It has been observed elsewhere that this website has not been updated in a while. Mea culpa. Worse, it would unfortunately be wholly mistaken to assume that no news is good news. In fact, personally speaking, it has more been a case of what to say if you haven’t got anything nice to say.

Taking things in turn, the Gender Balance Task Force / Campaign for Gender Balance (as it is now known) has been without an administrator for six months. Technically, this has not been because of a lack of funding, but it has been subject to the Party’s Finance and Administration Committee dragging its feet over whether to approve the advertisement of a vacancy. On the positive side, the new administrator has begun working today.

The motion on ethnic diversity debated in the Spring at the Party’s conference in Harrogate was passed overwhelmingly. However, a rider was added at the insistence of the Party’s President (Simon Hughes) that most of the substantive parts of the motion would only be ‘considered’ by the party’s Diversity and Equality Review.

That review met for the first time as recently as July. The motion that it has presented to Party Conference is, in my personal opinion, both entirely unobjectionable and entirely unsubstantial. In short, more warm words.

Meanwhile, the Party Leader has appointed Steve Hitchens to serve as his ‘Diversity Czar.’ As leader of the Lib Dem council group in Islington, Steve was extremely successful in helping to create a council group that was both gender balance and diverse in terms of ethnicity, sexuality and disability status, so I’m not dismissive of this move. But from what I’ve been told it is to be mainly focused on ‘head hunting’ strong candidates rather than working to increase the number of candidates from under-represented groups overall.

In my view, the party’s fundamental problem is not in finding strong candidates from under-represented groups or in local parties discriminating against them. The main problem is we don’t have enough of them. The approach of both the Campaign for Gender Balance and the Ethnic Minority Election Task Force was to provide a mechanism for proactively going out and finding candidates in significant numbers. Replacing it with a ‘favoured sons and daughters’ approach will have limited success. It is also open to the charges of ghettoisation - selecting (eg) BME candidates for areas which are ethnically diverse rather than supporting them wherever they choose to stand - an approach which the party overwhelmingly opposed last year.

It isn’t entirely bad news. The party has launched a new website - LibDems4Parliament - which aims to better co-ordinate the work of the candidates’ office and other stakeholders. The party has had a welcome recent spate of female candidates selected in winnable seats. My problem is that any attempt to set up a large scale and adequately resourced campaign to proactively find, train and support candidates from under-represented groups has been resisted and democratic attempts to introduce such measures have been bypassed by senior party officials for their own purposes (about which, please read my article in the last issue of Liberator).

Personally, I am intending to speak and vote against the “Diversity and equality” being debated on the Monday of Conference. It calls for almost nothing, and only the embarrassment of a defeat is likely to stir the party at a senior level into action on this issue. I would be grateful if others would join me.

Finally, there is the question of what to do about this website. It is wholly owned and paid for by myself. Would people be interested in continuing the website in some form - either as a focal point for campaigns or as a networking website for potential candidates? Add your comments below.

James Graham is writing in a wholly personal capacity and his views should not be inferred to be shared by those supporting the Reflecting Britain campaign set up earlier this year.

With the new Lib Dem leader due to be announced in just a few hours time, this is just a short note to thank everyone who has supported this campaign and made it a success.

We have been delighted by positive response we have received, not least of all by the leadership contenders themselves. It has been generally recognised that one of the key things that the new leader will be judged on is to what degree he manages to ensure that the Parliamentary Party after the next General Election is significantly more diverse and gender balanced.

The petition will be closing in a few hours time, but there is still time to sign up. The new leader will be presented with the signatures we receive.

The website will continue to be available for the foreseeable future as a public record and to chronicle progress as it develops. In addition, we are still encouraging people to nominate their diamonds and will continue to develop the do it section.

Thanks again for your support!

Ming Campbell has a new video on his campaign website, in which Nicola Davies (candidate for Birmingham Hodge Hill in the 2004 by-election) and Baroness Barker interview him about the women who have influenced him in his life and about his desire to see a more representative House of Commons. In it he commits to establishing a trust fund to help female and ethnic minority candidates.

All three leadership candidates spoke at the Ethnic Minority Election Task Force hustings at the National Liberal Club last night (14 February).

Simon Hughes, Chris Huhne and Ming Campbell have included details of what they said on their respective websites.

In the blogosphere, Mark Valladares has given his reaction, as have Peter Pigeon, Colin Ross and James Graham.

UPDATE: Susanne Lamido adds her comments.

Reflecting Britain is launching a new challenge. With all three Lib Dem leadership contenders now signed up to the campaign, we are switching our focus to finding new talent within the party.

We are asking party members to encourage their own “diamonds” to put their names forward as Prospective Parliamentary Candidates (”PPCs”). This could be someone in your local party, a friend or a member of staff you think has the Right Stuff.

A lot of the party’s brightest and best MPs only decided to put themselves forward because they were encouraged by friends and colleagues. By meeting our challenge you could be finding one of tommorrow’s true stars. Possibly even a future leader!

We’ve made it extremely easy for you. Simply fill in this form and we will send your “diamond” a message, pointing them in the direction of the Gender Balance Task Force and the Ethnic Minority Election Task Force as appropriate.

It will be up to them to take the first step, but your little bit of encouragement may be all that they need!

The Ethnic Minority Election Task Force have called a ‘Special’ Leadership Hustings to specifically address the issue of how the Leadership Contenders intend to move forward the agenda of making Liberal Democrats more appealing to ethnic minorities. They also want to hear their views on what they intend to do to ensure we have proper ethnic minority representation in Parliament and on local councils across the country in order to reflect the diverse culture of modern day Britain.

Venue: National Liberal Club, Whitehall Place, London SW1A 2HE,
Date & Time: 14th. February 2006, at 6.30 pm

The Candidates have now all signed up to the Reflecting Britain Campaign. Now they are being asked to go further and outline their plans in more detail. They are being asked to say how they intend to make the Party’s Policies more relevant to the modern day diverse multi ethnic Britain as well as to expand on their plans, end the ethnic deficit within the Party structures – both Parliamentary and organisational.

Although these hustings have been organised specifically with the ethnic minority PPC, Councillors and members in mind, EMETF wants the attendance to reflect the Party as a whole. Please pass the details of this hustings on to your colleagues.

If you plan to attend, please email Rabi Martins to allow EMETF to keep an eye on numbers.

The Fawcett Society has welcomed the launch of Reflecting Britain and its call for more women Lib Dem MPs.

Jenny Westaway from Fawcett commented:

Fawcett supports Reflecting Britain’s campaign to increase the number of women and Black and Minority Ethnic MPs in the Liberal Democrat Party. As long-standing campaigners on women and politics, we are pleased to see the challenge to the Lib Dem leadership candidates. Fawcett believes that every party must adopt positive action to ensure that the MPs who represent us, reflect our nation more closely.

Thanks to all of you who have already signed up to the campaign, as of now we have 62 people signed up, including 2 MPs, 1 Peer and at least 19 people who were parliamentary candidates in 2005.

If you haven’t signed our campaign petition yet, please do. And please keep spreading the word!