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cosmolinguistWhat's your name, where are you from, and which committee(s) are you standing for?
I'm Alice Thomas from London (currently Leytonstone) and I'm standing for Federal Board.
Are you standing for the first time or restanding? If first time what new thing do you bring that nobody else could; if restanding, what about your record are you most proud of that you think should make us vote you back in?
I'm currently on the Federal Executive - I ran last time and joined the committee earlier this year after another member resigned. She was a champion for diversity and young people, and I'm proud to have taken that mantle and run with it, when discussing conference safety arrangements, pastoral care and candidate selections.
Are you standing for any other committees, if so which ones; and if elected to more than one how do you plan to divide your time?
No - I am planning to concentrate all my time on Federal Board.
Are you an active member of any SAOs, and if so which ones?
I'm the Chair of Lib Dem Women (I was elected vice-chair last year, and took over from Liz Leffman on her election as Chair of the English Party earlier this month).
At LDW I've been proud to work hard to ensure that our membership, and our candidates, properly represent the country as a whole, to fundraise for women candidates and to feed into the party's policy process.
If someone asked you on the doorstep, the hustings or on TV to sum up in one or two sentences what the Lib Dems, uniquely, stand for – and then why anyone should vote for us – what are your answers?
Personal freedom: by stopping the state overstepping and by providing the support people need to succeed.
What is your view on diversity quotas for committees? Should they be extended to cover more than just gender, scrapped totally, kept as is or something else?
I think that the more diverse FE has been at its meetings since I started, the better informed it has been and the better decisions it has made. That mixture includes gender, age, experience and class.
At the moment women are underrepresented as candidates for several of our committees. I believe gender quotas are a short term solution - one of a number of including making our new members aware of how to get involved in committees and what they do - that are needed until we get to a position where enough women feel comfortable putting themselves forward to close that gap and make them unnecessary.
I think that same logic follows for other groups, including LGBTQ+ people and ethnic minorities, but find it difficult to see how that would be possible under the Equality Act. During the debate at York Spring conference this year, LDW and the Lib Dems as whole committed to campaigning to widen the law to allow for a greater range of measures to promote diversity and I will continue to do so.
Secrecy rules prevent the party knowing what committees are doing. What will you do to communicate with members; and in what circumstances is confidentiality justified?
It is all about communication. When I've written pieces for Lib Dem Voice or posted to my Facebook page, I spread the information as widely as possible in forums where people can respond and I can engage with them to make sure FE hears their comments. If I'm elected to Federal Board I will continue to do so.
Where there are concerns about any individual's personal safety, privacy or dignity that should always be completely confidential. It also makes sense that, during active campaigns, certain information could give us an advantage and Federal Board should be able to delay when it is released. Otherwise, it can be hard to justify restricting information from members and we should avoid doing so whenever possible.
As the party has now backed the principle of OMOV, how will you ensure all members are represented, not just those who can afford to go to Conference?
With these elections, we have now cracked the process for electronic voting. I want to work with FCC to use similar technology to allow members to vote on motions remotely, whether live or slightly in advance of the motions being discussed at conference.
We also need to use available tools online as widely as possible at conference - facebook live, twitter, snap chat - to make sure all those who are not able to attend can view as much of conference as possible.
At LDW we have worked hard to make sure our events and training are as affordable as possible and to create targeted and effective fundraising schemes. I would use those skills to widen and target the conference support funds, and make sure we are connecting members with accommodation and other needs to each other to bring down costs.
If police accreditation to attend conference was proposed again, would you support or oppose it and why?
The police or party management would have to show the Federal Board a credible reason for reintroducing police accreditation for me to support it. If there were threats to conference, for example, that would only be solved by accreditation, it would be our duty to do what we can to protect members. In principle, I can't imagine a scenario where that was the case.
What is your view on electoral pacts? Should the party make them, and if so, who with?
I think the Lib Dems have the clearest statement of principle in British politics in their constitution. If people agree with it, rather than other parties' members pushing for pacts, they should join us and fight for us directly instead.
I also think that electoral pacts are a bad solution to a worse problem. The point of them is to increase the seats a party gets by strategically depriving voters of the democratic choice they might otherwise make, and so push them towards the next best option - that's why if you're socially centre left and care about environmental issues, you might suggest an electoral pact between the Lib Dems and the Greens. It's an undemocratic way for political parties to force tactical voting.
This wouldn't be necessary at all if we had a system of voting that fairly represented the views of voters. That's why I won't support electoral pacts and will keep pushing to replace the first past the post system with one of proportional representation.
The list of all candidates who have answered can be found here.
I'm Alice Thomas from London (currently Leytonstone) and I'm standing for Federal Board.
Are you standing for the first time or restanding? If first time what new thing do you bring that nobody else could; if restanding, what about your record are you most proud of that you think should make us vote you back in?
I'm currently on the Federal Executive - I ran last time and joined the committee earlier this year after another member resigned. She was a champion for diversity and young people, and I'm proud to have taken that mantle and run with it, when discussing conference safety arrangements, pastoral care and candidate selections.
Are you standing for any other committees, if so which ones; and if elected to more than one how do you plan to divide your time?
No - I am planning to concentrate all my time on Federal Board.
Are you an active member of any SAOs, and if so which ones?
I'm the Chair of Lib Dem Women (I was elected vice-chair last year, and took over from Liz Leffman on her election as Chair of the English Party earlier this month).
At LDW I've been proud to work hard to ensure that our membership, and our candidates, properly represent the country as a whole, to fundraise for women candidates and to feed into the party's policy process.
If someone asked you on the doorstep, the hustings or on TV to sum up in one or two sentences what the Lib Dems, uniquely, stand for – and then why anyone should vote for us – what are your answers?
Personal freedom: by stopping the state overstepping and by providing the support people need to succeed.
What is your view on diversity quotas for committees? Should they be extended to cover more than just gender, scrapped totally, kept as is or something else?
I think that the more diverse FE has been at its meetings since I started, the better informed it has been and the better decisions it has made. That mixture includes gender, age, experience and class.
At the moment women are underrepresented as candidates for several of our committees. I believe gender quotas are a short term solution - one of a number of including making our new members aware of how to get involved in committees and what they do - that are needed until we get to a position where enough women feel comfortable putting themselves forward to close that gap and make them unnecessary.
I think that same logic follows for other groups, including LGBTQ+ people and ethnic minorities, but find it difficult to see how that would be possible under the Equality Act. During the debate at York Spring conference this year, LDW and the Lib Dems as whole committed to campaigning to widen the law to allow for a greater range of measures to promote diversity and I will continue to do so.
Secrecy rules prevent the party knowing what committees are doing. What will you do to communicate with members; and in what circumstances is confidentiality justified?
It is all about communication. When I've written pieces for Lib Dem Voice or posted to my Facebook page, I spread the information as widely as possible in forums where people can respond and I can engage with them to make sure FE hears their comments. If I'm elected to Federal Board I will continue to do so.
Where there are concerns about any individual's personal safety, privacy or dignity that should always be completely confidential. It also makes sense that, during active campaigns, certain information could give us an advantage and Federal Board should be able to delay when it is released. Otherwise, it can be hard to justify restricting information from members and we should avoid doing so whenever possible.
As the party has now backed the principle of OMOV, how will you ensure all members are represented, not just those who can afford to go to Conference?
With these elections, we have now cracked the process for electronic voting. I want to work with FCC to use similar technology to allow members to vote on motions remotely, whether live or slightly in advance of the motions being discussed at conference.
We also need to use available tools online as widely as possible at conference - facebook live, twitter, snap chat - to make sure all those who are not able to attend can view as much of conference as possible.
At LDW we have worked hard to make sure our events and training are as affordable as possible and to create targeted and effective fundraising schemes. I would use those skills to widen and target the conference support funds, and make sure we are connecting members with accommodation and other needs to each other to bring down costs.
If police accreditation to attend conference was proposed again, would you support or oppose it and why?
The police or party management would have to show the Federal Board a credible reason for reintroducing police accreditation for me to support it. If there were threats to conference, for example, that would only be solved by accreditation, it would be our duty to do what we can to protect members. In principle, I can't imagine a scenario where that was the case.
What is your view on electoral pacts? Should the party make them, and if so, who with?
I think the Lib Dems have the clearest statement of principle in British politics in their constitution. If people agree with it, rather than other parties' members pushing for pacts, they should join us and fight for us directly instead.
I also think that electoral pacts are a bad solution to a worse problem. The point of them is to increase the seats a party gets by strategically depriving voters of the democratic choice they might otherwise make, and so push them towards the next best option - that's why if you're socially centre left and care about environmental issues, you might suggest an electoral pact between the Lib Dems and the Greens. It's an undemocratic way for political parties to force tactical voting.
This wouldn't be necessary at all if we had a system of voting that fairly represented the views of voters. That's why I won't support electoral pacts and will keep pushing to replace the first past the post system with one of proportional representation.
The list of all candidates who have answered can be found here.