Following the resignation of William Clouston as leader of the Social Democratic Party, Sebastian Moore has announced his intention to run for the role. We speak with Sebastian about his plans.
“I want to lead our party to create a culture where all members are valued and all views debated”
Can you introduce yourself and tell us why you are running for leader of the SDP?
I’m Sebastian Moore, a 30 year old adopted Mancunian with a passion for travel, languages, reading, and of course politics.
Despite my interest in politics, I never thought I’d join a party until I found the SDP. I read the party’s founding document (the New Declaration which was published in 2018) and realised I’d found my political home in the SDP’s project of rebuilding a nation based on our shared interests.
I’m contesting the leadership election because I think the party needs to change, not its policies, but the way it works if we are to make a real difference. There’s sometimes a feeling that it’s wrong to criticise the party in the public arena but being able to criticise yourselves is important for any organisation that wants to improve.
Tackling the things that aren’t working takes not just courage but a clear idea of how to put them right. I want to lead our party to create a culture where all members are valued and all views debated, to grow and develop its members, to have a clear strategy for growth, and to find and talk engagingly to a wide audience.
If we want to change the direction of our country, people like me cannot simply sit on the sidelines. We have to take responsibility for making things better and the SDP has to be a party that seeks to do just that.
That conviction has shaped the past few years of my life, and it’s why I’m standing to lead the SDP.
“To really build the vote, we need to grow the party membership – not just increase the number of members but to help members to grow their contribution”
The party has received a lot of publicity but has had limited electoral success. How would you hope to build the vote?
It’s not quite right to say we’ve received a lot of publicity. We’ve been effectively ignored by most of the media but we have built up a good presence on X. A Labour-supporting X commentator noted after Clacton that the SDP is “just a Twitter microparty with a couple thousand very online hobbyists. That’s the reality. People on Twitter know about it.” That kind of criticism is hard to take because it is too close to the truth. And we all know that elections aren’t won on Twitter.
To really build the vote, we need to grow the party membership – not just increase the number of members but to help members to grow their contribution by asking them to do more than just make a monthly payment. We need to find out what their skills are and what they would like to do for the party, and then help them to make the most of their skills and experience and to be able to contribute to the party’s development in new ways. Crucially, by working with each other, we develop a collective responsibility so we hold each other to account – that means we can set realistic regional and national targets for different activities. Doing this means we know if we are failing or succeeding.
Having a more active membership also means we develop groups of people in every region who are willing to go out to their workplaces, communities and the wider world to put forward the SDP case. This activity means we hone our arguments and learn what works and what doesn’t work with the public. And it helps us build the political muscle in our party – because it isn’t enough just to win elections – we also need to be able to make a difference in power.
“it is important that as a party, we have a democratic structure for policy-making so while the leader can steer the ship a little, policy making is largely in the hands of the members”
What changes to policy, or shifts in policy emphasis, would you introduce?
I’m an ardent believer in the New Declaration so I’m not in a “rip it up and start again” mindset. But the political times we find ourselves in now are ones where our absolute guiding principle has to be nation-building. So I’d like to work with our policy team to recast our existing policies in order to frame them around this North Star: how our policies strengthen and integrate the British nation.
In any case, it is important that as a party, we have a democratic structure for policy-making so while the leader can steer the ship a little, policy making is largely in the hands of the members. Recently within the party, there has been a shift away from that member control with a move to set policies from the top. I want to make sure members are at the heart of policy making – first, because it means we make the most of our members’ deep knowledge in many areas but second, because a robust internal policy debate means arguments have been thoroughly tested before being presented externally.
Perhaps because of our online presence, we have tended to focus our content on cultural issues which generate online engagement. But this is a crowded area where it is more difficult to draw out the distinctiveness of the SDP’s position. We need to make more of our social market policies where our combination of a public sector that helps the private sector to thrive can be a big differentiator. These are policies which appeal particularly to a younger audience where we need to build our membership.
“There’s no point in aiming our message at our bubble or our quadrant – we need a message for the whole country”
Beyond the party itself, what’s your pitch to the public to support the SDP?
I’ve borrowed a phrase from another party member of “no one is coming to save us”. By that I mean we all have to take some individual responsibility to rebuild Britain.
The project of nation building is our pitch to the public and is one that can reunite what has become a very tribal and divided country. Nation building can mean an actual physical project – let’s say we agree as a country that everyone should have an affordable home. That becomes something we can all work on. I love the (possibly apocryphal) story of President Kennedy asking a NASA janitor what his job was and the janitor replied “I’m helping put a man on the moon”. Builders, baristas, barbers, bankers, bus drivers, and ballet dancers can all help in a national project to provide everyone with an affordable home.
But nation building also means talking across the aisle – to supporters of the Conservatives, Reform, Labour, and the Green party, to trade unions and employer organisations, building a lasting settlement that can command both minority consent and majority restraint. There’s no point in aiming our message at our bubble or our quadrant – we need a message for the whole country. Of course, that means lots of political debate and discussion and disagreement before we come to a compromise. Leading this discussion is the statecraft we need to relearn because our existing political class has contracted it out to unelected judges and quangos and supra-national organisations.
How can people find out more about your campaign?
My website is https://www.moore4sdp.co.uk/
You can follow me on X: @moore4sdp
I’m a great believer in face to face meetings. I often visit different regions and attend events across the country, so if you’d like to meet, send me an email: sebastian.moore@sdp.org.uk.
