The celebratory yellow smoke from the 2024 general election may have cleared, but inside the local party branches of some of our major cities a very different kind of atmosphere is settling in. It is a thick, unmistakable sense of urban unease.
Whilst the national narrative remains focused on the “Blue Wall” breakthroughs, a growing contingent of activists and councillors in our urban heartlands are beginning to ask a difficult but very necessary question: at what cost?
As others have intimated on this website over the past week, in the wake of recent local election results the mood among urban Lib Dems has shifted from quiet concern to open frustration and potential dissent.
I got a sense of this when, on Thursday evening, whilst on the train travelling down to London to appear on Talk, I got a message from a very prominent city-based Lib Dem asking if I had a few minutes for a chat. In our subsequent phone call this person, usually very affable, was noticeably reaching the end of their tether at what they perceive as the party leadership all but abandoning us being competitive in urban areas. I gave this a brief mention on Talk later that evening and clipped it up for social media the next day. The reaction from others in the party was interesting and, in some cases, very telling. Whilst most folks agreed that something is going very badly wrong others tried to suggest that everything is hunky dory in the party and there are no problems.
As I suggested on my Political Frenemies podcast on Friday evening, sticking your head in the sand and ignoring the reality of a situation is not a very sensible or useful way to behave for a political party.
For years the party’s strategy has pivoted heavily toward suburban and rural gains – a strategy that undeniably delivered seats in Parliament. However, on the ground in our cities, many feel the federal party is leaving them to rot.
Several well-known figures within the party have now broken ranks. Tom Gordon MP, Cllr Victor Chamberlain and former London Mayoral candidate Rob Blackie have all waded in. In private forums and increasingly public social media posts, activists are criticising recent local election results as a sign of an ever-narrowing political identity for the party. It is clear that tailoring our message so specifically to disenchanted Conservatives in the shires, we are becoming background noise in the diverse, high-density wards of the English North and Midlands.
The man we haven’t yet heard from is Carl Cashman. As a prominent voice for urban liberalism and a leader who has skilfully navigated the tough terrain of Merseyside politics, many will see him as the natural figurehead for this internal discontent. I’m hearing murmurings from parts of the party that activists are apparently waiting for and asking Carl to make a definitive public statement – a “State of the Union” for urban Liberal Democrats. His endorsement of the current direction or a public pivot away from it could well define the internal party climate for the next year. However I’m also hearing suggestions that those wanting to hear the party’s leader in Liverpool make a firebrand speech might have to wait.
The word is that Carl will not go public until he has had a frank, face-to-face conversation with Ed Davey. I consider Carl a mate (indeed I went up to Liverpool to interview him last year for the first ever long-form profile/interview with him for this very website) and I know that he will want what is best for the party as a whole. I hope, if what I’m hearing is true, he does indeed get a meeting with Ed and manages to get some sort of concession out of what, frankly, is an increasingly out of touch leadership team.
When did Ed last call for us to rejoin the EU?
It is certainly striking that both potential Labour leadership contenders Wes Streeting and Andy Burnham have this past weekend openly hinted at, or explicitly backed, Britain eventually rejoining the European Union.
Streeting went furthest, rightly calling Brexit a “catastrophic mistake” and saying the UK’s future lies “back in the European Union.” Burnham, meanwhile, spoke of a “long-term case” for rejoining. Which raises an awkward question for we Lib Dems: When did Ed Davey last explicitly make that case himself?
In recent years, the Lib Dem leadership’s language has noticeably softened into calls to “repair” or “fix” Britain’s relationship with Europe rather than openly advocating for us to rejoin. Indeed, reports dating back to 2020 noted Davey saying the party would not actively campaign to rejoin immediately, despite remaining strongly pro-European.
At a time when polling increasingly suggests Brexit regret is becoming mainstream, the danger is that some Labour figures (even if for their own internal party reasons) now sound more ambitious and emotionally honest about Europe than Britain’s traditionally most pro-European party.
A new start for the BBC
Today is the first day for the BBC’s new Director General, Matt Brittin, and it must signal a genuine fresh start for our national broadcaster.
The Corporation faces growing political and cultural attacks from those who would happily weaken it or dismantle it altogether. Now is the time to defend unapologetically its founding mission: to inform, educate, and entertain – and to let the BBC flourish again as one of Britain’s greatest public institutions.
* Mathew Hulbert is a former Councillor, is a regular commentator on TV and Radio, and is Co-Host of the Political Frenemies podcast.
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12 Comments
“Urban unease”
I conclude that you have not read all the contributions over the past week or so. Unease is far from confined to urban areas.
1. We need to address the issues relevant to urban and semi-urban areas.
2. We MUST focus more on housing issues such as the leasehold scandal, empty buildings and the lack of social rent homes.
3. We must continue to concentrate on health issues, including the long waiting lists, plus related social care issues.
4. We need to attract more members, especially in urban areas. This is best done through a laser focus on our values with plenty of opportunities to join up through links in our leaflets, online and through P.P.B.’s.
Some of us have been around for long enough to remember the last time figures in our party forced out a decent, principled and popular man as leader.
This followed the 2005 general election that delivered our highest number of MPs but, as now, ambitious individuals felt that wasn’t good enough. The disastrous end result of removing Charles Kennedy was Nick Clegg, which saw us go backwards in the following election and then almost wiped out in 2015.
Ed is a genuinely nice guy and comes across as human to voters. His backstory demonstrates that he is genuinely caring and has had more than his share of the hardships millions of regular people have faced.
Ed is by no means perfect, but at a time when politics is being dominated by inauthentic snake-oil salesmen on the left and right, we at least have a leader who is genuine and human while combining experience of both real life and being in government.
We need to better articulate what liberalism is and why it matters to ordinary citizens. We also need to show we have answers to the real issues facing society, such as UBI to provide financial security in an age where millions of jobs are threatened by AI. These are criticisms of the party as a whole, not just the leader. I’ve yet to see evidence of any potential leadership contender who is in a position to do better.
Councillor Andrew Makinson
Liverpool
I received an email from LDHQ last night titled “Making the case for stronger ties with the EU” and sent in the names of Al Pinkerton, Lisa Smart and Calum Miller.
It doesn’t mention ‘rejoin’ once, even as a distant, long term aim. It also accuses Labour of being “timid”…..
We risk becoming followers rather than leaders on an issue that was once our electoral USP, and also drove the massive surge in new members and activists that enabled our recent success and delivered the “incumbency” that others have pointed out provided the platform for our modest gains this year.
I suggest it’s not just the Labour leadership that is guilty of being timid.
And further to my previous post, that membership “surge” has mostly drifted away now, shrinking the pool in which we fish for the activists and candidates who are becoming increasingly difficult to attract and motivate.
On the question of Ed’s needing to be vocal about whether or when we might seek to rejoin the EU, I had thought there was agreement that we should apply to rejoin the Single Market, not the Customs Union. Is there possibly silence on this because of our separate new trading pacts with other countries? Do we accept as a price of rejoining, whatever Freedom of Movement (restricted now perhaps?) the EU demands? Do we wish to be in some sort of outer circle, as I think Nick Clegg was once in favour of? What is the party policy on this which we wish Ed to speak out about, or should we first be developing the policy?
Wonderful – turn to email from the party today and find an answer to my confusion on our EU stance! A vote in the Commons tomorrow is “to require Government to begin talks on Europe on a Customs Union”. This vote is to be forced, we are told. Let us know more, please, Europe spokesperson Al Pinkerton!
Anything we say about joining the EU must be accompanied by speaking about the cost of living and inequality issues. These are even more urgent and many people will see little benefit of joining the EU unless this is dealt with. Indeed one reason for Brexit was because too many people did not feel they received any benefit from being in the EU.
The thing about all of this is I don’t believe our policy is the problem, the issue is our message and our comms. We NEED to be better than this, and we easily could.
Very well said Andrew Makinson.
@ Rebecca Jones: you are right. Policy is NOT the problem.
We have popular policies that appeal across the board. And indeed we draw similar levels of support from all classes.
In the southeast and southwest, we have always been supported by the poorer off. Apparently many posters in the election post-mortem are blithely unaware that waiters, factory workers, nursing assitants, teaching assistants, shop assistants, bus drivers, prison officers etc all live in the “leafy” Home Counties. Shock horror!
The way we present ourselves is resolutely square; there is much to be said for that. Ed has an enviable ordinary square dad human air. And he gives our pitch on the NHS and social care authenticity. It’s a vote-winner.
But squareness doesn’t work with right on left-leaning young professionals or in the inner cities. We need hipper younger MPs and council leaders to step forward and make a fiercer pitch to these voters.
Our President and the party leader in Liverpool could surely transition to national traditional and social media. Ed can’t do it all on his own.
Nick, Looking at the stats, it is clear our Remain membership surge was allowed to totally dissipate over the four years following our leaving the EU. Clearly these voters were a new demographic in the party (or perhaps a reinforcement of the old social democrat demographic that has sadly declined within our party) and not as “progressive” as some, but those I met were clearly fully signed up to the old school tolerant wing of the Libs and Lib Dems. However for some reason, those at the centre of the party did nothing like enough to ensure that they felt welcome and were actively encouraged to feel part of the team. No specific instruction, guidance or even just encouragement to local parties to help them reach out to these new people. Overall when it comes down to a 50% drop in membership, our key organisers and influencers didn’t.