Liberal Democrat membership figures
Here are the end of year (31 December*) membership figures for the Liberal Democrats since the party’s creation in 1988 with exact figures since 2001 and rounded-off figures for the earlier years.
Also in this table are the membership totals at the point of various all-member ballots during the party’s history.
Year | Membership | Change on year |
1988 leadership contest | 80,104 | n/a |
1988 president contest | 80,071 | n/a |
1988 | 80,000 | |
1989 | 81,000 | |
1990 president contest | 82,455 | |
1990 | 77,000 | |
1991 | 91,000 | |
1992 president contest | 101,768** | n/a |
1992 | 101,000 | |
1993 | 101,000 | |
1994 president contest | 101,091 | n/a |
1994 | 101,000 | |
1995 | 94,000 | |
1996 | 99,000 | |
1997 | 87,000 | |
1998 | 89,000 | |
1999 leadership contest | 82,827 | n/a |
1999 | 83,000*** | |
2000 | 69,000 | |
2001 | 73,276 | |
2002 | 71,636 | -1,640 |
2003 | 73,305 (63,373 after lapsing) | 1,669 |
2004 president contest | 72,868 | n/a |
2004 | 72,721 | -584 |
2005 | 72,031 | -690 |
2006 leadership contest | 72,064 | n/a |
2006 | 68,743 (65,997) | -3,288 |
2007 leadership contest | 64,728 | n/a |
2007 | 65,400 (62,380) | -3,343 |
2008 president contest | 60,357 | n/a |
2008 | 59,810 (56,294) | -5,590 |
2009 | 58,768 (50,245) | -1,042 |
2010 president contest | 65,861 | n/a |
2010 | 65,038 (62,036) | 6,270 |
2011 | 48,934 | -16,104 |
2012 | 42,501 | -6,433 |
2013 | 43,451**** | 950 |
2014 president contest | 43,246 | n/a |
2014 | 44,680 | 1,229 |
2015 leadership contest | 60,500 | n/a |
2015 | 61,598 | 16,918 |
2016 | 79,507 | 17,909 |
2017 leadership contest | 103,300 | n/a |
2017 | 97,403 | 17,896 |
2018 | 95,228 | -2,175 |
2019 leadership contest | 106,075 | n/a |
2019 president contest | ? | n/a |
2019 | 126,724 | 31,496 |
2020 leadership contest | 117,924 | n/a |
2020 | 98,247 | -28,477 |
2021 | 73,544 | -24,703 |
* Hence before the end of the fourth quarter lapsing of members overdue with their membership subs. For some years post-lapsing figures are also quoted in the table in brackets.
** Around this point the way of counting was changed to include people up to six months in arrears with their membership subs (rather than the previous three months).
*** Around this point the six month period was cut back to three months.
**** At its lowest point in the middle of the year, the party’s membership was 40,530.
With thanks to the House of Commons Library, Stephen Tall and David Loxton for help with the data, along with the election results recorded by Colin Rosenstiel. For information on how to join the Liberal Democrats yourself, see here.
Do you have any information on the size of the liberal party membership in 1970, for example? I don’t think we’re always comparing like with like, given the ructions of the SDP etc in the 1980s.
There is longer-term data here Peter: http://researchbriefings.parliament.uk/ResearchBriefing/Summary/SN05125
The old Liberal Party did not have centralised membership records, so the older data needs to be treated with some caution.
Mark, how many people have been members since 1988?
Not sure, but it will be quite a small proportion of the party’s membership as in 2020 around 1 in 6 have been members for at least a decade.
As President, there is a simple way to find out. Just ask the Head of Membership Services how many members have a seven-digit membership number beginning with 0 or 1 (ex-SDP) or 2 (ex-Lib). Before, I think, the change from Pro7 to Salesforce our membership numbers were all seven-digit, with the last digit used as a check digit so you could get a membership number ending in an X(=10).