ALDE Party Congress - where your correspondent did go to the (meat)ball…

The world turns, and things change.

For many years, going to an ALDE event meant being led by the suave, and occasionally cynical, Robert Woodthorpe Browne, whose almost legendary ability to cut deals meant that our influence somewhat outweighed our numerical strength. And now, we have a new leader, David Chalmers, whose first Congress this was.

Naturally, David operates rather differently, although he clearly gets that, in a post-Brexit environment, Liberal Democrats have to work harder (and smarter) to get things done. And, whilst he’s still trying to assess the strengths and weaknesses of his core delegation, and work out whether or not individuals can be trusted, he’s being cautious in terms of how much room for manoeuvre he can grant us. Discipline is the watchword.

There is a logic to that, in that we’re obviously not in a position to freelance - we’re bound by Party policy, of course, and there are relationships with other sister parties that we want to maintain.

In truth, it affects me less than some. I’m not much of a policy wonk, at least I know that I’m not expert enough to assert much. And my “specialist subject”, i.e. the inner workings of the ALDE Party, is seldom of critical import, or, if I’m frank, of interest to my colleagues. Except when it is…

And this Congress was one of those rare events, with some rather significant proposals on representation of non-EU member parties, the abolition of the Individual Members in their current form, and a clearer structure for the appointment of future Secretary Generals. Having served on a small working group appointed by the Bureau to look at the Individual Members and Secretary General issues, I at least had a grasp of what was happening and the background before it.

There were a lot of policy resolutions - forty-three in total, plus six urgency resolutions - far too many to allow any meaningful discussion, although they had been ranked in order of perceived significance to ensure that some of the most far reaching ones got debated.

But I did at least have a job of sorts. There was a time when Returning Officers mattered. With paper ballots, a count was required and ALDE’s somewhat bizarre elections rules - first past the post but with a stipulation that voters must vote for as many candidates as there are vacancies - meant that you did at least have to think a bit. Now, with electronic voting, once polls close, the ballot technician pushes a button, the results are displayed, and that’s it.

But the rules still state that a Returning Officer is necessary, and my German colleague, Daniel Obst, and myself are apparently acceptable to the Secretariat - I don’t imagine that the Bureau care much - and so we are informally approached in advance, agree to resume our double act and all is well.

All that was required was to get to Stockholm…