Tag Archives: 2025 internal elections

Scottish internal election results

The federal and all the State parties have been having internal elections.

The Scottish Party announced its results on Friday with a brilliant mix of people being elected to office bearer roles and committees. Except the President – watch out for her, she’s bound to be trouble.

Returning Officer John Lawrie emailed all members:

President – Caron Lindsay
Convener – Jenni Lang
Policy Convener – Neil Casey
Conference Convener – Fraser Graham
Campaigns & Candidates Convener – Charles Dundas
Treasurer – Mike Gray
Executive Committee Members (12 Members) – Willie Wilson, Alan Reid, Jill Reilly, David Evans, Stephen Harte, Amanda Clark, Christine Murdoch, Greg Foster, Daniel O’Malley, Grant Toghill, Lauren Buchanan-Quigley, Jacquie Bell
Policy Committee Members (5 Members) – Sally Pattle, Andy Williamson, Amanda Clark, Jack Clark, Eloise Martin
Conference Committee Members (6 Members) – Paul McGarry, Mel Sullivan, Ross Stalker, Noah McGarry, Leo Dempster, Jacquie Bell
Federal Council (3 Members) – Stephen Harte, Fraser Graham, Christine Murdoch
A member of The Federal Policy Committee – Daniel O’Malley
A member of The Federal Conference Committee – Paul McGarry
A member of The Federal People Development Committee – Caron Lindsay

Congratulations to everyone elected and commiserations to everyone who didn’t make it this time.

We have our youngest committee member in Noah McGarry, who is 14 but wise beyond his years. He has been elected to Conference Committee after impressing so many conference go-ers with his speeches and supporting role to his Dad, Paul, the former Conference Convener. He wants to make Conference accessible and enjoyable for young people.

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Internal Elections update – Federal Appeals Panel, statements from official party organisations and presidential candidates

This afternoon, the party’s highest dispute resolution panel met to discuss the ruling issued by the Returning Officer on 27th October, prior to the ballots opening in the federal party elections.

Lucas North had appealed to the Federal Appeals Panel and after the hearing this joint statement was issued:

We were pleased to attend the FAP hearing today on the rules around the internal elections.

The FAP made clear that the rules as written in the constitution need to be reviewed by members as they can no longer be implemented as originally intended following the Supreme Court ruling in For Women Scotland and therefore there is a lack of clarity.

The FAP has ruled that parts of quotas should be disapplied on a case by case basis, as the election count proceeds, in order to avoid discrimination. This requires a different approach to that originally set out by the RO; it means that quotas will apply as written in the constitution until they lead to a breach of the Equality Act 2010 in any individual circumstance.

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Liberalism, living our values and quotas

Liberalism means you can do what you want as long as you don’t limit others’ freedoms. That’s why I have written to the party leadership asking them to step into the quota debate for the Federal Elections. Even if only a few party members are affected, making people register to stand for election by a gender they don’t identify with is wrong. It goes against our core values and must not happen.

Setting quotas in the way proposed may satisfy one group but harm another group’s basic rights, indeed the new interpretation forces quotas to work in the opposite way to what was intended. Until the law changes, which I hope our leadership will support, we shouldn’t allow this.

Denying gender reassignment and self-determination breaks the liberal values many of us stand for. Our party has fought for true equality, and abandoning these principles is deeply wrong. Just weeks after honouring a trans woman with the Patsy Calton award, treating her as a man in internal elections is cruel and must be changed if we want to keep calling ourselves Liberal.

Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged | 1 Comment
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