Talk:2017 Liberal Democrats leadership election

Not potentials

The potential section lists 4 LibDem MPs who have not yet declined to stand. I think this section should go. We have no reliable source citation saying that any of these are likely candidates. A BBC article is linked, but that article explicitly lists all the party's MPs: it doesn't describe these 4 as likely in any way. To conclude these 4 warrant listing here is, thus, WP:OR and WP:UNDUE, and inconsistent with other party leadership articles. We have a Guardian article saying that no-one else is likely to stand: we should leave it at that. Bondegezou (talk) 07:34, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

I agree, it's little more than personal speculation and should be removed. Tannlos (talk) 09:25, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

Other sources, e.g. The Independent, agree that there are no other likely candidates. Bondegezou (talk) 10:18, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

I entirely agree. I can understand the desire for completeness given the manageable number of Liberal Democrat MPs, but there really is no justification I can see under policy or convention in similar articles given the lack of reliable sources claiming them as likely candidates. Ralbegen (talk) 10:50, 28 June 2017 (UTC)

Fair point! Quite a reasonable position, happy to agree with it. FriendlyDataNerdV2 (talk) 17:44, 29 June 2017 (UTC)

Infobox picture

I favour keeping the portrait of Vince Cable in the infobox from now on, as this is consistent with the article: Cable is standing, and nobody else is likely to. I understand that this has been a controversial choice on this page, and it has been moved backwards and forwards several times (once each way by me). Rather than continuing to shuffle it backwards and forwards, I thought it'd be better to discuss it here, and hopefully reach some consensus. Ralbegen (talk) 22:19, 29 June 2017 (UTC)

It really seems wrong to only include him when there's still a month left of nominations. You'll recall that Jeremy Corbyn wasn't a declared candidate until a few weeks before nominations closed, and looked very unlikely to even make the ballot until the day of nominations closing. There are 2 remaining MPs, and unless they both rule themselves out, treating Cable as the only candidate is simply factually incorrect. FriendlyDataNerdV2 (talk) 01:50, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

Please don't edit the page with regard to this until we reach a consensus—that's the point of talking about it here instead of shuffling it back and forwards. I think it's clear from the lede, rules section and campaign section that Cable has put himself forward and nobody else is likely to. This is consistent with reliable sources. I hence don't think it's misleading to include his portrait in the infobox. Rather, I think it's consistent with the rest of the article. In general, infoboxes have portraits of declared candidates—see UK Independence Party leadership election, 2017—but this has been treated as a special case because there is only one candidate. I think that there is a material change when there are no longer any potential candidates that reliable sources consider likely candidates, and that now that that has happened we should put him in the infobox. Ralbegen (talk) 08:48, 30 June 2017 (UTC)

It's not usual for this to happen. As you'll now see, other editors have removed the UKIP candidates from that infobox. We are speculating about who will and won't be a candidate and that's not our responsibility. FriendlyDataNerdV2 (talk) 00:40, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

That was me, with the UKIP article. I feel there that there is sufficient doubt in that case that people saying they want to be candidates actually will be allowed to be candidates that we need to be careful about that distinction between "declared" and "(officially accepted as) candidate". With this article, I am in two minds. I guess I favour keeping the box blank until such time as nominations officially close, but I take Ralbegen's point at the start of this section and don't feel strongly either way. Bondegezou (talk) 14:20, 3 July 2017 (UTC)

Given that only Jardine remains, and her tweets have indicated support for Cable, I'm comfortable with putting him in the infobox now. I find it a little odd though that 9/10 eligible MPs (excluding Farron and Cable) have ruled themselves out and yet Jardine hasn't. FriendlyDataNerdV2 (talk) 20:33, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

The idea of Jardine standing is perhaps so unlikely that it hasn't even occurred to her that she needs to explicitly rule herself out for the purposes of a Wikipedia article!

I don't see any need to rush to fill in the infobox. I feel happy to wait until nominations officially close. Bondegezou (talk) 22:05, 11 July 2017 (UTC)

Has Tim Farron declared that he's not standing?

Just wondering. I would assume he's not standing for reelection, of course, but he's not in this article's list of MPs that have declined to stand. Chessrat ^{(talk, contributions)} 00:36, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

I think it's clear from context that he's not standing—with his speech explicitly saying that he's standing down and covering what his successor will need to do. I really don't think that the Declined section should be as exhaustive as it is, as there were only a handful of MPs considered by reliable sources to be likely contenders. I think this near-exhaustivity is what makes Farron's exclusion seem odd. Ralbegen (talk) 11:06, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

We could remove the Declined section and just leave the text in the Campaign section. Bondegezou (talk) 22:13, 8 July 2017 (UTC)

I'd be in favour of that. Further, we could merge the endorsements section into the candidates section using an Template:Endorsements box. That's something I'd been planning to try once nominations closed, but I really think the Campaign text does a better job at explaining the same information than the current Candidates section. Ralbegen (talk) 22:57, 8 July 2017 (UTC)