GLD Elections 2019/20 - Ordinary Members

Ross Benzie

The Liberal Democrats are the only UK party offering a realistic response to the environmental crisis.

I will do whatever it takes to help.

Steve Bolter

Co-operation and the Appliance of Science

I joined the Liberal Democrats in 1997. I have been our Candidate for local District and County elections.

When I served a term on Braintree District Council, whichever committee I was on, I was the only Liberal Democrat. Reaching consensus with other parties was stimulating. I worked with the Green member on planning and environmental committees, to successfully commit the Council to embedding sustainability into all parts of council work and to oppose a second runway at Stansted.

When I lost my seat I transferred my energies to the Green Liberal Democrats. I was Vice Chair Policy for 3 years, and met frequently with parliamentarians during the Coalition.

I have used my experience as physics and maths lecturer to help explain and apply the science and maths that that informs our policy decisions, via our website and social media; and as part of the Working Group that produced the 2013 Policy Paper (109) on the rtransition to a zero carbon Britain. I also worked on PP 110 that looked into the post school education for that future.

I support working with environmentalist from other nations and parties. I went to Paris for international demonstrations at COP 20 and hope do the same for COP 25.

Diana Catton

During the election night in May 2015 I became so incensed with the unfairness of our present electoral system that I joined the Libdems before the results were announced. I decided that it was time to put myself back in the game. I had been a Young Liberal before the demands of career and family meant I had little time for my own interests, and now that my youngest was off to university and in theory I was approaching retirement, I felt that I could at last follow my political interests and try to make a difference locally.

I immediately became active and joined the Exec in my local party, taking various roles over the years and also acting as Election Agent and/or Candidate in the local elections on several occasions. I shall be Election Agent for our Parliamentary Candidate in the upcoming General Election.

All my life I have been an "eco-freak", joining Friends of the Earth in the seventies, teaching vegetarian and vegan cookery in the eighties and generally practising all the Rs of Refuse, Reduce, Reuse, Repurpose, Recycle, etc. as far as humanly possible. I also encourage others to do the same. During my life I have been regarded as a freak of nature, but have persisted and am very pleased that being "green" is finally accepted as the right thing to be.

I believe the greatest challenge facing us is not Brexit, it is the Climate Emergency, and if elected I shall do my very best to spread the word.

Geoff Harvey

I believe the Green Lib Dems are a natural and deserving vehicle to capture campaigning energy within the wider party, now that EU membership has become a longer term project. Now is the time to recruit others to the Green Lib Dems; to make it the larger force it needs to be. If elected I would commit my energy to that aim. Personally, I have already made the journey. I joined the Party at 8am on 24/6/16 and was elected district councillor in May 2018 as part of the capture of South Cambs District Council. In 2019, I joined the Green Lib Dems and was invited by Cllr Pippa Heylings to join her SCDC Climate Change and Environment committee as Vice Chair for Climate Change. In that role I've been instrumental in kickstarting interest in green energy investment at SCDC first by seeking out opportunities for grid battery storage and solar PV and latterly supporting the green energy investments officer I helped to recruit. As a schoolboy I was strongly influenced by the OPEC oil shock and the Apollo program and won a regional technology competition with my 1kW tracking parabolic solar collector. As a Cambridge University engineering graduate, I've had a successful career in electronics and engineering but always with a theme around energy efficiency. I hold several fundamental patents around resonant energy recycling in microprocessors. My novel circuit topology, cooks' matchbox sized, 2kW DC to AC inverter was shortlisted in the final 18, worldwide in Google's 2015, $1million prize 'Little Box Challenge'. I bring my passion and engineering knowledge to my new role as a politician and a seat on the Green Lib Dem exec would be a wonderful further opportunity for me to contribute. I would greatly value your support.

Pippa Heylings

I have been an Ordinary Member of the GLD Exec during 2018-2019. I am a South Cambs District Councillor, where LDs are now in control of the Council. I am Vice-Chair of the Planning Committee and, even more excitingly, we have created a brand-new Climate Change and Environment Committee, of which I am the Chair. We have fully adopted my motions on Zero Carbon, Climate Emergency and Doubling Nature - and incorporated actions and resources in the corporate Business Plan. I am passionate about the political role of national and local policy in mainstreaming a green vision. I was a member of the Federal Policy Working Group for our new Climate Change manifesto, with responsibility for the local government section. I stood as Parliamentary Candidate for South East Cambs in General Election 2019.

Jed Marson

What can I do for climate change?

I'd like to support our tactical political approach to sift the possibles from the probables and pursuade the membership to ambitious adoption of a wide range of probables, knowing not every new thing is adopted by people.

George Miles

I was recruited to the Young Liberals by Felix Dodds and Mike Harskin in the '80s when I was a Traveller around Glastonbury and London.

For personal reasons I did little with the 2019 GLD exec.

I have reslated, draught proofed, rewired and half insulated my house, so should have more time for GLD in 2020.

With the new exec I'd like to help develop the website look, functionality and content (HTML, CSS and Javascript tweaking) - incremental improvement is my motto.

Our website looks old, but contains 1788 articles and more - a powerful archive available through Google search. We should have lots more content being published and then to social media.

We should use the Facebook GLD Members page (which I proposed) as a source of ideas, and a place to debate changes - we have a wealth of experience in our members, a resource we should tap into. Webpages like 'Policies' should be updated.

If someone surfs into the GLD webpage from somewhere we have maybe two seconds to engage their interest before they click away.

I'd convert our Challenge Magazine templates to open source software like Scribus, so it's open to all to contribute whether using Macs, Windows or Linux.

Challenge articles should be on our website - such wonderful content there.

We should email our members at least bimonthly.

Jean-Paul Sartre, writing abour Baudelaire, said that the revolutionary wants to change the world, but the rebel is careful to preserve the abuses from which he suffers so that he can go on rebelling against them.

As Liberals we should trust people to make their own decisions, even though they may fail, but with a safety net for those who fail, the ill, the young and the old.

Me, I'm very Liberal!