Liberal Democrat Chief Executive Tim Gordon has just emailed Party members about the Helena Morrissey Report, published at 4pm today:

Today Helena Morrissey published the report of her independent inquiry into allegations made in February that the Party had failed to respond adequately to complaints and warnings of alleged sexual harassment.

You can find Helena’s full report here.

The report concluded – and the Party has accepted – that, despite recent improvements, and despite the fact that the report is clear that those with whom issues were raised acted in good faith, it failed to deliver the procedures needed in a modern organisation to respond adequately to all those involved.

Helena has made some clear practical recommendations which as Chief Executive I will work with the Leader and President to implement in full.

These include changes to the guidelines throughout the Party for handling bullying and harassment, the appointment of a dedicated member of staff for complaints processes, and raising performance and standards through regular surveys.

Helena recommends raising the priority given to complaint resolution, encouraging formal submission and improvements to processes for handling them.

She also has suggestions for ensuring that women and minorities are valued, tackling under-representation and measuring progress.

Helena recognises in her report that as a Party we are in many regards like a family. We do not want to lose this.

However, we are also an organisation operating in the 21st Century, and it is imperative that we have the processes in place to reflect the responsibilities and standards that you rightly should expect – not to mention the values and ideals that brought us together in the first place.

We must now work together to achieve that outcome.

Yours sincerely,

Tim Gordon
Chief Executive, Liberal Democrats