Tag Archives: associated organisations

What is LDFU and how will we help Ukraine?

By Cameron Greer | Thu 3rd March 2022 - 12:42 pm

On 26th February, I tweeted “who would help me set up a Liberal Democrats Friends of Ukraine?” thinking I might get one or two people to help me set up a small Associated Organisation. What I got was multiple volunteers, a larger than expected interest and, very quickly, an organisation with nearly 100 members.

Myself, Jake Stevenson, Leo Dempster and Euan Davidson became the founding members, and first executive, of Liberal Democrats Friends of Ukraine (or LDFU). We launched a basic website, Twitter account and a sign-up sheet on Google Forms, and within 14 hours we had 70 members and over 100 followers. What we were most surprised at is the amount of members that said they would like to volunteer: as it stands, about 70% of members said they want to volunteer for LDFU.

Liberal Irish – the new Liberal Democrat Irish Society

By Richard Logue | Fri 20th September 2019 - 9:34 am

Party President Sal Brinton with (L to R) Richard Logue, Audrey Eager and Conrad Bryan
We weren’t sure what to expect on Monday morning when we picked up 500 flyers for our launch event. We weren’t inside the conference building, we weren’t on the conference timetable and we certainly weren’t on the conference app. What we did have was enthusiasm and determination to get the message out to conference that we were there and would welcome anyone who wanted to know what we are about and what we intend to do.

We were delighted to secure the Irish Ambassador to the UK, Adrian O’Neill as our guest speaker. The Irish Ambassador and his team make the point of attending all the major party conferences so we took the opportunity to book him.

We booked space in Bar So at the Royal Exeter Hotel, a regular haunt for Conference attendees and shamelessly door-stepped everyone going in and out of conference inviting everyone from MPs, Peers, MEPs and members.

Baroness Dee Doocey has very kindly agreed to be our Honorary President hailing from Dublin herself originally. We were delighted to meet with Party President, Sal Brinton who encouraged us and was very supportive of our aims. We also spoke with Baroness Sarah Ludford who was in attendance at the reception along with Nick Harvey, Chief Executive of the Lib Dems.

And what a turnout at the reception it was!