Twenty minutes after Vince finished speaking yesterday, I was sitting in a room with him, his wife Rachel Smith eating delicious egg sandwiches.
We only had a few minutes to chat, but we covered a fair bit of ground.
I did the geeky party hack thing and started by asking him about his ideas for the party. I mean, he was talking about open primaries, wasn’t he, when he said this?
Our sister Liberal Party in Canada, under Justin Trudeau, leapt from third to first in a ‘first past the post’ system every bit as unforgiving as ours.
I have turned to them for advice on modernisation on how we can apply their successful model here.
The Canadian liberals engaged all their registered supporters – their voters – as well as their members in leadership elections and candidate selection.
They became a new party; a movement.
Building on our own traditions, we must address how we in the Liberal Democrats can become a movement for those who are alienated by the Conservatives and Labour.
He reckons it’s worth a try to connect with more people: