The men in sandals come for Tim Farron

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Tim Farron more than doubled the Liberal Democrat membership and presided over an increase in the number of Lib Dem MPs at last week's general election.

But that was not enough for those anonymous "Lib Dem sources".

Understand some Lib Dems inc Paddick went to see Tim Farron to ask him to go. He initially said no.

— Jessica Elgot (@jessicaelgot) June 14, 2017

I am sorry to see Tim go. I think he did as well as could be expected in the near impossible circumstances in which he won the leadership.

The election campaign came too soon for him, with the result that a lot of voters did not know who he was. But with the exception of interview with Andrew Neil, he did well.

The Lib Dems' problems, as shown by the fall of our vote last week, run deep. We need some hard thinking about what the party is for and where our future lies. A leadership election is as likely to distract from that as aid it.

Tim's statement today was perhaps the worst thing he has done as leader.

No doubt it was true that:

“To be a political leader – especially of a progressive, liberal party in 2017 – and to live as a committed Christian, to hold faithfully to the Bible’s teaching, has felt impossible for me.”

But I would suggest this shows the problem with the rather sectarian Evangelical Christianity that Tim favours. Charles Kennedy being a Catholic never seemed to worry him or anyone else.

Maybe it also reveals a problem with modern liberalism. It is not enough for people to tolerate the currently approved progressive view: you have to embrace it or you are no liberal.

Nick Cohen says behind a paywall somewhere that, while we say we are fed up with indentikit PPE-and-think-tank politicians, the truth is that anyone who departs from model is hounded for it.

I suspect Tim's rise and fall shows the truth of that.

Sir Frank Whittle remembered in Lutterworth

The jet engine was invented by Sir Frank Whittle in the years before the Second World War.

Much of the development work took place at the Ladywood foundry in Lutterworth.

Whittle is remembered by a sculpture of a jet on a roundabout just outside the town and by this more modest memorial in its centre.

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British journalism failed in its coverage of the general election, argues Brian Cathcart.

John Pugh explains why the Liberal Democrats lost Southport: "We lost in Southport not because we’d forgotten how to campaign or even because of the genius of our opponents but because the party did not have a clear enough national message that connected emotionally and personally with the local electorate and in a quasi- presidential election in 2017 that mattered."

"One glimmer of hope is that the DUP, for all its sectarian history and obscurantist beliefs, is pragmatic about economic policy. It will kill off the idea of the idea of the UK leaving the EU customs union which is fundamental to the economy of the island of Ireland." Vince Cable on politics after the election.

Oliver Wainwright looks at the failure of Richard Rogers' new gateway to Cambridge.

"A borstal was an obvious recruiting ground for the army because they were only permitted to detain healthy boys who could withstand the tough regime of drill-instruction, training and education, all of which began before dawn." Conor Reidy on the Irish Borstal boys who chose to go to the First World War.

Alex White meets some fox cubs.

Roger Helmer to quit the European Parliament

Reaction to the news that Roger Helmer is to stand down as one of the East Midlands MEPs is meeting with a mixed reaction across the region.

Reports are reaching us of wailing and gnashing of teeth in Market Bosworth and the more remote regions of Kesteven, while there has been dancing in the streets of Matlock.

As we go to press there are Facebook rumours of outbreaks of public disorder in Cropwell Bishop.

But I thought it would be appropriate if Liberal England paid its own tribute to Mr Helmer. He has certainly given us plenty to write about.

He first spoke of retiring from the European parliament in 2011 when he was still a Conservative. But when the Tories declined to allow him to be succeeded by a self-proclaimed expert on UFOs and alien abductions, he decided to say on and cross the floor to Ukip.

In August 2012 he was obliged to move his office from the Harborough Innovation Centre, a facility for start-up tech companies opened with the help of public money. "I have to admit I'm not a start-up tech company,” he admitted.

That same month he was a few seconds from providing this blog with a scoop.

In August 2013 he told Stephen Nolan of his belief that girls aged under 16 could consent to sex.

And in October 2014 he performed the considerable feat of discovering a Thai massage parlour in Lutterworth.

Since then things have been quieter. But, truly, we shall not see his like again.

A few minutes later. A report on the Guardian site suggests we may not have heard the last of Mr Helmer:

Roger Helmer, a key member of Ukip’s top team, is resigning from the European parliament, ahead of a demand to repay around £100,000 of EU money for alleged misuse of public funds.

The last week of the Woodhead Route

This electrified line from Sheffield to Manchester closed in the summer of 1981.

Note that in those days goods trains still had a guard's van.

Liberal Democrat attitudes to existing grammar schools

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The Liberal Democrat manifesto was in no doubt:

The Conservatives want to take us back 50 years, to an outdated system of grammar schools and secondary moderns, ignoring all the research and expert advice that show it will damage the life chances of so many children.

And Tim Farron was certainly in no doubt after the election result was known:

"Even a modest extension of grammar schools is still unacceptable. It is a betrayal of the principle of comprehensive education. It needs to be thrown out of the window. 

"This election delivered a message to the Conservatives, people do not want to go in this direction. Theresa May needs to axe her plan for grammar schools like its architect Nick Timothy has been axed. 

And he added: "People want a country that is fairer not the rose tinted spectacles of the 1950s."

Both quotes, it is true, are about the Conservatives' plans to open new grammar schools. But if the evidence is so clear, and if feelings are running so high, you would expect Lib Dems to campaign locally to close the existing grammar schools where they still exist.

I once asked if this happens, but received no clear answer,

A clue to the position on the ground came in a New Statesman article about Tom Brake's campaign to hold on to his Carshalton and Wallington seat:

From there, it was north through the heart of Wallington, formerly part of Surrey, where three of Sutton’s five grammar schools are found. 

“Sutton is very popular because of the grammar schools,” Brake says. “Parents often make a point of moving to Sutton to access them. The downside is they are selective in their nature. It means that unless a child does well – not just well, but really well – in the 11-plus exam or the equivalent, then the fact that you live in Sutton is no guarantee that your child will get a place there. They are very high performing, there’s no doubt about that.” 

Theresa May has paved the way for more grammar schools to be set up. Is Brake pro or anti-grammar? 

“Well, I think provision of schools is something that should be locally decided,” he says. “Our party position, and my personal view, is that it’s something local councillors should be allowed to make a decision on.”

I am not getting at Tom. He did tremendously well to hold his seat and I am very glad he did.

And if that is the party position on selection, I am happy to support it. It certainly was the the old Liberal Party's view back in the 1970s when this was last a live issue.

But given how few powers local authorities now have in education I wonder if it now makes much sense as a policy.

There does tend to be a disconnect between Liberal Democrat national and local campaigning. The former calls for the extension of the market: the latter is concerned with protecting the victims of that extension. I wonder if our policy on selection in education is another example of that.

You may that such a disconnect is inevitable in the rough and tumble of elections, but I think it might do the party good to face up to its existence.

Confusion over date of Queen's Speech

Michael Gove signed letter promising to maintain all EU payments to farmers

Yesterday Michael Gove returned to the cabinet as environment secretary.

Which makes an article on the Why Vote Leave website dated 14 June 2016 particularly interesting.

It begins:

Thirteen Government ministers and senior Conservatives have today committed that every region, group and recipient of EU funding will continue to get that money after a ‘Leave’ vote in the EU referendum. 

In an open letter, the signatories - who include Boris Johnson, Michael Gove and Priti Patel - assure those people and organisations who currently receive money from the European Union that their funding is safe if we Vote Leave. 

In the letter they say:

"There is more than enough money to ensure that those who now get funding from the EU - including universities, scientists, family farmers, regional funds, cultural organisations and others - will continue to do so while also ensuring that we save money that can be spent on our priorities.

"If the public votes to leave on 23 June, we will continue to fund EU programmes in the UK until 2020, or up to the date when the EU is due to conclude individual programmes if that is earlier than 2020.

"We will also be able to spend the money much more effectively. For example, some of the bureaucracy around payments to farmers is very damaging and can be scrapped once we take back control."

The article goes on to reproduce the full letter.

Lutterworth's old police station

This is the former Lutterworth police station. According to the Leicester Mercury, before it closed last year it was "England's oldest serving purpose-built police station".

The town's former magistrates court is on the same site and when I was there yesterday there was also a police vehicle parked there for old time's sake.

One of the Liberal Democrat MPs who abstained on Article 50 lost his seat on Thursday

I have seen it suggested that the Liberal Democrats' position on Europe was toned down during the general election because some of our remaining MPs were concerned it would alienate their voters.

In view of that, I was interested to discover a post I wrote back in December. There I quoted the words of the three Lib Dem MPs who abstained on Article 50.

I see that, sadly, one of those MPs - Greg Mulholland - lost his seat on Thursday.

The others were John Pugh, who did not stand this time, and Norman Lamb.

Michael Gove's appointment as environment secretary this evening rather bears out what I wrote in that post:

If the farmers of North Norfolk think they will do better out of a Tory government than they have out of the European Union, they must have been sniffing the silage.

Later. I originally suggested that John Pugh had been defeated on Thursday, but of course he did not stand this time. Which makes this post rather less impressive than when it first appeared.

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Fintan O'Toole dissects the fantasy that is Brexit: "Theresa May is a classic phony Brexiter. She didn’t support it in last year’s referendum and there is no reason to think that, in private, she has ever changed her mind. But she saw that the path to power led toward the cliff edge, from which Britain will take its leap into an unknown future entirely outside the European Union. Her strategy was one of appeasement—of the nationalist zealots in her own party, of the voters who had backed the hard-right UK Independence Party (UKIP), and of the hysterically jingoistic Tory press, especially The Daily Mail."

The Liberal Democrats finished far behind Kate Hoey and Labour in Vauxhall. Our candidate George Turner offers his reflections on the campaign there.

"Since the Great Recession, Polanyi has become something else: a totem for social democracy, much like Marx for communism or Hayek for neoliberalism." Daniel Luban on the elusive Karl Polanyi.

"The Berlin Wall had stood for decades as the most tangible symbol of the intransigence of Cold War politics. Then, quite suddenly it was gone, but not through any of the battle scenarios the generals had war-gamed. On the day, it happened because some border guards refused to use lethal force." Rod Duncan on political change and fantastical fiction.

Tabish Khan has been to see Grayson Petty's new exhibition.

"On this morning of great doubt and uncertainty, I think we should consider things of far greater interest like the lookers' huts on Romney Marsh in Kent," says Peter Ashley,

Jesca Hoop: The Lost Sky

Stephen Thompson introduces this Sunday's artist:

Jesca Hoop first attracted national attention in the early '00s, when her unusual backstory — the daughter of musical Mormons, she'd served a long stint as nanny to Tom Waits' kids — helped fuel critics' interest in songs that always seemed to be coming at you sideways.

The Lost Sky is a track from her latest album. Memories Are Now.

There is a whole symposium devoted to it on Pop Matters, where Andrew Paschal says:

"The Lost Sky" is a gorgeous if troubled reverie, Jesca Hoop’s smokey vocals a relentless stream of circular thoughts, memories, and admonitions. There’s an uneasiness to the dueling guitar parts that adds a psychological feel to the song, as though we are in Hoop’s head as she hurries down the street or through the woods, muttering softly under her breath. There are so few pauses in the song that it’s easy to lose one’s way, which is, of course, part of its joy.

Tom Waits featured here a few Sundays ago.

A bedtime story from Vince Cable

Sleep tight.

Meet the Conservatives' new friends in the DUP

Here's a new cartoon from @Adamstoon1 for our third edition @EveningStandard - after Saatchis pic.twitter.com/u2VGmfxbIy

— George Osborne (@George_Osborne) June 9, 2017

Georgia Grainger has put together a useful guide to the Democratic Unionist Party, its personalities and the scandals in which it has been involved.

A couple of examples:

2016-17 ~ Brexit Finances 

During the European referendum campaign, the DUP funded advertisements which were not run in Northern Ireland – a weird move for a party that only stands in Northern Ireland. 

A possible, and likely, explanation of is that Northern Ireland has different political donation laws, protecting the secrecy of donors’ identities, and therefore allowing donations from “less savoury” people than would be tolerated by Tory or Ukip voters when their donations were published. 

There’s been some digging done, linking some of the finances to Saudi money and gun running. Basically the DUP allowed themselves to be used as a laundering service to get unpleasant funding for Brexit.

And:

Edwin Poots MLA 

As Culture Minister in 2007, Poots participated in an interview saying he believed the earth was created in 4,000 BC. He was then appointed Health Minister, and in 2013 he challenged gay adoption in the Supreme Court, using taxpayers’ money.

Georgia says she will keep this page updated, so this is definitely one to bookmark.

Lauren Laverne talks to the Zombies

Rod Argent and Colin Blunstone were on Lauren Laverne's BBC Radio 6 Music show the other day to talk about the recording of their classic album Odessey and Oracle 50 years ago.

This is an extract from the full interview - it starts at 2:12:55

The flat railway crossing at Newark

Just past Newark Castle station the line to Lincoln crosses the East Coast main line on the level.

It's all controlled by signals, of course, but if I were driving a Lincoln train I would be tempted to look both ways before proceeding.

The photo above was taken from Newark Castle station and shows a train on the East Coast main line using the crossing.

There used to be an arrangement like this at Retford too, but one line was raised and the other sunk so that they no longer crossed on the level. At Newark the River Trent makes any such arrangement impossible.

The footbridge at Retford used to be a great place for watching trains. Deltics accelerating through the station on the main line: coal trains hauled by brand new Class 56s thundering through underneath.

I remember that the local lads all called each other "thee" and "thou". I wonder if that usage survives today?

Giles Watling gets to Westminster 53 years after fighting his first election

Last night Giles Watling gained Clacton for the Conservatives - it was the seat that Douglas Carswell won for Ukip at the last election.

If you were with this blog during its fixation with the 1960s police series Gideon's Way last year, you may remember that Watling, who played one of the title character's children, fought a school election back in 1964.

Play the video above and you will see the snippet of this episode in which he appears.

No one knows anything about politics – here are my 12 hot takes on the general election result

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More and more, I feel that William Goldman’s view of the film business

"Nobody knows anything. Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what's going to work. Every time out it's a guess and, if you're lucky, an educated one."

also applies to politics.

Plenty of political bloggers offer hot takes, but they generally turn out to be wrong.

I was more circumspect during the election campaign, offering two modest predictions that turned out to be correct.

The Liberal Democrats did have a good chance of winning Bath and the Conservatives did fail to gain Leicester West.

Still, though you wouldn’t think it sometimes, Liberal England is meant to be a political bog. So here are a dozen thoughts on the general election and its aftermath.

1. What I got badly wrong about the election

Like most commentators, I was convinced that Jeremy Corbyn would crash and burn when he was exposed to the scrutiny of a general election campaign. But it turned out that his chilling with the military wing of Irish Republicanism was too long ago to interest most voters.

More than that, he came over as human when set against the wooden Theresa May. He even overcame his hatred of journalists (remember that grim, silent walk the night he was elected?) to give some good interviews.

Labour’s success means that the people who declined to serve in Corbyn’s shadow cabinet will now make themselves available. This will mean more credible people appearing for Labour on television (sorry, Richard Burgon) and that any talk of a new centre party is dead (sorry, Lord Mandelson).

2. What I got right about British politics

For years I have believed (or clung to the belief) that if the Conservatives moved to the right to chase Ukip’s vote they would alienate their more moderate supporters. And that is more or less what happened. I find that immensely reassuring for the future of the country.

3. Jeremy Corbyn has been good for political debate

For years British general elections have been fought on a narrow strip of territory. They supported the free market and supported public services (though not too much). Jeremy Corbyn has changed all that. I doubt the costings in his manifesto: in fact it reminded me of the Labourism that foundered in the 1970s, but that is also too long ago to interest most voters.

What his manifesto did do was offer voters the hope that things could be different. He has opened up territory that other politicians may one day occupy.

4. The DUP blinks in the unaccustomed sunlight

When Liberal Democrats joined the cabinet one was forced to resign within weeks and another ended up in prison. DUP MPs are not nor going to become ministers, but they may well find the sudden media interest in them and their MPs equally uncomfortable.

I also suspect that the alliance with them will end in tears for the Conservatives too.

5. "I am the ghost of your tuition fees decision"

The decision to support the introduction of tuition fees under the Coalition continues to haunt the Liberal Democrats and Nick Clegg in particular. As the surge of support for Labour among young voters yesterday showed, the really damaging thing about the decision is not merely that it undermined trust in us. The real problem was that it was politically obtuse.  How can a liberal party expect to flourish without the support of educated young voters?

6. Time to be honest about the level of Liberal Democrat support

After half a dozen results had been declared last night I was moved to tweet what no one else in my timeline was saying: those results were uniformly awful for the Liberal Democrats. I am delighted that we won a dozen seats – that was far better than I feared we might do – but we have to face the fact that in seats where we do not campaign, the Liberal Democrat vote is vanishingly small.

And even in seats where we had the MP a few years ago or where we have traditionally recorded a respectable second place, that vote is now disappointingly low. (I am thinking of Ludlow and Harborough, seats I know well.)

Yet the same patterns has been true of local elections for years now, and it has also passed unremarked. There are some great gains – greeted with #libdemfightback – but where we do not campaign hardly anyone votes for us now.

We need to talk about this problem as a first step to addressing it.

7. Tim Farron: The boy done goodish

Leaving aside his interview with Andrew Neil (the two have always had a scratchy relationship and Tim appeared poorly briefed for Neil’s easily predictable lines of attack), Tim did pretty well. He was always telling people that he came from Preston and had four children, but then the election came too soon for him with the result that few people knew who he was. It is natural that he should try to tell them.

Calling for a change of leader can be a way of avoiding deeper thought about the party’s purpose and direction. And then there are those who are convinced that a front-line politician must have a Southern, public school and Oxbridge background…

8. Theresa May: You have to laugh

Has there even been a less credible British prime minister? Quite what Theresa May stands for, wants to achieve or why she considers herself fitted for the job remain a mystery.

Her credibility has gone, most importantly to her own party. That means that her colleagues will be politicking for the contest to succeed her and every time something goes wrong there will be press speculation about her being replaced.

My guess is that we will start to hear stories about her brave struggle with her health problems and she will be gone sooner rather than later.

9. Mourning the loss of Nick Clegg

Nick Clegg’s defeat was a loss to the Liberal Democrats and a loss to political debate generally. I like Nick and hope he will stick around in some role, but I wonder if, deep down, he was more suited to being a technocrat than a politician. I remember a review of his book Politics: Between the Extremes by James Kirkup:

"Politics is about arguments, about persuading people, by fair means or foul, to lend you their votes and their permission to rule. And this is what baffles Clegg."

10. Ukip is not dead yet

When we have finished laughing at the self-immolation of Paul Nuttall, remember that there may be a by-election in South Thanet one day and that Nigel Farage could be Ukip’s candidate and could win it. The party has fallen apart and reassembled itself several times over the past 20 years. It could easily happen again.

11. No Liberal Democrat MPs in Wales

If you can hear a rumbling sound from the direction of Llanystumdwy, it is Lloyd George turning in his grave. There are no Liberal MPs left in Wales.

12. The power of the press

Some have argued that this election represents the triumph of social media and that the newspapers have lost their hold over voters. I was always sceptical that they had such a hold. Generally speaking, Rupert Murdoch backed politicians because they were going to win: they didn’t win because he backed them.

It would take a heart of stone not to laugh at Theresa May

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Cicero's Songs says "Watching the UK election from afar has been a sad and chastening experience. The fact is that neither the Prime Minister nor the Leader of HM Opposition are fit for office,"

"Knowing when to quit is important in politics, as we’ll discover in the aftermath of this general election. But it’s true in political broadcasting too; and this election is likely to see the last outing for David Dimbleby as anchor of the BBC's results programme." So says Roger Mosey in an overkind piece, but Dimbleby will probably have other ideas.

"Emily Davidson’s death moved the public in a way that astonished the Government and probably did much to change the public’s attitude to women having the vote." Sal Brinton shares an account of Davidson's funeral by Mary Stocks. Stocks was Sal's cousin and also the cousin of the late David Rendel.

Kevin Munger programmed bots to fight racism on Twitter and it worked.

Tom Marshall heard Mark Gatiss speak at the Oxford Union.

"Over here there’s a huge emphasis on skills and just picking up a rugby ball and playing rugby as opposed to going to the gym to do squats or bench presses. People are far more excited about playing a game of tag or touch rather than seeing how much they can bench press." Piers Francis has been playing rugby union in New Zealand, Interviewed by the Telegraph, he offers a telling contrast between attitudes to training there and in Britain.