News came through via Gareth Epps at the morning consultation session that the number of member registrations at this Bournemouth conference have now passed the previous record for the party. So this is now the biggest Liberal Democrat party conference EVER!
The party said:
More Liberal Democrat members than ever before will be attending conference this weekend, as leader Tim Farron leads the party’s fightback.
At 11am this morning 2,388 members had registered in Bournemouth with hundreds more expected to turn up over the next five days.
Around 50 per cent more members will take part debates and fringes than at the party’s last Autumn conference in Glasgow.
Organisers said first time attendees to conference have more than trebled, as the party’s membership hits 60,844.
Party leader Tim Farron said: “The enthusiasm of members old and new and the willingness to help us create an exciting conference has been overwhelming.
“The Lib Dem fightback is in full swing. Britain is teeming with liberals, some of them are not yet in the Liberal Democrats. But we are their home.”
* Paul Walter is a Liberal Democrat activist and member of the Liberal Democrat Voice team. He blogs at Liberal Burblings.
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8 Comments
Some people are perhaps worried that people who have joined the party since the general election are now turning up in large numbers ato the party conference, some of them as voting reps.
I however think it is great. The more the merrier.
It will perhaps put an end to the suggestions that some people have been putting around since May that they somehow know all about the new members, who of course agree with every word they or their faction have been saying for years.
It may not turn out like that. 🙂
Brilliant news 🙂
Yes, it is being shown live on BBC Parliament (but they are completely blanking the weekend sessions) unlike UKIP and the Greens (who are having every single moment of their conferences shown live)!. I have already complained about what appears to be a double standard.
And BBC Parliament does not provide subtitles…. so people like me cannot follow what is going on.
‘BBC Parliament does not provide subtitles’……….. unbelievable.
? How manypeople watch BBC Parliament. Very few I guess.
Very good news that this is the biggest Lib Dem Conference ever. Anyone who has observed the election of Jeremy Corben as leader of the Labour Party cannot fail to notice the number of young people who turned up to his hustings al so very tired of the status quo.
No one believes what polititions say ay more and with good reason and a an honest approach is now in vogue.
We the Lib Dems should be well pleased with our new members, our problem now will be High Profile defectors with no values other than ambition. They get us headlines for a few days but no long term benefit.
We need people who share our values
Info from HQ shows the profile of the new members and what they care about most. I’d met or exchanged emails with quite a few of our lot locally and heard from others with similar experience. I met a lot at Conference.
At one meetup for new members in NE Essex, I asked EVERYONE, however new or old in the party, to explain how and why they’d joined. Of course the circumstances varied (Harold Wilson’s first government versus the Tory victory on May 7th, say), but what was amazing was the similarity. Seems to me the new members are much like the old except younger (most of them) and keener.