A parliamentary sketch writer once suggested that Charles Kennedy should intersperse his press conferences with circus tricks. The premise was that he ran his party like a travelling fair. Moreover, if he entertained visiting hacks with the occasional handstand or juggling act, the assembled journalists would derive some sort of relevance from proceedings, allowing the laconic Kennedy to gain a sense of worth. Fortunately for ‘Chatshow Charlie’, Angus Deayton’s cocaine-induced romps intervened, opening up the way for a stint presenting Have I Got News For You, and the flame-haired Scot finally seemed to have found his niche in life. His Lib Dem colleagues, however, remain searching for theirs.
Take Lembit Opik. The bespectacled frontbencher’s interests range from Northern Ireland and Wales to fox hunting and intergalactic asteroids. Yes, that’s right, intergalactic asteroids. Perhaps fancying himself as a latter day Bruce Willis, Opik became highly excited when an asteroid recently passed within 350,000 miles of earth. He called on the government to take necessary steps to save the world. ‘Working out a way to deflect an asteroid would be expensive, but it would be an insurance policy for the planet,’ he said. ‘If we have ten, 20 or 30 years notice we can probably save the planet.’
Exciting stuff. The same, however, cannot be said of his colleague Norman Baker – described by Labour MP Stephen Pound as a man who ‘bores for Britain… a super-bore… a classic House of Commons bore.’ In his first three months as an MP, Baker asked more parliamentary questions than his predecessor had done in 23 years, sending fellow MPs and observers into a numbed doze whenever he rose. Pound spoke for many when he continued, ‘There are those of us who would rather have root canal surgery without anaesthetic than be cast away with the honourable member for Lewes and no ear plugs.’
In an effort to attract more entertaining members to his circus troupe, Ringleader Charlie has been casting his net far and wide. Fresh from trying to snare Labour voters, Kennedy wrote to a million former Conservatives across the country appealing for their support. Indeed, the political repositioning of the Lib Dems has taken more twists and turns than a double-jointed carnival freak. Neither right of Labour nor left of the Tories, ‘We are,’ claims MP Mark Oaten, ‘a tricky animal to portray on the left-right spectrum.’ Too true, as its targeting of new supporters shows. The model Lib Dem, it would seem, is a disaffected lefty harbouring rightwing tendencies.
Not, of course, that we’d dare characterise Labour turncoat Paul Marsden in such terms – we’d hate to upset the poor dear. After being treated like a ‘hunted animal’ by those nasty Labour whips – who had the temerity to upbraid him for voting against the government on manifesto commitments – this sensitive soul ran away to join Charlie’s Circus where he now runs a daily tightrope act, balancing perilously over a pit of irrelevance and obscurity.
Liberal politics naturally means a liberal agenda. The extremes to which this can be taken, though, can be alarming. Frontbencher Jenny Tonge, for instance, is an advocate of the legalisation of cocaine. If that’s wacky, her colleague Sandra Gidley’s outpourings are rather more bizarre. On the one hand she is on the Lib Dem’s health team, on the other she opposed the draft EU directive on tobacco. Somebody, it would seem, believed the old John Player ads…
As if this wasn’t enough wackiness, the Lib Dems have an emerging wealth of loons waiting in the wings. In a stunt that would do Trigger Happy TV proud, Welsh Assembly member Mick Bates turned up to a debate dressed as Santa Claus. ‘A mockery,’ blasted his opponents; an embarrassed shrug came from his party’s HQ; but ho ho ho, how we nearly laughed.