Squeezed Out? The Liberal Democrats and the 2019 General Election

Peter Sloman

OAI: oai:www.repository.cam.ac.uk:1810/303560 • DOI: 10.17863/CAM.50637

As the third party in a winner-take-all political system, the Liberal Democrats are used to electoral frustration. The Liberal Party and Liberal Democrats’ record over the last century is littered with disappointment, including crushing defeats (in 1924 and 2015), the loss of talented leaders (in 1935 and 1945), and failed attempts to regain major-party status (in 1974, 1983, and 2010). Few Liberal and Liberal Democrat election results, however, have been quite as disastrous as the 2019 one. Having started the campaign in high spirits, with opinion poll ratings around 20 per cent, the party slipped to 11.6 per cent on election day and won just 11 seats. New leader Jo Swinson’s defeat in East Dunbartonshire came to symbolize the debacle. The Liberal Democrats’ failure to achieve a breakthrough contributed to the Conservative majority of 80, which will allow Boris Johnson to take the UK out of the European Union on 31 January. As in the 1930s, British Liberals find themselves looking on impotently as Conservatives dismantle the UK’s established trading relationships in pursuit of a populist vision of national sovereignty.