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Lib Dems leave conference season in the best shape – but all the main parties have issues to solve ahead of an election

Inside Westminster: Potential strategies are starting to emerge about how the battle for voters will be fought, but beneath the bluster there are worries that Swinson, Corbyn and Johnson must face

Andrew Grice
Friday 04 October 2019 23:46 BST
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Boris Johnson sets out 'compromise' Brexit proposals to Brussels

The annual conferences of the three main UK parties have given us some valuable clues about how they will fight the coming election. The Liberal Democrats emerged as the most united and confident. They have momentum after electoral gains this year and recruiting some former Labour and Tory MPs. They are closing in on Labour; a “poll of polls” puts the Tories on 33 per cent, Labour on 24 per cent, the Lib Dems on 22 per cent and the Brexit Party on 14 per cent.

They have an energetic new leader in Jo Swinson. She is aiming high, telling her party’s Bournemouth conference she is a “candidate for prime minister” as she hopes to beat the squeeze that traditionally afflicts the third party when the election becomes a choice of two prime ministers. Boris Johnson will certainly frame it as a presidential contest between him and Jeremy Corbyn. Swinson’s antidote is boldness – a clear pledge to cancel Brexit in an attempt to hoover up the Remain vote. It’s high risk; overturning the 2016 referendum without another one could alienate some voters.

Although tactical anti-Tory voting and electoral pacts with the Greens and Plaid Cymru could help the Lib Dems, they know they would never have to revoke Article 50 as Swinson is not going to become PM. Privately, some party figures fear another false dawn, as progressives with doubts about Corbyn “hold their nose” and support Labour as the best way to defeat the Tories.

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