Article for the Social Market Foundation Newsletter

Written by Susan Kramer and published in SMF Newsletter on Fri 2nd Sep 2005

One of my constituents reminded me, as I continued at a frantic pace after the General Election, "slow down dear. Remember there are 4 years or you'll do yourself an injury". And perhaps that is good advice for the party too. The temptation is powerful to use our Conference week in Blackpool this month to pass judgement on past performance, cure all ills and begin the campaign for 2009. That might suit the media but it understates the goal ahead.

The new intake of Liberal Democrat MPs, the class of 5/5/5, is varied in age and experience but has definite common threads. We have typically been successful in a previous career and have acquired confidence and a taste for action. We intend to play a robust and strategic role in Parliament, as effectively as we have taken on roles in our communities. And none of us are in Westminster to be in opposition. We are there to be in government.

Our view of our role has also been shaped by recent events. We were elected in the shadow of the Iraq war for a party that took the risk of opposing it. We had been in Westminster only weeks before the 7/7 terrorists struck. I suspect that for most of us the most frightening thing we have seen is the Blair Government's willingness to shred both international law and civil liberties at the first opportunity - from the lack of a 2nd UN resolution on Iraq to restricting jury trials to ID cards. And we've seen the Tories either co-operate or unable to resist effectively.

Now the Blair Government's response to the London terror attack is on our watch. So far the Parliamentary timetable, which seems eccentric and arcane in sending us home for the summer, has kept us in the role of spectators. But when we return, we will have to find ways to make ourselves heard in defence of civil liberties given the Blair instinct for central authority. For me at least, this will be a test of Parliament and our party. Are we able to challenge the Government effectively? Is Parliament an effective institution or has it been turned into a side-show with the real battles taking place in the media?

But responding to current events and Government proposals is only part of the picture. This is the time to begin laying the corner stones of our own agenda. We must begin the process of setting out the reasons why we believe the country needs a Liberal Democrat Government and what that Government would do and why. This is the time to explain why and how we would draw the boundary differently between security and individual liberties. This is the time to illustrate how we reconcile social justice and fairness with our convictions on economic liberalism. This is the time to develop the programme of sustainability that provides for long-term economic growth through protection of the environment.

So Conference will be a time to set the tone and test the agenda. It may not be the formal debates and set speeches but in the fringe meetings and the conversations at the bar. We must not let others pin us into being seen as a strange blend of left and right when we are neither.

None of this can be completed in one Conference but we can go a long way. We have the luxury of focusing on principles rather than the minutiae of policies. We will be looking to the party elite for courage and leadership on these issues and for the ability to articulate them.

And I believe that this is what the public wants of us. In the months of campaigning for my seat in Parliament, I found a widely based trust and even affection for the Liberal Democrats. But I also found a real desire for us to clarify our politics and to come out strongly for our beliefs, challenging not trimming. We are often seen as bold on the minor issues such as drugs, but cautious on the big issues like the health service or education.

We have time and we need to pace ourselves. But as a new MP I am looking to this Conference to set the framework for the next 4 years.

Of course we must respond to events and to Government proposals or actions. But as Liberal Democrats we need to shape our own agenda and have distinctive, clear and bold principles and policies that earn us credibility as the potential party of government.

Susan Kramer