At this rate of ‘progress’, it will be the next century before the Liberal Democrats win a majority

There are no excuses this time round for the Liberal Democrats’ humiliation. That is not too strong a word for it. Not only that, but it is entirely self-inflicted.

There was no need to have this early general election. There was no demand for the extreme and undemocratic “Revoke” Brexit policy the Lib Dems adopted for it. There was no overwhelming reason to run the campaign in such an overly personalised way, concentrating on one personality above all others.

All these decisions, and the poor electoral performance that resulted from them, are the responsibility of the party leader: Jo Swinson. A politician who, remember, boldly launched her leadership by declaring: “I stand before you not just as the leader of the Lib Dems, but as a candidate for prime minister”. As it turned out, she was not even a successful candidate for her own parliamentary constituency of East Dumbartonshire.

There is a bitter irony in her losing her career to the SNP when it was she, Swinson, who teamed up with the SNP to give Boris Johnson his early election. She flopped.

The progress made in these last few weeks, compared to some cosmic early expectations, has been modest, to say the least. Few gains, and most of the defectors from Labour or the Conservatives failed to get back into the House of Commons. The Lib Dems even stood against other natural allies, such as the Independent Conservative David Gauke, or Labour’s Ben Bradshaw, who were close to their views, with the effect of splitting the anti-Boris and stop-Brexit vote.

Getting Sarah Olney back into parliament really wasn’t worth it. “It” being Johnson’s majority to do what he likes – including putting a no-deal Brexit back on the table – for five long years. It’s not Boris Johnson who will “get Brexit done” – it’s Jo Swinson.

Let’s look back. At the 2017 election, the party was led by a bloke called Tim Farron. There was no-one else to lead the party at the time, so this cheerful, thoughtful man took on the thankless task of crawling out from under the wreckage of the Coalition years and the tuition fees fiasco. Nick Clegg had lost his seat and walked away to the embrace of Facebook.

Farron endured a miserable leadership and election campaign in 2017. Everywhere he went, he was asked not about Europe or the NHS, but whether gay sex is a sin. It was ridiculous. The Liberal Democrats won 12 seats and 7.4 per cent of the vote. This year, at the time of writing (when a Tory majority had been confirmed but not all seats declared) that “advance” amounts to just 11 per cent of the vote. At this rate, it will be the next century before we get a Lib Dem government.

This time around, things were looking better. The bitter regrets about Brexit and Labour’s failure to back a final say referendum were working in the Lib Dems’ favour. At the European elections in May, the last under Vince Cable’s leadership, the party won 19.6 per cent of the vote and came second. In parliament, Johnson was caged in the Commons, unable to get a no-deal Brexit approved by MPs, and constrained from his more aggressive instincts by lack of a majority. The Liberal Democrats held the balance of power, at least in part. It might have been possible to secure a second referendum on the Johnson “deal”. You can judge for yourself what might have happened and what the chances would have been in this parallel universe.

Now there is probably no possibility of a second referendum, Brexit is not going to be stopped quite so easily, the Commons and Supreme Court will be weakened under new laws, and the Liberal Democrats do not hold any sort of power.

Swinson made the historic blunders that led this debacle, and she will not have to account for her actions. When she was elected she seemed a bright, confident leader who had laudably high ambitions for herself and her party. As it turned out, the more the public saw of Swinson and her ideas, they less they liked them. You can draw only one conclusion from that.