LDDA - The Liberal Democrat Disability Association

Conservative MP Philip Davies has started taking a surprising interest in the Liberal Democrats' commitment to an equal parliament, and our internal selection procedures.

Perhaps he has decided to turn his back on his sexist views, or perhaps he has a different motive.

Read Philip Davies' letter to Ed Davey, and Ed's reply:

We did it!

The Vagrancy Bill is a blunt outdated instrument that makes criminals of rough sleepers. It hurts the people most in need in our society.

Liberal Democrats have been fighting to scrap it for years. And today, the Prime Minister has been dragged kicking and screaming to a point where even he admits it needs to go.

This #NationalHCAW we want to talk about disability hate crime.

It can have a profound effect on people's lives. It's not anti-social behaviour so we need to make sure we identify and record it for what it is.

Find out more ➡️ https://t.co/xJSc0M5g88 #ZeroTolerance2Hate pic.twitter.com/lFigtAizsC

- Devon & Cornwall Police (@DC_Police) October 14, 2021

In collaboration with the Liberal Democrat European Group, the Federal Policy Committee are organising regional events giving members a chance to shape our policy on Europe. We want to hear your thoughts on what our priority areas should be, what solutions you might have to problems raised and how we can continue to promote a close relationship with Europe.

The autumn party conferences traditionally mark the start of the new political season. They are a time to reflect on the past year and set out plans to succeed in the coming year.

Both politics and coronavirus have made it a tough time since the last round of conferences. But we can look forward to this new political season with confidence that if we continue to raise our game, we can prosper. We've seen signs of that already, including with Sarah Green's fantastic win in Chesham and Amersham and also with the latest net favourability leadership polling from Savanta ComRes:

The Federal Conference Committee recently met to discuss the Conference format for 2022.

We considered a number of options for next year's conferences and took the difficult decision to hold Spring Conference as an online conference and only returning to an in-person event for Autumn Conference. The dates of Spring Conference will be 11-13 March 2022 and we will announce the dates and venue for Autumn Conference in due course.

On Monday 18th of October the Board will hosting a surgery for all Party members.

This is an open invitation to everyone, whether you have a burning question for us, would just like to get to know the Board a bit better, or have an issue you'd like to raise. We are all ears.

The session will run from 18:00-19:00, please feel free to drop in and out as best fits your day, and you can register here.

This Autumn, we say goodbye to Isabelle Parasram, our Vice President responsible for working with ethnic minority communities.

Isabelle has been a tremendous advocate, leader and example in the Party and she will be greatly missed. We wish her all the best in her new role as Chief Executive of Social Value UK, which has led to her making the difficult decision to step back from the demands of the Vice Presidential role.

October is Black History Month - an opportunity to celebrate the enormous contributions that Black people have made across our country.

From Mary Prince to Paul Stephenson, so many Black pioneers have transformed our society's cultural and political landscapes. We owe a great debt to everything they have achieved.

Questions 1-3 are on a similar topic so have been grouped together, they were also answered orally during Conference.

Q1. Submitted by Prue Bray

I like the disciplinary proposals, but the system still does not deal satisfactorily with complaints about councillors. Will you discuss this with local government representatives?