Campaign Liberal Democrats leadership election, 2007

1 campaign

1.1 opening
1.2 policy differences
1.3 hustings
1.4 voting issues

campaign
opening

nick clegg , chris huhne

in media reports , betting markets, front-runners friends nick clegg (home affairs spokesperson) , chris huhne (environment spokesperson). huhne ran in 2006 leadership election, coming second campbell, whom clegg had supported.

after campbell s surprise resignation, there speculation run. various contenders ruled out on (including notably vincent cable, edward davey, lynne featherstone, julia goldsworthy, simon hughes, susan kramer, david laws, sarah teather , steve webb), leading possibility of 2 candidates achieving sufficient nominations. huhne launched campaign first on wednesday 17 october, clegg launching on friday 19 october.

john hemming announced on blog wished stand, , taking soundings colleagues, went on acknowledge difficult him obtain sufficient mp nominators. former leader charles kennedy said highly unlikely run again, , not part of game plan , did not rule out possibility. later more rejected idea.

huhne , clegg submitted formal nomination paperwork. clegg attracted support fellow mps, although both candidates had high-profile supporters, including former liberal democrat leader paddy ashdown clegg , former liberal leader david steel huhne.

nominations closed @ 16:00 (utc+0) on 31 october 2007.

policy differences

nick clegg took more multilateralist line chris huhne, opposed trident ballistic missile system. nick clegg favoured retaining half of trident s arsenal use bargaining chip in 2010 negotiations; chris huhne saw saving money on nuclear deterrent being viable means of raising money fund greater spending on army equipment , conventional weaponry possibility of smaller deterrent system.

chris huhne emphasised opposition voucher systems in provision of public services. nick clegg denied supporting voucher systems, , has gone on record ruling such systems out.

nick clegg stated saw liberal democrats role in hung parliament scenario being support whichever party able form government; however, said other 2 main party leaders , parties both conservative , neither heir blair nor cameron clone. clegg stated saw liberalism being more important ever, , accused chris huhne of entering unholy alliance snp , conservatives on environment , supporting principle of elements of conservative party s plans have english voting english matters.

on issues 2 candidates shared common positions on environment, identity cards, counter-terrorism , war in iraq.

hustings

both candidates appeared @ several hustings organised party. there joint appearances on bbc s tv shows question time, newsnight , politics show, latter of saw spat between candidates after huhne s campaign team had delivered press briefing document show mistitled calamity clegg , leading formal complaint clegg team.

huhne acknowledged have edged televised debate - candidates clashed on issues including trident , presentation - , straw poll following cambridge hustings placed huhne as 2-1 ahead. however, given unreliability of such polls, , clegg s continued position bookies favourite, consensus in party , media 2 running neck , neck. columnists have been critical of clegg s debate performances.

a yougov poll of party members gave clegg 56% 44% lead in late november, although half of respondents had yet vote. on 3 december 2007, on basis of poll, clegg claimed ahead 60% of votes cast far in favour.

voting issues

about 1,300 postal votes caught in christmas post , missed election deadline. unofficial check of late papers showed huhne had enough votes among them hand him victory. huhne stood result, saying nick clegg won fair , square on rules counting ballot papers arrived in deadline. there no question of re-run.