"How can my generation trust you?"
As part of the BBC’s coverage of the 2024 general election, the main party leaders have been in front of a studio audience on a special edition of Question Time. The audience were able to put questions directly to the leaders, including the Lib Dems’ Ed Davey.
Multiple audience members put to Davey that the Lib Dems couldn’t be trusted because of the decisions the party made over the years it was part of the coalition government with the Tories.
The first asked Davey: “Isn’t the problem though Ed that you’ve got a credibility issue? We all remember the broken promise on tuition fees. You enabled Cameron and Osborne’s austerity. So I don’t think people are going to be convinced by what you’re saying you’ll do now.”
Davey responded by saying: “I have to say it was very difficult governing with the Conservatives. We couldn’t get everything we wanted. But we were faced with a choice as a minister. You either had to stay in and fight inside the government or leave. I think the easy choice for me would have been to leave the government, vote against it and tour the media studios and complain. The hard choice was to stay in, roll my sleeves up and really fight.”
Tuition fees would come up again later. A second member of the audience asked: “In 2010, your party promised to abolish tuition fees, and that was the centre of your campaign. Now students like myself are burdened with hundreds of thousands of pounds of student debt. How can my generation trust you?”
That question was met with loud applause from the audience.
In response, Davey said: “I understand why your generation lost faith in us. It was a difficult government to be in. I explained I had choices – whether we came out of it and carped from the side lines or tried to get there and win things. We didn’t win everything and we lost that one. And we got punished at the 2015 election. I lost my seat along with most Liberal Democrats actually.”
Chris Jarvis is head of strategy and development at Left Foot Forward
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