Tim Farron has claimed the mantle for the Liberal Democrats as the anti-Brexit party. In a desperate bid to claw back voters who abandoned the party in sheer numbers during due to the Coalition years prior to the 2015 General Election, Mr. Farron says he is the voice of the 48% who voted to remain in the EU. He hopes to benefit from Labour's Brexit dithering. But these are all just delusions of grandeur.
For a start, the Liberal Democrat leader has refused to draw up a coalition with Labour and the Conservatives. A foolish announcement really, considering the first-past-the-post electoral system Britain uses to elect its governments in Westminster is heavily biased against them.
Many of the Liberal Democrats' seats in 2015 were lost to the SNP. The latter party is likely to retain these seats as they have made it clear only they can ensure Scotland remains a member of the EU by separating from the UK. The Conservatives are at their most popular polling ratings since the early 1990s. So whilst sitting MPs like Alex Chalk and Nicola Blackwood are right to fear the Liberal Democrats throwing the kitchen sink at their Cheltenham and West Oxfordshire and Abingdon seats respectively, it is unlikely they will win them if the Tories' popularity ratings remain at these levels, regardless of Mr. Farron's anti-Brexit position.
Even though Labour continually fail to clarify their Brexit position, the Labour seats of Bermondsey and Hornsey & Wood Green are unlikely to turn orange due to their loyalty to Mr.
Corbyn.
The reason first-past-the-post is so biased against the Liberal Democrats is because there are not enough seats that meet the criteria of voting heavily against Brexit. If the UK used proportional representation, it would be an entirely different story. But the truth of the matter is that Mr. Farron stands no chance in altering the political balance of the House of Commons right now. He is misleading his supporters if he honestly believes this is the case.
