Star-studded Line-up for Conference

Vince Cable

The programme for the 30th birthday Conference of the Green Liberal Democrats is looking good folks. This last few days has seen the confirmation of our STAR speakers, so Sir Vince Cable MP will be coming along to speak. Vince was one of the co-authors of the Brundtland Commission report back in 1987 which introduced us to the concept of Sustainable development, thus taking the heat out of the growth/no growth debate which had been raging up to then. Perhaps we can anticiapate an up-to-date review of the current status of "Sustainable Development" in 2018 from vince, who is an Honorary Professor of Economics at Nottingham University, the venue for our conference.

Ed Davey

Sir Ed Davey MP has also, this week, confirmed he will be in Nottingham on 19th May to tell us more about the Green progress we made during the coalition years, much of which has been traduced, mangled and dismissed by this terrible Tory excuse for a Government. We could and should have had enforcable new zero energy standards for new housing builds by now. We should be making faster progress towards zero energy by 2050, but we aren`t and..... (I will let Ed Davey tell the rest of the story next week!)

Wera Hobhouse

Wera Hobhouse MP will be at the Green Liberal Democrat conference too to introduce us to her sense of committment to matters Green. Even her associated picture tells a story about how cycling is one way to reduce air pollution, a subject she is passionate about and which she will be speaking about in Nottingham.

It will be fascinating to hear how she is discovering how to steer her way through the corridors of power after only a year in the Mother of Parliaments.

Liberal Democrats may have been clobbered in the last couple of General elections, but it speaks volumes for the subject of Green Liberal Democracy that we have managed to get one quarter of our MPs to come and celebrate 30 years of the existence of one of the most active and influential pressure groups in the Party with us. We will also have a paper from Alistair Carmichael MP at the conference looking at the work he has been doing to minimise plastic pollution in our oceans, though unfortunately Alistair cannot be with us in Nottingham on the day.

Baroness Lynne Featherstone, our current spokesperson on Climate Catastrophe and energy in the House of Lords, will be chairing some of the sessions at the conference, and former MEP Phill Bennion, will be addressing the conference on the environment and rural affairs. This is all after the tone of the day has been set by the person who was our keynote speaker at the inaugural Green Lib Dem conference, also in Nottingham, back in 1988, former Bermondsey and Old Southwark MP, Sir Simon Hughes.