Tag Archives: lester holloway

NewsHound

Two ways to find out more about the Ethnic Minorities Liberal Democrats Leadership Hustings

By NewsHound | Sat 11th July 2015 - 12:20 pm

cropped EMLD logo
Last week, Ethnic Minorities Liberal Democrats held a very good hustings event in London where Tim Farron and Norman Lamb were put through their paces.

You can listen to the whole thing here on Soundcloud.

You can also read Lester Holloway’s report of for The Voice here.

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Caron Lindsay

On making LDV more inclusive

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 29th October 2014 - 9:38 pm

Today has not been a good day. It’s not a good feeling when you discover that someone has left the party over something you did, as Lester Holloway has done. I hope that he reconsiders his decision.

The story begins on Saturday when I published this story about Lib Dem Campaigns supremo Victoria Marsom’s visit to Botswana at the culmination of a year long  project to help our sister party in the elections there.

Lester said in the comments that he was unhappy with our interference in this African election. In the ensuing debate, onc eommenter, who as far as we know is not a member or even a supporter of the party, made a racist comment at around 11pm on Monday. I woke up to an email complaining about it at 8am on Tueadsy. I immediately removed the comment and had a fairly lengthy email conversation with a number of people who were copied into the email. I would have been quite happy to bin the comment completely, but I gave an additional option that it should be reinstated but with a very clear statement that comments of that nature are completely unacceptable. It was agreed that this is what we should do and two of the people who were copied into that email thanked me and seemed happy with the outcome.

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Lester Holloway

Opinion: An embarrassing lack of diversity

By Lester Holloway | Thu 9th October 2014 - 4:52 pm

The lack of Black and Asian members at federal conference was depressing and embarrassing.

Glasgow was the most racially undiverse Lib Dem conference since I joined in 2006. Every TV scan of the audience showed a sea of white faces, even for equality debates. The day I went was no different.

The message it sent Britain was that we are not a party that reflects modern multicultural society, and therefore probably don’t care much for it.

To add insult, the Federal Executive (FE) proposed committee quotas for women while ignoring BAME and other under-represented groups.

Under this system the three BAME men would all have lost their places to, in all probability, white women. The only ethnic minority left would be Pauline Pearce on Federal Conference Committee (FCC).

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The Voice

Stephen Tall guests on Guardian Politics Weekly podcast – Lib Dem conference preview

By The Voice | Fri 13th September 2013 - 11:05 am

guardian politicsLibDemVoice co-editor Stephen Tall joined the panel for this week’s Guardian Politics Weekly podcast, hosted by Hugh Muir and also featuring Guardian columnists Seumas Milne and Anne Perkins. They preview the Liberal Democratic party conference; Ed Miliband’s reception at the TUC; and Boris Johnson losing the plot at the London assembly. There’s also a contribution from Lester Holloway from Ethnic Minority Liberal Democrats, highlighting the party’s continuing difficulties in getting MPs elected from diverse backgrounds.

You can listen to it here online, or download it as an MP3 here.

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Caron Lindsay

“Go home” billboards – an open letter and blog round-up

By Caron Lindsay | Wed 24th July 2013 - 12:55 pm

Since my post on Monday about the Home Office’s plan to send mobile billboards proclaiming that people who are in this country illegally should go home or face arrest, a number of bloggers and party members across various internet fora have expressed emotions ranging from horror to anger at the plan.

Sarah Teather is, as far as I can tell, the only Liberal Democrat MP to have passed any comment at all, and just to remind you, she wasn’t chuffed:

Vulnerable individuals who are fleeing persecution and violence are treated with disbelief and a complete lack of compassion in a rigid

…

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Lester Holloway

Sarah Teather: Liberal Democrats must tell positive story on immigration because nobody else will

By Lester Holloway | Wed 17th July 2013 - 8:56 am
Ex-minister Sarah Teather made an impassioned plea to Liberal Democrats yesterday not to give in to fear of the Daily Mail on immigration but instead to “stand for something” on the issue.
Delivering the Gladstone Lecture in Westminster the MP for the heavily-diverse seat of Brent Central repeated her call in a recent Guardian article to bravely challenge popular language that “dehumanises and degrades” immigrations who make a positive contribution to British life and culture.
She accused the coalition government of splitting up thousands of families just so that David Cameron can boast about reducing numbers of immigrants at the next

…

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