Earlier this month, ALDC emailed our members asking for them to submit feedback on their local election experiences for the ALDC-LGA Lib Dems formal submission to the party’s elections review.
We would like to encourage all of our members and other Liberal Democrats councillors and campaigners to take part and are seeking submissions between now and our deadline of Monday 23rd June.
A message from Cllr Gerald Vernon-Jackson (Lib Dem Leader, LGA) and Cllr Claire Hudson (Chair, ALDC):
Clearly these were not great elections for us, and we lost too many hardworking, excellent local councillors. We need to learn the lessons of why this happened and fight back so we do much better in future years.
In some places people did great campaigns and won, in others they did great campaigns but did not win. We have to make sure that next year we make progress wherever we can. In Portsmouth our administration has been thrown out by a minority Tory administration with just 12 councillors but with the supporting votes of the 6 UKIP councillors and the 4 Labour councillors.
We’d very much like to hear your views on the elections – why we got the results we got and what might need to change to improve things in future. We’re looking for reasons why we won in some places and why we lost in others. If you have already responded to the review (chaired by James Gurling) then by all means simply send us what you have already submitted.
Our thanks to everyone who worked so hard in the May elections, whatever your local results. Next year the local elections will be another tough test and the campaigns to win in these elections has to start now.
Your response might refer to one or more of the following themes – but of course need not be restricted to these issues:
· Local messaging
· Opposition activity locally
· Our own local activity and motivation
· The candidate
· Connect
· National literature on Europe
· National messaging or literature
Please send your submission to tim.pickstone@aldc.org and alannacoombes@hotmail.com by Monday 23 June.
With a further loss of seats our position at the LGA is weakened. We will lose places on committees, chairs and budgets. This means we need to look at how we operate to make sure we have maximum impact to support Lib Dem councillors across the country. This will mean changes to how we operate and I will let you know about proposed changes when they have been worked through in detail.
Best wishes and keep campaigning,
Gerald Vernon-Jackson and Claire Hudson
Lib Dem Leader, LGA. Chair, ALDC