As Reform continues to lead the polls, we are witnessing a movement that mirrors Trump’s MAGA movement in the US, unlawfully arresting, detaining, and sometimes deporting non-white residents, including U.S. citizens and legal residents. What we’re seeing from this administration is an attempt to ethnically cleanse the country of non-white people. With the clear ties between Farage and MAGA, Reform is not just any political rival. Their ascent to government would initiate a direct assault on British democratic values. It won’t be long before non-white British residents and citizens are targeted in the same way.
A Reform government is existentially dangerous because our democratic institutions and guardrails are uniquely vulnerable to an authoritarian takeover. Whilst the UK prides itself on stability, structural features like FPTP allow an extremist minority to seize absolute power with as little as 30% of the vote. That is fundamentally undemocratic. When you combine that with a House of Lords that lacks democratic legitimacy and an uncodified constitution that relies on the “good chaps” theory of government, our long-standing constitutional crisis fosters a ripe environment for a demagogue to bypass the traditional norms and conventions that hold our democracy together. More precisely, Reform and the Conservatives have already pledged to repeal the Human Rights Act and withdraw from the ECHR; the core risk is that a Reform or Reform/Conservative coalition could secure a substantial parliamentary majority with a voteshare below 50%. This simple majority would then be used to push through an authoritarian power grab similar to what we’re seeing in the US.
To fight back, we must offer a transformative vision for the country. I am calling for us to build on and fill the gaps in our Federal UK Framework that we passed in 2021, ensuring a more resilient and decentralised constitutional structure. By ensuring every MP commands majority support in their seat and entrenching fundamental rights, we can build institutional safeguards resistant to authoritarian hijacking. Our agenda would focus on three essential pillars from the Australian Model: replacing FPTP in the House of Commons with the Alternative Vote (AV) to prevent minority rule, replacing the House of Lords with an elected Senate that follows STV to restore accountability, and entrenching our fundamental rights so they cannot be stripped away by a simple majority; any amendment would require a two-thirds supermajority in both chambers.
Institutional reform is one part of the solution. We must mount a maximalist pressure campaign on the current government immediately, demanding constitutional & electoral reform, or at the very least, the adoption of AV in the House of Commons. Should the government fail to abandon FPTP, a pragmatic contingency is necessary: tactical voting with other political parties. In seats where Reform presents the greatest threat, we must be prepared to put partisan competition aside. Moreover, we should serve as the key “convener and lubricant” for a broad pro-democracy alliance. This coalition should include the Greens, Your Party, SNP, Plaid Cymru, and grassroots groups like Make Votes Matter. Our message to the public must be unequivocally patriotic: we are safeguarding the existence of our democracy and keeping fascism at bay.
Turning these ideas into action requires a coordinated effort starting now, particularly within Parliament. By introducing legislative benchmarks, we can lay the groundwork for future reform and signal that Farage’s extreme plans will face fierce resistance. Our peers in the Lords have a unique role as well, using their platform to highlight the need for an elected Senate and even floating the idea of a “reverse Salisbury convention” to warn that the Lords will intervene if democracy is at stake.
Beyond the chamber, we leverage All-Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs) to build cross-party consensus for these changes. By bolstering the APPG on Electoral Reform and considering new groups focused on “Constitutional Resilience,” we can produce credible reports and engage Select Committees to study lessons from abroad on resisting populism. Furthermore, we ought to prepare for the possibility of a hung Parliament, where our leverage could be used to make these democratic reforms non-negotiable “red lines” for any governing arrangement. By preparing to play “constitutional hardball”, we ensure that we do not squander the chance to safeguard the UK’s democratic future. The choice ahead of us is stark. We can either watch as our democratic norms are eroded by authoritarianism, or we can lead the charge to modernise and fortify our institutions for the 21st century.
* Tushar Aneja is Vice Chair of the Kingston Borough Party and a member of the London Regional Executive Committee.
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32 Comments
Two unrelated points in response to your article, if I may.
Firstly, it is complete hyperbole to suggest that the Trump administration is engaged in “an attempt to ethnically cleanse the country of non-white people”. What it is attempting to do is deport millions of immigrants with no legal right to be in the country. We may disagree with the Trump administration in doing this but he repeatedly stated during the election campaign that deporting millions of illegal immigrants from the USA would be one of his priorities if elected…and he was. This is not ‘ethnic cleansing’.
As for entrenching a requirement for a supermajority for certain types of legislation, you will understand that this can not be done without a written constitution. To explain, if such a requirement was put in place by merely passing legislation to that effect, all that would be required to remove the requirement would be for MPs to amend the legislation by simple majority. Parliament can not bind its successor, so the only way to entrench an supermajority would be for the UK to move to a constitution that was endorsed by referendum and, thereafter, backed by judicial power.
Reform have a Zia Yusuf head of policy & Laila Cunningham London mayoral candidate – both practising Muslims. The post doesn’t reflect reality ..Obama handed Tom Homan a congressional medal for deporting 920,000 illegal immigrants – part of the 3 million Obama managed to deport. Deaths in custody under that adminstration were significant. Never once did we witness any rioting or camera crews or outraged liberals ….The only reason we are seeing this now I’d because it’s Trump ..
@ Greg Hyde It would be helpful in evaluating the value and purposes of Mr Hyde’s contributions to LDV if he could declare whether or not he is a member/supporter of Mr Farage’s Reform Party.
“To fight back, we must … replace FPTP in the House of Commons with the Alternative Vote (AV)”
To keep Reform out, we must first find a way to win under FPTP!
If we campaign to replace FPTP, will that win votes, or lose them? Our opponents will stir up arguments between AV and STV supporters, and will then accuse us of being political anoraks who care more about political careers than the real issues that matter.
“We should serve as the key “convener and lubricant” for a broad pro-democracy alliance. This coalition should include the Greens, Your Party, SNP, Plaid Cymru, and grassroots groups like Make Votes Matter.”
Yes – Coalition is the only way forward that looks at all likely to work. But groups like Your Party, who would drive away far more voters than they could bring, should be kept strictly at arms’ length. As for the nationalists, the reality is that if they end up with the balance of power, they will be deluged with offers from all sides. Before the election, the Right will no doubt try to repeat their dishonest message of 2015 “Don’t vote Miliband, he’ll help the SNP wreck the United Kingdom.” Don’t let’s help them repeat that message.
And Labour? Yes, but at the right price. First, Labour need to get scared. They need to lose hope of winning again on their own. Once they have done that, a reasonable deal will be possible. One that doesn’t let them dominate.
I’ve no time for Farage or Reform David …
But the article is an exaggeration to say the least …You’d be better addressing the points I’ve made & Joan’s made instead of questioning somebody’s political.leanings ..
Joan Summers is right about the constitution. The fixed term parliament act enacted by the coalition, had supermajority clauses in it, but Johnson simply repealed it. AV is no use. Parties can win absolute majorities on much less than 50%. It’s not even proportional. Only a PR system can make seats proportional to votes. Incidentally, a written constitution is party policy as far as I can recall
@Greg Hyde
“I’ve no time for Farage or Reform”
The problem is, the way you repeat their talking points is rather inconsistent with that assertion.
To my knowledge, Obama never tried to impeach a judge who ruled against him;
Obama never tried to restrict scientific research on grounds he didn’t like what the data revealed;
Obama’s supporters never tried to overturn an election by force.
Do you REALLY think Obama’s America was no more liberal than Trump’s as it is currently evolving? Which of the two would you prefer to live in in?
To Joan and Greg (On Ethnic Cleansing and the 2026 Reality):
With respect, the comparison to the Obama era does not hold up in the face of what we have seen this month. We are not talking about standard immigration enforcement but rather a $45 billion mobilisation to build military-base tent cities for a systemic purge. When federal agents, acting with total impunity, are shooting U.S. citizens such as Renee Good and Alex Pretti in the streets of Minneapolis during sweeps, we have moved into the territory of state-sponsored ethnic cleansing. My point is not that our uncodified constitution is a shield. Quite the opposite, I am arguing that our current system is too weak to prevent a similar authoritarian power grab from happening here if an extremist minority ever seizes the levers of the British state.
To Joan and Mick (On Parliamentary Sovereignty):
You have highlighted the exact problem my article seeks to solve. My blueprint explicitly calls to build on the 2021 Federal UK Framework that our party passed. This framework is designed to replace the unlimited power of Parliamentary Sovereignty with a formal federal settlement. By establishing a higher law and a clear division of powers, we can create the legal mechanism needed to entrench rights and supermajority requirements. This ensures they can no longer be overridden by a simple 50 percent plus one vote in the Commons. We need to move beyond the good chaps theory of government and towards institutional resilience.
Tristan ….Where in my posts did I say that he is better than Obama. What I stared is Obana carried out the biggest successful deportations post war – and Homans efforts were rewarded by Obama. Did anybody state Obama was ethnically cleansing the US. Obviously not
Where were the riots , TV crews , etc …
Trump was elected clearly stating his aim. Those who are upset by that should put the blame on the Democratic party with a woeful candidate & campaign.
Masked squads of paramilitaries, recruited from far-right and white supremacist groups are detaining, beating, and murdering US citizens. The Trump administration is shielding them from investigation, and covering their crimes with lies and disinformation.
If you’re making excuses for this, ask yourself: would you accept this from any other administration? Or are you just fine with state violence as long as it targets liberals and ethnic minorities?
@Andrew Melmoth
I am not aware of any evidence to support your claim that ICE recruits “from far-right and white supremacist groups”. If you have a link to anything to support this assertion, please post it. Thanks
@ Greg Hyde
“Where in my posts did I say that he is better than Obama”
You have just been given an opportunity to make a judgement between Trump’s America and Obama’s and have rather conspicuously failed.
You are like a doctor who, confronted with a woman having a heart attack, prefers to treat her ingrowing toenail
We have more important things to do right now than listen to an apologist for Trump and Farage even if he is too innocent to understand what he is doing – which I suspect you are not.
– Joan Summers
It is well known that ICE recruitment posts use slogans and memes drawn from neo-nazi subcultures.
ICE nodding to far-right extremists in recruitment posts, experts say
Well, this article and certain comments show why the LibDems are stuck electorally. Lots of obsessions with name calling and lashing out at parties they don’t like, not a lot of substance. When pointed out this is either wrong or childish just further lashing out.
While massive constitutional reform is a wonderful debating point for a good few party members, it is a total turn off for the vast majority of normal people. If we propose anything that implies we want to spend time in the next parliament on a “transformative vision”, setting up ‘decentralised constitutional structures’, with ‘an elected senate’, ‘requiring two-thirds supermajorities’, we will show ourselves to be electoral geeks, completely unable to focus on the real problems facing most voters.
As for proposing a system where ‘every MP commands majority support in their seat’ we will almost certainly find that there is no MP anywhere who commands majority support in their seat right now. A majority of voters – maybe, but majority support – never.
Finally we come to ‘leverage All-Party Parliamentary Groups (APPGs) to build cross-party consensus … bolstering the APPG on Electoral Reform and considering new groups focused on “Constitutional Resilience,” we can produce credible reports and engage Select Committees to study lessons from abroad on resisting populism.’
Sorry – It’s pouring down and blowing a gale, but I’m sure I can find some leaflets I can deliver in a no-hope ward.
@ David Evans. Quite right, David.
Modern Lib Dems often forget that PR was voted down in 1918 by both Asquith’s and Lloyd George’s supporters when they could have had it.
These days, “it’s the economy stupid” – phrase coined by James Carville in 1992 . Carville was a strategist in Bill Clinton’s successful campaign in the 1992 U.S. presidential election against incumbent George H. W. Bush. His phrase was directed at the campaign’s workers and intended as one of three messages for them to focus on. The others were “Change vs. more of the same” and “Don’t forget health care”.
David Allen 26th Jan ’26 – 3:38pm…To keep Reform out, we must first find a way to win under FPTP!…
That ‘job’ may well be done for us.. The Tory/Lab parties are in dire straits and, unless things drastically change in the next couple of years, their chances in a FPTP election are nil..
However, Labour have an unassailable majority in the HoC and could unilaterally rule to change the system or decide on a referendum (a referendum that all main party’s voters, excepting Reform, might well unite to win)
With Reform so far ahead they are liable to ‘raise merry hell’ but once passed they will, even if they hold a majority in the HoC, not be in a position to change until the following GE..
I never under-estimate the desire for MPs to try and stay in their jobs and, in this case, that desire could work in our favour….
Expats, I like your post except I think you have misjudged one aspect. In your last sentence you say “I never under-estimate the desire for MPs to try and stay in their jobs …”
This is a very valid point, but when you then add “… and, in this case, that desire could work in our favour.” I would only say “Except for most Labour party MPs who could easily find their numbers cut by nearly half.” (and that assumes Labour’s vote share would stay at 33.7% as in 2024).
Sorry.
David Evans 27th Jan ’26 – 5:56pm….. “Except for most Labour party MPs who could easily find their numbers cut by nearly half…
“Drowning men will clutch at a straw”.. far better a SMALL chance than NO chance
Interesting article but AV is as bad as FPTP. It is not in the least proportional.
I would say STV for Commons and open party list for a new Senate.
@David
If you are advocating STV for all Commons seats, what would you do about rural Scotland where the single-member constituency of Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross covers 11,632 square kilometres on its own. How are you going to combine it with enough others of these massive Highlands constituencies to make a meaningful STV seat? It’s all very well repeating the letters STV as if it is a mantra but we need an electoral system that works everywhere in the UK, not just in big cities.
@David: STV is also not proportional (Google ‘droop quota’ to see why). It’s more proportional than AV but still likely to discriminate against smaller parties. I would not say AV is as bad as FPTP: Compared to FPTP, AV has the huge advantages of avoiding ‘splitting the vote’ and discouraging extremist positions and tribalism.
@Greg: I would say the reason Obama-era deportations didn’t result in huge protests is that under Obama, deportations were focused on convicted criminals and recent arrivals – which meant little disruption or visible ICE presence in communities, plus the people being deported were people about whom there was little controversy that they should be deported. It wasn’t because Obama was a Democrat. I do however agree with you and Joan that some of he claims about Trump and Reform in both Tushar’s article and some of the comments are exaggerated and factually wrong.
@Laurence Cox “How are you going to combine it with enough others of these massive Highlands constituencies to make a meaningful STV seat?”
No electoral system is perfect, although I think STV balances the desires for proportionality and local representation well (it works well in Ireland and in NI for for non-Westminster elections) But one of STV’s advantages is that you can have a standard rule for 5- or 6- Member seats in cities but in rural areas (such as the Highlands) you can have smaller numbers of MPs, possibly down to 1 (where you would effectively have AV in that seat).
We already make exceptions for some island seats in Westminster such that they aren’t required to have minimum population levels, so it’s not like “special casing” is a new thing (similarly, for example, the German-speaking part of Belgium has a single MEP rather than being included in one of the other constituencies, so it’s not just us that make exceptions)
@Daniel Walker
But once you have accepted single seats in rural Scotland then the question is why not single seats in rural parts of Wales and England too. Would you want to have a single STV seat that covered the whole of Cornwall, for example? It is why I have always argued for Roy Jenkins’ system of AV+ where we retain the constituency link, require elected candidates to get a majority of votes in a constituency (including lower preferences) and achieve better proportionality than STV by using top-ups based on first preferences. Once you have a sizeable number of single-member seats in a mixed STV/AV system you end up with a bias towards any party where its strength is in rural areas.
“some of the claims about Trump and Reform in both Tushar’s article and some of the comments are exaggerated and factually wrong”.
Which claims about Trump and Farage do you think are exaggerated/factually wrong please?
I agree it is very important to establish the facts, so far as “facts” are knowable at all. All we actually have is evidence from which we can try to draw conclusions. The more evidence we have the better.
@Laurence Cox “Would you want to have a single STV seat that covered the whole of Cornwall”
That would be a six-member seat covering the existing 6 Cornish constituencies? That doesn’t seem at all unreasonable.
“It is why I have always argued for Roy Jenkins’ system of AV+ where we retain the constituency link, require elected candidates to get a majority of votes in a constituency (including lower preferences) and achieve better proportionality than STV by using top-ups based on first preferences”
STV retains the constituency link. Indeed, you are much more likely to be able to talk to one of your MPs than under a single-member seat system, as you have more than one; it is a known issue that if your MP is a Minister they may not be able to help you due to collective responsibility.
AV+ is not, I think, unworkable, and is a lot better than FPTP assuming open-list AV, but has two classes of MP, which I don’t personally like.
Cornwall is definitely a real community. Can you honestly say that of any of the existing seats in Cornwall?
So, we already have at least three different variants of non-FPTP on offer. An anorak’s paradise. A total turnoff to ordinary voters!
Expats “Drowning men will clutch at a straw”
Yes, but Labour won’t clutch at a PR referendum. That would be seen as a desperate attempt to hang on to power by gerrymandering. So people would vote down the referendum and then vote out Labour.
Labour would do much better to clutch at a Coalition offer to the Lib Dems and Greens.
Sorry expats, but choosing the certainty of half of them losing their seats under a new system, as opposed to the chance of holding their own seat when all their closest advisors (their staff) will be saying we can do it and keep the team together, is just not an option most Labour MPs would choose.
For an analysis of the psychology of facing up to bad situations and the straws people will cling to, I suggest you read Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman – specifically Chapter 26 on Prospect Theory, but you might need to read several preceding chapters first.
As an aside, it also provides a useful insight into the behaviour of many in our party immediately after the 2014 EU election result to avoid having to face up to the problem.
@Mr David J Allen “So, we already have at least three different variants of non-FPTP on offer. An anorak’s paradise. A total turnoff to ordinary voters!”
So we can’t propose, or indeed even discuss on a party forum, anything at all with more than two possible choices? Come on.
Daniel Walker: The problem with discussing electoral reform is that it won’t be confined to a party forum. As with Clegg’s referendum, the Press will inevitably be full of conflicting opinions about voting systems, all through the campaign. Then it will be easy for the Farages and Badenochs to say “Ignore these anoraks, vote for someone who is talking about real issues!”