A strong southern projection in local elections, including a landslide victory in Somerset, has fueled Lib Dem’s hopes. Sir Ed says the party has opportunities in areas that the Conservatives have “taken for granted”.
“We talk to people who share our values, but maybe in the past they’ve voted conservative, but they’re actually looking at us and saying, ‘You know what, these guys have been constantly strong in these areas.'”
Justice Secretary Dominic Raab to Esher and Walton and Jeremy Hunt, currently the favorite of bettors to succeed Boris Johnson as Conservative leader, in southwestern Surrey are high-profile MPs threatened if there is a swing to the Lib Democrats in those seats. The former has only a 2,700 majority, while the latter has an 8,800 lead that was halved by the Lib Dems in the 2019 election.
Others at risk on Lib Dem’s list of outcasts are Conservatives calling for the Prime Minister’s departure, including Stephen Hammond at Wimbledon and William Wragg at Hazel Grove.
Former Lib Dem leader Sir Vince Cable says: “We have a reaffirmation of the guerrilla army’s old-fashioned approach to politics.
“We find it very difficult, obviously, to compete nationally with the first-pass system. But if we concentrate all our resources on places where we are strong or have potential advancement, we can do spectacular things.”
He says any resurgence in the south “is not an overnight thing,” but the resumption of a recovery that began under his leadership. Sir Vince says this was “all thrown away” in the 2019 party’s “disastrous” election under Jo Swinson, a defeat he attributes to middle-class fears of Jeremy Corbyn’s Labor rather than a failed Lib Dem campaign .
One theory is that the political readjustment that emerged in the 2019 elections is only halfway through. Some believe that by driving tanks on Labor lawns, Conservatives have left their own backyard exposed.
While working-class Brexit voters are turning blue in the north, conservatives in the south are facing threats on two fronts. Labor voters leaving the capital to find affordable housing are moving to Conservative counties, while Liberal Democrats are gaining ground in the Remain and anti-housing development areas.
A Conservative MP in a southern seat with a shrinking majority avoids talking publicly about Brexit for fear of defeat.
“I have to win a marginal seat and I will not win a marginal seat by eliminating Remain voters,” the MP says.
“I’m in a reclining seat for Remain with a lot of angry Remain voters and I can’t keep up with them.”
Lord Barwell, Theresa May’s 10th chief of staff and former Conservative minister, agrees that political realignment in Britain has been under way for some time, a change that is sweeping other countries, including the United States.
“I think it’s been a readjustment for about 20 years. I think Brexit acted as a catalyst, so the socio-economic class is no longer a strong predictor of voting intention.
“This has opened up a lot of ex-industrialists, working-class seats in the Midlands and in the North to the Conservatives. But there’s another side to London and some of those seats to the south-east.”
He believes the Conservatives’ counterattacks in the south will be based on a “repeat” of the 2015 election campaign which fueled fears of a “chaos coalition” led by Labor leader Ed Miliband.
Still, the main topic of conversation in Devon is not a major realignment of British politics, but Johnson and his 10th position.
Emma Ranson-Bellamy, owner of Tiverton Snob’s clothing store, supports candidate Lib Dem, saying the party can “bring balance” between Conservatives and Labor. She says: “If you put a monkey in the palace, the monkey does not become king. The palace becomes a circus. That’s exactly what’s happening right now. “
While both Conservative and Lib Dem candidates would prefer to say the campaign has been fought for politics and government, they admit that Partygate is repeatedly approaching the door.
Conservative candidate Hurford said: “It simply came to our notice then.
“I think people just want to get involved. We have a crisis in the cost of living, they want to know what I’m going to do about it.”