The Change Agenda: Digging In
What are the problems of CF? Why do we seem to change only very slowly? Why can we not make more rapid gains as a youth organisation?
A CF member was chatting to me after the Manchester hustings and he blamed the CF elections. 'If only we didn't have elections every year we wouldn't lose so many talented people'
Well almost.
This year has certainly shown how weak we are nationally, as the Area Chairmen are unable to find successors. 18 of 44 places for Area Chairmen filled has to be an all-time low, and with the (sad) loss of Chris Wales from the NME candidates list there are fewer candidates than last year.
Part of the regionalisation plan is to force the issue and agressively recruit in empty spots, but I'm not keen on the idea of 'picking winners'. True success will be when CF starts replicating its success naturally, otherwise each election will mark the departure point for ever more ACs.
To start this process of rebuilding we'll have to start getting CF members dug in. For students this will involve getting student sabbatical officers elected, but more commonly, this will involve CF-age councillors.
The trick will be to engage the senior party, CF shouldn't act as a seperate organisation. Rather, the senior party needs to be provided with that capability to recruit and retain younger members. Working to compliment the senior party at every stage will help in that.
Importantly, I don't see CF's role as being a narrowly defined one. Yes we should do the envelope licking and leaflet dropping, but if that's all we can aspire to then it's a bit dissapointing.
CF has a social side that shouldn't be overlooked, but still far too few events. This is due to a lack of infastructure.
Same too with training, we should be able to hold training events in each region aimed at directly improving our activists skills and also finding the politicians of the future. Sadly, outside of London this is currently not the case - something we could change by implementing a regional structure.
Targetted campaigning - the vital project for all three candidates - will not take off simply through funding or sending the seven members of the NME to help out. A strong regional identity and simple system of management in each region could help to deliver this. We need to appoint the regional coordinators and have them bring together the senior party and Area Chairmen to help rebuild those grassroots.
Proof, if it were needed, came in the form of another conversation at the hustings. I met a former regional coordinator of the old YCs, who was, to say the least, passionate about CFs failing in the regions. She asked why we couldn't organise regionally? Then, a person in her position in the senior party could start thinking about funding CF activity on a regional basis.
All politics is local, CF should recognise that.
A CF member was chatting to me after the Manchester hustings and he blamed the CF elections. 'If only we didn't have elections every year we wouldn't lose so many talented people'
Well almost.
This year has certainly shown how weak we are nationally, as the Area Chairmen are unable to find successors. 18 of 44 places for Area Chairmen filled has to be an all-time low, and with the (sad) loss of Chris Wales from the NME candidates list there are fewer candidates than last year.
Part of the regionalisation plan is to force the issue and agressively recruit in empty spots, but I'm not keen on the idea of 'picking winners'. True success will be when CF starts replicating its success naturally, otherwise each election will mark the departure point for ever more ACs.
To start this process of rebuilding we'll have to start getting CF members dug in. For students this will involve getting student sabbatical officers elected, but more commonly, this will involve CF-age councillors.
The trick will be to engage the senior party, CF shouldn't act as a seperate organisation. Rather, the senior party needs to be provided with that capability to recruit and retain younger members. Working to compliment the senior party at every stage will help in that.
Importantly, I don't see CF's role as being a narrowly defined one. Yes we should do the envelope licking and leaflet dropping, but if that's all we can aspire to then it's a bit dissapointing.
CF has a social side that shouldn't be overlooked, but still far too few events. This is due to a lack of infastructure.
Same too with training, we should be able to hold training events in each region aimed at directly improving our activists skills and also finding the politicians of the future. Sadly, outside of London this is currently not the case - something we could change by implementing a regional structure.
Targetted campaigning - the vital project for all three candidates - will not take off simply through funding or sending the seven members of the NME to help out. A strong regional identity and simple system of management in each region could help to deliver this. We need to appoint the regional coordinators and have them bring together the senior party and Area Chairmen to help rebuild those grassroots.
Proof, if it were needed, came in the form of another conversation at the hustings. I met a former regional coordinator of the old YCs, who was, to say the least, passionate about CFs failing in the regions. She asked why we couldn't organise regionally? Then, a person in her position in the senior party could start thinking about funding CF activity on a regional basis.
All politics is local, CF should recognise that.
posted by Andrew Young at 9:45 AM
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