20 Comments

• Paul Barker 16th Nov '22 - 6:43pm

  Could we have a percentage turnout for the various sections ? Since the turnout for the Presidential vote was around 12% I guess we are looking at less than that ?

  I found the system almost impossible to use, there were just too many people standing & the need to put them in order made everything much harder. For me this aspect of voting was both irritating & useless. I simply didn’t know enough (with a few exceptions) to list candidates in order, the best I could do was weed out the most obviously unattractive ones (to me).

  We need to find a better way but I don’t have many bright ideas – does anyone else ?

• Massimo Ricciuti 16th Nov '22 - 7:27pm

  Best Wishes everyone!

• TonyH 16th Nov '22 - 8:01pm

  Paul is absolutely right. The system was ludicrously hard to use. Fine for the presidential election with just three candidates, but not for the Board and Council. I mean the idea that anyone could sensibly read 54 (or whatever it was) manifestos, which involved either a lot of clicking back and forth or printing them off (bad for the trees), is stupid.
  I’ll be honest, I didn’t even look at them. I voted for the folk I know (and like!), and then for a few others I’d been recommended to vote for on the basis of one issue, and just ignored the rest. And that’s not fair to the candidates.
  Why do we make things so hard for our members and then we’re surprised by low turnouts?
  In terms of solutions, maybe we should take a leaf out of the Tories’ book and set a higher bar for nominations. It goes against my instincts, but we have to consider it. The other option would be, instead of electing the full Board all at once we’d could do it in thirds, the way councils do it. That might cut the numbers down a bit.
  One thing is sure. We can’t have another election like this.

• Fiona 16th Nov '22 - 8:17pm

  Congratulations to those who won, and well done to everyone for standing.

  I have to agree Paul that voting was a slog. I knew some candidates, and some better than others, but wanted to read all of the manifestos and take preferential voting seriously, but it was tough given the number of candidates, number of places, and a few too many near identical manifestos.

  I can’t remember where it was (sorry), but I’ve had a better experience of preferential voting when you could move preferences up and down, so it was easier to keep track of your preferences. With the system used I had to go back and forth between the page where I allocated numbers and the review page a number of times and was very tempted to throw in the towel several times. It didn’t help that when I checked the social media feeds of some candidates who I theoretically agree with, to find they were spending way more time than I’m comfortable with bickering with other members and engaging in bad faith arguments.

• Laurence Cox 16th Nov '22 - 10:58pm

  Despite the difficulty of voting, we should be pleased with one outcome. As far as I know for the elections where it was relevant (FC, FPC and FCC) we did not need to promote anyone above someone else to meet the Party Constitution’s diversity rules.

• Henry Jebb 17th Nov '22 - 7:43am

  Yes, the voting process could have been improved. But if we of all parties complain how difficult STV was to use, we have no chance of convincing the nation to abandon First Past The Post. We are a federal party and we need to make the ‘constituencies’ for our internal representatives more realistic. Why don’t we elect Regional reps for our party bodies? Let’s start with Regional Federal Council reps.

• Nonconformistradical 17th Nov '22 - 8:35am

  “We are a federal party and we need to make the ‘constituencies’ for our internal representatives more realistic. Why don’t we elect Regional reps for our party bodies? Let’s start with Regional Federal Council reps.”
  Agree – because to expect members to wade through thoroughly the number of candidate statements involved in this particular section was ridiculous.

• Andy Hyde 17th Nov '22 - 9:34am

  When were the voting “papers “ emailed out to members?
  Currently I’m rather more preoccupied with family health matters, but I don’t recall receiving any actual voting information (lots of emails from candidates).
  I could have easily missed the crucial email, but checking back cannot see anything.
  Can someone say when I should have been notified, so I can cross check.

• Barry Lofty 17th Nov '22 - 10:57am

  For my part I was not impressed with the voting procedure for these elections and also an email I received after the event informing me that I may notice the new format of that email, I did, my email address but the wrong name ???? It did not fill me with confidence I am sorry to say?

• Adam Pritchard 17th Nov '22 - 2:42pm

  Congratulations to everyone who got on and to those who came close. I am always impressed with how many people volunteer for these roles considering how much of your personal time will be sacrificed and how your efforts can often go unappreciated.

  I noticed that 6,688 people voted for the entire slate of Federal Board applicants whereas 42,756 voted for Ed as leader. That’s a pretty massive mandate for the leader. I don’t feel like that disparity is recognised when I see people on twitter and on here bemoaning an announcement from the leader’s office and insisting it needs to be ratified by several committees and should be immediately withdrawn etc etc

• David Raw 17th Nov '22 - 4:07pm

  @ Adam Pritchard, you state, “I noticed 6,688 people voted for the entire slate of Federal Board applicants whereas 42,756 voted for Ed as leader. That’s a pretty massive mandate for the leader”.

  The ‘massive mandate’ of 42,756 has changed somewhat since Ed was elected in 2020 when there were 117,924 members. It dropped to 73,544 in 2021, and 64,762 in 2022 – and even the LDV Editorial noted the massive drop in Mr Pack’s Presidential vote.The casual observer might also note a drop in the number of LDV postings.

  Now if a football club’s attendances dropped like that, it would be obvious something wasn’t working. There would be calls for changes of manager and it might be suggested that dropping top international striker, ‘Oppy Brexit’, was a mistake. Get Oppy back in the team….. relegation to non-League football is a real possibility.

  Given it’s likely there will be nearly two years before the next election there’s a window of opportunity for change at the top of the Lib Dems….. something’s obviously not working outside the comfortable Home Counties and even there it looks wobbly.

• Tim Rogers 17th Nov '22 - 4:58pm

  The total number of votes is abysmal. How has it been allowed to drop like this without being flagged. I know I might sound like a stuck record but to me this is the malaise that Davey has led the party into. His weekend speech was good but there was no follow up. But now that we have the various teams elected and knowing the sense of direction from the government we will find the leadership now find that sense of direction.

• Martin 18th Nov '22 - 9:33am

  David Raw spells out uncomfortable truths for the Party as well as this platform that need to be heeded. The polls show that we have not gained from the the Tories plummeting support, rather we may have lost support. Dwindling membership tells its own story: 126,724 in 2019; 117,924 in 2020; 73,544 in 2021; to 64762 in 2022.

  Since 2019, the Party has taken a wrong turn.

  I think we have not enough to say on the immediate key economic, political and social issues that face the country and too much to say on secondary issues that whilst worthy will do little to reverse the negative trends. Effective leadership is lacking. Unfortunately I saw little in the candidates’ blurbs to suggest recognition of the problems the Party is facing.

• Paul Barker 18th Nov '22 - 1:32pm

  The relationship between Membership & other measures of how we are doing is not obvious. We actually gained Members in the second half of The Coalition !

• Martin 18th Nov '22 - 3:25pm

  My point is that a dwindling membership and flat lining, possibly sinking, in the polls indicate that the party is not doing well. Paul Barker, what is your point? Are you trying to claim the Party is doing well in some metaphysical sense?

• David Raw 18th Nov '22 - 4:21pm

  I’m sorry to have to contradict Paul Barker, but, as a matter of fact, Lib Dem party membership dropped steadily every year during the course of the Coalition from over just over 65,000 in 2010 to 44,000 by the end of the Coalition.

  After the end of the Coalition, but not before the debacle of the 2015 election, there was a slight recovery – probably as a reaction to the impact of the shock of the result.

• Gordon 18th Nov '22 - 5:48pm

  @ Paul Barker (first comment). I agree – we should have turnout figures for each section. I would also like to see first preference votes for each candidate.

  Taking the FPC as an example, first preferences are only given for the two elected in the first round and they were supported by 0.77% and 0.62% of the 2022 membership.

  While I don’t doubt for a second the commitment and hard work of those elected to these and other positions, these low levels of support mean their efforts have little to no mandate from the wider Party.

  In contrast Ed’s 42,756 votes as leader was just over 36% of the then membership, reasonable though hardly a ringing endorsement.

• Gordon 18th Nov '22 - 6:35pm

  @ Martin (comment 18th @ 9:33 am). Yes – the Party has lost the plot. The context here is that the wheels have come off the Tory Project of the last 40 years, one that’s been aided at times by Blair/Brown and the LibDems, yet all we have are “secondary issues”.

  The job of an opposition party is to oppose and that means in part developing a coherent critique of the government and an alternative programme so that, when it eventually falls into a heap, there is an alternative ready to step up and take over. LibDems haven’t done/can’t do that. ☹

  The reason they can’t is an important but moot point. FWIW my view is (in large part but not entirely) it dates to the aftermath of the SDP-Liberal Alliance. The imperative then was to achieve consensus so that was what was prioritised in the constitution. But building an unchallengeable consensus freezes out rival views (Conference has DECIDED!). This creates an intellectual monoculture and weak policy ecosystem which cannot generate a strategic vision.

  Meanwhile, we expect the leader to lead because (a) humans are intensely hierarchical, and (b) complex decisions need a single person (or small, tight team) to make the judgement calls involved in delivering a strategic vision. But the leader is only Chief Spokesperson (Conference has DECIDED!) so he stretches the boundaries when he must, to breaking point at times (see Coalition), yet the membership can’t hold him accountable.

• Lee_Thacker 19th Nov '22 - 6:18pm

  I am reasonably active and longstanding member. However, I am ashamed to admit I didn’t realise there were any elections taking place.

  Is it possible to set up a WhatsApp group giving links to candidate manifestoes and reminding people to vote?

  When are the next set of elections?

• Adrian Sanders 23rd Nov '22 - 11:12am

  David Raw, whom I more often than not agree with, offers a dangerous conclusion. The case against Brexit is not yet won, certainly not in areas like mine where 6 in 10 people voted for it. The problem is the Party, though its structures, has forgotten how to campaign and have fun. A lack of activity is the problem and it isn’t encouraged by top down canvassing/contact targets or promoting policies that are difficult to understand such as bringing back MIR.

  It comes from giving people a reason to get involved and be active around issues that have general appeal and resonance with the voters – health, fair tax, education, transport, pensions, public transport, cost of living, tackling crime and disorder etc.

  We can be motivated by fair votes, internationalism, foreign aid and human rights, and with targeted messaging we can engage and attract others who are, but it’s the bread and butter issues we should be campaigning on that grow the Party among a wider electorate and finding one to prioritise on, that local parties, council groups and Parliamentarians can champion, will build an impression of what the Liberal Democrats stand for, something that is lacking.

  Could not help noticing that I once had a majority larger than the winning president’s total vote within a public electorate of a similar size, rather than one supposedly politically aware and interested. Something is very wrong, banging on about Brexit outside of remain areas isn’t the answer.