The Lib Dems are doing themselves no favours by sidestepping Brexit

The Liberal Democrats kick off the autumn party conference season in Bournemouth this weekend with apparent reason for optimism. So far in this parliament the party has claimed a Tory scalp in four parliamentary by-elections, its best record since the 1992-7 parliament. In May the party recorded what was probably its best performance in English local elections since it entered into coalition with the Conservatives after the 2010 general election – a step that of course proved electorally disastrous and from which the party has been trying to recover ever since.

Yet a look at the party’s standing in the opinion polls in this parliament raises questions about the progress it has achieved on the road to recovery. It is currently running on average at 11 per cent – still slightly below the 12 per cent it recorded in 2019. At no point since 2019 has its rating been higher than its tally four years ago. While Labour has soared in the polls, the Liberal Democrats have seemingly failed to profit from the Conservatives’ travails.

True, winning more votes is not the party’s primary objective at the next election. Rather, it is to win more seats in the hope it can reclaim from the SNP the mantle of the third largest party in the House of Commons – and the attendant opportunities for media coverage that would bring. To that end its focus is on winning the so-called “blue wall”, Tory-held seats, many of them in the south of England, where it is the Liberal Democrats rather than Labour who are the challengers locally.

The party hopes and anticipates that in these seats voters who are disenchanted with the Conservatives will turn to it to express their views. And those parliamentary by-election victories, where the party has seen its vote increase on average by 34 points while Labour has fallen back by 12 points, have given succour to that expectation.

However, there are questions about the likely effectiveness of this strategy. First, it seems to be betting strongly on the continued unpopularity of the Conservatives, and that may have declined by the time of the next election. Second, because Labour has advanced strongly in the national polls while the Liberal Democrats themselves have not. In around 40 per cent of the seats where the Liberal Democrats were second to the Conservatives in 2019, Labour now look to be better placed to win locally.

Indeed, while this year’s English local elections indicated that some voters were voting tactically against the Conservatives (though on nothing like the scale witnessed in recent by-elections), the Liberal Democrats only benefited in those wards where they had been second in 2022. In wards where the party had lost second place to Labour since 2019, it was Sir Keir Starmer’s party who seemed better able to pick up the anti-Tory tactical vote.

In short, the Liberal Democrats’ low poll rating threatens to reduce the number of seats where the party might profit from any anti-Conservative mood.

So why is the Liberal Democrats’ national poll position still relatively modest? One key reason is that while the party has gained support from the Conservatives, it has lost ground to Labour. As many as around one in four of those who voted Liberal Democrat in 2019 now say they will vote Labour at the next election. And these are overwhelmingly people who voted Remain in 2016, and who would now vote to rejoin the EU.

Much like Labour, the Liberal Democrat leadership have been reluctant to talk about Brexit over the last four years, regarding the issue as having been closed by the outcome of the 2019 election. But whereas Labour have, nevertheless, been able to increase their support since 2019 among both Remainers and Leavers, the Liberal Democrats have lost ground among those who would like to be inside the EU without making sufficient gains among those who would like to be outside to compensate for those losses.

According to recent polls, Liberal Democrat support is nine points down on 2019 among those who would vote to rejoin the EU (a group that is now bigger than it was four years ago), while it is only up by six points among those who would vote to stay out (a now rather smaller group).

In short, there is little sign that the Liberal Democrats have profited from their silence on Brexit. With little to differentiate between themselves and Labour on Brexit, they have seemingly left themselves at risk of losing voters on the pro-EU side of the Brexit debate to Sir Keir Starmer’s party, while reaping relatively little reward among Brexiteers.

And now that Labour is beginning to send out softer messages on Brexit, the competition from Labour can perhaps no longer be ignored.

John Curtice is professor of politics, Strathclyde University and senior research fellow, National Centre for Social Research and ‘The UK in a Changing Europe’. He is also co-host of the ‘Trendy’ podcast.