Mark Pack

Good news on the Wednesday morning of the Liberal Democrat autumn conference in Birmingham. The Federal Executive’s very sensible proposals to relax the rules on campaigning in internal party contests will be voted on after a debate scheduled for 9am-9:30am.

As I wrote previously of the proposed changes:

Regular readers of The Voice may notice a certain similarity between these proposals and the ones I submitted to the rules review before Christmas. Whilst in part that is welcome news (to me at least ), I fear it also reflects the relatively small number of submissions made – and is a reminder that the party’s decision making mechanisms can often be influenced by the simple act of taking part.

Here is how the Federal Executive report to Lib Dem conference summaries the proposed changes:

• the introduction of the use of electronic communications by the Acting Returning Officer (ARO) with voters, as per Leadership and Presidential elections;
• the introduction of an ARO-published e-mail and telephone contact for each candidate to encourage voter-candidate contact;
• the removal of the ‘no endorsements’ rule for the Interim Peers’ Election, bringing said elections into line with the Committee, Leader and Presidential elections by allowing consent to manifesto endorsements;
• the removal of the ban on electronic campaigning as it is no longer enforceable;
• the removal of the specific question and answer requirements on the second side of the interim Peers’ artwork.