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Ioan Phillips

Why I’m wary of an early contest

By Ioan Phillips | Mon 1st August 2016 - 8:58 am

 

“A week is a long time in politics”, so quipped Harold Wilson – although in the aftermath of Brexit, perhaps ‘week’ should be replaced by ‘hour’. The glut of political developments since June 23rd have evidently led Tim to forget the nadir of 2015. “There must be an election”, he demanded upon the accession of Theresa May to the premiership. Right now, we will gain little if Britain were to go to the polls early. We need more time to rebuild our grassroots organisations and to formulate a liberalism that acknowledges the circumstantial changes catalysed by Brexit.

We should take our press office’s releases lauding the surge in membership that has taken place following the referendum with a pinch of salt. The 15,000+ increase in members is impressive, but we need to find ways to secure our new members within a grassroots framework which contracted massively during our time in coalition. Maybe the way forward is to follow the example of left-wing parties in continental Europe, and start community organising.

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Posted in Op-eds | Also tagged and | 16 Comments
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