Our place to talk – an independent website for supporters of the Liberal Democrat party in the UK.

The most-read independent website by and for Lib Dem supporters. Not paid for by trade unions or millionaires.

Advert

Tag Archives: james davidson

A bit of Lib Dem history

By Martin Thomas | Wed 2nd August 2017 - 12:34 pm

Embed from Getty Images

The sad passing of Jim Davidson recently brings back memories, as I write this here in Aboyne in the heart of his former constituency.

“We can’t have another Welshman as leader of the Liberal Party” said Jo Grimond. When Jo resigned as leader in 1967, there were two contestants to replace him: Emlyn Hooson and Jeremy Thorpe. The electorate was the Parliamentary Party of twelve Liberal MPs. Initially, Hooson had the support of six of them which, if he voted for himself, would make him the clear winner.

Jo took aside Jim Davidson, the pleasant and talented recently elected Member for Aberdeenshire West, who was a Hooson supporter. Jo’s wife Laura had not forgiven the Welsh wizard, David Lloyd George, for supplanting her grandfather, Herbert Asquith, as Prime Minister in 1916 and splitting the Party. Another Welshman as Leader was unthinkable. Jim succumbed to Jo’s pressure and with misgivings, as a memoir of Jo and Laura revealed in 2000, promised his vote for Thorpe.

Continue reading »

Posted in Liberal History | Also tagged emlyn hooson and jeremy thorpe | 15 Comments

Most Read

Op-eds

Hope is not just desirable, it could be the key to defeating populism! (Chris Bowers)
Elon Musk’s X ownership amplifies the far-right agenda in Britain and beyond (Jack Wilkin)
Candidates – a route to fixing a recurring problem (Callum Robertson)
From Labour Council Chair to proud Lib Dem: How Labour forced me out (Sam Ammar)
Public transport in the United Kingdom – why do we accept poor performance? (Daniel Stylianou)

Advert

Tweets from @libdemvoice/team

Recent Comments

Jenny Barnes
It's not just physical beds and hospital infrastructure. There's not any more staff. So the only solution is to do less of something. Most NHS treatments are c...
Katharine Pindar
A splendidly vigorous and broad-ranging speech from Ed which we hope will be well reported. It is to be hoped also that Federal Policy Committee will be bringin...
Mohammed Amin
In his Financial Times Politics newsletter this morning, based on the advance copy of Ed’s speech, Stephen Bush was very complimentary about Ed’s strategic ...
Mohammed Amin
In his Financial Times Politics newsletter this morning, based on the advance copy of Ed's speech, Stephen Bush was very complimentary about Ed's strategic posi...
Roland
One highly significant consideration has been totally overlooked I all the discussions to date: just how much time and effort is actually needed for a typical b...