Malcolm Blair Robinson
April 20, 2010 By Malcolm Blair-Robinson

Will the Bubble Burst?

No I do not think it will. I know that Labour, the Tories and a good few partisan newspapers and commentators hope it will, but not this time. This is not 1983.

Then I was very active in politics as a founder memeber of the SDP, its constituency Chairman, first for the City of London and during the actual campaign, of  Folkestone & Hythe (Michael Howard). The SDP was part of the Alliance, which was a working partnership with the Liberals, which arbitarily shared out the contituencies to one or the other. Both the City of London and F&H went to the Liberals, so I helped out in Dover, where I ran every public meeting for the SDP Candidate.

I saw the 1983 General election from the inside and it was clear from the start that, brave and exciting though the Alliance  certainly was,  it could not possibly work. It was made up of two parties, one new, one old, the main inspiration of the new one being the leftward drift of the Labour party, whilst the old one was driven by the rightward drift of the Conservative party. Moreover the Liberal half remained with the traditional constituency organisation, while the SDP was organised into so called Area Parties grouping three constituencies together, an impractical arrangement which did not work. There was no proper political infrastructure, few councillors and a handful of MP’s.

Moreover the dynamics were completely different. The centre had moved to the right and the right was led by Margaret Thatcher. She had put the economy on the road to recovery and spectacularly won an heroic war to take back the Falklands. The greengrocer’s daughter from Grantham was a fierey dragon who offered a new opportunity for advancement to the aspirational working class, who defected to her in large numbers. Meanwhile the left was split between three parties, Labour led by Michael Foot, far to the left, the Liberals who always won by-elections from the Tories and lost them at general elections and the SDP run by the Gang of Four, who saw themselves as great political reformers, but were seen by voters as  has beens. The Tories were focused, inspired and single minded. Labour had vered so far to the left they were off the road and the Alliance was muddled, though well meaning. The result, a Thatcher landslide. Actually she won 58 new seats pushing her majority up to 144. This was Thatcher’s high water mark. In two general elections she won 120 new seats giving her a majority only six short of 150. If Cameron won that number in one go now he would have a majority of 4.

Things are very different now. First there is the sheer scale of the Tory gains required to win. Second the majority of the voters want change, real change. Third, Labour is united and focused. Fourth the Lib Dems, born out of the Alliance partnership, but made up of a much more coherent, cleverer and sophisticated leadership, with 62 MPs already and a significant political infrastructure right across the country, can win seats both from the Tories and Labour. They are led not by a gang but by a very bright multi-lingual more middle class edition of Cameron called Clegg, aided by the universal first choice for Chancellor, Vince Cable. They offer real change. The tide is starting to flow their way. Tides are not bubbles and they do not burst. The Tories find themselves having to row against this in a vessel not designed for the purpose. It will be hard going. If the tide does not ebb before polling day, the risk of shipwreck is real.

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