Lord Bonkers' Diary: Why the Liberal Democrats did so badly

Rutland's most celebrated fictional peer gives us the benefit of his long experience in explaining...

Why the Liberal Democrats did so badly

Why, I hear you ask, did we do so badly at the general election?

First there was that slogan: "Stronger economy, fairer society." Ashdown did his best to perk it up by adding "Opportunity for Everyone," while I had some success here in the Bonkers Hall Ward with the kicker "Remember your rents fall due on Lady Day," but I admit that was not an addendum open to every Liberal Democrat candidate.

Then suddenly it was all about looking left and right before crossing the road. As it happens we have never bothered teaching the village children the Kerb Drill because we have kept in place the anti-tank defences that were installed at the top of the main street at the outbreak of hostilities in 1939. Some people call such measures ‘traffic calming’, but here they have a far from calming effect on drivers who go through them. So that slogan was never going to have much of an impact hereabouts either.

After that we had that stuff about the Wizard of Oz – one of my favourite films, but hardly likely to win over the younger voter – and after that… Well, I forget, but I think ‘Decency’ came into it somewhere. It sounded rather like the chaplain at school when two fourth-formers had been found in bed together.

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

Previously in Lord Bonkers' Diary

• He had to Put a Bit on Top