Categories
Can the LDs become the 3rd party once again? – politicalbetting.com
Can the LDs become the 3rd party once again? – politicalbetting.com
Before the weekend my old friend Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, was in town as part of his party’s local elections campaign and I managed to speak to him about the party’s objectives at the next general election.
0
This discussion has been closed.
Comments
Yes, at this stage they're likely to gain seats (though they'll have to devote a fair amount of resource to maintaining those three by-election wins). Yes, they'll probably benefit from an increase in tactical voting as they did in 1997. Yes, there's a strong possibility the SNP's star will fade a bit under a new leader (but we've no idea by how much yet).
But my feeling is the gap they have to overcome is so large they'll need at least those three to come home and more if they're to recapture third place.
I'd say the probability of it happening at the next General Electionbare no more than 10%.
....and were utterly irrelevent in having any influence on Tony Blair or Gordon Brown for 13 years, who increaed their seats by 146.
LibDems have to hope and pray they hold the balance in a hung Parliament.
They have to hope and pray Labour don't get a majority.
They have to hope and pray nobody else can be bought off ahead of them - as with the DUP in 2017.
They have to hope and pray for the Tories or Labour to fall short of a majority by about 15 seats. Any less and the Ulstermen hold the key to power. Any more, and the Scotsmen do.
That's a pretty narrow Window of Relevance.
The real problem for the Lib Dems isn’t arithmetic within the Westminster Bubble, it is the harsh realities of real world.
They are a 10th tier political entity. Lots and lots of public organisations and personalities are ahead of Mike’s old pals in terms of public influence and prominence. To take just a few examples, the Royals, DUP, Sinn Féin, Welsh Labour and Scottish Greens are also well ahead of the LDs in the public eye. Then you have all the Whitehall characters (Gray etc). And then all the international personalities (Ukraine, US, the list is endless). And then all the celebs and sports stars. And all the other media personalities. And that’s before you get to the TikTok generation, who have probably never even heard of the LD brand.
There is simply no space left for the Lib Dems. In a well-stocked grocery section (not in the UK obvs) the Lib Dems are the floppy wee carrot that has been kicked under the display unit and will be discovered and disposed of during the next renovation.
Can they? Yes. But will they? Not in the near future, unless the Conservatives collapse utterly.
What exactly is their pitch?
Even after last night’s train crash that’s not easy to see happening.
(* except for viewers in Farageland, where it’s Happy Englandshire Wives, Handmaids, Marthas, Econowives and Aunts Day!)
The Lib Dems were not there waiting to be "bought off", as you put it, after their damaging experience of being in coalition with the Tories. Having been stabbed in the back by their so-called coalition partners, they made it quite clear that they would steer clear of the treacherous bastards (as their own Conservative Leader John Major used to call them). The only group that the Tories could look to for support was the DUP, their last resort - and as OGH has frequently pointed out - now there is nobody left willing to play ball with the Tories. Deservedly.
Mr Dixon sneers at the Lib Dems - as again is his custom - but he does so from his bolt-hole in deepest Scandinavia. His only source of information is what he picks up from the media - which is even less reliable as a source than Mr Mark's biased outpourings.
Is local government not an important area of influence and power?
It was a good night . . . for Labour and the Tories. We should have leadership contests more often — said no one in the SNP.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/yousafs-record-condemned-by-forbes-during-heated-debate-dwxfkcvxn
For a couple of decades, the LibDems tried to be all things to all voters. To Tories, they appealed as being not as scary as Labour. To Labour voters, they were nothing like those Tory scum. Riding two horses at once finally got spectaculalry unseated when you had issues of governance to cope with. Like tuition fees. Like an EU referendum - first promised to voters, then a term of the Coalition Agreement that "thou shall never talk of EU referenda".
The pretence of being two-faced could only work until you actually had power.
As to local government, the LibDems are quite good at getting control. They then show themselves to be utterly shite at governing. And their fall is equally spectacular.
But frankly, it is the only one trick pony your party can ride these days.
Both Humza Yousaf and Kate Forbes have raised the bar on when Scotland should hold a referendum on breaking up Britain. Last week Yousaf said that independence had to be the “sustained settled will” before a vote was triggered. Forbes echoed this, using the phrase “sustained majority”.
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/snp-s-new-order-is-taking-a-smarter-route-to-independence-sfn9t73b3
But two threads ago, the title of the thread was "WHY I STILL THINK LAB WILL STRUGGLE TO GET A MAJORITY". And a lot of Mike's thinking there was predicated on the idea that the electoral system would remain heavily biased against Labour and increasingly so. Yet a significant Labour revival in Scotland would undo a lot of that bias and make it more likely that Labour will get a majority. So two threads ago, Mike in effect implied that a Scottish Labour revival of any significance was unlikely to happen.
So this and the last but one thread effectively contradict one another. If the idea of a Labour revival in Scotland is being discounted, you would expect to see this thread have a title more like "WHY I DON'T THINK THAT THE LDS CAN BECOME THE 3RD PARTY ONCE AGAIN".
Equally, as I say upthread it’s hard to see a complete collapse for the SNP. They might lose 15-20 seats at the outside if this goes on but unless it’s an exceptionally good night for the Oranges elsewhere that probably won’t be enough.
In the mean time the LDs need to focus on building up locally. They already have a good presence in council seats and should be able to build from there. But national relevance is always going to be a struggle.
This is where major local government devolution would help. Labour have promised devolution but at the region and city level. I think we we need a much bigger rebalancing of democracy to the local community. That, coupled with voting reform for council elections (so we don’t have the silliness of 50/50 seats for a single party in my borough), could see the LDs and Greens carving out an important niche.
I struggle to name a single policy. Are they still the party of rejoin? Are they anything else?
Their biggest problem is they're only ever going to get into government in coalition with either Labour or the Tories, and we've no idea how they'll behave in coalition, though the 2010-2015 era gives us a few hints, i.e. if they have any red lines, they'll quickly drop them. But what even are those red lines? What would they push for, as part of a coalition government?
Having a clearly defined document of what their red lines would be and what they'd demand in exchange for, say, getting Labour over the line at the next GE would help a lot. All we have at the moment is their 2019 manifesto (simply titled "stop Brexit" - a bit late for that now...)
Says yesterday's legislation is simply the worst piece of drafted legislation he has ever seen.
Like it was focus grouped and then drafted.
He feels sorry for the GLD teams that will have to defend this shit in court.
There's a retroactive clause in the bill that must have been written by Lionel Hutz.
Point is that the SNP's best play for independence is be credible and successful as a government. Increasingly they have been neither. Forbes could fix that. Won't make independence come quickly, but otherwise the risk is the SNP fall apart.
Sorry, not risk. Hope.
Lionel Hutz was funny.
In 2024 they'll pick up some blue wall seats and potentially some SNP seats if Humza Yousaf proves to be as useless as expected or if the MSP for Gilead wins.
By 2029 they should pick up some Labour seats.
If the next election goes really well for the Lib Dems, what's their optimistic-realistic target? Lib Dems really need to fight a doorstep to doorstep ground war to win seats, which limits how many they can go for.
And their likely demographics- graduate heavy Remain 2016 seats, the leafiest of suburbs and cities with a cathedral but not a university- are limited, if fairly well-defined.
They only way to get any publicity at all is by being radically borderline crazy.
Not Ed Davey at all.
Can't see the SNP going significantly below 30 unless Yousaf wins and is even more inept than he looks. The latter would be some achievement.
Then we get Dishi in front of a Stop The Boats lectern. Speaking in his Jackanory voice. Quite literally telling stories to political toddlers.
They know the plan - laughable to even use that word - doesn't work practically. They know it doesn't work legally. But they also know their remaining voters don't care, they just want action. Though I don't think "blame the courts" works as an excuse any longer.
But the Lib Dems have benefited from strong and interesting personalities over the last 40 years, people who have something to say and seem worth listening to. Ted Wavey or Ed Pavey or whoever is as noticeable as a small branch bank manager, if such things still exist. There is no moral, clarion cry to be heard. They are irrelevant and, even worse, dull.
Take today as an example. The UK government is putting forward legislation that on the balance of probabilities of their own inhouse lawyers breaks international law. They are doing so to victimise the other, to blame desperate people who want to improve their lives by coming to a country that they admire (seriously, they do) rather than address their own failings. Where is the moral outrage? Who has the courage to face down the red tops and say, "we are better than this"? Does anyone doubt that Kennedy would have done? Or Ashcroft, or Clegg? It's sad in its way.
You say Grammar schools give parents more choice. They don't. If your child fails the 11 plus they get less choice.
On the 'leftie' nonsense you haven't responded to the fact that I am not a 'leftie' and that successive Conservative governments have done nothing to remove comprehensives and that Tory controlled councils like Surrey implemented and supported them. When I identified David Johnston as a Tory MP who writes against Grammars you call him a leftie. I mean one of your own MPs. You also referred to him as a Heathite. Was Heath's government leftie then? What about Thatcher's government who didn't undo comprehensives? Or Surrey Country Council? All lefties?
Are everyone lefties other than yourself? This is very confusing if most Tories are lefties, especially as many of your own views are indistinguishable from far left authoritarianism.
Just be glad you weren't talking about the Falklands.
Despite being ignored by the media and political establishment 1 in 12 Britons or more plan to vote LD at the GE, and possibly twice that at the Local Elections.
We are the third party already in terms of national popular vote, just penalised nationally by the current electoral system.
As to what we stand for, those with open minds might want to follow the LD Spring Conference the weekend after next, having lost our autumn conference to the Royal mourning.
https://events.libdems.org.uk/events/45197/liberal-democrat-spring-conference-2023
Their tickets sell out as quickly as Eurovision, and Matt Hancock has the best Whatsapp line on Dominic Cummings: "his insight is as bad as his eyesight".
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M_0Z-UYk3vI and other podcast platforms.
ETA I've not listened to all of it, and add this disclaimer in case they go on to advocate the slaughter of the first-born.
If Clegg and Cameron had stood in the rose garden at Number 10 in late 2010 and announced a referendum "to define our position in the EU for the ages", they would have got a 60-40 win. And would indeed have locked us into the EU for all time.
The LibDems are just shite at politics.
I really can’t see it ending well for Sunak. The people whose support he is targeting are those most likely to buy the Farage/Reform betrayal narrative that will inevitably explode into the right-wing press this summer when the boats keep on coming. Meanwhile, anti-Tory tactical voting will be turbocharged.
Cooper was right yesterday: people want results, not performative gestures that won’t work.
Do have to laugh at the people who defend this bill though. A nastier retread of the existing law which doesn't work. None of the steps the bill proposes are actionable. It will bring international condemnation. And it's illegal. Yet political toddlers will say ite betraying the country not to support it.
We used to have serious politics. Proper disagreements about serious policies. Not crayon drawings for idiots couched in absurd rhetoric.
Lab 68%
Con 15%
Grn 7%
LD 6%
UKIP 3%
Ref 1%
Rest of South
Con 41%
Lab 34%
LD 12%
Grn 6%
Ref 4%
UKIP 2%
Midlands
Lab 56%
Con 29%
LD 7%
Grn 5%
Ref 3%
North
Lab 53%
Con 34%
Ref 9%
LD 3%
Grn 1%
Wales
Lab 41%
Con 24%
LD 14%
Grn 13%
PC 3%
Ref 1%
Scotland
SNP 46%
Lab 30%
Con 10%
LD 9%
Grn 2%
Ref 2%
Deltapoll; 1,063; 2-6 March)
How *would* anyone stop the boats?
It doesn't seem to me, short of major military operations on the beaches of Northern France, which ain't happening, or arranging odd accidents for all the traffickers - and even that would presumably pause rather than eliminate the problem - that there's much to be done about it.
That doesn't mean we can't still point and laugh at the stupidity of this idea, but are there are any concrete suggestions? If so, let's hear them.
Ed Davey isn't as noticeable as some previous LD leaders, but was a very effective minister, and is a very astute organiser, as we see from the LD by-election gains.
But yes, we ought to be better than this. It ought to be possible to help people who need help and return those who are trying it on. It used to be how it worked. But the British State doesn't have enough competence any more, and some people really seem to want to cut asylum numbers to zero.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Education_in_the_Falkland_Islands
However, they do apparently pay for A-level students to board at colleges in the South of England, which makes them sort of privately educated. So I suppose that would meet with his approval.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gỏi_cuốn
Possibly the healthiest poolside snack imaginable. Vietnamese food is outstandingly good. There are almost no fat Vietnamese people. Love it
Ok the beer, but it’s 30C!
I don't think it will shift his views, however often you say it!
When I squint at the Cons party I can see much has changed, not least Rishi himself (that he is a leaver is subordinate to the fact that he seems to be a competent technocrat). However, he has blundered imo (eg Braverman) and presumably this is on account of the ERG types who are looking over his shoulder. Plus their bizarre (but ameliorated, courtesy of Rishi) determination to drive the UK into the ground rather than give an inch to the EU over anything.
Is the party still nasty? Sort of, yes it is. So would I vote for them tomorrow? No. They need to be taught a lesson about not being arseholes and I don't believe they have learned that lesson.
Would I vote Lab? No I don't think so. Too many trots requiring red meat for me to trust them. Will need to study their retail offer. The five missions mean nothing so I need to see the bigger picture.
Which leaves...the LibDems. As always, the perception is a harmless use my vote NOTA strategy so my pen might stray there because what harm can it do plus I quite liked the Coalition.
I wouldn't rule out Mike's premise at all.
Would that stop them buying them elsewhere and dropping them off in Northern France from a passing ship?
And anyway, wouldn't they just use the smaller dinghies?
Stopping boats without letting people in another way? Can't help you there.
It is also, and perhaps more significantly, that the LibDems are no longer called to add balance to news and current affairs programmes. Question Time has had just one LibDem guest this year. And let's face it, no-one is going to invite Ed Davey on to light entertainment programmes, as they did with Chat Show Charlie. The LibDems are invisible to the public, and even PBers on this thread are ignorant of their current policies, because they lost that crucial third place.
Edit - and since quite a lot of these people are likely being trafficked anyway, that's again not going to help.
My personal view is that this needs sorting out at the root, i.e. in Albania. But exactly how you would do that I do not know. Armed intervention isn't usually considered acceptable, assassinations less so and the country's in such a state anyway that removing the people wouldn't remove the business model.
30 seats more like SNP 34% Lab 28% others the same.
Latest Yougov polling SNP 38% Lab 29% Con 19% LD 6% G 4%
So yes it is definitely possible for LDs to become third party.
LibDem: "Follow the LD Spring Conference"
Can't you give us a little bit of a spoiler?
Obviously requires support from the EU countries to enforce.
We cannot sustain endless and infinite migration - legal or otherwise. In the end people will vote for Nazi parties, or start their own militias. See Sweden for a country that has swung from decades of social democracy to the hard right in 20 years. And this is all going to get worse
These farcical ideas about “arresting employers” or “working with France” or “getting tough on sellers of dinghies” or “providing more secure asylum routes” are just ways of saying “I don’t know what the fuck to do other than nasty things, and I don’t want to appear like a Nazi, so here is my ludicrous pretendy idea”
In the end it will be: are we prepared to let everyone in, who can make it - which leads to a very hard right reaction - or are we prepared to be brutally violent with the boat people, and let them drown (which is evil and appalling, of course)
Or I suppose we can at least try a Rwanda type scheme. But actually do it properly. Actually see it through -and deport everyone immediately
It is unlikely to work. Australia made it work because it is lucky with its geography. But it is better than the other two
Nick Robinson playing the "your father" card on Suella right now on R4.
I have the perfect solution to the boats: an agreement with Russia.
We have a border problem, they have a demographic crisis. Ship them off to Siberia to help make up the numbers.
I mean, it's very even-handed to help both sides militarily but the Ukrainians might be displeased.
In our lifetimes? That's trickier. Maybe.
"The Conference,
considering that many persons still leave their country of origin for reasons of persecution and are entitled to special protection on account of their position,
recommends that Governments continue to receive refugees in their territories and that they act in concert in a true spirit of international cooperation in order that these refugees may find asylum and the possibility of resettlement."
We have repeatedly affirmed our commitment to the Convention, along with most other states.
Article 8 provides:
With regard to exceptional measures which may be taken against the person,
property or interests of nationals of a foreign State, the Contracting States shall
not apply such measures to a refugee who is formally a national of the said State
solely on account of such nationality. Contracting States which, under their
legislation, are prevented from applying the general principle expressed in this
article, shall, in appropriate cases, grant exemptions in favour of such refugees.
Article 16(1) provides:
A refugee shall have free access to the courts of law on the territory of all
Contracting States
Article 25(1) provides:
1. When the exercise of a right by a refugee would normally require the
assistance of authorities of a foreign country to whom he cannot have
recourse, the Contracting States in whose territory he is residing shall
arrange that such assistance be afforded to him by their own authorities or
by an international authority.
Article30 provides:
1. The Contracting States shall not expel a refugee lawfully in their territory save on grounds of national security or public order.
2. The expulsion of such a refugee shall be only in pursuance of a decision
reached in accordance with due process of law. Except where compelling reasons of national security otherwise require, the refugee shall be allowed to submit evidence to clear himself, and to appeal to and be represented for the purpose before competent authority or a person or persons specially designated by the competent authority.
3. The Contracting States shall allow such a refugee a reasonable period
within which to seek legal admission into another country. The Contracting
States reserve the right to apply during that period such internal measures as
they may deem necessary.
The suggestion by the Inhouse lawyers that there is a better than 50% chance of the current bill being in breach of international law sounds like the kind of odds on bet that we would all like to take. The government really should be offering odds.
Mr. Tubbs, aye. Anyone getting information from the media would suppose women are far likelier to be the victim of physical assault, which isn't true. There's just more concern expressed about it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BrxYZk9qQr4