Our national politics is in total turmoil. The Tories are ‘between the devil and the DUP’. Labour is utterly unfathomable on Brexit. The Lib Dems are pretty Captainless, as far as the media and the country at large are concerned.
And internally, within the party, there is turmoil too. Some successes were had on 8th June but there were huge disappointments. Good MPs were lost. Many of us are still recovering from bruising contests, even where we had little chance of making a breakthrough. I expect most Liberal Democrat candidates standing in key Tory-Labour marginals would attest to a level of online abusive from ‘Progressive Labour’s’ supporters that has exceeded anything previously experienced.
Here in Hastings & Rye, as candidate for the third time, I was vilified for having the temerity to stand in an election that unexpectedly (even I would suggest for local Labour), nearly removed the Home Secretary. The eventual result saw Amber Rudd scrape home by a mere 346 votes with even an independent anti-corruption candidate gaining more votes than the eventual majority.
The criticism hasn’t only come from trolls. Hastings & Rye Liberal Democrats get excoriated by Compass’ James Corré here:
But this analysis is misleading, especially when we had explicitly offered to work with the Labour Party in order to send fewer Tories back to Westminster from East Sussex. You can read the statement that I made mid-May here:
Corré certainly does not give Labour fair treatment for their obstinacy in this whole process.
So what should be done now? Locally, and at a national level?
Follow @LibDemVoice on Twitter
Like us on Facebook
Subscribe to our feed
Sign-up for our daily email digest
John Stoa Original Art exhibition #dundeewestend
The Muesli Assassins
Nick Cook: England's forgotten spinner of the Eighties
Steve Comer 
Phillip Bennion 
Mark Frankel 
Peter Watson 
Roland 