As Kemi Badenoch frightened a lot of progressive horses with her plans to get rid of the Climate Change Act, leave the European Convention on Human Rights, put the Human Rights Act on a bonfire and be even more vile to asylum seekers and immigrants, Ed Davey invited “one nation” Conservatives to join the Liberal Democrats.
Certainly a lot of moderate Conservatives will be disgusted with Robert Jenrick’s full mask-off racism and his attack on the judiciary.
In an open letter to those who feel that the Conservative Party has speeded away from them, he said:
Dear friends,
Our country is at a crossroads.
The Conservative Party under Kemi Badenoch is becoming more extreme and out of touch, chasing Nigel Farage instead of focusing on the issues that really matter to people. Meanwhile, Reform UK is growing in strength – threatening the tolerant, decent values that hold our communities together.
I know many One Nation Conservatives are deeply concerned about the lurch to the hard right in our country and under Kemi Badenoch’s leadership. Her plans to tear up the Climate Change Act and withdraw from the ECHR show she is abandoning traditional British values of tolerance, decency and the rule of law.
So my message to the millions of One Nation Conservatives who feel let down by their party and reject the divisive politics of Badenoch and Farage is to come and join us. Help us save our country and defend the values we all hold dear.
We will stand strong where others back down. We will not pander to Reform. We will fight to protect our environment, stand up for decency and the rule of law, and stop Trump’s America from becoming Farage’s Britain.
So if you share those values, now is the time to join the Liberal Democrats.
With best wishes,
Ed Davey
The party has also put a poster van near the Conference venue in Manchester.
Kemi Badenoch ignored the former Conservative voters who believe in the rule of law, protecting our home for future generations and human rights for all our people.
With the help of a snazzy van we made sure people could hear a different message in Manchester today.
Join us pic.twitter.com/VLTapdZVkh
— Ed Davey (@EdwardJDavey) October 8, 2025
It is perfectly understandable that he should make this sort of plea during the Conservative Conference. I think that we do need to be a bit cautious about the strategy though. We need to be careful that the people in or who vote for other parties don’t hear from this messaging that we are a one nation small c conservative party. Because we are not. Nor will we ever be.
We don’t want to stick to the status quo, we want to reform just about everything about how our government operates.
We need to make sure that we emphasise that everyone who believes in the freedom of all to be who they are, human rights, civil liberties saving the planet and reforming the immigration and asylum system to make it decent and humane is welcome in the Liberal Democrats.
There are just as many Labour members as Conservatives who could be attracted by such a message. And now that the Greens have gone so far left that there’s no point to Jeremy Corbyn and Zarah Sultana’s pained efforts, some of their more liberal members might see us as a more effective route to saving the planet.
Next year the big electoral contests in Scotland, Wales and London require us to be appealing way, way beyond one nation Tories. Those of us on the ground need the federal party to be amplifying our messaging in our very different political environments.
There is a huge opportunity for us to present a distinctive message. Alex Cole-Hamilton’s refrain of choice at the moment is “change with fairness at its heart.”
When Holyrood went back after the Summer, he said:
As we head into the final months of this Parliament, Scotland could be on the cusp of removing the SNP for good.
People are tired of the waits to see their GP, soaring household bills, the national embarrassment of the ferries fiasco and the fact that Scottish education is not what it used to be. Scotland deserves better than this.
Scottish Liberal Democrats are winning again because we are showing that we can get things done, end 18 years of SNP decay and deliver change with fairness at its heart.
He said it in his speech in Bournemouth twice in the same paragraph:
Scotland deserves better than this. But it needs to be change with fairness at its heart.
This is my message to voters.
You have two votes at the coming Scottish Parliament elections.
In many constituencies, we are on the verge of winning against the SNP.
But wherever you are, every vote for the Scottish Liberal Democrats on the second peach ballot will deliver change with fairness at its heart.
This can only apply to us in Scotland so I have a feeling we’ll be hearing a lot more of this between now and the May election.
We need a similar message that says who we are, not just who we are not, in the rest of the country too.
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings. You can find her on Bluesky at caronmlindsay.bsky.social
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24 Comments
It might be pedantic on my part, but I feel that had he said “liberal conservatives” or “progressive conservatives”, it would have sent a far more direct and transparent message, instead of one nation. As you say, one nation conservatives will hear this and think “Lib Dems are small c conservative” when that is further from the truth about who we are, and what we want the party to be.
Some really good points here, particularly in relation to the Green party who have now just about completed the transition to a socialist party.
We need to be seeking to attract those who care deeply about the environment but don’t see themselves as being on the far left!
Very much agree in principle with what the Party is trying to do here. We should be a home for One Nation Conservatives, who have a social conscience. They should support change with a heart as Alex says.
I agree with Jack M – ‘liberal conservatives’ might have been clearer. I’m in this party because I am very very not a conservative, including the kind you find on the left. We’ve always had a Whig tradition in this party, and it’s a valid part of the liberal family that is perhaps attractive to Peelites, but I’m a radical anti-authoritarian human rights liberal. We should be a party of social liberals, power decentralisers and internationalists, with an internal economic spectrum where we debate HOW to liberate people rather than WHETHER we should bother.
My gut instinct is that it is better to appeal to people whose political priorities might find a home in the Liberal Democrats rather than talking about actual journeys from other political parties. There is a subtle difference but, if this is being pedantic, I’m with Jack Meredith.
While I do agree with Caron is trying to say and I think we must remember our connections and ties to our liberal instincts such as co-partnerships for workers, decentralisation and even elements of social democracy and Keyanisan economics; I do think we forget that we should lump “One Nation” Tories as seemingly opposite. Probably my favourite Tory Prime Minister was Harold MacMillian. He was very European looking (after trying and failing to get us into the Common Market), he kept the war time consensus, still built the most council houses (or record) for a Post-War PM with 500,000 at its peak. One Nation Tories in the times of Disraeli was at one point as seeing more on the side of workers, small farm holders, and voter enfranchisment than Gladstone’s liberals in some points of history. It can come across as over-generalisation. It is a broad Church. Although I do agree with some comments that perhaps the language might be off but as someone who has read up on Conservatives who identity as One Nation Tories I think its a bit more complicated than that.
Ed, thank you for saying: ‘Kemi Badenoch’s plans to tear up the Climate Change Act and withdraw from the ECHR show she is abandoning traditional British values of tolerance, decency and the rule of law.’ These are the major issues which the LibDems should be fighting on.
Sorry for the really bad typos on my first comment. Hope people can read it okay, joys of short attention spam and typing this on a nosey bus.
However, I also want to add, I don’t think language really hits the minds of voters. Im sorry, it really doesn’t. I call my Uncle a one nation Tory but he doesn’t call himself that. Or liberal Conservative. Or any label. Jo public don’t neatly define themselves in those words. It might be fine for data, analysts (for which I am one of) and us political geeks but this isn’t how people talk. People’s politics are also a lot more fluid than I think people give credit.
What this was, was a political stunt. It was there to upset the Tories at Conference and to make headlines and get media attention. And sometimes that is what is needed and to get people talking and possibly thinking of joining us. Its sad that I find the same people who moan we don’t get enough attention, and then we try to get attention it ends up not being “there attention” and when politics is so polarising they want to further polarise politics by taking aim at labels or what language is used.
We have lots of MPs now because Labour and Green voters held their noses and voted for us to oust Tories at the last election.
We have to be careful. Clegg, Laws and Davey have been allowed to do this sort of thing before.
He was a lucky general last year. Keep a close eye on him.
I thought the van was a good idea – and strong on that messaging.
The problem is that being a one nation Tory with reasonable views on Europe, remaining in the ECHR and basically being a broadly functioning human being isn’t the same as being a Liberal. It was really apparent post the 2015 election and then Brexit referendum how the centre of gravity of the Lib Dems was moved by the influx of members and made it much more of a party of moderate centrists with liberal tendencies than a Liberal one.
That has been electorally successful – and there is some credit to a strategy that goes to where the seats can be one. Additionally – and this is not without importance – probably the party has a chort of MPs from constituencies that is a politically better fit for the centre of gravity of the party than previously (was it really sustainable to represent constituencies from Burnley to Richmond upon Thames?)
What we should be asking ourselves is why the hell Didn’t we also do this outside the Labour conference??
There are a great many labour members who’s values are more in line with ours than with their authoritarian party, but the only party trying to appeal to liberal labour supporters right now are the Greens! And we shouldn’t fool ourselves into thinking that they’ll be too left wing for liberal minded voters, we lost allot of ground to labour in 2017 after all.
I agree with much of what Caron says (as usual) but also with those who say we can overthink this. We need to be clearer on what we are campaigning for – well said John Waller – but this was a good stunt with not a pratfall in sight. My only beef with it really is, as David said, why on earth were we not doing this at Labour’s conference – and the Greens for that matter.
@David Le Grice “What we should be asking ourselves is why the hell Didn’t we also do this outside the Labour conference??”
I’ve drifted away from this site and the party over the last 18 months or so and might have missed a significant change in strategy following electoral success, but in the long run up to the general election, the Lib Dems appeared to be focusing entirely on replacing the Tories in affluent areas by appealing to small-c and large-C conservatives of the soft / wet / one-nation variety (or at least, not scaring them away). The subject of Caron’s article looks like a continuation of that approach, and the nuance of “one nation conservatives” is likely to be overlooked by most people seeing simply an appeal for Tories to join the Lib Dems.
So a possible – and depressing – answer to the question posed is, “Because the Lib Dems don’t want left-leaning people to join them.” 🙁
Similarly, I see reported elsewhere that Lib Dem membership has declined significantly in recent years, possibly reflecting a migration of more radical or left-wing members towards the Greens. It’s reassuring though, to see reflected in the comments that some of that attitude remains.
Would like to think of the Lib Dems as the pre-Thatcherite Conservvative Party of Harold MacMillan..
And in Christopher Haigh’s comment above therein lies the problem. Pre-Thatcherite Macmillan-esque Tories include a significant number of decent, honoourable and principled people. But that doesn’t mean they were Liberals.
Indeed Hywel, but since 1988 the Lib Dems ceased to be just Liberals or even liberals. My view is that if we are intent on being simply out and out liberals, we will find that only about 5% of the population support us. If on the other hand we are a competent left to right of centre not a party full of ideologues and other isolationists we will probably succeed to make the UK a bit more liberal.
“So a possible – and depressing – answer to the question posed is, “Because the Lib Dems don’t want left-leaning people to join them”
I am sure this is the wrong framing of the political debate es right now. The real battle is between liberals and authoritarians (mostly backward looking), not left vrs right. Besides, I don’t see how a socialist can be a member of a liberal party. One values the collective above the individual. We are the opposite.
In response to Tristan Ward, I would say that both left and right sometimes display authoritarian tendencies, which I think supports your suggestion that the debate should be reframed.
I would push back though on the suggestion though that liberals should value the individual over the collective. Unless we have a sense of community and collective responsibility, we will not thrive as individuals or as a society. I believe liberalism should be about balancing both aspects of being human.
In response to @Christopher Haigh:
“Would like to think of the Lib Dems as the pre-Thatcherite Conservative Party of Harold MacMillan”
While I admired Macmillan’s efforts to uphold political consensus, he was still a small-c conservative. We can’t forget that our predecessors, the Liberal Party, existed alongside the Tories and Labour at the time. We are them, they are us. I’ve got a piece coming out today on this issue which people might find interesting, but for now, all I can say is that the spirit of “One Nation” cannot, and should not, be given to the Tories any longer.
@John Davis
“I would push back though on the suggestion though that liberals should value the individual over the collective”
I don’t think we are that far part.
I read the promotion of liberty, equality and community bit the preamble as putting individuals centre being treated equally by everyone else within a supportive and stable community (to which that individual should contribute by treating everyone else else equally as a minimum) where no one is enslaved by poverty ignorance or conformity.
But the individual is (for me at least) the most important thing.
Another part of understanding what is going on is (I think) that the post WW1 Conservative party coalition is breaking down. The two dominant parties in the 19th Centaury were the Liberals and Conservative. Meanwhile socialism was gaining strength and post WW1 the Conservatives managed to become the dominant anti-socialist force that aimed to resist socialism by uniting nationalists capitalists and the petit bourgeoises.
100 year later it is clear socialism is an historical failure, (witness for example the limited low actual vote and lack of enthusiasm for Labour at the last election notwithstanding the number of Labour MPs). The anti-authoritarian, individualistic pro-capitalist part of that 1920s Conservative coalition (let’s call them Conservative liberals or liberal conservative) does not fear socialism anymore and certainly fears the like of Farage.
What will happen? If the conservative liberals don’t come to us or labour they will soldier on. Right now I think Farage etc are more likely to be stopped if the conservative liberals join forces with the liberal party – us – provided we/they can find a way of talking constructively about the difficult issues (esp identity politics (trans rights especially)), how to properly regulate markets/trade and the role/size of government.
“No bullying, the rule of law and lots of evidence” might provide a framework. I don’t see human rights and environmentalism causing much of a difficulty.
@Hywel
“It was really apparent post the 2015 election and then Brexit referendum how the centre of gravity of the Lib Dems was moved by the influx of members and made it much more of a party of moderate centrists with liberal tendencies”
Yes I think this is right but if (as I think) the real debate is between liberalism and authoritarianism such a person is not a second rate liberal by being “a moderate centrist with liberal tendencies”. That person (I think) will be strong on rule of law, internationalism, human rights, markets and trade as free as possible but properly regulated . They want policy to be based on evidence and/rational discussion rather than dogma. That person cares about fairness, and I am sure is deeply concerned about climate change etc, while wanting to get on and improve their and their family’s life (if they have a family) life. And that person will see education the means to achieving that end.
I don’t call that second rate liberalism at all.
There is significant overlap with one-nation Conservatives but the Liberal Democrats are essentially progressive and not centre-right so newcomers are welcomed for their support that recognises the necessity of the public sector and for the benefits the welfare state provides.
David Warren has got it about right .Perhaps we should remember that a lot of Conservative voters switched to the Greens at the last GE . They are not going to be attracted by red/green politics . We should make better use of the Green Liberal Democrats . not all conservatives support the expansion of fossil fuels now advocated by the current leadership of the Tories , They do not want to see our green and pleasant land turned into a “Frackers” paradise with a moonscape of drilling rigs. No lets promote environmental sustainability and sound economics .That way will attract new members despite their previous leanings .