Lib Dems need a no deal Brexit to stay relevant

Liberal Democrats leader Jo Swinson (Image: thetimes.co.uk)

If there's one political party that's been through one helluva journey this decade, you wouldn't look much further than the Liberal Democrats. Rewind to 2010, they were the party to vote for. The UK had a Labour government for thirteen years previous and you could tell the nation sought change. By that point, Labour had been battered and bruised thanks to controversies around the Iraq War and the global economic crash. So many loyal Labour voters wanted a route away from the party in red and some saw the Lib Dems as a suitable choice.

But the election outcome over nine years ago was unexpected. Labour lost votes, but the Lib Dems didn't get the electoral breakthrough political commentators were expecting. At the same time, the Conservatives didn't get enough votes to lead a government. When a hung parliament was confirmed, many Labour ministers and voters, including a 19-year-old me, showed complacency and thought Labour and the Lib Dems would join form a coalition government. However, a handful of days later, the opposite happened - the party in yellow opted for the party in blue. As a result, over the following five years, we saw how the Liberal's reputation falter towards near extinction from the Westminster scene. It showed in 2015's general election when they lost so many seats, you could count the number of MPs by using your fingers.

The Lib Dems had to rebuild and many doubted the party would ever recover. Yet, suddenly, the past four years has seen things fallen into place for them. A combination of both Jeremy Corbyn's leadership win as Labour leader in September 2015 and the outcome of the European Union membership referendum in 2016 has led to a surge of yellow fever. It's taken them a while for this mini popularity surge we see today though. They have completed a full circle.

Particularly this past year, the Liberal Democrats' never had it so good. Its single and simple message - "Stop Brexit" is resonating with many. No other party in the UK is offering this as bluntly as the Liberals are. Certainly, the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Green Party hold strong views against Britain leaving the European Union, however they have other policies that voters can associate them with. Not the Lib Dems, not at the moment anyway.

Let's give credit where it's due, the Lib Dems's tactics are working. MPs from both Labour and Conservatives are defecting to the party in yellow. They now have a young leader in Jo Swinson who doesn't hold as much baggage as her predecessors in Nick Clegg, Tim Farron and Vince Cable, who held bigger roles during the coalition government that nearly killed the party off. Her charm and wit is something the party never had since Clegg, before he made that move with David Cameron's Conservative Party over nine years ago.

Sam Gyimah unveiled as Lib Dem, left (Image: Evening Standard)

But the Lib Dems face an inevitable predicament, thanks to their single pitch mentioned earlier. MPs like Chuka Umunna and, most recently, Sam Gyimah, are defecting to the Liberals purely because they strongly oppose UK's supposedly imminent cancellation of EU membership - that's it. They can argue all day long that it's because the parties they left are moving "more to the left" or "more to the right". They can argue all day long that the party they've moved to represents the so-called "middle ground". I'm left unconvinced.

It is clear that a large handful of MPs aren't thinking the way they used to. What mattered to them when entering politics has become secondary. The EU exit is clouding their judgement and it's leading to Parliament not agreeing with anything. And with a General Election apparently around the corner - please, no - who knows how the Lib Dems will perform.

How the Liberals fare in a General Election will depend on when it happens. While we still assume an EU exit will take place on 31st October, if a snap election happens before, it could be good news for the Lib Dems as hard-core "Remainers" are likely to be lured towards voting for them, even if the thought deemed inexcusable, in their eyes, just four years ago. An election before any type of EU exit with massive Lib Dem gains could mean the end of Brexit. But if Boris Johnson's Tories and Brexit Party performed amazingly too, the Lib Dems's efforts are likely to fall short.

If I'm honest, the Lib Dems will only thrive in an event of a no deal exit - and they need it to result in total catastrophe for the UK. Their campaign, during a forthcoming General Election would truly do them wonders as nobody again would vote for the Conservatives, and should divisive Jeremy Corbyn still be Labour's leader, Jo Swinson would be laughing her way to 10 Downing Street.

The prospect of a Lib Dem-led government possesses a big problem. Suddenly, both Labour's "broad church" and the Conservatives' "broad church" are now the Lib Dems's broad church. Echoing my concerns with Change UK earlier in the year, will Umunna and Gyimah, for instance, see eye-to-eye on the NHS, crime and the economy? As people may know, I don't believe in 'wings', so if those who saw themselves as 'centre-left' or 'centre-right', as the defectors did when entering politics, and now think they can collectively agree on big policy changes post-Brexit, are only kidding themselves.

Boris Johnson (Image: iNews)

An open mind in today's erratic political climate is critical. Nobody can see that at the moment, as everyone seems to have an opinion on one side without considering alternative views - and probably hence why Labour find themselves down in the polls. But if we want the next few months to be bearable, there needs to be a sense of calm. As a Remain voter myself, I truly believe Britain needs to Leave the 52/48 way; cease EU membership yet leave with Theresa May's deal (or Boris Johnson's deal if all 28 European countries agree to any alterations proposed) that ensures both sides of Ireland get what they want, as in no hard border, as well as access to European markets, even if Britain would have very little say on matters concerning it. While this does mean the unlikely event of Johnson compromising with both Brussels and Westminster, and the unlikely event of Corbyn agreeing to any deal that the government proposes in a few weeks, I remain naively hopeful.

The Lib Dems need to change tactics, and soon. The EU debate could end in six weeks, or it may never end. But the Tories are already showing off their extravagant spending plans, Labour ministers have been proposing them for years. Will the Lib Dems's manifesto reflect what they wrote over two years ago, when the last General Election took place, in terms of their priorities on the NHS and the economy? How will Swinson's fresh ideas be received by her new recruits? Best she splurts them out now, with or without a General Election.