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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Before you bet on the next Lib Dem leader market just remember the next leader might be in another party right now
Since @joswinson became leader, the Lib Dems have gained a new MP on average every nine days.
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https://twitter.com/DrJamesRogers/status/1172808611204128768?s=20
Miss Vance, an alarming, if not perhaps surprising, development.
I thought it would take a generation to recover from 2015 wipeout, but it seems to be a Scottish generation of only 5 years.
Some of the defectors won't survive the coming GE, but there is likely to be a lot of novice MPs too.
Some of the outsiders are silly (Lamb and Cable are retiring as MPs, for example).
Those at short odds (Moran and Umunna) are plausible but, as the article says, if things go well for the Lib Dems they could well be joined by others... and, if they go badly, they may both be out of Parliament.
Also ties money up - Swinson could also be leader for a significant time given she is the party's second youngest MP after Moran.
(This is a prediction that might very rapidly be overturned by events. Or not...)
I couldn't help but think that the crowd that I marched with on the #PeoplesVote marches were the sort of people that were New Labour, then Cameroons. People who want positivity in politics and inclusive social and economic policies, not the politics of hate and envy. I was encouraged to see so many. There is still hope for this country.
'...We don't know in advance which pollster will be most accurate for the next election, so using averages is the best thing to do IMO.'
An alternative would be to look at the Council Results over the past few months.
Normally I wouldn't set too much store by them but in the current febrile atmosphere they do have the very big advantage that they are real votes in real elections. They have been remarkably consistent - Tories steady, Labour down, LDs up.
That feels about right.
Perhaps we need a new political sub-category - The Well-Behaved, as opposed to The Left Behind.
Unfortunately, what I've seen so far is rather bitter and doesn't paint him (yet) in the most flattering of lights, and is very defensive.
I can only hope that this is simply trailing the most dramatic and headline-grabbing quotes to maximise sales on the recommendation of his publisher, who in turn may have encouraged him to dish the dirt, but if the rest of the book is like this it won't be worth buying.
There'll be nothing new or interesting in it.
Honestly, he'll be telling us bears shit in the woods next.
There is an Alexander Boris de Pfeiffel Johnson, but not a Boris Alexander.
I'm going to walk the dog. Get that off my mind, I hope.
Cheerio.
Tony Blair's autobiography was pretty poor as well. Maybe there's a pattern here?
He's like a europhile Mark Reckless.
But those who are against a disorderly withdrawal - what political home do they have - given that they’re gleefully being told by the likes of HYUFD and others to “fuck off”?
It is those who have turned a major political party into one that now actively supports as a matter of policy the UK’s disorderly withdrawal from an international organisation who need to be asking themselves some serious questions. Not those who are rightly bewildered by this odd turn of events.
Dave - it worked. You could have still been PM if you'd had the balls to tell the EU "give me a decent renegotiation - or I will support Leave". Boris had the balls; you didn't. Complaining about that marks you out as a mardy arse.
And, for the record, I didn't agree with kicking them out the party and stripping them of the whip either.
Watch your back, Jo Swinson. He's coming for your job.....
Boris hasn’t got any sort of renegotiation yet. So the jury’s out as to whether his threats will turn out to be anything more than childish piss and wind appealing only to those who think that basing your political strategy on a cartoon character is some sort of act of genius.
I agree they have little grounds for complaint but Sam has laid his cards on the table, he wants the job and he'll sit with whoever he can get that job with. It's not like these defectors suddenly wake up with serious wood for the LD manifesto. Serious wood for their salary and the chance to continue earning that salary perhaps.
And, in a nutshell, there is the problem with politicians. Job not calling for 99% of them
The current Conservative party has nothing to offer anyone who prioritises the country ahead of Brexit, and will not for many years to come. Sam Gyimah has had the wit to realise that quickly. Your frustration with him comes from that, not his decision.
Sam Gyimah has let his ego get the better of him.
Sam Gyimah stood for the leadership only a few months ago and fought for free speech in universities and also lower taxes. I'm astonished he's decided to defect at the Lib Dem conference and twist the knife, rather than stay and fight for his whip to be restored. I don't expect Boris Johnson to be around very long.
He should have pushed his point of view as an independent Conservative like all the others have. His stump speech this weekend, where he talked about what other Liberal Democrat values he shared, just made it look he'd secretly been one all along. It weakens his argument within the Conservative family, rather than strengthens it, and fuels a betrayal narrative.
But take a look at the 2010 or 2015 GE. The manifestos were about relatively small differences between the three parties engendered in world views that were not a million miles apart, rather than fundamental differences.
In such a world, it is easy for voters - or even MPs - to shift from Conservative to Lib Dem, or Lib Dem to Labour, and vice versa.
I'm not quite sure what 'convictions' you think the likes of Gyimah is betraying by moving to the Lib Dems - especially when the Conservative Pary has moved itself.
Perhaps his 'convictions' were more stressed by remaining in Johnson's Conservative Party?
And whoever is elected leader has choices as to how they reach out to all wings of the party. Boris rather petulantly made one of his very first acts to sack anyone who hadn't publicly backed him with zero effort made to reach out and bridge across the divides.
It says a lot about him and his character.
I see no evidence of any sort of long-term strategy or thought about any of these issues but quite a lot of worrying signs.
Any fool can destroy things. Creating something better is very much harder.
I cannot say if that's the case for Gyimah - but it wouldn't surprise me. As one example, remember that the Conservatives are now a screw-business party.
Ken Clarke on the other hand I am genuinely sorry to see out of the party, I am a committed brexiteer and certainly don't agree with him on Europe but he voted for the WA and for us to leave and has been a lifelong Tory and the party owes him a great deal of respect at least.
Of the 21 who lost the whip all will are either standing down or will loose their seat at the next election... Unless anyone feels some may hang on as indy or LDs?
I accept you haven’t.
Others on this forum have. I know little about Gmiyah and care even less. But the Tories are making themselves distinctly unappealing to anyone who does not think that Farage is God’s gift to the world. To my mind - as an outsider - they look and feel and talk like the Brexit party. They may as well join them.
I think it a great shame that they have done this and expelled people like Ken Clarke and Rory Stewart. It is doing themselves and the country a disservice. But there we are. I am only one voter. They don’t want my vote and they’re not going to get it.
Don’t you realise how dangerous it would be for politics overall, if the Tory party adopted a similar Brexit platform to either the Lib Dems (overturn the vote - aka Gyimah) or Labour (ignore it through never ending extension - aka Hunt)?
Political moderates of all stripes should be hoping beyond hope that Boris gets his Brexit deal done and over the line, or failing that executes as orderly an exit along WTO terms as possible. Because the alternative is an even harder polarisation of the electorate to the fringes, with moves likely thereafter into far more controversial territory than EU membership.
Right now it is the likes of Gyimah that I view as being the dangerous political extremists, for being so willing to dump on the democratic process because they were upset with the outcome. I hope this ex Goldman’s boy is happy with his likely short lived flirtation with the Liberal “Democrats”.
I sort of wonder whether the Lib Dems might be trying to replace the Tories.