Good afternoon Neil McGovern.
As a user of Debian and user of Debian Live I am personally contacting you to express my disappointment over the issue named in the title of this message. The available evidence appears to indicate behind closed door machinations in which only a few people were privy to and those same people made decisions which affect not only Debian users but also Debian itself. I would, personally, appreciate it if you, as the Debian project leader, would look into the events leading up to this decision and opened the discussion up to users of Debian Live but also gave the Debian Live team an opportunity to state their case.
I believe openness is the only way an community can work productively yet it seems Debian is slowly becoming a closed court. If this is the case then Debian is a project that has lost its way. I, personally, find this to be a great pity.
Regards.
Michael.