More United.uk the post-referendum cross-party campaign for an open tolerant and inclusive Britain, is consulting its members on whether to endorse Sarah Olney in the Richmond Park by-election.
This comes at a crucial moment as postal votes are landing and there is a concerted effort to speak to postal voters. If you can’t get to Richmond Park, just log into Connect and you will find a Virtual Phone Bank ready for you.
This decision by More United is a critical test of its core concept, of a willingness to endorse candidates from any one of a number of different parties, should they subscribe to the values. If it doesn’t endorse Sarah in Richmond Park, how can it ever deliver? The letter to members is as follows:
In just under thirty days voters in Richmond Park will choose a new MP. This might be a local by-election, but the issues at stake are much bigger.
We believe this by-election is a huge opportunity to send the Government a message that the path they’ve chosen towards a hard brexit is wrong and that millions of people still believe in a more united, less divided Britain.
However, this is your movement, so we’ll only get involved with your support.
Over the past few days, the More United team have been hard at work analysing which of the candidates meeting the criteria we have. Firstly, will they represent our principles if they’re elected and secondly can they win.
On that basis, we’re recommending that we support pro-European Sarah Olney in this by-election, but we’re only doing that if a majority of our supporters agree. Click here to vote now, or read further to see why we’re asking you to support Sarah.
The incumbent, Zac Goldsmith, is long term supporter of Brexit. He has been endorsed by UKIP, and his campaign last summer to become Mayor of London was one of the most divisive in living memory.
We don’t believe Zac’s position on Europe or previous conduct are consistent with our principles, so we can’t consider supporting him.
The Green Party have decided not to field a candidate, and the Labour candidate, Christian Wolmar, doesn’t have a realistic chance of winning. The seat is historically a close Lib Dem/Conservative marginal, and a group of Labour MPs even signed an open letter suggesting they shouldn’t field a candidate because they couldn’t win this time.
That leaves Sarah Olney, the Liberal Democrat, as the only candidate with a realistic chance of beating Zac Goldsmith. Sarah isn’t a career politician (she is an accountant who lives in the local area), so we can’t judge her political record. However she has agreed to publicly back our principles and will advocate for them if she is elected.
Critically, Sarah is passionate about Britain’s role in Europe and opposition to a hard Brexit is the centrepiece of her campaign.
We believe this is the right moment for us to mobilise More United to make a difference. That’s why we’re recommending to you that we should help Sarah win this election.
But the choice is yours.
It’s really simple. You, and everyone else getting this email has one vote on whether we should back Sarah or not. If a majority of you say we should help Sarah, then we will. If a majority say we shouldn’t, we won’t. This is what More United is all about.
If you have signed up to More United, check your inbox. Then make some phone calls.
* Joe Otten was the candidate for Sheffield Heeley in June 2017 and Doncaster North in December 2019 and is a councillor in Sheffield.
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25 Comments
I’m betting that MU will endorse cross party as long as they are Labour or Green. Sarah hasn’t got a chance.
When Brian May did his cross party decent politics thing, I might not have agreed with his picks in every seat but he was GENUINELY cross-party, even endorsing some tories, not just a Labour front with Paddy playing useful idiot as MU appears to be.
Still, I’ll be happy if/when I get proved wrong.
@Jennie
I’m surprised to hear that.
If MoreUnited.uk doesn’t endorse the Lib Dem they might as well fold.
The more interesting question for Lib Dems is when More United back a candidate from another party in other by-elections.
Judging from most of the comments on many LDV articles in the past months, there are many Lib Dems who agree with other parties not standing or not making much effort (eg. the Greens in Richmond Park) but would not take a reciprocal position.
William — I think you are right.
The issue for us is complicated by the highly varied nature of the views that might be put by Tory and Labour candidates.
Added to this is a lack of clarity about whether our priority right now should be to reduce the government’s majority, or to put in place a majority for a specific proposition.
(And if so, what – total opposition to Brexit, support for a second referendum, support for ‘soft brexit’ proportional reform, a ‘progressive alliance’???)
But also, to what extent should we be standing down when we also need to increase visibility across the nation to remind people we are again a serious contender for their vote?
The major parliamentary test so far is Sleaford.
Matt,
I would say that the most powerful message that Lib Dems can give to the country is that progressives can come together (what unites us is greater than what divides us) and defeat the Conservatives.
My core principle for this desire is to get PR. To my mind, all politics will change dramatically if that happened – and greatly for the better. But it will only happen if we start winning, and we will only win in ‘alliance’ with other progressive parties. That is particularly true in the SW of England where we can fight the Greens to our mutual irrelevance or work to displace Tory hegemony across the whole area.
More United is very much a work in progress, the original intention was that “Local” members would vote on which candidate to endorse, if any. Obviously Richmond Park came too soon for that stage to be reached, they are taking things step by step.
Some of the comments show there is still confusion about MUs aims, the whole point is that Parties wont be discouraged from standing in particular seats, that idea is a non-starter for The Main Parties. MU are just another group that might endorse particular Candidates.
I am willing to give MU a chance, its a new idea & it might work. I voted to endorse Sarah of course & I await the result with interest, I have no idea which way it will go.
It will take a lot more than organisations like More United backing a particular candidate to shift the conservatives in many seats, it will need a return to candidates being backed by two parties (as currently happens with the Co-operative Labour candidates, and used to happen with the SDP Liberal Alliance candidates and the Liberal Co-operative candidates in years gone by.
For the Liberal Democrats to be in a position to joint-slate we would need a change to our party constitution which would enable the federal party to propose strategic co-slating to local parties and then a common manifesto to be drawn up for those candidates.
Although this would have been difficult 30 years ago when the Social and Liberal Democrats had just come through the agony of merger and so the exclusivity clause was written, it may well be that today such a change is feasible, particularly with us having already effectively set a precedent with Martin Bell in Tatton.
It would have though to be done seat by seat because the Conservatives are not our only adversaries in UK politics, and it would have to be borne in mind that there may be occasions when a Con-Lib Dem arrangement may be appropriate (lets face it its not only Tories who do wrong).
We need all the help we can get. Whilst the odds in Witney shortened as the campaign developed the reverse is true in Richmond. Over the weekend the odds changed three times with our chances going out from 4/6 to 5/2. We need to be shifting Conservative Remainers. Not sure more united helps much in that regard
I think this referendum on the deal thing is damaging Sarah Olney’s chances in general. What happens if the public vote to stay in? Do we have a best out of three, the problem Vince Cable highlighted? Or do we try for another negotiation? It’s a recipe to further divide the country. The party should just aim for soft-brexit.
@David Butcher
There was a YouGov poll (https://yougov.co.uk/news/2016/11/03/five-stages-grief-most-remain-voters-are-stuck-den/) which suggests that Conservative Remain voters have accepted we are leaving the EU. Presumably the poll will be representative of Richmond Park.
I doubt many Conservatives will want to play the anti-democratic games espoused by the Lib Dems.
@William Hobhouse ‘Judging from most of the comments on many LDV articles in the past months, there are many Lib Dems who agree with other parties not standing or not making much effort (eg. the Greens in Richmond Park) but would not take a reciprocal position.’
As a supporter of ‘More United’ I appreciate the decision of the Greens not to contest Richmond Park in the hope that our Sarah Olney can defeat odious brexiteer, Zac Goldsmith. In response I hope that the Local party in Brighton will stand down our PPC in Brighton Pavilion at the next General Election, where we are also-rans, so that Caroline Lucas can be a voice of the Greens that by rights should be heard in the next Parliament. I realise that not to contest every seat goes against the grain for us Lib Dems but the centre-left divided will never bring about proportional representation, which is essential if we are to have the new pluralist politics that our county so desperately needs!
Anti-democratic games, John Peters?
Theresa May wants to dragoon us all into leaving the EU, irrespective of what the majority think when long, complex negotiations with the EU have been completed, and the dire effects of our forced devaluation will have come home to roost. Now, maybe the majority will still be keen to Leave, in which case Theresa’s refusal of a vote won’t matter. But, maybe there will be a big majority by that time who recognise that Leaving would be disastrous, and would be desperate to vote, in order to pull back from the brink?
To enable the public to have its say in those circumstances, Tim Farron is calling for a vote. Theresa May is seeking to prevent a vote.
Who, Mr Peters, is playing the “anti-democratic games”, pray?
John Peter’s,
No that poll will not be representative of Tories in Richmond Park because if you look more carefully the proportion of Remain voters in London who have “accepted the result” is very low compared to the rest of the country. I did a calculation on another board and the absolute maximum would be about 20% of Tory voters in RP
@John Peters
“I doubt many Conservatives will want to play the anti-democratic games espoused by the Lib Dems.”
If this is the case, where is the official Conservative Party candidate?
There is absolutely nothing to read into betting odds either way, which simply reflect the fact there has been one dodgy poll in Richmond Park which showed Goldsmith well ahead before anyone else had even selected a candidate..(and showed us up 10% without having started campaigning…)
@Andrew McCaig
My mistake, I had forgotten about the London factor.
Sarah’s opposition to Art 50 seems more hardline and unwavering that Tims.
Slightly off-point but that YouGov poll is highly dubious in trying to use the Kubler-Ross of five stages of grief for Brexit (although the idea seems to be a popular meme) as many of the comments under the poll note. I found myself in some agreemeent with all of the categories apart from Acceptance…..
In particular, Brexit is much harder to come to terms with because it is a process not an event and we will not actually know the result until a new deal is either signed and agreed with the EU (or it gets completely derailed). Even that might not be the end because it is possible that it would only be an “interim” deal. So, I don’t think much can be read into the poll although it is interesting that only 7% of Londoners are at the point of “acceptance”. Even if the polling is dubious, that is a very striking figure – lower than either Lib Dems or Labour – so there remains a real difference between the various parts of the country.
The by-election odds are interesting. I tend to agree that they are still drifting out on the basis of the initial poll. There are rumours of another poll being undertaken so we might yet see a dramatic shift.
@ Mark Goodrich,
Indeed, there is little empirical evidence to support the widely used 5 stages of grief model. Kubler- Ross formulated her theory based on interviews with dying patients.
It may be slightly off point but it is spot on when it comes to whether one should take the poll seriously.
I thought it would be too early for MoreUnited to get involved with this campaign, but I suppose once the Greens, and the Women’s Equality Party both formally threw their support behind Sarah, and with many in the Labour party suggesting similar, it would be a bit weird to keep quiet. The reasons for supporting Sarah are all very sensible, and practical, and while we might not gain a huge number of votes as a direct result, it is a statement on the need to work together, and sometimes accept a hit, same as the Tories and UKIP are ‘nobly’ not standing a candidate so they can support Goldsmith.
The timing of this by-election isn’t ideal for maximising the publicity around those withdrawals and for building momentum to convince dithering Labour and Tory voters that it’s worth voting for her. The cynic in me might suggest they timed it all knowing this, but I don’t think any of them could have guessed just how big a distraction it would be!
Obviously, this isn’t part of the full, proposed MoreUnited process, but it will be interesting to see how people react. It’s easy for the natural LibDem and Green voters to get behind their recommendation to support Sarah, but it will challenge the resolve of the natural Labour voters who may have assumed that their candidate is always the “most progressive”. Looking at the comments on their Facebook, it’s apparent that some commentators can’t possibly have read the original aims of the movement, or at least didn’t fully grasp them, now they’ve suddenly decided they’ve been ‘conned’ into supporting someone who is anti-Brexit, or not Labour. So be fair, there are some LibDems convinced it’s designed to undermine our support – even when it’s our candidate getting the nod this time!
Fortunately, there also seems to be some sensible Labour supporters who aren’t scared to admit that for this election, supporting Sarah is the natural choice, and I hope that when the circumstances are different, LibDem supporters will be big enough to admit that it might be better to support the Labour candidate.
I agree with Leekliberal that we ought to stand-down in Brighton at the next GE for a bit of reciprocity, to demonstrate our support for PR and the right for the Greens to be represented in Parliament. Let’s face it, most natural LibDem voters are already doing this there, so we might as well get some useful publicity for it.
I am gradually warming to the More United concept. I personally don’t like not standing in elections because I think that voters should have the choice but using More United gives a welcome boost to tactical voting where it is obviously beneficial.
I don’t trust movements like More United, because my experience of them in the past is that they rapidly become Labour front organisations that almost always assume labour is the progressive choice, except in a very few cases where Labour really don’t stand an earthly. Richmond is one such constituency, so it’s not a real test of MU. That will come when the choice isn’t so clear, but the Lib Dem is slightly more likely to win and my bet then is that Labour will be the MU choice every time.
Incidentally, MU or no MU the decision should always be to stand, because there are people out there who want to vote for their party right or wrong. Denying them that choice is undemocratic. Standing candidates is no bar to tactical voting and if MU does turn out to be genuine in highlighting the candidate most likely to beat the Tories, then it may be of limited use. I’m not holding my breath.
A real problem about not putting up candidates, if more than a handful of constituencies are involved, is that having fewer candidates, and consequently having less of a national presence, is likely to impact on the support shown for our party in nationwide opinion polls. In the days of the Liberal/SDP Alliance we got round this by persuading the authorities to lump together the poll figures for both parties, but I can see no mechanism for achieving this in the much looser scenario envisaged by those who are promoting More United.
Right then you tribalists, the vote of More United was 96% in favour of supporting Sarah and they will organise an Action Day on 26th November.
The right decision. I hope that when the logic points toward supporting a Labour candidate, LD members of More United (of whom I am one) can be similarly non-tribalist!
Does anybody know what advice More United gave about Witney?