Diversity and equality - haven't I seen this somewhere before?

And so we now have the motion for debate at Brighton, somewhat later than originally promised but at least available for challenge. After a fairly shambolic process whereby a working group hand-picked by the Party President failed to meet until early July and the initial paper to the Federal Executive came from who knows where (I know of at least one member of the working group who claims not to have seen it until it was introduced at the Federal Executive meeting), a somewhat wet motion has been generated.

In the David vs. Goliath (aka Simon Hughes) contest that has taken place thus far, the score is tied after two rounds, with David winning the first contest, defeating Goliath's appalling proposals at Blackpool, but Goliath snatching a late winner in Harrogate after David made most of the running.

I fear that Goliath is going to win the decider too, as the motion is entirely reasonable if almost entirely lacking in detail. Rumours of slush funds for ethnic minority and female candidates imply that the initial idea (providing support for such applicants to create a level playing field) appears to have been subverted to the notion of bribing Local Parties to select them (say it ain't so, Simon, say it ain't so...).

The commitment to fighting for proper representation of all sectors of our community is extremely laudable, and it is nice that we make it, but I was hoping for something more concrete.

James Graham has, elsewhere in the blogosphere, indicated what he believes to be wrong with the Federal Executive and there does appear to be a tendency to use it as a place to park issues where the leadership doesn't agree with the membership. And this, sadly, is one of those occasions where a number of people who are quite knowledgeable on the subject of candidate selection throw their hands up and say, "Simon, you really don't get it, do you?". Because, Mr Hughes, you don't...