Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Traitors grate

I don't suppose that Adrian Graves' (who he?) defection would have even made regional TV news but for the current leadership contest. Parliamentary candidates for development seats (in Suffolk West we finished third with 17 per cent of the vote in 2005) are pretty low in the Lib Dem food chain. Certainly as a majority group leader in a district council I would expect to have precedence over them in any parade of Lib Dem worthies.

James Graham pretty much sums up my view of defections. Unless there is a whole string of them they have little impact on the public and are a bit of a one-minute wonder. They often look cynical rather than principled. I hope the Paul Marsden episode taught the Lib Dems a bit of a lesson.

1 comment:

cymrumark said...

come come Ian.. Adrian Greaves was Vice Chair of the candidates association.....

People change parties for all sorts of reasons but if you are unhappy its probably best to let your membership lapse quietly then a few months later join your new party. This way at least some of the people in your old party will still speak to you and you look less like an opportunist/traitor etc....

I suspect there may be a few Lib dems taking this course soon.