Hook, line, and sinker

Today was my first day back at work, after my first Party Conference and oh boy do I have the post Conference blues.

I registered for Conference pretty last minute, other personal commitments having not been settled till quite late - I did at least manage to just avoid having to go to what was clearly going to be the Room of Shame and pick up my pass on arrival, it instead arriving by mail a few days beforehand.

A friend of mine who is a long standing Lib Dem was attending and was able to offer me a spare bed in his already booked hotel room on such short notice, which helped to keep costs down, and gave me a solid base, along with easy introductions to some people to find my bearings. I downloaded the app and started adding things to my personal schedule on the train down.

I was somewhat nervous about attending, being able to only think of 3 people who I might know already going, on top of long standing social anxiety and mental health concerns and so my ability to talk to people and make friends amongst a large group of strangers was a little under question.  Conference was a thing I knew I was either going to love, or hate, and there was only one way to find out.

Dear Conference, I should not have been worried. 
I went from sitting with my friend and a few people he knew on the first night to the next night eating at a comically long table with 20 people from my local party and dancing/singing like an idiot at Communi-oke till 1am. 
Within 24 hours I was experiencing the common problem of it taking 15 minutes to walk even between rooms next door as you bumped into so many people you knew - I can't imagine what it must be like after 20 years of this.

In fact, as with everything I have done with the Lib Dems to date, I LOVED every moment of it.  From my first policy vote and the feeling of true engagement with the party process, to fascinating talks and speeches with party luminaries, excellent and focussed training that was designed superbly given the massive influx of new members & attendees who are eager but inexperienced, and of course, the many many drinks receptions.  And just as you're told as new member, if you go up to stranger and start a conversation, they will be delighted to talk to you - it really is true!

One day, no doubt, I will meet some quarrelsome figure within the party and come across things I really dislike (although I did go to the excellent training session on 'Dealing with Difficult People' which got across some useful techniques for dealing with conflict in all areas of life, not just Party matters), but for now, the impression the Liberal Democrats have made on me is impeccable and a credit to the Party's values.

I have fallen hook, line, and sinker for my new found politicsm and involvement with the Liberal Democrats and if I didn't know it before, Conference has definitely proved it to me.  I've come away with a host of new contacts, new motivation to get even more involved, and I'm already looking forward to when I can register for my next Conference.

By then I might just have got over the shock of what exactly I walked into at 'Glee Club'...

This Conference thing..

So I keep getting emails about this Conference thing...

I guess it's what you do as a Lib Dem?

Honestly, I don't know that much detail, and it could be the sort of thing I love or hate.  I get the impression it's that for a lot of people, and no reflection on my specific personality.

But I am interested to learn more about the party, about how it operates, to see that in action and understand what I can get involved in and how.  That information isn't exactly easily findable.  It's either provided with barely a passing reference to federal structure and precious little that might actually be informative (*cough* welcome pack *cough*), or else comes in an over burdensome format that whilst probably somewhat of a useful reference to old hands, is far too convoluted and poorly indexed for a newcomer to navigate (depths of the LD website).

Conference seemed like a good, deep-end jump into getting to grips with all this.  I'm frustrated by my ability to not do more - I still get stuff from the local party in the wake of the General Election, but the tricky element for me is finding what I can fit around my excessively demanding work schedule. 

Pleasingly, as a first time attendee, the rate is to come is heavily discounted and doesn't suffer from any early bird period - I can make my decision whensoever I choose. 

For now, the holiday request from work is in, and I'm awaiting the next payday to pay my registration fee.  I'm definitely curious, and if nothing else this feels like the sort of thing I should attend the once, so I can understand what exactly happens there, even if it proves not to be my cup of tea.

Fear and Hope

So the big day is tomorrow (today now).  It's called a snap election and I've definitely felt the breakneck speed of it is.

From a couple of hours one afternoon delivering leaflets, to managing large complex print runs of campaign material, finding myself with the keys to not just one but two campaign offices in my pocket late one night and now tomorrow I've been elevated to the lofty heights of captain of a polling district.

It's been utterly crazy.  And enjoyable.  Even coming from an industry which is habitually last minute, endlessly changing, high risk and demanding many late hours, from my tiny corner of perspective I've felt this election you ramp up.

I gave more than I was expecting to, and I got back more than I anticipated.  Tomorrow is, on a personal level, terrifying in many ways.  It's placing me reasonably far out of my comfort zone, and for a pretty decent period of time.  But because people have recognised my enthusiasm and my capability, because I've been able to find worth in my contributions, I've allowed myself to get swept up by the torrent of energy this campaign has demanded and I'm willing to rise to the challenge.

On a selfish level, it will hopefully help me to work on problems I've been trying to fix for a long time.  But that's not why I agreed to it.  I'm doing it because I believe in the campaign - in what the Lib Dems are fighting for and what they represent.

I am fighting with all my heart tomorrow because I genuinely believe in what I'm doing, and the passion I've found in everyone else I've been around the last few weeks has just further cemented my own passion for it too.  I hope the Lib Dems do well, I hope Simon Hughes gets elected because it would be the best reward for all the effort I've put in, but if he doesn't I won't regret it.

I will continue to fight, and I have found people who will fight alongside me.  And if you're in the district I'm captaining tomorrow, you better vote early, or I'll be knocking on your door non-stop till you do!

Overcoming betrayal

I couldn't have decided to join the Liberal Democrats without revisiting, and reconciling with myself the problematic sense of betrayals that many people of my generation felt came from the 2010 General Election and resulting coalition.

All the way back in 1997, when I was just hitting adolescence at school there was a similar sentiment to the one that seemed to be driving things in the run up to 2010.  A generation was frustrated with decades of the old then Thatcherite/Major Conservative government; a government of the past they felt no longer represented them, and on the wave of that came the shiny promise of New Labour.
They'll regret it, my parents said, lifelong fiscally Conservative voters.  Labour governments are always a disaster. ("Eventually you run out of other people's money.")
But this was New Labour.  A Labour that promised none of that previous incompetence.  Charismatic (a very novel idea to the Thatcher/Major crowd) and keyed into an increasingly global and conscientious electorate.  If I could have voted then I'd have voted Labour of course.
And we got Blair.  I perhaps began to then the dangers of the populist choice promising new ivory towered housing for all and free rose tinted glasses through the NHS.

Fast forward 12 years and again, with a new stock of voters, people had grown tiresome and indeed hostile of the actions of the Blair years.  Disillusioned Labour voters were sensible enough not to completely flip, and the new millenial of which I was a part had an affinity with 1960s socialism (aptly reflected in a strong shift to human interest news coverage and fly on the wall style documentaries).  Why not give the Lib Dems a shot?  They've been out on the side lines for a good line while now, surely they can't be any worse than what we've had?
Of course back in those heady days the political centre hadn't lurched as far to the right yet and the Lib Dems comfortably occupied the centre left just as much as Labour did with the inevitable fringe elements in both directions.

The initial results of the 2010 General Election prove fascinating, reflective and indicative of the future problems to come in so many ways I could probably get 3 posts out of talking about them before I even needed to do any external reading on the subject.  But like many, I voted Lib Dem, hoping for them to win, and if not, that a left wing coalition of LD/Lab would result. 

We ended up with the Con/LD coalition, which was very much NOT what so many of us had voted for. 
Hindsight is of course, 20-20, and I can see now that given the numbers, a LD/Lab minority government would have all kinds of issues.  Given the increasing partisanship running rife through Western democracies I'm sure the conservatives would have to a certain extent dug in and been intransigent for the sake of it.
I'm also now blessed with the insight and understanding of how the Liberal Democrats softened Conservative policies; where they forced compromise, a better knowledge of what they were responsible for, and critically what was unfairly blamed on them.

But these are not insights that can easily be imparted to the general populace; they are not obvious, and they are not quick to communicate; it's taken me the better part of 3 years to come to know them.  And whilst I have learnt to accept them not everyone may be so forgiving.

This Election I find myself plagued by friends, who regularly say 'well I would vote lib dem, but look what they did last time'.  The coalition and tuition fees are the most cited reasons, and they are cute often.
I now have some of the answers to why these were necessary, or at least felt the best course of action.  But they are not quick answers.  They are not satisfying answers.  I still understand my friends' sense of betrayal.  And no answer I can give them will remove that, or has the ability to assure them such decisions wouldn't be taken in future.

I still think the Lib Dems made grave mistakes on these and other issues.  Politics is always about compromise, but I still firmly believe these were the wrong ones to make.  They were the bottom lines.  And dear gods are they paying for it.
But I didn't join the Liberal Democrats to fix this election.  I didn't join them because I think next time around I could help avoid such folly.  I joined them, because Brexit, Trump, this Election, are about the kind of society we want to be, about the kind of world we want to live in and how we wish to approach those around us.
I became a Lib Dem because I believe they represent one of the best and strongest hopes for the kind of views I have on those subjects, and I think it's more important than ever for those people to be visible. It's why I've gone from rarely posting anything UK politics related on my social media feeds to yelling from the mountaintops about my involvement.
This fight, my fight is for the long haul.  And I'm lucky in joining a party whose members very rarely agree on the best course of action, but routinely turn up and fight for what's important.

Empty Chairs at Empty Pedestals

It has been announced that Amber Rudd is to represent the conservatives at the next televised debate.

I grew up with a lot of Americanisms - smores, school prom, the idea that summer starts in may and ends in September.  I grew up with an ingrained knowledge that live debates were a key part of the electoral process.  The chance for voters on a massive scale to engage with the candidates who will potentially lead their country, and see how they respond on the spot against each other and the public.

To me, it is unconscionable, and bluntly, insulting, that Theresa May refuses to engage with this process in full in the UK.

Televised election debates are a new concept in the UK - very much an import from the US system.  And it's important to note the systems have differences.  We don't vote for a leader here per se, we vote for local party candidates and thereby decide which party, and which leader the country will have; because the UK doesn't isolate it's Executive from the Legislature, there are frequent opportunities for the 'losing candidate(s)’ to hold the winner to account in the form of PMQs; we are a country fiercely proud of it's Parliamentary system with good reason, and we are inherently against creeping Americanisation as a society and nation.

But from its inception in the UK, live televised election debates have been a success - viewing figures show they do engage with a huge number of voters, importantly, they engage with a lot of younger voters, the IT generation, where political apathy is otherwise rife.  Up to 40% of voters consider televised debates to have directly influenced their polling day decision.
And political parties, given the chance, have taken part in them, fielding their leaders, hopeful future PMs, to represent why they and their party are the best hope for our futures.  Whatever their misgivings, the parties have understood the importance and potential of these kinds of events from day one.

That May refuses to meet with the voters in this kind of public forum is utterly unacceptable to me.  It is the sort of thing that would lead me to consider a politician unfit to lead their party.  It speaks of such a flagrant disregard to engage with votes, to defend one's political views and principles under pressure.  At worst it reveals a known inability to do so but a blind refusal to acknowledge that shortcoming.

Election debates aren't perfect.  They're slightly artificial with their prearranged topics and rules and candidate preparation, but they inevitably have those uncontrolled moments and unpredictable developments of arguement that can be found telling of a person, and fundamentally, regardless of the local vote being for local candidates and parties, election campaigns have ALWAYS revolved around the personalities of the leaders.  They are the representative of the party, and they are the face of the party; they should be expected to defend the parties policies in national campaigns, and parties across the whole spectrum should be entitled to take part if we are to call ourselves fair democracies.
(I recognise situations like the 2016 US Election prove the problem of that latter point where you can end up with a field that is too large to practically manage a debate with, but that is not a reason to abandon the process in entirety.  Throw the bathwater.  Keep the baby etc.)

We poll locally, but we vote nationally.  Candidates face hustings locally, why should party leaders be expected any lesser of on the national stage, from both the electorate, and their own parties.

Theresa May's absence is inexcusable.  The lack of a comprehensive party leader debate is unacceptable, and where party leaders do not participate in them, they should damned well be empty chaired.

Catching the bug

I've had a few days off and so, glutton for punishment that I am, instead of spending them watching daytime tv and gorging on chocolate ice cream, I decided to head into the Southwark Liberal Democrat Campaign office and see if I could help out.

It was helped a little by the fact I had a doctor's appointment Thursday morning.  Being already up and about it was easy to get off 2 stops early on my way home.

First impressions were how busy it was for a weekday around 1130.  A full big table of volunteers was already deep into stuffing envelopes - my first task of the day to pitch in on whilst they found a fuller task they could set me to (I'd conceded on arrival I could help all day so they knew they had several hours of my time).

Experienced members helped show me the best places and lines to fold the leaflets along - an art clearly honed thousands and thousands of leaflets and envelopes.

Shortly thereafter it was onto organising the stacks of stuffed letter into a coded order and then grouping by delivery office ready to send out in the freepost.

Good credit is due to the team at the office that day, who took the time to explain not just what they needed me to do, but what it was for, what would happen next, how everything fed into the larger picture, what the campaigning aim of each task was.  It was hugely helpful to me as someone who wants to learn more about the entire process and become more involved in it, but I also think an understanding of context helps people work out what to do generally - understanding that the reason everything has to stay in coded order is because that corresponds to the walks that volunteers are then sent out to deliver. 

Having delivered a little here, and also up in the Sleaford by election, I also understand that roads don't often go in number order; you want all the evens together and all the odds together because that's how the road is laid out when you walk it - unless it's a cul-de-sac, in which case it does go in number order, or an estate or block of flats, which might have any variety of arbitrary ordering schemes.  I massively appreciated everyone who took the time to not just explain the single task, but its importance, the best ways to do it, and how it ultimately helped us target and reach voters.

Owing to the fact it was a weekday that I randomly had off, I was the only young volunteer in the office, I was inevitably asked the question all young people are asked these days - 'Do you know how to work the technology?'
First it was the Apple TV, then a printer jam.
They clearly realised I'd found my element.

Before long I was delegated a task of overseeing a print run of 40000+ letters - managing multiple printers, clearing jams,  grabbing materials from a store room, sorting paper, always keeping everything in number order as it comes off and remerging it all as the multiple printers finished.  Soon they added another print job of a different sort and I was learning all kinds of repographics things.
At one point, manically running back and forth with my 3rd set of print trays, sorting boxes and scribbled on paper label dividers I was even accused of looking like I was enjoying myself!

Okay so it's a bit of a weird thing enjoy - in honestly it was very similar to my day job so was an easy task for me.  But the enjoyment came from the feeling of engagement and involvement.  Of the growing sense that I wasn't just sitting around wondering why the world is become a darker place - I was doing my small, rather arcane but useful part in fighting against that and standing up for the kind of world I'd like to live in, the kind of society I'd like to be a part of.

Being in the campaign office gave me a great opportunity to see and learn some of the many different cogs that feed into an election campaign, overhearing campaign gossip, learning he experiences of those who are hardened pros. 
From intending to go in for half a day, I ended up going staying till 8pm, going back the next day for another 10 hours, and getting up early on Sunday to do another 3.5 hours because I wanted to see the job done personally.  That all happened because people took the time to encourage me, to recognise my enthusiasm, to take the time to explain context and train me up on new processes and equipment right from the start.

I left with a request to email across my availability until polling day, and mentally revising my diary to find some additional days to go do my part.

Personal Pronouns

Theresa May posts on Facebook and Twitter:
"If I lose just six seats I will lose this election..."

Firstly, note the use of I, not the Conservative Party.
But more importantly, this shows just how ridiculous it is that the Conservatives should be so complacent about this election when their position is in fact so tenuous as to be not just in danger, but eliminated if they lose a mere 6 seats

May is so self-assured of her victory that she is campaigning on a manifesto that even includes restarting the fox hunting debate, taking lunches away from school children, and bringing in flawed voter ID and internet censorship laws.
As one friend pointed out: "if these are their campaign promises, what the hell are they planning to sneak in quietly after the election?!"

6 seats isn't many and some good strong tactical voting could cause May and the Tories to rethink their positions as a result.

If you vote Conservative in this election, you will get May for the long haul.
If you vote Conservative, you will get Hard Brexit with no final say by the public and a very limited say even by our elected representatives.
If you vote Conservative you get someone who prioritises foxhunting over the NHS.
If you vote Conservative you will get an increasingly authoritarian and invasive state, far worse than anything the EU ever regulated.
If you vote Conservative you will have no guarantee that the changes Brexit brings will still leave you with 28 days holiday, the right to paid leave, or to discuss your working hours, or retain your job when you are sick for a long time.
If you vote Conservative, you will get confirm that it's not about the Conservatives, it is about Theresa May, her personal vision of dystopia, and those 6 seats.

For the love of all god(s), #anyonebutthetories

The first step(s)

I've got a fair few weekdays off over the next month - the byproduct of a very intense April workwise.

After an intentionally very slow weekend taking time to myself, I finally took the chance to go to the local Lib Dem campaign office, or at least the local one that is considered the best target seat - Southwark in my case, and offer to help out.

I get emails about canvassing rounds being run around the neighbourhoods every evening, but firstly, I don't get out of work in time for them, and secondly, I'm not confident talking to people I don't know.  I go in and ask about something that doesn't involve that, knowing I'll probably get send out in some way.  There's 2 large tables full of little old ladies and new mums scribbling out addresses on envelopes.  I get asked if I'll go out delivering focus letters.  It's not ideal.  Ringing doorbells makes me nervous.  But I get it; I'm young, I can walk around, it's the first time they've seen me and they don't know if/when I'll be back.  And it's important to get the word out.  I'm willing to earn my stripes.  I packed with a bottle of Lucozade, bag of Minstrels and a new set of headphones for this eventuality.

It's not much, but it finally feels like I'm doing something.  When I made my decision, I had no intention of joining the Lib Dems for lip-service.  I want to be active and engaged.  I have to fit that around my rather demanding work schedule, which is problematic and frustrating.  I finish 2 rounds and go back for another 2 more.  My day is brought to an end by a dying phone battery more than time restrictions on my part (must buy a new battery pack!).  It's 584 doors worth of deliveries (less 10 in a building I couldn't get access to).  No doubt a very small proprotion of what there is in Southwark.  But I'm willing to accept that maybe out of that 1 person will feel engaged with and that's enough to keep me satisfied.

I'll go back.  I didn't intend my involvement to be a one-off either.  I have a handful of days off over the next month in the run up to the election and I can hopefully do more.  If I can get the chance to stay in the office and help there I'd love to do that; because I think I'd learn a lot myself just being in that environment.  It's also the way I'm most likely to stand of getting to know who the local lib dems are given I'm not keen on canvassing.  But for now, as a newbie, helping out in the face of a snap election, I also understand the value in being useful where I can.

It finally happened...

**Originally published on my personal blog 18th April 2017**

It comes as a surprise to none of my friends; it was long overdue as far as they were all concerned.

But to me, it was a big and oddly-troubling decision.


I've never liked UK politics.  I've routinely hated UK politics.  I gain some inexplicable fascination and amusement out of US politics even as a globalised world means its own actions no longer are isolated from my life; but I continue to consider this fascination a distinct and singular aberration.  I detest politics, in so many ways.  It is broken, in ways that for all our supposed intellectualism we are unable to solve or even simply alleviate in any way thus far.  I acutely despise a world that makes politics the demesne of the financially independent, or obnoxiously vocative.  That necessitates tactical voting.  Where associations collaborate to decide explicit rules purely for the purpose of intentionally bending them in every way possible.  Politics is a universal and unrestrained disaster.  And we deserve every grievance we get for it.

It's a decision I've been debating internally for a substantial amount of time.  Both that, and the fact I was even considering it in the first place both struck me.  I have generally voted Lib Dem, Green or Independent all my life, that 's no shock,  But to actively align, to declare myself; to involve myself; that was always unconscionable to me.

Credit must of course go, to 2 friends in particular, who have in large part, convinced me of the merits, not of politics, not of parties, but specifically of the Liberal Democrats.  They made no grand appeals to my sense of fairness, no late night debates over the social mores of our time, they in fact, said nearly nothing.
They acted.  They continued on with their lives as they always had.  And their passion and commitment, both unique yet clear and undeniable, was disarming.  I have met few people so openly, unapologetically, and plainly open about their beliefs on the world.  My ignorance was never made to feel awkward, nor did it result in avoiding discussing things around me.  Sometimes, they were irritatingly quiet when I wished they would say more, or explain more, to help my own understanding of my shifting views.   But they let me come to my own views in my own time.
I went to Sleaford and ended up delivering leaflets.  That's simple I guess.  But I went to Sleaford to see a friend, to spend time with a friend, not to help in a campaign.  He never asked me to either.  But I chose to.  Because walking up every driveway in an housing estate or quietly addressing envelopes at a dining room table was about spending time with a friend, and seeing passion shine forth from him pure as you could ask for in the world.


I cannot, and will not sit by and do nothing.
I wholeheartedly, completely, rabidly believe in the right to vote.  I struggle to understand the right not to vote.
I disagree with Brexit, and even though I can understand the viewpoints now better than I chose to at the time of the referendum (credit for that goes to another acquaintance of rare and special mention; one who I admire for being more intelligent than me), I still fundamentally disagree with them.
I was born in the era of globalisation.  I was born in the era of the EU.  I was born a citizen of the EU.   Even after Brexit, I will, in my heart and mind, if no longer on paper, continue to be a citizen of the EU.
There are people who will fight for that.  There are people who will stand up and be counted for that when the need arrives.  There are people who believe in a more global world.  There are people who believe in paying higher taxes to help society.  There are people who desire a more federalised Europe.   There are people who think the status quo is something to be suspicious of.  Not all of these people are Lib Dems; not all Lib Dems are these people.  But I choose now to align myself with people who display more passion for their beliefs than I ever expected to find outside of religion.

I do not expect the Lib Dems, or Labour for that matter to win this election.  I expect Brexit to still happen.  But I wish to be counted.  I am ready to be counted.  I haven't entirely worked out what that means past this, but after today, now was the time to choose.




This isn't doing much, at all, really, in the grand scheme of things, or even in smaller, less-conspiratorial schemes perhaps.  But for me, this is a bigger moment than it first appears.