The F10 function key on my keyboard serves as a Mute button.
And that, unfortunately, is what the F10 motion up for a vote this Saturday in Harrogate would also do: mute the voices of all those that want to be able to choose their candidate for Parliament in their hometown.
You know when the Federal Party is worried because it takes a sudden interest in what ordinary members think, and uses the same skills it directs at the electorate in an effort to win votes.
And so we have been treated to a series of pieces from our science and technology spokesMP, from a former council leader, and even from our esteemed CEO in a mass email that doesn’t have a comment button.
They all believe we should vote in favour of giving the Federal Party greater control over how Parliamentary candidates are chosen, rather than leave it to the English Party to decide on the rules and process for this critical task.
Why? According to the former council leader, because now is the time for change; to our member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted, because it will enable diversity; and to our CEO, because it will give voters more time to get to know their potential future representative.
Never mind that the process for candidates goes through constant change and improvement; never mind that a similar central control of candidates and diversity drive carried out by the Conservatives empowered exactly the wrong sort of people to take positions of power – remember the damage caused by Priti Patel, Nadine Dorries, Chris Pincher and Kwazi Kwarteng? And never mind that the Federal Party could easily incentivise local parties to pick their candidates earlier if that was truly its biggest concern.
The simple truth is that HQ thinks the answer to getting more MPs in power is for it to decide every part of the process, including who the actual candidate should be – and the pesky English Party with its elected officials and processes rooted in local democracy is getting in the way.
There have already been thousands of words dedicated to this topic and there’s no need for thousands of more, so here’s two reasons why members should vote No to F10 on Saturday.
- It’s just not Liberal. We believe in local democracy. We believe that better decisions are made the closer they get to those affected. We believe in collective individualism. We believe in choosing our leaders. This proposal is little more than a power grab by an unelected few who think they can do a better job of things from their seats in Westminster.
- Just look at what the same process has done to the Labour Party. If the central party gets to decide who stands in their most coveted seats, it quickly becomes an enforcement tool. It stirs up ill-feeling. It degenerates into civil war. If there is one thing we should take away from our remarkable win of 72 MPs at the last election, it’s that we should do politics our way; embrace Liberal values, not walk away from them. The best safeguard of democracy is the diffusion of power; when many have a voice, no one can rule unchecked.
Vote No on F10. Do not vote to mute yourself.
* Thomas Prince is a pseudonym for a party member whose identity is known to the LDV team.
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5 Comments
As I understand it, the problem lies not with who is responsible for candidate selection, but the lack of volunteers to deliver it. There is a chronic shortage of returning officers, which slows the process to a crawl.
I am not convinced that changing responsibility from the states and regions to the Federal Party will make any difference. A different committee will not solve the problem.
Just one quibble. Selection will still be done by local parties in either system but only if the logjam is broken
@Mike Taylor. My eyes tend to role everytime I hear someone say that we don’t have enough volunteers for a particular position. Has the party sent a note out to all members asking for people to volunteer for particular roles ? Do they do this on a regular basis ? I would go further. Those who have prominent positions in the voluntary party have a certain amount of influence and see it as a zero sum game and more people getting involved means less for them. And now some of them see those even further up the hierarchy gathering even more power to themselves, all in the name of greater efficiency, of course. Meanwhile those whole pay their subs and get the occasional email……………..
We have to decide as a Party whether our future is better served by professionalising all aspects of our structure and become more like the other main parties or retain our distinct identity as a political body supporting grassroots democratic empowerment in all areas of our lives.
I do not recognise the article’s characterisation of the F10 proposal as « the federal Party’s power grab. The proposal seems to me to an eminently sensible simplification of over-complicated processes for candidate approval ,leaving the final selection of one of those approved candidates as THE candidate for the constituency firmly in the hands of the local members
Let’s get the proposal passed !
At the 2019 General we were forced to take a candidate appointed by the Party. If we had been allowed to stand our excellent, well-known, local candidate I am sure we would have got a better result.