Lord Bonkers' Diary: I am not the Wise Woman of Wing

And so another week at Bonkers Hall comes to a close. There is more about the Wise Woman of Wing on this blog.

Tuesday

The telephone is brought to me; who should be at the other end of the line than one of those amusing young people at Liberator magazine?

I am respectfully asked if I would care to include my predictions for May’s various elections in this diary.

“By all means, I reply. “When is the copy deadline? The week after polling day, I trust: that makes it so much easier to get one’s predictions right.”

Not a bit of it: it turns out that the copy deadline is tonight.

Who do they think I am? The Wise Woman of Wing?

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West, 1906-10.

Previously in Lord Bonkers' Diary

• Freddie and Fiona at Remain
• The jellyfish of the Lakeland fells
• Reviewing David Laws’ memoirs
• "Take your hands off our cox"
• I know how the Children of Israel felt
• The giant wicker figure of a hare

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Jasper Gerard is the Liberal Democrats' new head of press

Apologies if I am late to the party, but I have not seen this reported anywhere in the media or the Lib Dem blogosphere.

The new Liberator reports that Jasper Gerard is the Liberal Democrats' new head of press. The magazine sources the news to an email to party staff by its communications director James Holt.

Gerard will be remembered as the party's candidate in Maidstone and the Weald at the last election. This is a historically safe Conservative seat, but Peter Carroll had got a good result there in 2010.

Because of that we convinced ourselves that Gerard stood a good chance of winning and funded his campaign accordingly. In the event he finished more than 10,000 votes adrift.

Jasper Gerard will also be remember as the author of a book with a spectacularly inaccurate title: The Clegg Coup: Britain's First Coalition Government Since Lloyd George.

Simon Titley reviewed it when it came out and was not impressed:

Gerard’s basic thesis is that the coalition government was the product of a carefully orchestrated ‘coup’ by Nick Clegg and his allies. But coalition was inevitable sooner or later. The two-party system reached its peak at the 1951 general election, when 97% of the electorate voted either Labour or Conservative. Since then, the two-party vote has slowly shrunk, reaching a post-war low of 65% in 2010. ... 

Gerard’s claim that the coalition was possible only because Clegg “had transformed his party and dragged it to the centre ground” simply doesn’t stand up. Indeed, the incompetence of the party’s general election campaign, the net loss of seats, and a popular vote share no better than 2005 (and lower than that won by the Alliance in 1983) suggest that coalition happened despite rather than because of Nick Clegg’s leadership. 

And the loss of Short money shows that the party was not as well prepared for coalition as Gerard claims.

Still, Gerard is an experienced journalist and I wish him well in his new job.

This item can be found in the Radical Bulletin section of Liberator. There you will also read of the internal tensions in the Young Liberals, how Nick Clegg turned down a favourable deal on party funding and of a hefty bill the party must pay before vacating Great George Street.

The moral is clear. You should subscribe to Liberator.

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Lord Bonkers' Diary: Freddie and Fiona at Remain

The new Liberator has landed on my doormat, so it is time to spend another week in the company of Rutland's most popular fictional peer.

Wednesday

To London and the office of the Remain campaign. (I judge it a little on the poky side and ask if they have thought of moving.) There I find my old friends Freddie and Fiona, late of the deputy prime minister’s office, ensconced.

I ask how their economic liberal think tank is getting on. “It’s going really well.” “Did you go to our fringe meeting at the Lib Dem spring conference?” “It was all about Uber.” “Do you know it? It’s this wonderful app on your phone.” “You can call at taxi any time.” “And if you don’t like the driver you can give him a low score and he loses his livelihood.” “We call it ‘the sharing economy’.”

 I ask how the campaign is going. “Will Straw is brilliant!” “He says that, a month before polling day, his father phones his agent and tells him to make sure everyone votes Labour.” “So I expect that he will do the same thing with the Remain agent.”

And what of Ryan Coetzee? “Oh, he’s brilliant too!” “Just like he did with the Lib Dems, he is making sure our campaign keeps using the same slogan.” “And then we think he will change it twice in the final week.”

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West, 1906-10.

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Happy birthday John Stuart Mill

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Time to post a link to an old Liberator article of mine:

So read Rorty, Popper and Berlin. Read L.T. Hobhouse if you want and pretend to have read T.H.Green if you must. But above all read the Mill of On Liberty.

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Liberator on the Gurling review

My copy of the new Liberator arrived this morning. I have already started serialising Lord Bonkers' latest diary, but I thought I would share some of Radical Bulletin with you too.

The lead item looks at the Gurling review of the Liberal Democrats' performance at the 2015 general election:

James Gurling and his colleagues have pulled few punches. If their report has a weakness it's that it all too well reflects the general election campaign's fundamental mistake of seeing political problems and offering organisational solutions ... 

The elephant in the room throughout ... is Nick Clegg himself, Its conclusions painfully reinforce the now clearer view that he lacked the political experience for the job having had one term as an MEP - so semi-detatched from UK politics - and only two years as an MP before becoming leader, in both cases parachuted into safe berths.

I am sure you would like to read more, but to do so you will have to subscribe to Liberator.

Radical Bulletin, incidentally, was originally a separate publication, latterly edited by John Tilley and Ralph Bancroft.

It merged with Liberator in the early 1980s, where it survives to this day as a section of the magazine.

Think of the two publications as the radical Liberal equivalent of Whizzer and Chips.

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Lord Bonkers' Diary: Do you know New Rutland?

The new issue of Liberator is on its way to subscribers, which means that it is time to spend another week at Bonkers Hall.

Except, Lord Bonkers if far from the Hall as he writes this...

Do you know New Rutland?

I sit in one of the dives on 52nd Street writing this diary before I take a yellow cab to JFK and a jet to Oakham International Airport. I was a regular visitor to New York as a young man, the more so after I was given a Manhattan penthouse by a grateful President for rendering services to the American nation that I had better keep under my hat even today. You will have seen what the locals call the ‘Bonkers Tower’ – perhaps because of the moustache-like structure that protrudes from either side of the 34th floor.

The purpose of this visit has been to observe the contest for the Democrat and Republican nominations at close quarters – the New Rutland primaries in particular.

Do you know New Rutland? No doubt you have heard the tale of how, after a painful schism in the Church of Rutland following an attempt to reform the LBW law, a party of settlers sailed from Oakham Quay. After many vicissitudes they reached New England, before trekking into the interior until they reached unclaimed land.

What became New Rutland was bought from Red Indians and proved to be difficult to farm. (Foolishly, the settlers failed to keep the receipt, with the result that the Indians refused to take it back. Some urged legal action, but the majority felt it unwise to sue the Sioux.)

Nevertheless, the settlers tilled the soil and raised their animals to build an economy based on the production of Stilton cheese and pork pies. Why, to make themselves feel even more at home they even dug a vast artificial reservoir and named it New Rutland Water!

I travelled there last week, receiving something of a cool welcome when I disembarked at a wayside station. There were three fellows hanging about, and not one of them had thought to bring me a horse! Well, I soon put them right, I assure you, and also told the stationmaster to oil his wind-pump.

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West, 1906-10

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Liberator's Ralph Bancroft has died

I spent Tuesday in London and met some Liberator friends at the Comedy Museum where we saw the Round the Horne show.

While it was bona to vada their dolly old eeks, I learnt the sad news that another of our number, Ralph Bancroft, has died.

There are tributes to him by Gareth Epps on Liberator's blog and by Caron Lindsay on Liberal Democrat Voice.

When I first joined the Liberator collective Ralph was central to the magazine and was responsible for its finest hour. That was the Runners and Riders article that led the BBC News one evening in 1984.

I think that is the best way to remember him...

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Lib Dems hold seat on Rutland County Council

Whissendine windmill © Kate Jewell

Good news from Rutland, where the Liberal Democrats comfortably held a seat in a council by-election in Whissendine yesterday.

The result:

Kevin Thomas (Lib Dems)   265
Conservative                      109
Ukip                                    33

The Ukip candidate was Marietta King, who has twice been their general election candidate in Harborough.

Her intervention took a few votes from the Conservatives, but otherwise the result was more or less unchanged from October 2014 when Sam Asplin gained the seat for the Lib Dems in another by-election. He was forced to stand down by poor health.

Rather impressively, there was a 40 per cent turn out, with no spoilt papers.

Martin Brookes has a photo of the victorious Lib Dem candidate.

Incidentally, Lord Bonkers played no part in this triumph. I sent his latest diary off to Liberator last night and it seems he has been in the US state of New Rutland for the Primaries.

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Lord Bonkers' Diary: A shadow cabinet maker

As I mentioned in yesterday's post on the botched attempt to oust Nick Clegg in 2014, the new Liberator is out.

Which means, whether we like it or not, it is time to spend some more time at Bonkers Hall.

A shadow cabinet maker

My cabinetmaker calls this morning to effect some repairs to one of my Sheraton sideboards. They are occasioned by too vigorous a celebration of the anniversary of Graham Tope's victory at Sutton and Cheam – really, once the members of the Liberal Democrat Women’s executive committee get a few pints of Smithson & Greaves Northern Bitter down them no piece of furniture is safe.

I always enjoy watching a skilled tradesman at work, but I am puzzled by the man he has brought with him. At every turn he exclaims "You’re doing that all wrong" or "I wouldn’t do it like that". When the fellow is out of the room, I ask who he is. "Oh," comes the reply, "he’s a shadow cabinet maker".

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South West 1906-10.

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How Nick Clegg was nearly toppled in 2014

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The new Liberator is out, which means a limited amount of copy from it is available on the magazine's website.

From there you can download a PDF of an article by Seth Thévoz - "A Very Nearly Successful Coup."

It tells the story of the attempt to topple Nick Clegg as Liberal Democrat leader and argues that it came far nearer to succeeding that was generally realised at the time:

What destroyed the coup was when the second wave of MPs got ‘the wobbles’. A disciplined media grid had set out a detailed timetable of MPs who would go public in waves of two or three at a time, staggered with other parliamentarians, to build a sense of momentum. 

On day one, a members’-led open letter calling on Clegg to resign was released as per the plan. (This was never a petition as claimed – it was an open letter which envisioned 20 signatures. It accidentally secured over 400.) 

On day two, the first two MPs went ‘over the top’, publicly calling for Clegg’s resignation, and were joined by a third MP who wasn’t scheduled to declare until several days later, jumping the gun.

Then on day three, we were badly let down by one MP. The response of his colleagues was “If he’s not going, I’m out” – which spread like a chain reaction among MPs and peers. The activists roped in to do the MPs’ dirty work were left holding the baby.

The moral is clear. If you want to know what is going on in the Liberal Democrats you should subscribe to Liberator.

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Where is the Liberal Democrat equivalent of the Beckett Report?

Margaret Beckett's report on what she believes to be the reasons for its defeat in last year's general election has been published by the Labour Party. BBC News has a summary.

There is an article about it on Liberal Democrat Voice, which gives in passing a dispiriting glimpse of the tactics we used to hold on to Sheffield Hallam.

It also has a noteworthy comment from Liberator's Mark Smulian:

At least Labour has published its report. I understand the equivalent Lib Dem one was released only to Federal Executive members on paper, which they were obliged to return at the end of their meeting, and has otherwise remained secret.

Let's hope the Lib Dem equivalent of the Beckett Report will be published soon.

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Paddy Ashdown meets himself coming back

There is an edition of Meeting Myself Coming Back currently available on the BBC iPlayer in which Paddy Ashdown looks back on his career with the help of some archive recordings.

It was first broadcast in 2012 when we still hoped  the voters might reward us for entering government at a time of severe economic difficulty. As it turned out, in politics (as in the rest of life) no good deed goes unpunished.

One of the recordings comes from 1983 when the Liberator spread above was not not only on the front page of The Times but was also the lead item on the BBC evening news.

It is characteristic of Paddy's generous spirit that, unlike his predecessor as Liberal leader, he said nice things about the magazine.

A hedgehog snorts: "Generous spirit"? He ate my Uncle Ernie.

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Lord Bonkers in 2015

You can find a selection of the old boy's wit and wisdom over on Liberator's blog:

[The Revd Hughes] tells me he has arranged for a locum vicar to take Divine Service and visit the sick whilst he is away. 

“He’s young and keen and believes every word of the Liberal Democrat manifesto is the literal truth.” 

I eye him levelly: “It’s not Farron, is it?”

You may also enjoy these two posts from 2010:

• Twenty years of Lord Bonkers: Part 1
• Twenty years of Lord Bonkers: Part 2

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Lord Bonkers' Diary: "I'm a Jihadi, Daddy"

Another diary entry from Rutland's most popular fictional peer, first published in Liberator magazine. This one proved scarily prophetic.

"I'm a jihadi, Daddy"

This evening I attend a viewing of a sparkling new print of one of my favourite Oakham Studios films.

Set amid the trad jazz boom of the early 1960s, it is nevertheless the hard-hitting story of a schoolgirl (played by the young Helen Shapiro) who is radicalised by a penfriend and eventually travels to Syria to take part in the armed conflict there.

I feel sure that ‘I’m a Jihadi, Daddy’ will win itself a whole new generation of viewers.

Lord Bonkers was Liberal MP for Rutland South-West 1906-10.

Previously in Lord Bonkers' Diary<

We are not downhearted

How the Lib Dems won Loch Ness

Freddie, Fiona and four-cornered liberalism

Mary Berry is unmasked

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Ambitious Liberal Democrats circle our most promising seats

Back in September I blogged about Liberator's take on the row between Tony Greaves and Liberal Democrat Voice.

Members of the Lib Dem Voice queued up to comment, but it was all a bit gnomic and I am not sure we were much better informed when they had.

The good news is that peace has broken out and Tony Greaves is writing for Lib Dem Voice - on an almost daily basis.

I imagine him and the editorial team running through flower-filled meadows hand in hand.

The best gossip in the new Liberator concerns the people who have their eyes on some of the more promising seats for ambitious Lib Dems:

Richmond may soon be the scene of a by-election if Tory incumbent Zac Goldsmith is either elected mayor of London or sticks to his pledge to resign if a third Heathrow runway is permitted. 

With last May's candidate Robin Meltzer having decided not to stand again, flocks of Lib Dems are circling, some from as far afield as Guildford. 

Next door in Twickenham, which Vince Cable almost held, a similar effect can be seen.

And then there are Yeovil and Sheffield Hallam... But to find out who has their eyes on those you will have to buy the magazine.

You can subscribe to Liberator via its website.

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