Why the Lib Dems need to welcome in supporters I’ve been a supporter of a registered supporter scheme in the Liberal Democrats since long before it became fashionable. Indeed, I’ve contributed in some way to making it so fashionable that now people who oppose aspects of Vince Cable’s proposed reforms usually preface their comments with a version of ‘Of course a registered supporter scheme is a good idea, but when we introduce one we shouldn’t…’. Those caveats – mostly around who gets to stand and vote for party leader – understandably attract much of the attention. But before getting into those, it’s worth remembering the basic case for change: we’re not doing well enough and we don’t treat existing non-member helpers and volunteers as well as we could or should. Or in more detail: 1. The party has been stuck at high single digits or occasionally just into double figures in the opinion polls for eight years. Our local government base, although growing, is growing at a rate that will take decades to get us back to where we used to be. 2. Even before the coalition years, there were problems: our local government base was already shrinking pre-2010 (and its long-term growth had ended long before Nick Clegg became leader), our volunteer and financial resources have never matched overall the big parties we’re up against and our diversity has consistently been poor. 3. Yet there is a huge groundswell of small-l liberals, pro-Europeans who share our values yet who do not consider the Liberal Democrats a party they can fully sign up to as formal members. 4. We can learn from how to reach out to such people not only from colleagues in other countries – such as the Canadian Liberals – but also from some of our most successful local parties, such as Oxford West & Abingdon. They run de facto local supporter schemes and they work well. What’s missing is a way of rolling this out successfully across the country, and which involves, for example, party bodies who do great outreach to communities currently under-represented in the party. One scheme run across the party will make it much easier and more effective for each different part of the party to contribute to its success in their own ways. 5. There’s a bigger problem with the status quo too, as I set out in LDN #113: for every one member a local party has, party HQ on average has the email addresses for at least a further two people who have signed up to support one or more party campaigns. We have a de facto national supporters scheme, but it is one from which local parties are mostly kept isolated: they don’t get the chance to email those supporters to involve them locally and these supporters, in turn, mostly miss out on the chances to attend events near them. Changing how we do things is a chance to crack this problem and have one integrated system which benefits all parts of the party – and which focuses on what is best for recruiting, involving and energising those who are willing to campaign on our causes. 6. There is a double-urgency for change: the daily battering that liberalism is taking and, more parochially, the repeated talk of new parties and party splits. However those play out, the stronger the Lib Dems are, the more likely the outcome will be one Lib Dems are happy with – which is why we need to be stronger, sooner. 7. Organisational change is not the only thing the party needs to do to prosper, but it is important, it can generate extra resources that help bring about other changes too – and changing to be a more open and welcoming party is part of the party’s overall message too. Wanting to work collaboratively with others who share our views is part of the liberal message. 8. The party has done research which shows that a registered supporters scheme could help successfully appeal to the wider audiences we need to win over. I think there are some questions about the details of what the research shows – such as how to my reading it makes involving supporters more in our policy consultations and policy processes more important than Vince Cable’s plans set out. But the overall picture is a promising one. 9. What’s more, other independent research shows that there is something about the concept of party membership which is off-putting to many strong supporters of the party – and this disproportionately hits those from more diverse backgrounds. We need to use other structures to do better at properly reaching and involving everyone who supports us. Whilst success is not guaranteed, the evidence from the research, from what local parties have done and from sister parties all points in the same overall direction.