It’s the Lib Dems who can beat Reform

Here are some statistics that should both encourage us and spur us on. They are for principal authority council by-elections since May 1st where a Reform candidate finished as one of the top two:

• Reform and Conservative in the top two : 0% Conservative wins
• Reform and Labour in the top two: 17% Labour wins
• Reform and Lib Dem in the top two: 78% Lib Dem wins

In fact, the figures are even better than that, because those other 22% of contests where Reform finished first and the Lib Dems second were all contests in previously Labour held seats and where we had moved up from further behind to second. Even though we did not win in those, they were still good results for us, taking significant steps forward.

In other words, just as liberalism is the philosophical answer to populism, so Liberal Democrat campaigning is the practical answer to populism.

Thank you, Dick Newby

The Leader of the Liberal Democrat group in the Lords, Dick Newby, has announced that he is standing down as leader of the group after almost a decade in post. That period has been a real rollercoaster for the party, and included a long stretch when the Lib Dem Lords group had to take on a big extra burden of work due to the shrunken size of the Commons Parliamentary Party.

Huge thanks for everything you have done, and for making me so welcome as one of the newest members of the group.

Constitutional amendment

The Board is still consulting on the wording of a ‘tidying up’ omnibus amendment to submit to Autumn Federal Council. This is designed to tidy up slight ambiguities of wording, missed cross-references and the like rather than to make any substantive change. Such periodic housekeeping does however end up saving time and making things easier.

So please grab your constitutional magnifying glass, ready your pedantic skills and take a look at the consultation.

Party posts

Mo Waqas has been appointed to the vacant Vice Chair, Racial Diversity Campaign (RDC), role, and Prue Bray, Matthew Foster and Peter Truesdale have been appointed to the Disciplinary Sub Group (DSG) which oversees the procedures used by the party’s complaints system . One further vacancy on the DSG is currently being filled and a decision on the Lead Adjudicator is also due shortly.

A recount of the votes has also seen Ian Franks fill a vacancy (caused by a resignation) on the Federal Council.

Are committees always filled by the same faces?

One recommendation passed the Federal Board’s way was to consider the merits of term limits for elected party committee posts. This idea is sometimes prompted by people saying that the same old faces always fill roles and that therefore we should force greater turnover.

It is of course important that there is turnover on committees. It is also the case that there are of course some benefits of having at least some consistency in faces, such as the greater experience and preservation of institutional knowledge that can come with that.

Following discussion of this in the past, the present position is that the Party President and those holding leading roles on committees are subject to term limit rules as well. But there are no term limit rules to be ordinary members of Federal Committees.

The Federal Board has therefore looked at data, kindly compiled by John Swarbrick, covering Federal Committee elections since the introduction of one member one vote (rather than the electorate being Conference representatives).

The Federal Board has been excluded because there has only been one election since the number to be elected in this election was set at 3 and so there is not enough data yet to spot any patterns.

This data shows that around half of those elected to federal committees each time are new faces, i.e. neither incumbents nor people who had been elected and defeated for and coming back again:

• Federal Conference Committee (FCC) – 33% re-elected, 8% retread returns, 59% new faces elected

• Federal Policy Committee (FPC) – 43% re-elected, 9% retread returns, 48% new faces elected

• Federal International Relations Committee (FIRC) – 50% re-elected, 6% retread returns, 44% new faces elected

It is a subjective question as to what the ideal churn rate, but it is worth noting that a turnover rate of around half is pretty chunky, and of course also means that the churn rate over several cycles is (even) higher.

Based on this data, therefore, the Board decided not to propose any term limits to Conference.

Complaint about the Parliamentary Candidates Association (PCA)

The Federal Board received complaints from several people about an email sent by the PCA to its members about our Parliamentary candidates process. The complaints said that sections of the email were racist in the way it described the party’s efforts to encourage more ethnic minority candidates and warned people about the possible entry into our candidates system of new people.

After considering the PCA’s response to the complaint, including its acknowledgement that mistakes were made and their willingness to apologise, the Board decided on six remedial steps it has asked the PCA to take:

• To send an apology letter (email) to their members and the complainants.
• To send a message from the Vice President responsible for working with ethnic minority communities to PCA members setting out the steps the party is taking to improve the ethnic diversity of candidates.
• For a Q+A session on the candidates process more generally to be held with the PCA Exec, members and the chair of the Joint Candidates Sub Committee (JCSC).
• For the PCA to agree an editorial process for future messages to members, including at least one person who was not involved in agreeing the email that was the cause of the complaint.
• For inclusive language training to be completed by those involved in the sign-off process.
• For the scheduled AO review of the PCA due next year to be brought forward, and to focus particularly on its plans to improve its diversity and promote candidate diversity.

The Board did not use its power to suspend the PCA, but will review progress on these steps later in the year.

Do you have questions on any of this report, or other Lib Dem matters? Then please drop me a line on [email protected]. Do also get in touch if you would like to invite me to do a Zoom call with your local party or party body.

* Mark Pack is Party President and is the editor of Liberal Democrat Newswire.