Time for Lib Dems to change the record
Mark Pack wrote in The Observer today that in order to succeed the Lib Dems should in effect get lucky:
‘The challenge now is for the party both to make its own luck and to seize the lucky breaks that others offer up to turn that opportunity into reality.’
As much as I love Daft Punk, Pharrell Williams and Nile Rodgers (one of his hit songs helped me to steal the crown from under Tim Farron’s nose last year at the annual Lib Dem Disco), I don’t agree.
This has been the Lib Dems’ strategy for as long as I can remember and it’s not working. Keeping our fingers crossed has earned the Lib Dems the princely sum of 12 MP (and on a good day) double figures in the polls.
For me one of the most depressing things about being a Lib Dem member is our lack of ambition. We have spent three years thanking our lucky stars our party still exists. I know, because I’ve been as guilty of this as the next person.
Members join parties like ours because they want to change things, but all they are getting is a continuation of the status quo.
Luck is defined as:
‘success or failure apparently brought on by chance rather than on through one’s own actions.’
Luck, making it or capitalising on it…either way isn’t that a bit of a cop out for a political party which aspires to lead the country?
Voters don’t care about what the Lib Dems did three years ago. Most probably don’t care what the party did three days ago.
And why should they? Voters want to know what politicians will do to fix their problems and address their concerns. For some people this is about Brexit, but for a lot of others it’s not.
We also need to face facts. In our democracy, who is speaking matters as much as what they are saying. In politics, it’s about the singers, not just the song.
This should give us pause for thought as to the lack of Lib Dem progress in recent months.
There’s a line in the song ‘Get Lucky’:
‘We’ve come too far to give up who we are’
This lyric sums up the Lib Dems’ essential problem. There is an underlying belief that changing anything means ditching core principles. It places power and agency in the hands of others, not ourselves. This is wrong and it’s holding back the party’s progress.
As the saying goes, if you do things the way you’ve always done them you’ll get what you’ve always got.
To change the country the Lib Dems need to either change the record or expect to be playing to half-empty dancefloors for many years to come.
