Anna Lo MBE MLA has been selected by the Liberal Democrats sister party in Northern Ireland, the Alliance Party, to stand in the next Westminster General Election for the constituency of South Belfast.
On the 11 November members of the Chinese Liberal Democrats elected their new executive to take them in to 2010 and beyond.
For the third year running, the Chinese Lib Dems set up a stall at the annual Dragon Boat Race at the Royal Albert Docks and joined in the festivities to raise funds for various Chinese community charities. It was also an opportunity to fly the Lib Dem flag and race as the 'Democracy Dragons' alongside about 40 other boats including teams from the Chinese Embassy, Hongkong University Alumni and the British Chinese Group. At the drums this year was Farid Ahmed, Parliamentary Candidate for Walthamstowe who set the pace for the 16 rowers. Lib Dem Cllr Faruque Ansari, Mayor of Camden also attended the event as one of the VIP guests.
Last June, we took part in the Dragon Boat Race organised by London Chinatown Lions Club and competed with 43 other boats, coming in the top 10 and within a few seconds of being in the final 3! We raced as the Democracy Dragons -- Min Zhu Loong (民主龙), with our Chair Cllr Linda Chung, as the drummer setting the pace for our 16 rowers.
The Chinese Lib Dems today organised a visit to Westminster with reception hosted by Simon Hughes MP in honour of Anna Lo (Alliance Party) of the Northern Ireland Assembly. Following this there was a tour of City Hall courtesy of Mike Tuffrey, leader of the Liberal Democrat Group on the GLA, and an afternoon visit to Camden Chinese Community Centre and Chinese National Healthy Living Centre.
The representation of Black and other minority ethnic (BAME) women at every level of governance from the Houses of Parliament to local government is woefully low. Of the 646 MPs in Westminster, two are BAME women and out of 20,000 Councillors, 149 are BME women, representing less than 1% of Councillors nationally.
