{"id":3053,"date":"2011-05-29T11:36:00","date_gmt":"2011-05-29T15:36:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/?p=3053"},"modified":"2011-05-29T11:36:00","modified_gmt":"2011-05-29T15:36:00","slug":"real-renewal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/?p=3053","title":{"rendered":"Real Renewal"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know some will roll their eyes when I say this, but the federal Liberals – and<\/em> all political parties for that matte<\/em>r – could learn a lot from the Alberta Liberal Party<\/a>. After all, everyone talks about “renewing” and “rebuilding” but all too often those are just meaningless buzzwords.<\/p>\n

The ALP, however, is actually doing politics differently, or at least trying to, at their annual convention in Calgary, which I’ve had the pleasure of attending and presenting at.<\/p>\n

The party president, executive director, and convention co-chair are all under 30. More importantly, ALP members are currently voting on a series of groundbreaking constitutional changes<\/a>. They may not all pass – after all, unlike trivial matters such as the future of the country<\/a>, 75% is required for these resolutions to pass. But either way, these are the kinds of reforms the federal grits should be talking about.<\/p>\n

I’ll be live blogging the resolutions as they’re voted on below:<\/p>\n

PARTY POLICY<\/strong> (PASSED): As I’ve said before, the policy process of most parties is usually conducted in the following stages:<\/p>\n

1. Policies are proposed by party members and debated at the riding level
2. After a series of conventions and votes, party members prioritize which policies they feel most strongly about
3. Passed policies sit in a binder in the Leader’s Office<\/p>\n

This amendment<\/span> requires the party platform to include at least 2 of the 3 top resolutions passed at convention. This is a great idea in my opinion, since it adds meaning to an otherwise meaningless policy process. A lot of people join political parties because they want to have an impact on policy decisions – if their voice are ignored, they just become disillusioned<\/span>.<\/p>\n

OPEN NOMINATIONS<\/strong> (PASSED): The motion would open up nomination meetings to any Albertan living in the riding who registers their support for the Alberta Liberal Party.<\/p>\n

In my opinion, this is a great way to get people who might be a bit squeamish about party politics involved<\/em> in party politics. It opens up nomination meetings, creating interest in the party.<\/p>\n

OPEN LEADERSHIP<\/strong> (PASSED): Basically the same intent as above – leadership races would be opened up to all Albertans.<\/p>\n

WOMOV <\/strong>(PASSED): Party members narrowly passed (77%) a proposal to weight all ridings equally in leadership races. This is an important move for a party struggling to find relevance outside of downtown Calgary and Edmonton – if anyone should recognize the importance of growing the Liberal Party outside of its traditional base, it’s Alberta Liberals.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I know some will roll their eyes when I say this, but the federal Liberals – and all political parties for that matter – could learn a lot from the Alberta Liberal Party. After all, everyone talks about “renewing” and “rebuilding” but all too often those are just meaningless buzzwords. The ALP, however, is actually […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3053"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3053\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.calgarygrit.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}