Category Archives: Op-eds

Norman Lamb MP writes…We must renew, restructure and simplify the way our party works

By Norman Lamb MP | Fri 19th June 2015 - 3:50 pm

I believe a priority for the new Leader of the Liberal Democrats is to renew, restructure and simplify the way our Party works. Some parts of the Party work well – others do not. Good practice should be shared and problem areas tackled.

As Liberal Democrats, we rightly set high standards for ourselves on tolerance, equality, openness, accountability, and diversity. But our party often doesn’t live up to them.

During this campaign people have been telling me that there wasn’t enough accountability within the party. People had concerns about our central message and the way we fought the election – but it felt like there was no easy channel to get those messages through. And where mistakes were made, it wasn’t clear who ultimately was responsible.

Few party members really understand how our party works. There are so many committees with overlapping responsibility. The process for election to many offices within the party is arcane. If no-one knows how our party structures work, there cannot be effective accountability.

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Tagged featured, liberal democrat leadership and norman lamb | 30 Comments

Opinion: 200 years on from Waterloo: democracy not dictators, unity not barriers, peace not war.

By Antony Hook | Fri 19th June 2015 - 1:32 pm

This week’s 200^th anniversary of the Battle of Waterloo is a reminder of how far Europe has come.

At Waterloo, 65,000 men were killed or wounded in one day. In contrast, we have now had 70 years without war in Europe. Long may peace continue.

We enjoy secure peace partly because every country in Europe now has an elected government. There are no more monarchs or dictators seeking out war for vanity or power. Most importantly, we have the European Parliament where modern opportunities and problems, which cross old national borders, can be discussed by MEPs we elect rather than fought over by armies.

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Tagged eu, europe, peace and waterloo | 10 Comments

Opinion: A moment of acceptance

By Mark Argent | Fri 19th June 2015 - 8:55 am

In the election campaign I was touched, but not surprised, to see Sal Brinton post a link on facebook to an interview with Adrian Hyyrylainen-Trett where he spoke of his experiences growing up gay, and self-identifying as an HIV+ parliamentary candidate. My suspicion was that many would encourage someone in Adrian’s position to “be discreet”: but seeing him being so open and the party President support him so clearly made me proud to be a liberal democrat.

From a gay perspective, it’s been encouraging in the present leadership election to see doubts over Tim’s support for LGBT people raised as a cause for concern, and to see him act quickly to counter them.

Recently I had a very positive surprise when I read an article picking up on Norman Lamb’s piece in Pink News where he moved the whole debate on a stage by saying:

until every young person is proud of who they are, who they find attractive and who they love, our fight will continue.

The shift feels significant: from accepting a minority (which keeps them as a minority whose acceptance is to be fought for) and something genuine. It calls to mind the slogan of the LGBT-majority Free Community Church in Singapore: “welcome home”

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Tagged LGBT, liberal democrat leadership, norman lamb and tim farron | 2 Comments

Opinion: Non-Linear Values: The Z Coordinate

By Kirsten Johnson | Thu 18th June 2015 - 4:27 pm

Since the General Election arguments have raged over whether we, or particular people in the party, are centrist, left of centre or right of centre, and, if so, how much left or right of centre.

I think we are getting this wrong. It is not a linear issue. If I am a kind person, am I left of centre or right of centre? If I am selfish, am I left or right of centre? Why do we limit ourselves by a linear construct?

Rather than see liberal values, and the placement of Liberal Democrats on the political map, as linear, my view is we must take a non-linear perspective. Values are overarching. Promoting liberty, equality and community might sometimes involve what might be called right leaning policy, at other times left, but whether it is one or the other or neither is immaterial. What is important is whether the policy achieves liberty, equality and community. Those overarching values should be the litmus test for any policy.

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Tagged liberal democrat values | 25 Comments

Baroness Liz Barker writes…Why Liberal Democrats should be out and proud in 2015

By Baroness Liz Barker | Thu 18th June 2015 - 1:37 pm

Next Saturday the LGBT community will celebrate Pride in London.

There has been a kerfuffle about whether UKIP should be allowed to attend. Of course they should. In this country the LGBT community is strong enough to be inclusive, to involve all sorts of minorities. Moreover several hours in which to challenge the absurdity of being an LGBT member of UKIP – preferably through the media of song and interpretive dance – is a gift too good to be spurned.

This year the march will be led by Lesbians and Gays Support the Miners; an organisation of which many young people were unaware until they saw the film Pride. Do get the DVD. It is well worth a watch. The presence of LGSM (as it said on the collecting buckets) is a timely reminder of how easily political fortunes can change and memories fade.

So this year it is more important than ever that Liberal Democrats have a visible presence at Pride events around the UK. Our record in LGBT equality has always been outstanding – even if Stonewall refuses to say so. In government we stuck to our principles and brought in Same Sex Marriage. It would not have happened without us. In DfID, Lynne and Lindsay fought hard to make LGBT equality a central factor in UK aid programmes and foreign policy. However, be in no doubt that, as part of their plan to eradicate Liberal Democrats in our remaining council and parliamentary seats, the Tories and Labour will airbrush us out of the picture and claim the credit.

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Tagged equality, LGBT+ Liberal Democrats and pride london | 2 Comments

For new and infrequent commenters only: What do you think of the leadership election so far?

By The Voice | Thu 18th June 2015 - 10:25 am

This is one of our occasional posts where we reserve the comments for those who don’t comment very often. Anyone who has made five or fewer comments in the past month is welcome to take part.

The subject for debate today is the leadership election. Liberal Democrat Voice is taking an entirely neutral stance and are doing our best to give equal and balanced coverage of the contest.

We just wondered what you thought of it all so far. Have you seen the candidates in action? Are they talking about the things that you want to hear about? What do you think of their campaign websites, videos and themes? Do you have any questions for them?

Let us know what you think in the comments below.

If you haven’t seen the two in action so far, you can always have a look at the New Members’ Hustings. A big thank yo to James Wright, too, for pointing me in the direction of these videos shot by his Dad Andrew Cambridge hustings last week. They are really good quality. Here they are:

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Tagged liberal democrat leadership, norman lamb and tim farron | 16 Comments

Opinion: No change please, we’re Liberal Democrats

By Alexander Ehmann | Thu 18th June 2015 - 8:55 am

There is an inherent predilection in our political culture towards continual reorganisation. A culture that often holds us back and stops valuable reforms from maturing and embedding.

This frustrating desire to manifest difference via perpetual revolution may offer some cautionary tales for our own forthcoming leadership election.

I start by saying that I am genuinely open-minded about who it is that should go on to lead our party. However, I am concerned that two issues risk becoming incorrectly linked in the emerging campaigns.

That the Liberal Democrats in the last election adopted a ‘centring’ approach is clear. That the Liberal Democrats suffered a huge electoral defeat is also beyond challenge. The question is whether there is anything in ‘centring’ that is (almost by nature) politically hazardous or whether in fact the issue was implementation of this strategy.

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Tagged future strategy | 29 Comments

Opinion: Magna Carta: Civil liberties 800 years on, under a Tory majority government

By Alfred Motspur | Wed 17th June 2015 - 2:43 pm

On Monday, the Magna Carta – the oldest charter in British (and indeed European) history which protects civil liberties – celebrated its 800^th anniversary.

At a celebration in Runnymede, where the Magna Carta was sealed by King John in 1215, David Cameron pledged “to safeguard the legacy, the idea the momentous achievements of those barons” who first signed the Great Charter.

That’s quite a bold statement to make, especially considering he’s in the middle of damaging – not safeguarding – such a legacy by repealing the Human Rights Act 1998 (hereon the HRA).

Like the Magna Carta protected civil liberties in the face of the monarchy, so the HRA protects civil liberties in the face of our government. Consequentially, as Liberal Democrat MEP Catherine Bearder and Dutch MEP Sophie in ‘t Veld suggest in their article in The New Statesman, it’s hypocritical that the Tories should glorify the Magna Carta whilst scolding the HRA.

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Tagged civil liberties and magna carta | 16 Comments

Opinion: Cameron is in danger of being like Mugabe on property

By Emily Davey | Tue 16th June 2015 - 4:53 pm

Housing is Londoners’ top priority according to the polls. Not surprising – with problems ranging from the cost, to shortage and too often to the quality too.

Yet the Conservatives’ lead housing policy – to extend the right to buy to housing association tenants – will solve none of these London housing problems: we should make attacking it a Lib Dem campaign priority for next year’s GLA elections.

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Tagged housing and right to buy | 38 Comments

Labour Leadership: Who should liberal democrats be cheering?

By Joe Otten | Tue 16th June 2015 - 2:47 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

Nominations have closed in the Labour leadership contest, and for £3 (probably in breach of our rules and theirs) you might even have a vote. The options are, Jeremy Corbyn, a socialist from another era, Andy Burnham, a good looking Ed Miliband, Yvette Cooper, an experienced minister of 11 years, and Liz Kendall, the Blairite.

I’m writing this post to give space for a debate on who we Liberal Democrats should be cheering on in this contest. Who, for £3 paid to the enemy, might it even be worth supporting? (No, I haven’t read the rules; this does not constitute advice of any kind.)

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84 Comments

Collateral Damage: CentreForum & the Fall & Rise of Liberal Ideas

By Stephen Lee | Tue 16th June 2015 - 12:01 pm

It is now clearly public knowledge that I have left my position as CEO of CentreForum, a job that I have undertaken these past three years with a great sense of privilege, pride and I hope some sense of humility.

We had planned before the general election for a downturn in our fortunes, planning that itself necessitated hard decisions, decisions that impacted on my staff, decisions that I did not take lightly. Like others, I did not foresee the magnitude of the Lib Dem reversal on May 7th. Its impact was both immediate and potentially transformational for CentreForum.

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6 Comments

Opinion: Bridging Futures – Young Migrants in London

By Merlene Emerson | Tue 16th June 2015 - 8:18 am

When is a Migrant an Expatriate? When he or she is a Brit abroad, obviously.

Inspired by the twin concepts of emigration and immigration, Prof Caroline Knowles posed this question at the launch of her research and report last week, supported by the Runnymede Trust and Goldsmiths College and hosted by Baroness Hussein-Ece at the House of Lords.

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6 Comments

Opinion: Let’s write our new leader a two-year contract – and get rid of him if it doesn’t work out

By David Faggiani | Mon 15th June 2015 - 5:45 pm

There’s been a lot of focus on the Labour Party’s new Leader being given a 2017 ‘break clause’, to ensure the freshness and efficacy of the Leader come 2020. Meanwhile, I saw a comment from a Lib Dem the other day to the effect of “we must give Farron or Lamb a good ten years, it’ll be a slow climb, etc.” I began thinking about the issue, and I have a proposal: why not give the new Leader of the Liberal Democrats a two-year contract, with rigidly-defined goals to meet, and either applaud them for meeting them, or get rid of them for not, on those criteria?

For too long, leadership challenges have been bloody, opportunistic, or subjectively triggered. Or, worse still, they haven’t happened, when they almost certainly should have done. We have recently seen the unreliability of opinion polls in measuring future performance. Will it be enough if, in 2017, we are polling back at, say, 20%? No. It will be success sculpted in the air, and prone to disassembly at a moment’s notice. What matters are solid, progressive results.

Here’s my proposal. We present the new Lib Dem Leader with a five-point contract, to cover the term August 2015 to July 2017. If they fulfil four or five criteria, astounding! If they fulfil three, that’s still a majority, they could carry on and improve. If they only manage two, one, or even none, they’re gone. We would have an automatic Leadership election.

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Tagged leadership election 2015, norman lamb and tim farron | 79 Comments

Opinion: Animal welfare legislation misses the mark

By Wayne Simmons | Mon 15th June 2015 - 2:19 pm

Leading animal welfare charities dismissed legislation introduced by Lib Dems in coalition as being not fit for purpose.

The new ban, coming into force in October 2015, will prohibit the testing on animals for finished household products in the UK – but not all their ingredients. The ban will only apply to ingredients where more than half of their usage is expected to be within household products. This is seen as a considerable u-turn by then Home Office Minister Lynne Featherstone, who announced in 2011 that the ban would ‘apply to both finished household products and their ingredients, although in …

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Tagged animal welfare and lynne featherstone | 25 Comments

Opinion: Can Local Government really cope with outsourcing?

By Nick Hollinghurst | Mon 15th June 2015 - 12:30 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

Council Officers have a strong public service ethos and some are excellent managers. But does their experience give them enough insight to negotiate outsourcing contracts? They have, after all, chosen a career pathway other than that of private sector business. They inevitably lack a deep understanding of the very different attitudes, styles and pressures of work and management in the private sector.

During the procurement process, these rather sheltered public servants are faced with slick teams of well-resourced professionals adept at putting on a good show and armed with as much carefully selected evidence as they need to demonstrate their company’s capability and good standing.

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Tagged Local government and outsourcing | 23 Comments

Lord Paul Tyler writes…Tackling the Tory Democratic Deficit

By Paul Tyler | Sun 14th June 2015 - 8:55 am

The advent of a Conservative government might once have meant no reform at all to our political system. However, David Cameron is almost accidentally opening the door to a review of party funding regime, the electoral system and the procedures of the House of Commons. During the Queen’s Speech debates, the Lib Dem team in the Lords has been tackling all three issues.

The Government wants to dry up some of the money available to Labour by placing restrictions on trade union funding. The principle that trade union members should consent to their subscriptions funding a political party is quite right. Yet it will be totally unbalanced to introduce that reform without something on the other side of the ledger, namely a cap on the large individual donations which fund the party arms race in spending.

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Tagged constitutional reform, democracy, featured and house of lords | 18 Comments

All-male shortlists for half of Commons Committees

By Caron Lindsay | Sat 13th June 2015 - 1:00 pm

Next Wednesday, MPs will choose who chairs their influential select committees. These are important, high profile positions as the Committees are there to carefully scrutinise the Government’s work. The more effectively they do their work, the better it is for our democracy. An effective chair will be able to work well with all their committee members from all parties and will be able to show capacity for tenacity and forensic attention to detail. Sadly, though, it looks as though the committees will not reflect diversity either in the Commons or society as a whole. You can find the whole list of people nominated here.

There are a few reasons to feel pretty gloomy at the selection on offer. The lack of any Liberal Democrat in the running anywhere is a predictable reflection of our decline in status. The calibre of some of the nominees and the fact that fewer than half of the Committees have had a woman even nominated for Chair shows that the Commons has not yet caught up with the modern world.

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Also posted in Parliament | Tagged house of commons and select committees | 11 Comments

A day to honour Charles Kennedy

By Caron Lindsay | Fri 12th June 2015 - 7:30 am

At noon today, in a small church near his Lochyside home, Charles Kennedy’s funeral will take place. Large numbers of people, including me, will be heading north to pay their respects. Many of us still haven’t quite got our heads round what’s happened. We are, however, all acutely aware of how much the world in general and the UK and Europe in particular will miss a man who could speak to both sides in an increasingly polarised political environment.

We want to pay our respects to Charles here on LDV, so today Paul Walter has lined up a series of posts that we hope you will find interesting and appropriate. It’s very much about Charles and who he was.

I just want to share this tweet of Charles’ from 10 September last year. Just before the referendum, he and Willie Rennie went up a mountain. They didn’t climb, because that wasn’t Charles’ way (something I get entirely) – and I have to laugh at Willie for wearing a suit. Who does that up a mountain, really? Charles was much more appropriately dressed. He recorded a message up there in that gorgeous setting that was broadcast at a massive Lib Dem rally in Edinburgh the next night. It doesn’t seem to be available on the internet anywhere, and we have tried to find it but to no avail so far. But here’s the photo.

First trip on today’s campaign trail is to the top of Aonach Mor, @TheNevisRange with @willie_rennie pic.twitter.com/NPLy1XUxLG

— Charles Kennedy (@charles_kennedy) September 10, 2014

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Tagged charles kennedy | 3 Comments

Opinion: Principles before policies

By Chris Fauske | Thu 11th June 2015 - 3:43 pm

Long ago, I stood at the podium of party assembly in Blackpool and asked our parliamentary spokesman on economic affairs, then Richard Wainwright, what he and his colleagues were doing to advance the party’s policy of zero economic growth. (Yes, we had such a policy once.)

I learned two things from that. One, ask my own darned questions not ones the organisation I represented (what was then the Union of Liberal Students) thought to ask. Two, try not to create an opportunity for deserved ridicule. This was 1981, and the next day The Guardian’s sketch writer had a fine time suggesting the answer should have been “We’ve succeeded. No growth. Mass unemployment. We’ve done it! And then some.”

The point, of course, is that while policies matter they are tactical devices for delivering strategic results. I have no idea why we thought zero growth was an economic policy worth pursuing, and I’m willing to bet the parliamentary party thought the idea both quaint and highly irritating. But there we were spending our time on a policy that was of no possible consequence given the depredations being loosed upon the country and that could not possibly have helped advance any of the principles it might have been intended to address. All we did was provide easy fodder to a paper that didn’t need it and cause an honourable man to have to waste his time.

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Tagged policy | 15 Comments

Opinion: Fighting for sex workers’ rights in Scotland

By Jade O'Neil | Thu 11th June 2015 - 12:30 pm

So, here we go again! Another bid to introduce the Nordic Model of criminalising the clients of sex workers has been launched this week in Scotland. This time it comes from a group called End Prostitution Now; a campaigning organisation made up of some very familiar faces and backed by Rhoda Grant MSP whose last attempt to introduce this legislation failed in 2012. Advocating for sex workers’ rights in Scotland can sometimes feel like playing Whack-a-Mole; every time we successfully argue against one campaign to make sex work more dangerous, another pops up almost immediately – perhaps having undergone a slight rebrand, but always essentially the same as the last.

On Monday, End Prostitution Now’s spokesperson Jan Macleod (whose widely-discredited research on the matter has been described by academics as “violating fundamental principles of human research ethics”) appeared on Scotland Tonight to defend the proposals. When challenged on the dangers caused by the Nordic Model in practice, she claimed that Googling brought up mixed evidence and stated that it was difficult to know which sources to believe.

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Tagged Scotland and sex work | 10 Comments

Opinion: Lib Demonstrating – Let’s be bold, loud and visible!

By Jonathan Brown | Thu 11th June 2015 - 9:10 am

Saturday 30^th May was one of the best political days I’ve had in years. Not only was I demonstrating in support of the Human Rights Act but I was doing so with hundreds of other Liberal Democrats. Too much of our protesting in recent years has been behind the scenes. I wasn’t a member of the party when Charles Kennedy was proudly leading Liberal Democrats in opposition to the Iraq war, but it meant a lot to me and stuck with me. I think it’s time to get out there again – make sure our fellow citizens can see the #fightback!

The human rights demonstration was so inspiring for me not just because we were out there in force again – with our leaders, our activists, our banners, and so on, but because we were there with our supporters too. I spoke with lots of people who were not party members, but many of whom were thinking about joining and were taking the opportunity to chat with our leadership contenders as well as activists like me. They appreciated us being there. And it was really nice to be there with them.

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Tagged demonstrations | 19 Comments

Opinion: Looking forward to the EU referendum

By Mark Argent | Wed 10th June 2015 - 5:03 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

With the legislation for the EU referendum now before parliament, that process is starting to feel real. I am thinking about what this might mean for Liberal Democrats, and the voice of liberal democracy.

In the General Election the consensus was not to campaign on Europe. That was probably wise, if counter-intuitive. Things are about to become very different.

In addition to the big question of which side will win, I had been thinking of the referendum in terms of its likely effect on the British political landscape — of the alliances that will form on both sides, and the possibility of splits in the Conservative party or defections leading to an early General Election, but am beginning to think more of this in terms of our distinctiveness.

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Tagged eu and eu referendum bill | 36 Comments

Opinion: Teresa May’s pipedream

By Anthony Durham | Wed 10th June 2015 - 10:58 am

View image | gettyimages.com

The draft Psychoactive Substances Bill worries me.

Those who do not know their history are doomed to repeat it. Recent discussions of drug misuse generally do not look back far enough. Every Voice reader already knows that prohibition does not work, mostly because of market forces, but it is sobering to read just how often over the centuries and in how many places that lesson has been learned the hard way. Again and again the same sequence has recurred: moral panic, decisive action, free publicity for forbidden fruit, final result worse than before. My favourite source of historical information is a 620-page report published in 1972 by the American Consumers Union entitled “Licit and Illicit Drugs” (large pdf).

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Tagged Psychoactive Substances Bill | 12 Comments

Opinion: An off-hand economic miracle, courtesy of new SNP Parliamentarian Tommy Sheppard

By John Dixon | Wed 10th June 2015 - 9:41 am

Last Sunday on Radio 4’s Westminster Hour the subject turned to the Scotland bill and the SNPs abandonment of their call for full fiscal autonomy.

About 05:20 minutes into this clip you can hear this exchange:

Carolyn Quinn – ‘Well Tommy isn’t it the case that the IFS say that if full fiscal autonomy is implemented now it would deprive Scotland of £8billion in revenue’

Tommy Sheppard MP – ‘That’s an academic estimate based on doing absolutely nothing to change the way the economy is run in Scotland.’

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Tagged Scotland and snp | 11 Comments

Tim Farron MP and Lord Wallace of Saltaire write…UK under threat from David Cameron and Tory Eurosceptics

By Tim Farron MP and Lord Wallace of Saltaire | Tue 9th June 2015 - 11:56 am

Let’s not kid ourselves. What David Cameron is supposed to be asking for as he travels round other European capitals is for a package of reforms to make the European Union more open and efficient. But what many in his government and party want is a fundamental renegotiation: leading either to the position of Norway, of association with the free trade area but exit from the EU, or that of Switzerland, an international finance centre with a fractious but dependent relationship with the EU. The Eurosceptics who want the Prime Minister’s negotiations to fail are driven by myths of English exceptionalism, by a tea-party Republican vision of a shrunken state and a deregulated market, and a refusal to recognise the disastrous impact of exit from the EU on the future of the United Kingdom and its place in the world.

Britain belongs in Europe. NATO and the EU are the twin pillars of our foreign and security policy. We share political and social values most closely with our European neighbours: on human rights, on what the Germans have labelled the ‘social market’ economy, on civil societies and national communities in which all citizens have a stake. It’s also the framework through which our economic interests are best promoted: a continent-wide market into which British products and services are closely integrated, a trading bloc which enables us to bargain with the US and China on equal terms.

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Tagged eu and eu referendum | 12 Comments

Opinion: We won’t get a fair society unless progressive politicians challenge Thatcherism

By Iain Roberts | Tue 9th June 2015 - 10:54 am

For nearly four decades progressive politicians have been losing the war of words – and of votes – over the economy. Those on the right have successfully persuaded voters time and again that a less equal, less fair society is better for nearly everyone, and those who lose out probably deserve to.

The evidence suggests that the right wing politicians are wrong – that the economics followed by governments of all colours since the 1980s locks a large proportion of society into poverty. Most of those poorer people are, in the jargon beloved of party leaders everywhere, “hard working”.

Last month …

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47 Comments

Opinion: A focus on values

By Peter Evans | Mon 8th June 2015 - 5:31 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

Prior to May 11th I had not read a manifesto, been on a political party’s website or looked for sites like LibDemVoice. My exposure to politics was limited but I had always voted LibDem, mainly because LibDems always seemed to resonate with me whereas other politicians, more often than not, had me shouting at the radio.

In this election I was taken in by the politics of fear and almost changed my vote, although at the last moment I stuck with my gut feel and voted LibDem again. I sat down to see what the exit polls were saying and could not rationalise my feelings of sadness and shock when I saw what was predicted. The next morning I watched Clegg’s resignation speech and felt I had to do something.

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Tagged liberal democrat values | 24 Comments

Opinion: ‘Scotland – where now?

By T J Marsden | Mon 8th June 2015 - 2:57 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

The referendum is over and has settled nothing. The election has raised more questions than answers. And the Conservative Government’s first Queen’s Speech has set the direction of travel, while leaving the specifics nicely vague. What we do know is that plans for ‘English Votes for English Laws’, barring Scottish MPs from voting on whatever the executive decides are England-only matters, will see Scottish Votes for British Laws made increasingly irrelevant. We also know that further devolution to Scotland is going to happen, but not if the offer can satisfy the SNP’s short term ambitions.

So where are Liberal Democrats in all this? Our historical commitment is of course to Federalism, which differs from devolution in that the members of a federation usually cannot be abolished by their federal government, and that such members are usually equals – each state has the same amount of control over its own affairs, and the same relationship with the federal government. Not so with devolution, which has led to the creation of several assemblies in the UK, each with differing powers and responsibilities.

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Tagged devolution, holyrood and Scotland | 17 Comments

Opinion: What if ?

By David Warren | Mon 8th June 2015 - 1:15 pm

View image | gettyimages.com

In February 1974 Edward Heath called a snap General Election in response to a second miners’ strike in three years. Heath famously posed the election as a decision on ‘Who Runs Britain’.

Despite opinion polls suggesting he would be returned to office and polling the highest number of votes, the vagaries of our electoral system meant Heath’s Tories not only failed to win a majority of seats, but actually got less than Labour. Historians suggest that the miners’ peaceful pursuit of their pay claim and an independent inquiry finding that there was justification for their dispute, dealt Heath a devastating blow.

The other big story of the election was the surge in the Liberal vote. From just over 11% in 1970, the party increased its share to nearly 20%, but again because of FPTP they only won a few more seats.

We all know what followed.

A weak attempt by Heath to remain in office, followed by a minority Labour government, and then another election which returned Wilson a small majority, the Winter of Discontent, Thatcherism, and all that followed.

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Tagged counterfactuals, edward heath and Harold Wilson | 9 Comments