Liberal Youth

Liberal Youth
President	Erlend Watson
Chairperson	Tom Wood
Treasurer	Adam Curran
Founded	1993
Headquarters	8–10 Great George Street, London SW1P 3AE
Mother party	Liberal Democrats
International affiliation	International Federation of Liberal and Radical Youth (IFLRY)
European affiliation	European Liberal Youth (LYMEC)
British affiliation	British Youth Council
Website	http://liberalyouth.org/

Liberal Youth is the youth and student group of the Liberal Democrats, a political party in the United Kingdom.

Liberal Democrat members who are under 26 years old or attending higher education institutions are automatically members of Liberal Youth if they agree to share this information at registration. The group is financially supported by the party and has offices in the Liberal Democrats' London headquarters.

Liberal Democrats and Liberal Youth

The constitution of the Liberal Democrats requires an affiliated Youth and Student wing. Accordingly, Liberal Youth is a Specified Associated Organisation (SAO) to the party. The Liberal Democratic Party constitution grants Liberal Youth at least one position on local party executives; while federal Liberal Democrat committees such as the Federal Executive, Federal Policy Committee and International Relations Committee each admit an observer from the federal Liberal Youth organisation. In addition, Liberal Youth is also granted a number of voting representatives at the Federal Conference of the Liberal Democrat party based on the number of members, as are local parties. This privilege is extended to the separate Welsh Conferences, Conferences of English regions and to the Liberal Democrats' English Council (the confederal body through which the regional parties of England make joint decisions).

History

Liberal Democrat merger

Liberal Youth is the successor organisation to all the youth and student wings of the Liberal Democrats, the Liberal Party and the Social Democratic Party, including the National League of Young Liberals, the Young Liberals of the 1960s and 1970s. Liberal Democrat Youth and Students was created in 1993 from a merger of the Student Liberal Democrats and the Young Liberal Democrats of England who had shared many resources in the run-up. The merger talks were overseen by a committee which included Sarah Gurling, now wife of Charles Kennedy.

Regional history

The Scottish Young Liberal Democrats formally integrated themselves into the federal structure in 2002; previously, the two organisations and their predecessors had been completely separate.^{[citation needed]}

Renaming

The organisation was formerly known as Liberal Democrat Youth and Students (LDYS) (before that National League of Young Liberals and Union of Liberal Students). Spring 2008 saw the announcement of the renaming of LDYS as 'Liberal Youth'. The decision to do this was taken at the 2007 Autumn conference. The following spring, Liberal Youth Scotland and IR Cymru relaunched as well.

Structure

Federal organisation

Since 2000 Liberal Youth has been, like the main party, organised on a federal basis, compromising of IR Cymru in Wales, Liberal Youth Scotland in Scotland and Liberal Youth England in England: each represented in their state party. The Convenor of each of these groups organises the regional activity of Liberal Youth.

Executive

The federal organisation of Liberal Youth organises liaisons with Liberal Democrats and affiliated organisations. The Federal Executive (current positions: Chair, Vice-Chair, Campaigns Officer, Communications Officer, Events Officer, Finance Officer, International Officer, Policy Officer and two Non-Portfolio Officers,) operates alongside committees for Conferences and Policy. These committees, barring ex officio members such as representatives from state organisations and delegates from the executive, are elected by the membership of Liberal Youth in an all-member ballot and are responsible to Conference.

The current executive is as follows:

Position	Holder
Chair	Tom Wood
Vice Chair	Matt Folker
Campaigns Officer	Matt Downey
Communications Officer	Bobby Dean
Events Officer	Harry Matthews
Finance Officer	Adam Curran
Policy Officer	Sarah Harding
International Officer	Harriet Ainscough/Sam Fisk (shared)
England Convenor	Conor McKenzie
Scotland Convenor	Sophie Bridger
Welsh Convenor	Sam Rees
Non-Portfolio Officers	Robson Brown/Stuart Brown(two positions)

Branches

Outside of universities, Liberal Youth eschews a formal, hierarchical branch structure, instead encouraging members to organise themselves and to use their local Liberal Democratic Party for financial affairs. Active members communicate with their local Youth Chair, who liaises with the parent party's representatives and with the federal Liberal Youth executive. In this way the activities of young and student members remain formally independent from but closely engaged with the Liberal Democrats.

International links

Liberal Youth is a member of two international youth organisations:

• The International Federation of Liberal Youth (IFLRY), which acts as the youth organisation of Liberal International.
• The European Liberal Youth (LYMEC), which acts as the youth organisation of the European Liberal Democrat and Reform Party.

Activity

Liberal Youth passes policy and runs campaigns. Current campaign topics include asylum detention and blood donation restrictions. Past campaigns include 'Homophobia is Gay'. In addition, Liberal Youth run events for their members, from conferences and training weekends.

List of Chairs

• Kiron Reid (1993–1994)
• Alex Wilcock (1994–1995)
• Phil Jones (1995)
• Tim Prater (1995–1996)
• Ruth Berry (1996–1997)
• Hywel Morgan (1997–1998)
• Polly Martin (1998–1999)
• Geoff Payne (1999–2000)
• Miranda Piercy (2000–2002)
• Alison Goldsworthy (2002–2003)
• Brian Robson (2003–2004)
• Chris Lomax (2004–2005)
• Gez Smith (2005–2006)
• Mark Gettleson (2006–2008)
• Elaine Bagshaw (2008–2010)
• Alan Belmore (2010)
• Martin Shapland (2010–2011)
• Tom Wood (2011 to present)

Chairs and chairmen of predecessor organisations

NLYL:

• George Kiloh (1965–1967)
• Louis Eaks (1969–1970)
• Tony Greaves (1970–1971)
• Peter Hain (1971–73)
• Ruth Addison (1973–1975)
• Steve Atack (1975–1977)
• Pat Colman (1977–1978)
• Alan Sherwell (1978–1980)
• John Leston (1980–1981)
• Susan Younger-Ross (1981–1983)
• Janice Turner (1983–85)
• Felix Dodds (1985–1987)
• Rachel Pitchford (1987–1989)
• Jane Brophy (1989–1990)
• Michael Harskin (1990–1991)

ULS:

• Trevor Smith (1950s)
• Tony Greaves (1960s)
• (Liz) Elizabeth Barker (1982–1983)
• Andrew Lawson (1983–1984)
• Andrew Lawson/Martin Horwood (1984–1985)
• Harriet Steele (1985–1986)
• Sheila Cunliffe (1986–1987)
• Alun Evans (1987–1988)

See also

• Liberal Youth Scotland – Scottish wing of Liberal Youth
• IR Cymru – Welsh wing of Liberal Youth

External links

• Liberal Youth
• The young ones: Is this the future of politics?