From an email to party members:

One of the most important features of our party is our “one member, one vote” democracy.

Nominations closed yesterday for the position of Party President.

All paid up party members will soon choose the person who is to take over from Simon Hughes for 2009 and 2010. The next two years will be very important with a General Election as well as important European and local elections.

The President can speak for the party, represents our members and plays a significant role in how our party is organised.

So, if you were a fully paid up party member when nominations closed yesterday, we will be posting out your ballot papers sometime after October 13th. You will have until November 7th for it to be received back by us.

Three candidates have been nominated:

Chandila Fernando: www.chandila.com
Lembit Opik: www.lembit4president.co.uk
Ros Scott: www.im4ros.com

The candidates are not given access to the party’s membership records during the campaign, but we will be sending out up to three emails from each candidate on their behalf to voters. The campaigns may also build up their own records from other sources and send their own messages based on them.

During the contest we are running an online hustings, with any member able to post up questions. The hustings are at http://forum.libdems.org.uk – and in order to login you will need a Liberal Democrats Account (LDA) username and password.

This is the common username/password that works across a range of our different websites, such as http://login.libdems.org.uk (members only website), www.ourcampaign.org.uk (online petitions), and www.libertyresearch.org.uk (online surveys), though it is different from the extranet username/password.

If you do not yet have an LDA, just visit http://login.libdems.org.uk and click on “Register” on the left. You will need to have your membership number and postcode.

If you already have an LDA, but have forgotten either your username or password then you can visit the same site and use the “Forgotten username” or “Forgotten password” links on the left.

Thank you again for all that you do for this party – and for your many suggestions about how we can do better.

Best wishes,

Chris Rennard
Chief Executive, Liberal Democrats