[Politics] The Liberal Democrats
Dec. 17th, 2010 10:39 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
davywavyThere was a point, about a year ago, when the Liberal Democratic Party were the hippest, most jivingest party in the country. Bouyed by Nick Clegg's failure to make a complete tit of himself on national television, LibDem supporters were jubilant, opinion polls briefly put them in second place in the election, and "I agree with Nick" was a catchphrase for, oooh, the best part of a week.
Speaking personally, I've never really considered voting for the LibDems. I always thought they had some really good ideas, but they also had far too many policies which read like they'd been written by someone who'd been kicked in the head by a horse - and it looked like most of the electorate agreed with me, because come the election they'd slipped back to their usual third place. It's arguable that the defection of the Eurosceptic wing of the Conservative partty to UKIP had a greater effect upon the outcome of the last election* than did any agreeing with Nick, but thanks to the vagaries of the electoral system we ended up with a Liberal Party in government for the first time in as long as anyone who is young enough to still have all their marbles can remember.
Since then, I've been generally impressed by how the coalition has worked out. I didn't vote for either of the parties involved, but overall I've come to the conclusion that of all the possible outcomes of the election they've turned out to be probably the least worst. George Osborne's economic shortcomings have been bolstered by David Laws and Danny Alexander telling him what to do, whilst the more 'kicked-in-the-head-by-a-horse' LibDem policies have been curtailed by David Cameron laughing until he cries every time they're mentioned. Moreover, the LibDems have got several policies through which most certainly wouldn't have happened under a solely Conservative majority - the raising of the tax threshold to 10k (which is a brilliant policy and will do more to get people into work and out of the poverty trap than Labour managed in 13 years and with all the tax credits you can eat. I'm hoping the economics of raising it to 14k will be in place before the next election), and the ending of the detention of migrant children, for example. Additionally, they've got a shot at their dream of electoral reform.
Despite their successes, the outright rejection of the LibDems by their voters has been impressive to watch. If I'd been a LibDem supporter before the last election, I'd be pretty much delighted at this stage of procedings but it appears I'm missing something about the Liberal Democrat Supporter mindset - and it's what I'm missing that I want to explore. Y'see, I'm generally an optimistic, glass-half-full sort of chap and I find that the world goes my way so rarely that I'm delighted when it does. The outrage from Libdems that their party hasn't been able to acheive their ideal world in eight months flat as part of a compromise government just leaves me baffled, and I'm starting to wonder what the average Liberal Democrat actually wants...
Nick Clegg once said something to the effect that the Libdems weren't a party of government, but their role was to act as the conscience of government and that comment makes me wonder if the LibDems (or their supporters) really ever wanted to get into power, with all the compromises and failures which being in power entails. As I didn't vote for either of the two current governmental parties, I'm aware of the smug self-satisfaction which comes from being able to believe anything I like whilst never having to engage with the consequences of seeing those beliefs enacted or challenged - and I'm kinda coming to the conclusion that the LibDems were the party for people who wanted to feel like that.
It's all really blown up over the pledges, signed by many Libdem candidates, to oppose university tuition fees. Pledges which, in the event, many of those who are now MPs have been unable to keep, to their obvious distress. Higher tuition fees have been coming ever since Polytechnics were allowed to start pretending to be universities in the early 1990s, Tony Blair decided that anyone can go to university no matter how thick they are and finally Gordon Brown getting the economy alone in the changing rooms and saying it had a real purty mouth. It really strikes me that blaming the Libdems for having to break that promise is like being angry that someone who promised to buy you a pint turned up at the pub having been mugged and their wallet stolen. Like Vince Cable wearily said - he's having to live in the real world now.
But this is a serious question to all my Libdem-supporting pals out there. What are the Liberal democrats? Or what did you think they were? Are you a political party, with politics being 'the art of the possible', with all the the grubby compromise that entails? Or were you just the biggest pressure group in the country all along who happened to get unlucky and find yourselves in over your heads when it came down to it? You've got more of your policies enacted in coalition than you otherwise ever would in a million years - why aren't you happy? What were you expecting to happen? What would you like to have happened?
What, in other words, did you actually want in the first place - because I'm darned if I can figure it out from your reactions.
*There are twenty seats where the number of UKIP votes exceded the number of votes which would have swung them to the Conservatives. If Cameron hadn't gone back on his EU-referendum promise, I reckon we'd've had an outright Conservative majority.
Speaking personally, I've never really considered voting for the LibDems. I always thought they had some really good ideas, but they also had far too many policies which read like they'd been written by someone who'd been kicked in the head by a horse - and it looked like most of the electorate agreed with me, because come the election they'd slipped back to their usual third place. It's arguable that the defection of the Eurosceptic wing of the Conservative partty to UKIP had a greater effect upon the outcome of the last election* than did any agreeing with Nick, but thanks to the vagaries of the electoral system we ended up with a Liberal Party in government for the first time in as long as anyone who is young enough to still have all their marbles can remember.
Since then, I've been generally impressed by how the coalition has worked out. I didn't vote for either of the parties involved, but overall I've come to the conclusion that of all the possible outcomes of the election they've turned out to be probably the least worst. George Osborne's economic shortcomings have been bolstered by David Laws and Danny Alexander telling him what to do, whilst the more 'kicked-in-the-head-by-a-horse' LibDem policies have been curtailed by David Cameron laughing until he cries every time they're mentioned. Moreover, the LibDems have got several policies through which most certainly wouldn't have happened under a solely Conservative majority - the raising of the tax threshold to 10k (which is a brilliant policy and will do more to get people into work and out of the poverty trap than Labour managed in 13 years and with all the tax credits you can eat. I'm hoping the economics of raising it to 14k will be in place before the next election), and the ending of the detention of migrant children, for example. Additionally, they've got a shot at their dream of electoral reform.
Despite their successes, the outright rejection of the LibDems by their voters has been impressive to watch. If I'd been a LibDem supporter before the last election, I'd be pretty much delighted at this stage of procedings but it appears I'm missing something about the Liberal Democrat Supporter mindset - and it's what I'm missing that I want to explore. Y'see, I'm generally an optimistic, glass-half-full sort of chap and I find that the world goes my way so rarely that I'm delighted when it does. The outrage from Libdems that their party hasn't been able to acheive their ideal world in eight months flat as part of a compromise government just leaves me baffled, and I'm starting to wonder what the average Liberal Democrat actually wants...
Nick Clegg once said something to the effect that the Libdems weren't a party of government, but their role was to act as the conscience of government and that comment makes me wonder if the LibDems (or their supporters) really ever wanted to get into power, with all the compromises and failures which being in power entails. As I didn't vote for either of the two current governmental parties, I'm aware of the smug self-satisfaction which comes from being able to believe anything I like whilst never having to engage with the consequences of seeing those beliefs enacted or challenged - and I'm kinda coming to the conclusion that the LibDems were the party for people who wanted to feel like that.
It's all really blown up over the pledges, signed by many Libdem candidates, to oppose university tuition fees. Pledges which, in the event, many of those who are now MPs have been unable to keep, to their obvious distress. Higher tuition fees have been coming ever since Polytechnics were allowed to start pretending to be universities in the early 1990s, Tony Blair decided that anyone can go to university no matter how thick they are and finally Gordon Brown getting the economy alone in the changing rooms and saying it had a real purty mouth. It really strikes me that blaming the Libdems for having to break that promise is like being angry that someone who promised to buy you a pint turned up at the pub having been mugged and their wallet stolen. Like Vince Cable wearily said - he's having to live in the real world now.
But this is a serious question to all my Libdem-supporting pals out there. What are the Liberal democrats? Or what did you think they were? Are you a political party, with politics being 'the art of the possible', with all the the grubby compromise that entails? Or were you just the biggest pressure group in the country all along who happened to get unlucky and find yourselves in over your heads when it came down to it? You've got more of your policies enacted in coalition than you otherwise ever would in a million years - why aren't you happy? What were you expecting to happen? What would you like to have happened?
What, in other words, did you actually want in the first place - because I'm darned if I can figure it out from your reactions.
*There are twenty seats where the number of UKIP votes exceded the number of votes which would have swung them to the Conservatives. If Cameron hadn't gone back on his EU-referendum promise, I reckon we'd've had an outright Conservative majority.
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no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 02:31 pm (UTC)But equality of opportunity really matters to many who voted LD in the last election. The scrapping of tuition fees is a huge kick in the balls for that. A kick in the balls that that fierce proponent of equality of opportunity, Margaret Hilda Thatcher herself, would almost certainly never have delivered. This is because she got that this country generates wealth by being cleverer than most. The only resource we can be competitive in a global market with is our intelligence. And the Lib Dems have basically said that we're not interested in finding the cleverest people any more, we only want those who are clever and rich.
This is a shocking betrayal of core Liberal Democrat principles, and an economic disaster waiting to happen. A lot of Lib Dem voters are strong believers in meritocracy. You don't create a meritocracy by making it uneconomical to get educated.
Still, it's an interesting new world we live in. I've never been a floating voter before.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 02:45 pm (UTC)The sensible solution would be a smaller, fully funded HE sector which would be able to take talent from wherever it were to be find, but who would have voted for the LibDems if their policy had been "Vote for us and fewer people will go to university"?
You're putting them in a no-win situation. Somewhat unfairly, I think.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 02:56 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 02:59 pm (UTC)Why did you vote Labour again?
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 03:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 02:58 pm (UTC)I would still be voting for them if they'd shut down half the universities to keep education free.
That's not what they're doing.
To suggest that I should vote for a party whose stance on a fundamental issue I disagree with violently seems unfair to me. That fact that my views on education are widely regarded as electoral suicide doesn't change that.
In fact we have no idea whether they are electoral suicide or not, as no-one's been prepared to try. Scholarships for the top 20% of students academically and everyone else paying fees would also work for me. There are many ways to crack this particular egg without pissing me off. None of them were taken.
I'll continue to vote for any party I believe in. Currently, that's None of the Above. My vote is the only say I have in how this country gets run. If you think I should abandon my core values for the sake of expediency, I respectfully disagree.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 03:16 pm (UTC)This. Lots. I'm hoping once the screaming dies down we will here more about how the proposed 'scholarships' will actually work. Unfortunately, this also requires greater investment in lower levels of education and a better exam system. A system that produces 90% of students in the top percentile is useless.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 07:16 pm (UTC)In addition, people are being admitted to do rather pointless degrees which are neither practical in a direct scientific way or in terms of developing critical faculties, but which are rather good at wasting resources which could have been spent on more productive courses.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-18 03:00 pm (UTC)Au contraire, you get a say every time you spend money, or change a tv channel. Just to a lesser extent. Don't want a McDonalds on every street corner? Don't eat the filthy crap. You get the idea. The more you earn, the more votes you get.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-19 12:50 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 03:13 pm (UTC)When I was making my applications for university, I had the opportunity to gain entry to a course with 1 D-grade A-level. I was offered a place at a university which I declined to attend interview at... thats hardly meritocracy at work. Making it free to attend those courses wouldn't have solved that problem at all.
no subject
Date: 2010-12-17 03:56 pm (UTC)