Some more new members respond to our tweet and tell us why they are part of the many thousands who have joined the party in the last few days. We asked people on Twitter to tell us why they had joined. Here are some of the responses:

Lee Wright:

In 2010 I voted for the Liberal Democrats. I believed and bought into Nick Clegg and his party’s vision. When the party became the third-largest in the House of Commons and entered the coalition I was hugely disappointed that is was the Tories they would be working with. However, I paid close attention to the party’s progress over the past five years and could see the positives that the Liberal Democrats were making. The huge loss of seats last week was nothing more than I expected. The moment Nick Clegg put one foot in the door of number 10 with David Cameron, the party was doomed to fail next time around. The public, and some supporters of the party, had had their fingers burnt. Once bitten, twice shy. Nick Clegg was never going to survive another day as leader after May 7th. He took a bullet for the party, which has taken five years to hit the target.

But anyone who thought that the Liberals were dead, should have watched Lord Ashdown on the BBC’s Question Time programme last Friday. He won me over. His passion and determination for the party to continue was all the persuading I needed to pay and become a member of the party for the first time in my life. Now Tim Farron says the party must “turn our anger into action.” Nothing truer has ever been said. With Labour at sea, and a majority Tory government steering the ship, anyone in the country who values a fair, free and open society will need a Liberal to fight their corner. And I’m up for it.

Chris Buckett

I’d felt an affinity with the values of the Lib Dems since the early 2000’s, and have voted that way, even though I live in a relatively safe Tory constituency (Maidstone & Weald).  I’d never really considered joining a political party, because although I take a keen interest in politics and the going-ons in Westminster, I’d always felt that it was a world away from my day to day life.

With Paddy’s “eating his hat” statement, and Nick’s magnanimous and heartfelt resignation speech, I realised that there was actually a need for me to show my support in more ways than through the ballot box.  I’d made a couple of small donations in the run up to the election, and had hesitated a over the “join us” button on the website, but something had stopped me from clicking.  After the election, I felt that there would be something valuable missing from UK politics if the Lib Dem voice was lost, and I realised that was the same voice that I speak with, one of tolerance, fairness and pragmatism.  I don’t blame the Lib Dems for going into coalition with the Torys – as I said to my neigbour before the election, I don’t think I’d have done anything different if I was in Nick’s position 5 years ago.

>Unfortunately it seems tricky to get complex political analysis into media soundbytes, and the tuition fees thing seemed to stick with many people. That’s a shame.

Anyway, after joining, and checking Twitter, I’m as amazed as anyone that I’m not alone, and that many many people must have felt the same as I did after the election – felt the need to show support to a party that consistently tries to do the right thing.