Ed Davey is often treated as a joke – and not without justification. On 31 March, the Liberal Democrat leader launched his party’s local election campaign by riding a hobby horse over a series of jumps. Such stunts have become familiar. During the general election, Mr Davey was variously pictured rollercoasting, paddleboarding and bungee-jumping.
But there was method in his apparent madness. Mindful that the Liberal Democrats often struggle to achieve media coverage, Mr Davey sought to guarantee it. This was a strategy made for the age of the attention economy, one in which companies and institutions recognise that human attention is an increasingly scarce commodity.
And it worked. In an election that could have been dominated by the Labour-Tory duumvirate, the Lib Dems, like Nigel Farage’s Reform, were insurgent. They won 72 seats – the largest number achieved by any third party since 1923. Owing to Labour’s landslide victory, the Lib Dems’ increased parliamentary presence may appear to count for little. In all but exceptional circumstances, a government with a 168-seat majority will get its way. But the Lib Dems could yet reshape British politics.
In Oxfordshire – a county now without a single Tory MP – Mr Davey declared that it was his intention to “replace the Conservatives as the party of Middle England”. It is a reasonable ambition. At the last election, the Lib Dems won 60 Tory seats including those once held by the likes of David Cameron (Witney), Michael Gove (Surrey Heath) and John Redwood (Wokingham). South-east voters repelled by partygate, the Truss debacle and rampant sewage relished Mr Davey’s offer of moderation. Buoyed by this, the Lib Dems aim to topple what remains of the “Blue Wall” (26 of their 30 notional target seats are Tory-held).
Yet faced with this threat, the Conservatives exhibit only complacency. Since becoming leader last November, Kemi Badenoch has performed a prolonged ideological tribute act to Reform. But she has had far less to say about a party that took 12 times as many seats from the Tories as Reform did. In a recent interview with the author Jordan Peterson, Ms Badenoch derided a “typical Liberal Democrat” as someone who is “good at fixing their church roof and – you know – people in the community like them: ‘Oh, he fixed the church roof, you should be a Member of Parliament.’”
Ms Badenoch’s comment was more revealing than she intended. The Tories traditionally pride themselves on being the party of the “little platoons” of society: family, church and voluntary associations. These, wrote Edmund Burke, the founding father of conservatism, are “the first link in the series by which we proceed towards a love to our country and to mankind”. Yet Ms Badenoch, who too often seems to be trapped in an alt-right filter bubble, has little feel for such sentiments. In an atomised age, fixing a church roof is an act that should be praised, not scorned. The leader of the Liberal Democrats understands this; the leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party does not.
It is not only on the matter of church roofs that Mr Davey deserves to be heard. The Lib Dems have long campaigned for reform of England’s broken social care system. Mr Davey, who cared for his late mother until her death from cancer at 46 and who now cares for his disabled teenage son, has a deep understanding of the struggles that this neglected sector faces. He was rightly withering of Labour’s decision to establish yet another independent commission on social care, which will not conclude until 2028.
But when the government eventually proposes a new funding model, the Lib Dems will play a pivotal role. The political temptation for the right will be to dismiss any contributions from homeowners as a “death tax”. Mr Davey has a chance to serve as an honest broker, ensuring that social care reform is both equitable and effective.
In an era of electoral volatility, Labour’s three-figure majority is far less secure than it would once have been. Unlike some of his predecessors, Mr Davey avoids grandiose talk of “realignment” and “breaking the mould”. But should the Lib Dems supplant the Conservatives, he will have achieved what they only dreamed of. In a potential hung parliament, his party would serve as kingmakers once more. It is, then, time to take the Liberal Democrats seriously – even if they are at times reluctant to do so themselves.
[See also: Nigel Farage’s mutinous army]
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This article appears in the 02 Apr 2025 issue of the New Statesman, What is school for?