Let the Lib-Cons have their marriage – we can recover quickly

By Ben Fox

So, the post-mortems are over and British politics is in unchartered territory. Cameron’s Tories dismally failed to win a governing mandate that they had expected to achieve comfortably, Nick Clegg after winning a mere 57 seats was reduced to pimping his party for power. So, at the sniff of seats at the cabinet table they’ve created the most unlikely of coalitions.

Yes, we can’t ignore the fact that with 29% of the vote, we lost this election and lost badly. Not since the 27% garnered by Michael Foot in 1983 have we polled so badly. But, having an unpopular leader and a physically and intellectually exhausted government after 13 long years in power made campaigning on what was, ironically, the most genuinely ‘Labour’ manifesto since 1992, virtually impossible.

But, although we have lost 91 seats, to return to the Commons with 258 Labour MPs, when the pollsters and bookmakers were predicting 210-230, is, in the circumstances, a good result. We will be strong in opposition.

This is, in part, because the Lib Dems and Tories are ideologically incompatible. A YouGov poll on the eve of the election revealed that 43% of Lib Dem voters described themselves as centre-left or left, compared to 29% who described themselves as centrist and just 9% who described themselves as centre-right or right.

Meanwhile, 39% of Lib Dem voters described their party as being centre-left or left, compared to 33% of Lib Dem voters who described the party as being centrist and just 5% who described the party as being centre-right or right. Consequently, numerous seats lost because of left-wing voters switching to the Lib Dems could come back to Labour in due course. Our 13,000 new members in the last week could be the proof of the pudding: new governing parties enjoying their ‘honeymoon’ period do not haemorrhage members, and many of these new Labour members are apparently former-Lib Dems.

These stats also show that we can finally kill off the myth that Britain is a conservative country. It is not – 52% voted for centrist or left-leaning parties. This election, like every other since 1992, shows that there is a decisive anti-Tory majority in Britain.

In creating their coalition, the Tories and Lib Dems are stuck between a rock and a hard place. In offering the Alternative Vote (AV), even though there is no guarantee that a Referendum Bill would pass the Commons and the Lords, Cameron drastically overplayed his hand. The reality is that AV, if it got through, would mean fewer Tory MPs. In contrast, in losing on electoral reform, the Lib Dems lose everything. Cracks are also already starting to show over the coalition’s constitutionally outrageous proposal to increase the threshold to 55% for a dissolution.

You could write a PhD thesis on why the Lib Dems and Tories are unlikely bedfellows, but here’s one example. I work in the European Parliament where the Lib Dems and Conservative MEPs (with the exception of several defectors) are spitting feathers at the coalition. Remember, the Tory MEPs in their new extreme-right ECR group often vote with UKIP, while the Lib Dems are avowedly federalist. With new EU financial legislation coming up on curbing bankers’ bonuses and derivatives – which Vince Cable has spent the last few years denouncing – and the Tory MEPs trying to scupper the new laws, how can the coalition partners vote together without betraying either their principles, or the British public?

With such profound ideological splits, I can’t see this coalition lasting two, let alone five years. So let’s allow the Tories and Lib Dems to have a short, unhappy marriage, marked by swingeing public spending cuts and splits on tax, Europe and most things under the sun. In the meantime, we need to renew, and we need a new leader that the party can unite behind. Most importantly, we need to get back into government. All these things can still happen – and soon.

Picture: Downing Street Flickr