Throughout the 12 days of Christmas, we’re bringing you the 12 most-read posts on this site of 2014. Here’s today’s offering…
Opinion: Why I was persuaded to back LibDems4Change – George Potter | Sat 24th May 2014
… I’m now backing LibDems4Change and have signed their open letter calling for a leadership contest. I’m not naïve. I don’t think electing a new leader would mean a clean break. I don’t think it will magically win us back loads of lost votes. But a new leader won’t start with the same trust deficit that Nick Clegg has. A new leader will be given enough of a first chance by the public to be able to put across the message that Nick Clegg has tried and failed to deliver.
That yes, Coalition hasn’t been ideal but that’s the nature of the beast. That we have had some key successes. That our principles and values that people have supported in the past are still the same. And, without such widespread personal distrust, this time the message might actually get through. Nick Clegg has achieved a lot, but I don’t see how keeping him as leader any longer will do the party any good.
Click here to read the whole piece.
Follow @libdemvoice.org on Bluesky
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
Violent Bonham Carter features on Fake or Fortune?
Have resignations led to a rethink?
High Fell leaflet watch (2)
Two new Makerfield by-election polls gives Burnham 5 and 12 point leads
Neil Hickman
Jana
Nonconformistradical
Simon McGrath
9 Comments
George Potter was correct in May 2014 to come to the conclusions he did.
In the months since May things have got worse for the party.
People did not listen to George and the hundreds of other party members who were saying similar things.
The leader of another party is very happy that those at the top of the Liberal Democrats did not listen to their members.
She is leader of The Green Party.
“…The Greens … .. a lot of the party’s new fans coming from the Lib Dems, who have lost around three-quarters of their vote since palling up with the Conservatives. This time, however, the Greens have a good chance of hanging onto their new supporters.
They are unlikely to return to the Lib Dems, the experience of government having exposed a gulf between the party’s pragmatic leadership and its rowdy left-wing foot-soldiers. ”
From Bagehot in The Economist —
http://www.economist.com/news/britain/21637420-green-party-growing-force-british-politics-if-only-it-was-more-world-green
Bit late for that now, with less than 6 months to go until the General Election.
Ditching Clegg now would just make the Lib Dems look like disloyal opportunistic back-stabbers with no loyalty, convictions or beliefs.
If this had been done 3 years ago then OK, but not now. The younger voters and the social democratic base of the party was swapped for 2nd rate ministerial positions, fixed term parliaments and an AV referendum. That was the price the party demanded for a coalition with the Tories and tuition fees increases which has cost the party the support of the young and social democrats.
Make your bed and lay in it I guess.
Mr Wallace
Did you miss the key fact that of when this was written by George Potter. ? It was. Sat 24th May 2014
At that point there was slightly more than eleven months to go.
Now there are less than six months to go.
The date of the 2015 General Election is the 7th May, but the date for the beginning of candidates’ expenses has already passed, the election campaign has effectively already started.
Some of your criticisms are entirely valid, but you need a new fact checker.
If you think that the “base” of the party was ever social democrat you have been mislead.
The merger which produced the Liberal Democrats brought some social democrat qualities and some faults into what was a party with a Liberal base and grassroots organisation; the growing success of the Liberal Democrats in the 1980s amd 1990s was quite obviously a product of the work of Liberal Community Politics activists and the subsequent local council base.
The Orange Book entryists have been equally at odds with both Liberal Community Politics activists and Social Democrat elements in the party.
It is because we we have beliefs that we owe no loyalty to the entryists. We did not make this bed and there is no reason why we should have to put up with it. Nobody was wanting to stab anybody in the back, what happened in May 2014 was an open and honest attempt to remove Clegg from the front.
It did not work in May 2014 — but it is only a matter of time.
@JohnTilley – “there are less than 6 months to go”.
There are 4 months, 8 days until polling day.
Hmmm!
“Ditching Clegg now would just make the Lib Dems look like disloyal opportunistic back-stabbers with no loyalty, convictions or beliefs.”
Actually no. What drives most of us is not a dislike of Nick Clegg as a person but our loyalty to what our party should stand for politically – a radical, reforming, economically and politically redistributive, democratic, centre-left Liberal view of society. A party of all the people – not just of the rich, powerful and the governing classes.
The largest single gulf in our party is not between Liberal and Social Democrat but between those who believe in the social and economic vision for our society as outlined in the preamble to our constitution and that small group who have sought to impose an entirely different set of ‘free’ market economic values upon us – without any consultation with the wider party. On the contrary, this group have frequently ignored or simply side-stepped long standing and agreed party positions.
Much of the scorn poured on Clegg by the press, Labour and the Tories alike has been unjustified or simply opportunistic but on the other hand the apparent eagerness Clegg and the free-marketeers have shown in accepting Thatcherite-style Tory economics and their lack political nous in red-lining our tuition fees pledge in particular, we and they have lost much of the credibility and popularity our party had steadily built up since the 1960’s.
I am yet to hear a convincing explanation as to why our MPs didn’t do more to replace Nick Clegg last May following the appalling European results and the latest in the series of dreadful local election losses. John Pugh offered hope and common sense in his comments regarding the ship not going down with the captain. My suspicion is that those ambitious MPs did not wish to be seen to wield the knife and the others decided simply to go home and dig in as deeply as possible in their own constituencies.
Speaking to long-term Lib Dem voters, most are deeply unhappy with Nick Clegg’s performance, real or perceived. While he remains and continues to repeat the same mantra and our parties vision remains ‘anchored firmly to the centre’, our support will, across the country, remain anchored firmly in single figures.
“Mr Wallace
Did you miss the key fact that of when this was written by George Potter. ? It was. Sat 24th May 2014”
Nope, it would have still been far to late with 11 months to go too. It is exactly the same situation now as it was then.
The party would have to have done this before the tuition fees debacle. Once the parliamentary party had broken their pledges it was too late to ditch the leader and try and pin the actions of the MPs on Clegg alone. Once they went along with Clegg and broke the personal promises they made they were all in the same boat, and would be expected to sink or swim together.
I reckon the Lib Dems will struggle to get 20 seats in May. Saying that, they may still find themselves needed to form a coalition government as Labour could be just short of a majority on their own. I think Labour would much rather deal with the Lib Dems than with the SNP.
If I were Ed I’d hate to depend on the SNP. Because the SNP will walk away from a coalition if they don’t get what they want out of it and they have real red lines that if crossed will mean no deal. There are some things the SNP just won’t compromise on, therefore they really will extract a much higher price from Labour for any coalition, Ed must be hoping he doesn’t have to deal with them. The Lib Dems I suspect would be much weaker in negotiations and will compromise on anything as they have no red lines and things they will insist on.
If the party is offered a coalition next time I hope they don’t sell out so cheap. To extract the best deal you’ve got to have red lines and ultimately be prepared to walk away if you don’t get a good price for what you are offering so to speak.
Paul In Wokingham 30th Dec ’14 – 10:02pm
“There are 4 months, 8 days until polling day.”
Indeed. On that note the above post is almost certain to be my last on the topic until May 8th.
I sincerely hope I awake on that morning to find a strong continent of Liberal Democrat MPs but with zero prospect of taking part in a coalition with any other party … and that the Labour party has managed to scrape home to form a government with less than 30% of the vote. At that point I trust we will be in a position to commence the rebuilding of our party after the damage inflicted upon us by our own centre-right during the preceding 5 years.
@John Tilley “If you think that the “base” of the party was ever social democrat you have been mislead.” – Much of your voter base was, at least it was in Scotland, and this voter base deserting the party over them being in national government with the Tories is why you failed to win a single mainland constituency in the Scottish Elections in 2011. Wait until May 2015 and you will see how true this is (or not) for the rest of the United Kingdom as well.
John Tilley,
Mr Wallace has a point. You and I would no doubt have chosen to ditch Clegg at least 3 years ago, a demonstration of commitment to traditional Lib Dem principles which Mr Wallace quite reasonably argues was necessary. George Potter wrote his article 11 months before the General Election, at which stage it was still valid comment. As Mr Wallace says, it is now too late to make a credible change of leadership. Those of us who are appalled at what has happened to our Party must make other decisions as to our individual courses of action. “Make your bed and lay in it” will not be mine.