(no subject)

[raincitygirl]

For those who haven’t been following the scandal, legionseagle breaks down the Lib Dem sexual harassment story. The Liberal Democrats are the third biggest political party in the UK, currently serving in a coalition government with the Conservatives. One of their top party grandees, Lord Rennard, was accused of sexual harassment by scores of women over a period of many years, mostly Lib Dem officials and volunteers. An internal inquiry found in favour of Rennard, in a very convoluted way, saying there wasn’t enough evidence to open a disciplinary hearing, and using some apparently fairly bizarre legal reasoning. legionseagle explains it all much better than I do, and is also a lawyer, which helps. The Lib Dem leader, Nick Clegg, has apparently been phoning all the women who laid complaints to apologize about what happened with the lack of a disciplinary hearing.

It's not my party or even my country, but I rather suspect the Lib Dems are developing a credibility problem with female voters. And they probably already have a credibility problem with their female party members.

Comments

[legionseagle]

Any chance of rescuing my comment over at your LJ from the spam filter? I think it didn't like me linking to something about the issue.

Assuming links are less of an issue on DW, have the latest from the Graun:

Nick Clegg Trial of Strength over Lord Rennard which includes the frankly boggling:

One senior parliamentarian told the Guardian he thought Rennard had been treated "appallingly" and the liberal principle of "innocent until proven guilty" had been thrown out of the window during the process, in which the peer has not been allowed to see the report into his conduct.

He also said only four women came forward to give evidence, despite one of the complainants claiming at least 10 members had been affected.

The four women in question (all of whom have chosen to waive anonymity for the privilege of being disbelieved, vilified and - at the hands of that irritating old turncoat Shirley Williams, told to get over themselves, it's not as if it was paedophilia or anything that actually mattered) are, of course, the completely non-credible complainants Bridget Harris, an ex-adviser to Clegg, and former [Parliamentary] candidates Alison Smith (now a lecturer in politics at a not-all-all credible small teaching establishment somewhere in the Thames Valley), Alison Goldsworthy, and Susan Gaszczak (now holding the entirely minor and practically nominal role of chair of the Party Conference organising committee)

[raincitygirl]

Hmmm, I've been attempting to rescue your comment from the spam filter but have had no luck. Stupid Livejournal. I could edit the original post to add links to your replies?

[legionseagle]

Oh, dear; it went into some detail in response to the commenter there about the LibDems history and why they weren't the Republicans but why they have a complicated idea that they're the good guys (read their constitution) and because good guys can't do bad things when allegations o fbad things arise either they aren't bad things or they didn't happen.

[raincitygirl]

Shoot, I'm really sorry.

[legionseagle]

Oh, well, things are moving pretty fast over here anyway:

This is the Independent OpEd

This is Nick Clegg's former advisor resigning - and how

And this is Rennard's allies threatening to sue if he isn't restored to the Party whip

[legionseagle]

Actually, I've found an even better, "Why Shirley Williams is a twonk about sexual harassment" piece: here

I've said before why I've got reservations about the "bingo card" format for arguments (it imposes a false equivalence between arguments just on the basis that they're frequently used arguments, rather than considering that some arguments have merit, even if you don't always accept them as valid in a specific case) but this sexual harassment scandal hasn't half been ticking the boxes:

1. Not "real" harassment (check; see above)
2. Gold-diggers aiming to get a quick payout from a lawsuit (check : and raised by the man himself, too )
3. "Kangaroo courts" "trial by rumour" "breach of natural justice" (check: see Guardian link in my earlier comment)
4. Can't be shown to be intentional/may have been social awkwardness* (check; in verdict of investigator itself)
5. Can't we just get on with the more important things and avoid this side-show? (check; various senior libdems including Lord Carlile)
6 [ETA from comments to the latest article about this on LibDemVoice] It's all a long time ago (check; what people using this one don't tend to mention is that the reason it's a long time ago is that it was first reported back in 2007/8 by the complainants, the people to whom it was reported including very probably Clegg seemed to have sat on it hoping it would go away, when it was clear it wasn't there was some kind of behind the scenes fudge where Rennard retired "on grounds of ill-health" in 2009 and it was only when he was brought back onstage in late 2011 that the original women said, "Oy! You told us you'd dealt with this, in a way which wouldn't cause damage to the Party but would make sure we didn't have to work with him again.")




*Such a common trait among senior politicians who've delivered the most effective electioneering strategy in their party's history

[legionseagle]

Oh, God - this is the story that just keeps giving:

@cathynewman: Rennard says he "considered" an apology "years ago", & brother accuses critics of a witch hunt "worthy of the ku klux klan" #c4news 6.05

Cathy Newman is the TV journalist who broke the initial story and has been running with it ever since.