Dear Friend,
Over the weekend the Parliamentary Party and the Federal Executive met. There will be further meetings of both these groups on Monday. Kirsty is currently attending Parliamentary Party meetings in addition to our MP’s, and John Last and Alison Goldsworthy are attending the Federal Executive as the Welsh Party’s representatives there.
We hope all party member’s will have received the statement below that was issued after Saturday’s meetings by the Shadow Cabinet, Parliamentary Party and Federal Executive.
——————–
On Saturday we had a very positive discussion. The Parliamentary Party, Shadow Cabinet and the Federal Executive have fully endorsed the position set out by Nick Clegg.
We will continue to put the national interest first and play a constructive role in providing the stable and good government people deserve.
We have heard what the Labour Party and Gordon Brown are saying but in line with the position Nick Clegg outlined yesterday we are continuing discussions with the Conservative Party as the party with the most seats and votes.
We want to complete this process as soon as possible but people will recognise that it is also important to get these decisions right in the long term national interest.
——-
We have established a dedicated email address where Welsh members can get their views on the current situation to us. That email is balanced.parliament@welshlibdems.org.uk. Where you are writing with the view of others (for example as a local party chair) please make that clear.
Roger Williams MP
Kirsty Williams AM
John Last
Alison Goldsworthy
Related posts:
There are three main possibilities – and two of them have to be ruled out.
A) Lab-LD with 315 seats + SDLP + Alliance = 319 needs solid support from either DUP or two nationalist parties to just clear the hurdle of a majority. Within weeks a package of cuts and tax rises would need to be agreed and it would be impossible to exempt Scotland, Wales or N Ireland – the core demand of those minor parties. So, unless the package obtained Cons agreement, the government would fall long before achieving PR. Moreover, the obvious instability would cause markets to fall immediately.
B) If we allow the Cons to become a minority government, without any agreement, they will blame us for market falls and say that makes the cuts more urgent and deeper. They will do a few counterbalancing popular things, look strong in adversity and go to the country in October. We cannot afford another election – they can – and we would have blown the argument for PR. We say it can produce stable government but try that in October when a hung Parliament has produced instability!
C) We have to negotiate hard with the Cons to secure policy agreement and then accept what our team recommends. We cannot repeat the Welsh experiment of failing to back the outcome of negotiations. The damage to the Party would be far greater – and undermine the PR argument for decades. Agreement and participation in government would help to win that argument.