Lib Dems nervously eye post-election future

The Liberal Democrats entered government for the first time since 1945 hoping to prove to voters that they were a serious party of power. Their likely reward after five years of coalition? A drubbing at the polls.

If seat projections suggesting they will lose more than half their MPs come true, the Lib Dems may even suffer the indignity of losing their status as the third largest party in the House of Commons to the Scottish Nationalists.

The attacks are coming from all sides: Labour and the Greens are taking votes from the Lib Dems in the cities and in the north, including in Nick Clegg’s Sheffield Hallam seat. The SNP is challenging Lib Dem Scottish bastions including Danny Alexander’s Inverness seat and the Conservatives are eyeing seats in England such as Vince Cable’s Twickenham constituency.

The FT’s projections currently forecast the Lib Dems winning just 26 seats, their worst performance in a general election since 1992. Last year, the party saw all but one of its Euro MPs wiped out as the country swung to the right and embraced Ukip.

Senior Lib Dems insist that the party will perform much better than pundits expect, partly because of deep voter loyalty to many of its MPs and strong local organisations in constituencies that they represent at Westminster.

But nowhere is the Lib Dem fight for survival more intense than in the party’s West Country heartland, where former commando and party leader Paddy Ashdown is overseeing resistance.

Indeed, if David Cameron is to return to Downing Street on May 7, the road to power may well be a single track lane with grass growing down the middle of it: the prime minister must beat the Liberal Democrats in the region.

No fewer than 10 of Mr Cameron’s top 40 target seats are Lib Dem constituencies in the West Country, from Chippenham in Wiltshire to St Ives in Cornwall: all are theoretically winnable following the Lib Dem slump in national support from 23 per cent in 2010 to about 8 per cent now.

Lord Ashdown, the Lib Dem campaign co-ordinator, and Ryan Coetzee, the party’s strategy director, have devised “win plans” for each seat, based on the Lib Dems’ reputation as local champions.

Although the party is proud of its national record — candidates trumpet Lib Dem policies such as raising the income tax threshold and helping disadvantaged children through the pupil premium — pictures of Nick Clegg on party leaflets are rare.

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The 4 key election battles

Projected election result for the UK as a whole and for individual constituencies.

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No Lib Dem candidate exemplifies the ultra-local approach more dramatically than Tessa Munt, Liberal Democrat MP for Wells, who has “gone rogue” in the Somerset hills and is fighting a campaign so focused on her own brand that one would hardly know she was a Lib Dem at all.

Party headquarters appears to have lost all contact with their MP. “Can you let us know what she’s doing?” said one Lib Dem official. Another says: “We think Tessa will win, but we have absolutely no evidence upon which to base that.”

Ms Munt, a bundle of energy in pink boots and red puffa coat, is to be found defending her majority of 800 in the village of Chilcompton. There is no sign of a Lib Dem rosette: “Rosettes are barriers,” the former teacher says. “My job is to break down barriers.”

Her election address is a masterclass in political disguise. In a 12-page pamphlet, there is no clue to the fact she is a Liberal Democrat MP. The predominant colour is green and the only political leader featured is David Cameron, not Mr Clegg.

“I meet people who say that they aren’t interested in politics. I say “I’m not either. Politics is completely irrelevant at a local level.” Ms Munt has rejected the offer of Lib Dem HQ to bombard constituents with emails. Her pitch is that she is “a strong constituency MP with deep local roots”.

In Chilcompton — a former mining village on the Somerset coalfield — she is visiting the local church that has just been handed almost £80,000 by chancellor George Osborne to have the roof fixed, an occasion she marks by ringing the bells in the 15th century tower.

“I didn’t see the last MP for five years,” says Chris North, the rector, referring to the previous Tory MP, David Heathcoat-Amory. “Tessa rings up, wants to know what’s going on, how she can help.” Ms Munt praises the rector’s “magic hands” as he brings his bells to life.

Lib Dem seats under Tory attack in the southwest

Mid Dorset & North Poole

Wells

St Austell & Newquay

St Ives

Somerton & Frome

Chippenham

North Cornwall

Torbay

Cheltenham

North Devon

Ms Munt’s political cross-dressing is a common feature among Lib Dem candidates across Britain but it is especially acute in a region where they have to fish for votes in diverse communities — often to the frustration of their political opponents.

Her Tory opponent in Wells, James Heappey, an affable former Army major who served in Afghanistan, says a recurring theme on the doorstep is that voters tell him that “Tessa is a Green really” or “Tessa is Labour really” or even “Tessa is Tory really”.

Liberal Democrat candidates across the region are adept at using multiple political identities. But where the Lib Dem MP is standing down, the party is in real trouble, including two other Somerset seats — Taunton and Somerton & Frome — and Mid Dorset & North Poole.

Gary Streeter, Tory MP for South West Devon, says the Conservatives could win all five Lib Dem seats in Cornwall and Devon. Mr Heappey believes he can win in Wells but that it will be “a mightily close fight”.

However, if the Ukip vote in the west country holds up, it could deprive the Tories of victory in a number of seats. Lord Ashdown says the idea of a Lib Dem capitulation in the far south west is fanciful, adding: “I’m confident that where we hold we are on a path to win — or are within reach of winning.”