Another brick in the wall

Congratulations to Sir Ming Campbell for his impressive majority in the LibDem Leadership election. I wondered how foolish Simon Hughes feels after another public declaration of “I’m on the verge of winning” (a la the London Mayoralty) only to be crushed. Anyway, now all eyes turn to the Campbell leadership.

The man most pleased is, of course, David Cameron because the LibDems have chosen somebody that nobody under 55 could vote for. Sir Ming is a well-respected authority on foreign affairs but lacks the dynamism to be a forceful political leader. Pleasingly my colleagues all seem to agree, and the LibDem voters amongst them seem most angry with this choice. I always said that voting Sir Ming simply puts off the Orange Book Liberal versus SDP choice that the party must make for another few years and so it does.

Cue the bookies lengthening the odds on a LibDem victory at the next election and, more surprisingly, the decision of senior frontbencher Norman Baker to quit. Mr Baker has been the Environment Spokesman (and a jolly effective one too) for many years and claims he wants to spend more time being a constituency MP. Huh? Norman’s majority in his Sussex seat is one of the biggest in the country! Anyway, there is some speculation around Westminster that he has jumped before he was pushed as apparently Mr Huhne has his eyes on the Environment portfolio.

Compare the media hype, the opinion poll jump and the unity that surrounded Dave Cameron’s victory to that of Sir Ming’s.