The party’s ongoing strategy review is welcome. But collecting feedback is only the beginning. Turning it into a successful long-term strategy requires us to answer four fundamental questions.
1. What’s the point of the Liberal Democrats?
I’ve been asked this question, sneeringly, more than once.
But, we do need to be clear what we want to achieve. More seats and votes are important, but they are not our ultimate aim.
This question might seem quite abstract today – but it will be critical in the years to come. We are going to have to make difficult decisions when we are fighting populist parties. For instance if the next election results in a hung Parliament, would we enter power with Labour to stop Reform? What if it meant we had to work with the Greens too?
Without a clear sense of purpose, it’s impossible to know which compromises are worth making and which are not.
I suggest that Lib Dem members would answer something like “building a freer and fairer Britain, both through exercising power and through influencing national debate”.
Our leadership needs to be clear on why we exist, because that purpose—not polling numbers or short-term tactical advantage—should guide the decisions we make when difficult choices arrive. And this answer needs to be public – because you can’t lead in secret.
2. How do we sustainably reach our objectives?
Too often we’ve focused on the next election at the expense of longer-term party-building. At best it’s been ‘strengthening our position’, and at worst it’s been ‘hail mary in hope of achieving electoral reform’. At times we’ve behaved as though electoral reform would solve our problems, rather than asking how to build a larger and more durable base of support. As we have seen in Scotland, Wales and the London Assembly, more proportional systems still leave us facing big challenges.
If we are going to make, and keep, Britain as a more liberal country, then we need a strategy that will succeed whatever happens, regardless of whether Reform, Labour or the Greens end up as the largest party after the next General Election.
Whatever happens politically, the one asset that benefits us in every scenario is a larger and more loyal base of voters who identify with the Liberal Democrats. This stronger Liberal Democrat brand* will mean more people voting for us in elections year in and year out.
3. How do we build a stronger Liberal Democrat brand?
If you ask the public what we stand for, by far the most common answer is ‘I don’t know’.
The first step in changing this is to be clear what we stand for. That’s harder than it sounds.
It’s hard, because the public gets a say. In 2010, entering the Coalition, we thought we were protecting liberal values. But Liberal Democrat voters had voted for an anti-Conservative party – and they were very clear in telling us that at the 2015 election.
To establish a stronger brand, we also need to be consistent. We can prioritise lower taxes, or we can prioritise higher public spending. We cannot indefinitely promise both without explaining the trade-offs.
And, hardest of all, we need to be differentiated from other parties. There’s no point trying to be the party of the NHS (Labour have that), or tax cuts (The Tories, just, have that) or the environment (The Greens have that – regardless of their lack of interest these days).
Exactly what that distinctive theme should be is a separate debate – and is rightly a job for our party leader to define. But unless we can identify one, our brand will remain weak.
Building a brand can’t happen by accident – it will only come through careful choices, which will mean some hard decisions on what we focus on.
A real political brand is defined not only by what a party chooses to campaign on, but by what it is prepared to say no to. We already instinctively do this on many issues, for instance standing up for asylum seekers and a liberal immigration policy. But we are campaigning for too many things – and each issue we campaign on dilutes our brand.
Being willing to say no is not a weakness. It is how parties build a recognisable identity.
4. Who are our target voters?
Developing a consistent brand means we need to choose target voters.
For instance if we want our brand to be ‘the party of people with liberal values’ then that, generally, implies a working age and educated target audience.
If we want to be ‘the party of people who live in our held seats’ then it will be a subtly different audience.
A party that tries to speak to everyone ends up speaking clearly to no one. That’s a temptation for us, because we are naturally consensual. Choosing our audience does not mean ignoring everyone else. It means deciding whose support we are trying to earn first.
We have an opportunity today – our opponents are unpopular or incoherent. And public attitudes are more liberal than ever. And we have a record number of MPs. We should use this opportunity carefully. Before we debate the next slogan, policy announcement or campaign tactic, we need to be clear about what we are trying to achieve, how we intend to achieve it, what we want to be known for and who we are trying to persuade. If we can answer those questions honestly, we will not just win more elections. We will be far more likely to achieve the liberal change that winning those elections is supposed to deliver.
* Rob Blackie was Liberal Democrat Mayoral candidate in 2024, achieving the best result for 16 years. He has beaten the Greens in competitive elections as an organiser or candidate in 2010 (twice), 2012, 2024 and 2026. https://bsky.app/profile/robblackie.bsky.social
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29 Comments
Is one of our key characteristics not that we are not extremists?
The Greens have some quite extremist environmental views and an extremist ‘open borders’ approach to immigration. Labour has some extremist class warriors. The Conservatives and Reform (they are becoming quite indistinguishable) have extremist policies on withdrawing from the Human Rights Convention.
The Liberal Democrats must be the only political party without an extremist tendency in its ranks. This is a strength which should be publicised at every opportunity.
Rob, very much I agree with in your interesting article.
But I strongly disagree with your remarks about the NHS: no party monopolises the NHS. The NHS is not Labour’s.
It’s precisely because we DID campaign on NHS and social care that we did well in 2024. Our policies in this area DO mark us out. And they appeal to voters across the economic spectrum. We should build on this.
Please no going back to campaigns built on distinctive LD shibboleths like PR and back into the EU now. These are not particularly liberal policies and are priorities for very few voters.
Thanks very much Rob for setting out the issue of LD strategy, and the essential framework for the Strategy Review. Best wishes to the review team with a difficult job.
Like most folk in our ‘political community’ I must have read hundreds of articles and papers on the topic. I have been a member of five Policy Working Groups. I have a collection of 40 quite voluminous policy reports in my library. There is so much material asking the same questions, often starting with ‘we must have a strategy’ … but the outcomes almost always peter out into some micro-strategy or ‘bee in the bonnet’. Almost all of these papersand reports suffer from the same problem, and I suspect this Review will too. In every report attempts are made to make an omlette without breaking eggs. Little work is done on researching and defining problems that strategy & policy is designed to solve. Symptoms and causes are not distnguished. Ideological differences are ignored, and no attempt is made to resolve them by reference to data and experiences. International experience is glossed over. Terms are usually vague but narrow. Reviews are conducted without ‘quality of policymaking’ rules, and avoidance of conflicts or interest are usually cursory. Before strategy is concluded upon, the methods of policy, strategy, aims, and ideological assumptions must be addressed. Unbroken eggs means no omlette, and the party has to face this. To gain public support we are going to have to displease some LD folk. Unavoidable.
Building a brand does indeed involve consideration of WHAT (issues and policies). But more important for creating lasting memories and trust, and winning heads, hearts, hands, and votes is the HOW. This is about working WITH people and organisations, building relationships with individuals, communities and sectors. Not doing things TO or FOR them. Being open, inclusive, transparent, outward-looking and full of hope. Being brave, courageous and kind. And it’s hard because each of us, as well as collectively, has to focus on our behaviour and on our storytelling. All day, every day, and every channel. It’s may be a slower burn in terms of results. But, as people experience the HOW, we can explain the WHY. To adapt some words from an old gospel song, they’ll know we are LibDems by our care.
@Jana: I regrade myself as an extremest for liberalism: the maximum amount of individual freedom that doesn’t infringe the freedom others. I’m also pretty keen on open borders becasue I think the principles of liberalism apply beyond the shores of Britain, enjoying the high standard of living we all could have if we shared rather better, and against the myth that the only way we can afford a decent society is by growth which will make the planet uninhabitable.
Rob, you offer two possible groups of key target supporters for the Liberal Democrats. However, both are, as you note, just subsets of the affluent middle class. Is there no place then for the rest of society in the Liberal vision? I have been an active member for 43 years and have (so far) served a collective 32 years in elected public office as Cllr and as MP. Not once in all those years have I ever judged my political purpose to be simply to represent affluent middle class interests.
About 20 years ago when you were a Policy Adviser for the Lib Dems and I was Chair of the Parliamentary Party there was not a view that we should be so narrowly based.
Rob, you also say that we can’t be the party of the NHS or the Environment because Labour and the Greens have those. Surely it is a mistake to abandon whole areas, of major public concern just because someone else is talking about it too? We were campaigning on environmental issues in the 1980’s before the Greens had elected more than a tiny handful of Cllrs. Should we stop talking about EU trade and Electoral Reform because Andy Burnham is flying kites on these and many other issues?
At a very micro level I recall a Council by election 8 years ago. At the start of it I picked up a Labour leaflet complaining about a very local highways plan that the County Council were putting forward and which I knew nothing about. Rather than thinking that this was Labour’s issue we put out 3 leaflets about it, lobbied the County Council and raised a local petition. We gained the seat from Labour and the County dropped their proposal.
We should define ourselves by our beliefs and policies and not according to what other Parties are saying at any given moment. Especially when, as with Burnham and PR, we should beware false prophets. Tony Blair suckered some in the Liberal Democrats in that way back in 1997.
@Peter Wrigley
“ the maximum amount of individual freedom that doesn’t infringe the freedom others.”
With due respect, I regard that as a libertarian standpoint rather than a liberal standpoint.
For example, as a Liberal, I believe it is justified to force adults to wearing seatbelts in cars as I believe the restriction on individual freedom is justified. A libertarian would argue that individuals should have the freedom to decide for themselves whether or not to wear a seatbelt.
Jana; Seeing as many in the party would like to decriminalise drug usage, & yet the party has voted to infantalise adults as they get older in regards to the smoking ban. The liberal Vs libertarian argument can get very muddled ..
Wise words from Paul Holmes, who has the experience to back his case. One tiny addition to the continuing debate on what the Liberal Democrats are for from a friend I asked. She said we seem to stand up for ordinary people who are badly off, the people trying to exist on benefits and the poorest. She and I agree too that our country’s International Aid budget needs building up again from 0.3 %.
@Jana: The definition I like is taken from an article by Timothy Garton Ash in the Guardian way back in the 2000s: “Liberalism properly understood (is) a quest for the greatest possible measure of individual freedom compatible with the freedom of others.” I like it so much that I’ve printed it off a stuck it on my kitchen wall.
Maybe above I’ve paraphrased it badly, but it certainly doesn’t mean libertarianism, or not to me, anyway (People not wearing seat belts are a danger and a cost to others.) We share with Labour concern that everyone should have at least a decent standard of living, (we pioneered that in the UK with the People’s Budget in 1909 ++ and the Beveridge Repost), and concern for a sustainable planet long before the Greens had much political traction.
But at the top of our list, our USP if you like, is the protection and promotion of Liberal Democracy (real equality, fair votes, accountability of those with power, fair taxation, a rules based international system, limits to the distribution of income so that no-one becomes too poor or two powerful, promotion of international development, our place in Europe etc.
My worry, and I think Bob Blackie’s, is that, though most of us subscribe to these principles we keep too quiet about them, and have become content to garner seats in the more affluent areas by being nicer than the Tories and not perceived as as dangerous as Labour.
For example, as a Liberal, I believe it is justified to force adults to wearing seatbelts in cars as I believe the restriction on individual freedom is justified
So you disagree with John Stuart Mill that:
‘the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others’
… because at least in this case you think that it is justified to exercise power over a member of a civilised community in order to prevent harm to themselves, not others?
What principles would you use to decide when it is justified to restrict people’s actions in order to prevent harm to themselves, and when it is not?
I agree with KP that the International Aid and diplomatic Budget should increased, to challenge both Immigration and the need for Defence. It may not be the cheapest in the short-term, but surely has been over the 50 years before Trump.
Recognising Jana’s comment, could we adapt PW’s to “the maximum amount of individual freedom that doesn’t infringe the freedom of others or society as a whole” (the societal cost of supporting those who might have chosen not to wear their seatbelt).
The thing is we can have lower taxes (for most) and better public services. The madness of the lost war on drugs which cost billions. Sorting social care, the NHS, local Government. scrapping trident. A wealth tax. Ending council tax. Stop trying to have a unique selling point, it doesn’t work in a 6 party system.
@Caractacus. Yes we need policies on all the things you mention but, we also need an easily recognisable identity: what is the party for? (Or maybe who is the party for?) The following may be microstratifications, but the Greens are for preserving the environment, Labour for the working classes, the Tories for the already comfortably off and Reform for the glories of the at achievements of the White British. Who or what a re we for?
Now then Peter. The Greens are no longer primarily for the environment and Labour are defintely not for the working class. What do you think we’re for?
The “easy” slot for the Lib Dems to go into is “pro-establishment centrism”. Branding like “sensible”, “competent”, “incremental”, “fully-costed” – getting across a proposal that things are basically pretty good right now and we shouldn’t rock the boat too much.
In a multi-party system this combines smoothly with the 2015 campaign promise to hold back any potential coalition partner from doing anything too distinctive – though it really needs a preferential voting system where being everyone’s second or third choice can get somewhere.
Other possible positionings are much more difficult for a lot of reasons – not least that there seems to be no particular consensus within the party on any of them. “Socialism-lite, but with Liberal excuses for the same policies” doesn’t seem to be getting agreement. “Pro-business libertarianism” seems even less likely to (though there is at least a lot less competition for that space from other parties).
Sorry Mike. I don’t know how “microstratifications” (whatever they are) became substituted for the “massive simplifications” which I meant and thought I’d written.
My point is that we need an identity which resonates with and is recognised by the average non-anorak voter (or non-voter.) The other parties each have one, even though they may be outdated (Labour) and misleading (Greens). My fear is that our identity is becoming “nicer than the Tories and not as dangerous as Labour.”
We need to emphasise our Liberalism, and I favour Timothy Garton Ash’s definition, as outlined above. But it is a vague abstraction and our communicators need to find a way of relating it to the electorate’s every-day concerns. This is , in my view, desperately urgent, since, with Trump installed in the US, powerful right-wing populists in Europe, and Farage lurking in our shadows, liberal democracy, which for most of your and my lives we’ve taken for granted, is now in desperate danger.
What are the Liberal Democrats for? I can’t see why this is such a difficult question.
“The Liberal Democrats exist to build and safeguard a fair, free and open society, in which we seek to balance the fundamental values of liberty, equality and community, and in which no-one shall be enslaved by poverty, ignorance or conformity.”
How in a world divided into power blocks is that visions most like to be realised? We get to chose between being a partner in a European power block or a peon in the US led one. It’s worth saying that the EU vision – of a cooperating set of broadly capitalist states based on the rule of law, human rights and enlightenment ideals, committed to common security on the continent sounds like a liberal and sensible approach for a “middle power” in an increasingly dangerous world.
For those in favour of open borders, I hope you are also in favour of mass housebuilding in your local area and neighbourhood.
Or are you proposing they all live on the street or in tents?
Also a generous welfare state requires border control, otherwise it will, and does, act as a massive magnet, and will become unaffordable and breed resentment in the native population.
“open borders” is a strawman.
How can it be a strawman, when Peter Wrigley on the 27th June at 6.25pm said he was pretty keen on open borders? I was responding to that post!
‘Slamdac. I think you’re a bit too negative about migrants; the numbers who come simply for the benefit system are insignificant. They nearly all come if there’s work for them to do and make an enormous contribution. A few yeas ago the pressure group Global Justice Now produced a booklet on the benefits of migration. I think it’s now out of pint, but last year I put some summaries of it on my blog. You can see the first one here (Keynesianliberal 12th May 2025):
https://keynesianliberal.blogspot.com/2025/05/welcome-immigrants-tha
I hope you’ll look at at and the four or five following it. Happy reading.
Sorry, the link given above doesn’t work.Hope this is better:
https://keynesianliberal.blogspot.com/2025/05/welcome-immigrants-thanks-for-coming.html
“Libertarian” as it is used really means “corporatarian”, as in supporting the “freedom” of the rich and powerful to trample on the freedoms of ordinary people. This is not liberty, it’s licence. Liberalism is mainly about protecting the rights of the individual (in the sense of the free citizen) from oppression, be that from state or private interests. As far as community is concerned, we support the sort of community that safeguards the interests of all the people in it, but not the sort that seeks to enforce conformity to some (usually) conservative social norm.
It is difficult to see what “freedom” is really taken away by requiring road vehicle passengers to wear seatbelts — unless you are a contrarian.
CorporatariansLibertarians often take contrarian stances on this sort of thing to pretend that they are supporting individual freedom, when it is actually a cover for their support for rich vested interests. The age restriction ratchet on tobacco is a tricky one because creating two classes of “adult” doesn’t sound very liberal, although it will most likely work.The teen social media ban-wagon, OTOH, is extremely problematic as a liberal. It seems shockingly paternalistic for modern society, especially with Starmer’s add-on of technologically enforced phone curfews for older teenagers (what’s the government going to do with those who don’t comply — stop their pocket money?). The paternalism makes it profoundly illiberal, not to mention the extensive Big Brother surveillance that will be required to enforce these restrictions. It also misses the point. What’s harmful isn’t social media per se, but the design choices made by the big platforms. It is these that we should be going after — regulate Big Tech to protect the rights of the individual. Social media bans let Big Tech off the hook for its platform design choices. The corporations can say “We’ve got the kids off, now we don’t need to do anything else.”
Surely people can’t have real choices and freedom if they live in poverty. They won’t have the decent home or the resources needed to exercise their rights. Social Justice is vital to ensure that people can exercise their rights. The Liberal Democrat commitment to Civil rights should go hand in hand with a commitment to Social Justice. That is why the preamble to the Liberal Democrat Constitution refers to “freedom from poverty”!
Completely agreed! Liberal Democrats have to realise the importance of positive freedom too. Scepticism of any involvement of state to achieve liberty is misleading – we cannot have the protection of freedoms without it.