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The 2007 Liberal Democrats leadership election was held following the resignation of Sir Menzies Campbell as leader on 15 October 2007, after 19 months as leader of the Liberal Democrats, the third-largest political party in the United Kingdom. Vince Cable, the deputy leader of the parliamentary party, was acting leader until the conclusion of the leadership election. [1] The result was announced on 18 December 2007 with Nick Clegg winning by a narrow margin of 1.2%. [2]
The resignation of Menzies Campbell came after a period of speculation about his future as party leader. This was seen as due to media-inspired concerns over his age and poor poll ratings for the party. This speculation mounted after Prime Minister Gordon Brown announced he would not be calling a General Election in 2007. [3] The resignation was announced by the party president Simon Hughes and the deputy leader of the parliamentary party Vince Cable.
The timetable for the election was announced on 16 October 2007 with the new leader to be announced on 18 December. [1] Liberal Democrat leadership elections use the Alternative Vote system, the single-winner version of the Single Transferable Vote, although, since only two candidates contested this election the contest effectively became a simple plurality vote.
Nominations for candidates opened on 16 October 2007 and closed at 16:00 (UTC+0) on 31 October: each candidate needed the support of at least 10% of Liberal Democrat MPs (i.e. 7 MPs) and at least 200 party members from at least 20 different local parties. MPs could only nominate one candidate, unlike the previous election.
A series of online and offline hustings meetings were held around the country, and were listed on the party's official news page for the contest. [4]
Balloting of members commenced on 21 November with the distribution of ballots to party members, the deadline for their return being 15 December and the victor to be announced at around 2:30 p.m. on 18 December 2007. [5] [6] [7]
In media reports and the betting markets, [8] the front-runners were friends [9] Nick Clegg (Home Affairs spokesperson) and Chris Huhne (Environment spokesperson). Huhne ran in the 2006 leadership election, coming second to Campbell, whom Clegg had supported.
Following Campbell's surprise resignation, there was speculation as to who would run. [8] Various contenders ruled themselves out early on (including notably Vince Cable, [10] Ed Davey, [11] Lynne Featherstone, [12] Julia Goldsworthy, [13] Simon Hughes, [1] Susan Kramer, [11] David Laws, [14] Sarah Teather [15] and Steve Webb [16] ), leading to the possibility of only two candidates achieving sufficient nominations. Huhne launched his campaign first on Wednesday 17 October, with Clegg launching his on Friday 19 October.
John Hemming announced on his blog that he wished to stand, and that he was taking soundings from colleagues, but he went on to acknowledge that it would be too difficult for him to obtain sufficient MP nominators. Former leader Charles Kennedy initially said he was "highly unlikely" to run again, and that it is not part of his "game plan", but did not completely rule out the possibility. [11] He later more clearly rejected the idea.
Huhne and then Clegg submitted their formal nomination paperwork. Clegg attracted most support from fellow MPs, although both candidates had high-profile supporters, including former Liberal Democrat leader Paddy Ashdown for Clegg and former Liberal leader David Steel for Huhne.
Nominations closed at 16:00 (UTC+0) on 31 October 2007. [17]
Nick Clegg took a more multilateralist line than Chris Huhne, who was opposed to the Trident ballistic missile system. Nick Clegg favoured retaining[ citation needed ] half of Trident's arsenal to use as a bargaining chip in 2010 negotiations; Chris Huhne saw saving money on the nuclear deterrent as being a viable means of raising money to fund greater spending on army equipment and conventional weaponry with the possibility of a smaller deterrent system[ citation needed ].
Chris Huhne emphasised his opposition to voucher systems[ citation needed ] in the provision of public services. Nick Clegg denied supporting voucher systems, and has gone on record as ruling such systems out.
Nick Clegg stated that he saw the Liberal Democrats' role in a hung parliament scenario as being to support whichever party is most likely to be able to form a government[ citation needed ]; however, he said that the other two main party leaders and their parties were both conservative and that he was neither an heir to Blair nor a Cameron clone. Clegg also stated that he saw liberalism as being more important than ever, and accused Chris Huhne of entering "an unholy alliance" with the SNP and Conservatives over the environment and his supporting the principle of elements of the Conservative Party's plans to have English only voting for English only matters. [18]
On most issues the two candidates shared common positions on the environment, identity cards, counter-terrorism and the war in Iraq. [19] [20] [21]
Both candidates appeared at several hustings organised by the party. There were also joint appearances on the BBC's TV shows Question Time , Newsnight and The Politics Show , the latter of which saw a spat between the candidates after Huhne's campaign team had delivered a press briefing document to the show mistitled "Calamity Clegg", leading to a formal complaint from the Clegg team.
Huhne was generally acknowledged to have "edged" the televised debate - the candidates clashed on issues including Trident and presentation - and a straw poll following the Cambridge hustings placed Huhne as much as 2-1 ahead. [22] However, given the unreliability of such polls, and Clegg's continued position as the bookies' favourite, the consensus in the party and media was that the two were running neck and neck. [23] Some columnists have been critical of Clegg's debate performances. [24]
A YouGov poll of party members gave Clegg a 56% to 44% lead in late November, although about half of respondents had yet to vote. On 3 December 2007, on the basis of another poll, Clegg claimed to be well ahead with 60% of votes cast so far in his favour. [25]
About 1,300 postal votes were caught up in the Christmas post and missed the election deadline. An unofficial check of the late papers showed Huhne had enough votes among them to hand him victory. Huhne stood by the result, saying "Nick Clegg won fair and square on the rules counting the ballot papers that arrived in by the deadline. There is no question of any re-run." [26] [27]
At the close of nominations, the following had been successfully nominated.
Supporters included:
Supporters included:
| Candidate | Votes | % | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
Nick Clegg  | 20,988 | 50.6 | ||
| Chris Huhne | 20,477 | 49.4 | ||
| Turnout | 41,465 | 64.1 | ||
| Sources: result, [2] turnout [66] | ||||
The turnout at this leadership election was over 10,000 fewer than in the 2006 election. A total of 64,727 ballot papers were issued, compared with 72,064 for the 2006 contest.
Walter Menzies Campbell, Baron Campbell of Pittenweem,, often known as Ming Campbell, is a Scottish politician, advocate and former athlete. A member of the Liberal Democrats, he was Member of Parliament (MP) for North East Fife from 1987 to 2015 and served as Leader of the Liberal Democrats from 2006 to 2007.
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Christopher Murray Paul Huhne is a British energy and climate change consultant, and former journalist, business economist and politician who was the Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Eastleigh from 2005 to 2013 and the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change from 2010 to 2012. He is currently chair of the UK green gas association – the Anaerobic Digestion and Bioresources Association – and senior adviser to the World Biogas Association. He also advises companies on his particular interest in renewable technologies that can provide back up for intermittent energy sources like wind and solar.
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Christopher John Rennard, Baron Rennard, is a British life peer in the House of Lords, appointed to the Liberal Democrats' benches in 1999. He was Director of Campaigns & Elections for the Liberal Democrats from 1989 to 2003, and Chief Executive of the party from 2003 to 2009.
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In the 2006 Liberal Democrats leadership election, Sir Menzies Campbell was elected to succeed Charles Kennedy as Leader of the Liberal Democrats, the third-largest political party in the United Kingdom.
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This timeline of events in the Liberal Democrats leadership election, 2007 lists the events covering the period from Sir Menzies Campbell's resignation to the conclusion of the 2007 Liberal Democrats leadership election.
The Liberal Democrats are a liberal political party in the United Kingdom, founded in 1988. The current leader of the party is Ed Davey. They are the third-largest party in the United Kingdom, with 72 members of Parliament (MPs) in the House of Commons. They have 78 members of the House of Lords, four members of the Scottish Parliament, one member in the Welsh Senedd, and more than 3,000 local council seats. The party holds a twice-per-year Liberal Democrat Conference, at which party policy is formulated. In contrast to its main opponents' rules, the Liberal Democrats grant all members attending the conference the right to speak in debates and vote on party policy, under a one member, one vote system. The party also allows its members to vote online for its policies and in the election of a new leader.
The list that follows is the Liberal Democrats Frontbench Team/Shadow Cabinet led by Menzies Campbell from 2006 to 2007.
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The events surrounding the formation of the United Kingdom's government in 2010 took place between 7 May and 12 May 2010, following the 2010 general election, which failed to produce an overall majority for either of the country's two main political parties. The election, held on 6 May, resulted in the first hung parliament in the UK in 36 years, sparking a series of negotiations which would form the first coalition government since the Second World War.
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