List of United Kingdom Liberal Democrat leaders

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The Liberal Democrat members elect the United Kingdom Liberal Democrat leader. Under the federal constitution of the Liberal Democrats the leader is required to be a member of the House of Commons.

Before the election of the first federal leader of the party (the Liberal Democrats having a federal structure in their internal party organisation), the leaders of the parties which merged to form the Liberal Democrats were joint interim leaders.

In the event that the leader dies, resigns or loses his or her seat in Parliament, the deputy leader serves as interim leader until a leadership election takes place.

1 List of Leaders of the Liberal Democrats
2 See also
3 References
4 External links

[edit] List of Leaders of the Liberal Democrats

An interim leader, who was never elected party leader, is not numbered in the list below. Such a leader's entry is in italics. Note: This does not apply to Steel and Maclennan, as they were the elected leaders of the predecessor parties.

		Entered office	Left office	Date of Birth
1.1	David Steel ¹	7 July 1987	16 July 1988	31 March 1938
1.2	Robert Maclennan ²	6 August 1987	16 July 1988	26 June 1936
2	Paddy Ashdown	16 July 1988	9 August 1999	27 February 1941
3	Charles Kennedy	9 August 1999	7 January 2006	25 November 1959
4	Sir Menzies Campbell ³	2 March 2006	15 October 2007	22 May 1941
	Vincent Cable ⁴	15 October 2007	18 December 2007	9 May 1943
5	Nick Clegg	18 December 2007	- present	7 January 1967

Notes:-

¹ Joint interim leader, as the last leader of the Liberal Party before the merger.
² Joint interim leader, as the last leader of the Social Democratic Party before the merger.
³ Interim leader between the resignation of Charles Kennedy on 7 January 2006 and his own election as leader on 2 March 2006.
⁴ Interim leader between the resignation of Menzies Campbell on 15 October 2007 and the election of a new leader on 18 December 2007.