Conference votes to recognise non-religious belief and caste in the party constitution
On Monday 20th September, at Autumn Conference, party members amended a key passage of the Preamble to the Party Constitution, to reject prejudice and discrimination on the grounds of non-religious belief or caste.
Previously, the Preamble recognised religious belief but not non-religious belief.
The passage, in the second paragraph of the Preamble, now reads: "Upholding these values of individual and social justice, we reject all prejudice and discrimination based upon race, ethnicity, caste, heritage, class, religion or belief, age, disability, sex, gender or sexual orientation and oppose all forms of entrenched privilege and inequality."
The motion that was originally proposed would have inserted the words "ethnicity", "caste" and "class" into this sentence. We submitted our own amendment, extending the motion to include non-religious belief.
During the short debate, HSLD Chair Toby Keynes spoke in support of the motion and our amendment.
The motion, as amended, was carried by a stonking majority of 194 to 11.
You can watch the debate at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqTSgJmkyiQ, starting at 52:20.
The amendment, as adopted, is at https://www.libdems.org.uk/f42-language-equality-inclusion
You can read the amended constitution at https://www.libdems.org.uk/constitution.