a speech style based on short snappy sound-bites, which seems impressive at first, but on further analysis looks rather shallow.
Ian, you are quite right this is a speech “to engage with our emotions” etc, and I’m sure it did the job to those present. Perhaps it was right for the time and circumstances it was given.
But does it serve for a wider audience, or is it something that turns people off politicians because it seems so glib and professional?
I think there’s a need to strike a balance, in terms of body language, between the groundedness that speaking from a lectern suggests, with the throw-away-your-prejudices, let’s-get-creative attitude that moving around helps to convey. The two types of attitude are obviously not mutually exclusive.
While I think Clegg was doing this, it would help if he were centred on a lectern rather than it being a place to grab a glass of water.