Defectors and the Liberal Party 1910-2010

Last month Dr Alun Wyburn-Powell, the author of  Defectors and the Liberal Party 1910-2010, kindly wrote me a guest post on the history of defections from the Liberal Party and the Liberal Democrats.

Now his book has been reviewed by Nicholas Thomason for the LSE Review of Books:

For the majority of Liberal MPs who joined Labour, there was to be no happy ending however. Over half of the forty-seven defectors found their move to be unsuccessful. Confronted with a tight-knit culture of trade unionism, strict party discipline and often poverty; the largely wealthy, professional Liberals struggled to integrate. 

Friendships were difficult to forge and the lament of Scott, one of the Disillusioned Progressives, summed up the feelings of many: “…I have joined the Labour Party – but I have found few friends there + [sic] am looked upon with suspicious eyes. It is a poor result…’