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The entire parliamentary Liberal Democrat party has defected to the one-day-old Independent Group as it’s already more successful and better known than them.
The remaining Liberal Democrat party is not understood to be calling for by-elections as a result of the defections, as no MPs at all is still more than they might have if they decide to make a fight of it.
Speaking from Westminster, former party leader Vince Cable told us that he was ‘deeply disappointed’ by his failures of leadership and was hoping to find a credible alternative to himself in the new group.
“The Liberal Democrats haven’t cut through with our message and we don’t feel that we’ve been responsive enough to criticisms of ourselves,” he said.
“We see this as a new dawn, and with a party formed yesterday already polling higher than I am, it can’t go worse, frankly.
“Hopefully there will be a level of engagement with the voters that this far our leader, me, simply hasn’t been able to provide.”
In a snap poll after this latest round of defections, the Independent group has already fallen five points.
When asked, Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said he’d consider joining the new group himself if only it didn’t have so many Jews in it.
