The Öpik History Wars

For many one of the biggest shock results in last year's general election was Conservative Glyn Davies's gain of Montgomeryshire from Lembit Öpik. But for some it wasn't a surprise at all and had been predicted for years.

Now that is standing to be his party's candidate for Mayor of London, there has been a lot of talk about why he lost so dramatically - the biggest anti-Lib Dem swing in a held seat, the most distant Conservative gain and the Lib Dems losing a seat that was supposedly "Liberal forever (so long as they remember to campaign)". And there's some fierce fighting over recent political history.

It's become such an issue that even Öpik's nomination manifesto (warning that's a very BIG file) feels the need to address it, saying the following:

CRITICISMS ANSWERED HEAD ON
Lembit lost his seat in 2010
The failure of the party to retain both the parliamentary and Welsh Assembly seat in 2010 and 2011 in Montgomeryshire is linked to the drunken altercation between Assembly Member Mick Bates and a paramedic which led to his prosecution and to him leaving the party. Many were aware of Lembit's celebrity profile and assumed that this was the cause of the loss. Regrettably the party did worse in 2011 even indicating a common factor for both poor results.

This just does not convince. And it's unsurprising that it's provoked blog post responses from both the Lib Dem Welsh Assembly Member Peter Black (Lembit Öpik and the rewriting of history) and Conservative MP Glyn Davies (Lembit - take it on the chin like a man.).

I've commented myself on the matter - see for instance my comments at Dave Hill's London Blog: London Lib Dems will choose their mayoral candidate from field of four for my trading the statistics - and so for now I'll just confine myself to showing that the defeat was being predicted long before Mick Bates hit the paramedic, even if not everyone picked up on it.

First from a Usenet post I wrote two years ago:

Montgomeryshire isn't quite the "Liberal forever (except when they're too busy planning centenary celebrations to actually campaign to retain it)" bastion of legend but in several ways is very much a personalist constituency. Now sure I have my personal biases but much of what I've heard from there (including from my sister, who until recently lived and worked in Machynlleth at the very west of the seat and is somewhat to the left of me), Lembit Opik's popularity is shrinking faster than an asteroid burning up in the atmosphere because of his clowning around, high profile personal life and lack of any serious political track record.

By contrast the Conservative candidate is Glyn Davies is widely respected across the political spectrum - I've heard many Plaid members openly say a lot of good things about him (and even that they'd vote for him) - and if anything has increased his appeal by losing his list seat in the last Assembly elections only because the Conservatives gained two constituencies. Whilst the Assembly list results aren't a 100% guide to what will happen in a Westminster election, it's notable the Conservatives topped the poll there.

Furthermore with the Liberal Democrats under pressure in the neighbouring seats of Brecon & Radnorshire and Ceredigion they simply can't target all their energy in Mid & West Wales on Montgomeryshire even if they wanted to - and from comments by Lib Dem activists I get the feeling that many would not want to anyway and are certainly not going to haul themselves great distances to allow Lembit to carry on as Mr Celebrity.

(Message from discussion Opinion poll in Wales on uk.politics.electoral at Jun 16 2009, 11:08 am

Next there's UK Polling Report's specific discussion on Montgomeryshire. Many amateur (and not so amateur) psephologists comment there and unrealistic predictions are easily shot down. People were predicting the Lib Dems were in Öpik-specific difficulties as early as February 2007, with the earliest outright prediction of a loss in July 2008.

Finally there's the Vote UK discussion thread on Montgomeryshire. The earliest outright defeat prediction was in September 2007.

One other point has emerged - Öpik neither wrote his own manifesto nor checked it before it was submitted - see his comments in WalesOnline: Peter Black launches furious attack on 'self-obsessive' Lib Dem colleague Lembit Opik. If he's not even in control of his own campaign, how could he ever hope to be in control of London?

To boldy go where Neil Hamilton has gone before?

I have now had a chance to catch up with last Friday's Have I Got News For You where one of the contestants was none other than Lembit Öpik, fresh from having lost his Montgomeryshire seat.

One of the cruelties of British politics is the way election results are declared, with the politicians there for all to see. On Election Night it was saddening to watch Jacqui Smith as her defeat was announced. I didn't catch Lembit's defeat but it can't have been great for him. But to go on Have I Got News For You and endure numerous taunts about his defeat is going beyond it all. Lembit looked uncomfortable at times but still took it well.

It reminds me of a previous ex MP going on Have I Got News For You soon after their defeat. Neil Hamilton made a memorable appearance back in 1997 and came out with the wonderful soundbite "I've found it's much better making political jokes than being one." He finished the show by accepting his fee. Naturally it was paid in cash in a brown envelope. But from that show Neil, and his Christine who also appeared, have carved out new careers as media celebrities.

Lembit Öpik is, of course, no stranger to appearing all over the media - of his party only Charles Kennedy seems to have appeared more. But now that Lembit is out of parliament will he take his career in this direction? It could be quite lucrative for him and he is genuinely funny. It could bring years of reward for him and entertainment for the rest of us.

Unless of course we're suddenly all wiped out by an asteroid.

Blog round up

Some interesting posts from the rest of the blogosphere:

Coleview, Covingham & Nythe Conservatives have noted how the Minister of Democracy and his family's electoral registration is in breach of the rules about second homes in Minister of Democracy's family ineligible to vote in Swindon elections

Dizzy Thinks has a sense of proportion about the way some MPs have made totally reasonable claims for their particular constituencies and are still being pilloried form them in This is the problem......

Iain Dale discusses the way criticism of the Telegraph's motives has been silenced in Telegraph Takes Down Nadine's Blog.

Paul Burgin (Mars Hill) discusses the forthcoming reshuffle in What Needs To Be Done With The Cabinet.

Tom Harris (And another thing) warns against kneejerk constitutional changes that have nothing to do with MPs' expenses The worst possible time to consider wider reform.

And since there's more than just MPs' expenses:

Kerron Cross wonders what the departure of the main generator of Liberal Democrat nastiness means in The End Of The Bar Chart Party?

Nábídána.com takes a look at some scientific developments at two rival universities in Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil students bid to outdo each other in political science.

Tory Bear in A small victory notes how LGBT Labour are losing both the T-shirt war and the plot.

Glyn Davies (A View from Rural Wales) is Declaring war on Bambi.

Can a political Jonah save himself?

Glyn Davies has emerged as one of the most unfortunate losses in the last Welsh Assembly elections, losing his own list seat entirely because of the Conservatives' success in winning two constituencies. Many tributes have appeared from politicians on all sides of the political divide.

In the aftermath many have urged Glyn to seek a return to politics, with several suggesting he should stand for Montgomeryshire at the next general election. (Glyn Davies: A Challenge Looms) This is the constituency currently held by Lembit Öpik, not exactly the most popular MP amongst Liberal Democrats at the moment and notorious for routinely backing campaigns that crash and burn. Now Montgomeryshire has a reputation for being a safe Liberal Democrat seat (although contrary to myth it hasn't quite been held by the Liberals/Liberal Democrats for all but four of the last 127 years - see my post An inability to get the figures right or just whatever will benefit?) but nothing is certain in politics and personalities sometimes can have strong positive or negative effects on elections. Indeed as Glyn points out:

This is what happened, in the 'constituency' vote, the Liberal Democrat candidate, Mick Bates, polled around 2,000 more votes than our man, Dan Munford - a great effort by Dan which makes Montgomeryshire a marginal seat. But the 'list' vote was as staggering as its been unnoticed. The Conservative vote surged up to 7,191 while the Lib Dem vote collapsed to just 5,111. We won by 2,080. For the first time ever, we absolutely hammered them.

So will Glyn Davies go for it? Many hope he will.

And can Lembit Öpik avoid giving himself the Backing Of Death?