There are two pitches on the table for the future of the political left in the UK - a radical proposal from Caroline Lucas and a pragmatic one from Vince Cable

The September conference marked Tim Farron's first as leader of the Liberal Democrats. Photograph: Tim Farron at the Lib Dem conference rally on 19 September 2015 by Dave Radcliffe (License) (Cropped)

Tim Farron's first speech, as leader, at a Liberal Democrat party conference came at a crucial time for the UK's political Left (Kuenssberg, 2015). Farron used his speech to try and unite liberals and social democrats and relaunch the Lib Dems as an opposition party at a time when the opponents of David Cameron and George Osborne are scattered and divided.

Less than six months after a bad election night for Britain's progressives, the two main parties of the Left have just come out of the turmoil of leadership elections. The internal wrangling, squabbles surrounding their respective contests, and the distraction they caused - particularly Labour's (Bush, 2015) - have allowed the thin Conservative majority to roll on unchallenged.

The question that lingers behind the efforts of figures within individual parties, like Farron, is how progressives of all parties, with their new leaderships in place, should come together to present an opposition to the Conservatives.

With regards to that question, there have been two pitches, each representing a different approach to tackling Conservative dominance: one from Caroline Lucas and the other from Vince Cable.

Shortly after the election, Caroline Lucas, the Green Party MP, made the first pitch. She suggested that a progressive alliance be formed in time for the next election in order to avoid splitting the anti-Tory vote (Cowburn & Boffey, 2015). Lucas argued that parties on the Left - again, Labour in particular - needed to embrace multi-party politics and co-operation to counter the advantage that 'split' votes offers to the Conservatives under the present first-past-the-post electoral system (Lucas, 2015).

The second pitch was made by Vince Cable, former deputy leader of the liberal democrats and business secretary. Cable took advantage of the dissensions and threats of splits and defections amongst Labour MPs to resurrect the idea of a realignment of the left (Mason & Perraudin, 2015) - an idea favoured by Roy Jenkins and Tony Blair (d'Ancona, 2015). Cable argues that there is a strong support for a progressive, centrist, party and that moderates from Labour and the Liberal Democrats could unite to fill that space. 

The election of Jeremy Corbyn and Tim Farron, as leaders of Labour and Liberal Democrats respectively, clearly shows where the hearts of the party grassroots are - deep within the radical left. That certainly suggests that there is an openness to the pitch made by Caroline Lucas for a radical alliance, where co-operation replaces the previous status quo, in pursuit of common progressive aims.

However, the parliamentary Labour Party and the so-called 'liberal-left' media have been cold to those instincts (Blair, 2015; Cook, 2015). Since his election, Jeremy Corbyn has been faced with rumours of splits, breakaways and defections by the self-described 'moderate' elements of his party (Peston, 2015).

Tim Farron has so far seen little of this kind of response, despite coming from the more radical edge of the Liberal Democrats (White, 2015). Yet his speech yesterday still tacked to the centre, using language that would appeal to centrist and Right-leaning liberals on hard work and opportunities and making references - that will be familiar to followers of the Labour Party (Penny, 2015) - to the necessity of attaining power before a difference can be made (Farron, 2015).

Within both the Liberal Democrats and the Labour Party, there are signs that the old patterns are hard to break. When one party makes a radical move, the other makes a centrist move - each trying to outmanoeuvre the other to be the one, dominant opposition to the Conservatives.

That certainly seems to make Cable's version of the Left coming together more likely. Historically, as Tony Blair has been at pains to tell the world (BBC, 2014), that has been the only choice that has ever been successful.

Yet that does not dampen the desirability of a radical alternative - nor lessen its necessity. Achieving long lasting and much needed change will require more than just an opposition. It needs a compelling alternative. Cable's proposal provides the first, but not the second. In Lucas' pitch, there is the possibility of both.

The austerity narrative, upon which Conservative domination rides, is part of a larger set of systems and presumptions that all need to be challenged - down to their roots. Only a radical alternative can do that - one that is willing to question accepted realities like the two-party monopoly over the electoral system.

So far, radical opposition, across Europe, has been stifled by its isolation (Fazi, 2015). In the UK, however, there are growing opportunities for progressives to work together - and they must if they are to challenge the establishment and the Conservatives who control it.

But before progressives can start down that road they must ask themselves a question, to which the answer matters: will they work together in the pragmatic centre, hoping to inherit control over the establishment, to soften its edges; or will they pursue a more radical course, seeking to challenge the establishment with an alternative vision?

References

Laura Kuenssberg's 'Tim Farron's message: Rebuilding Lib Dems piece by piece'; on the BBC; 23 September 2015.

Stephen Bush's 'Is Labour purging supporters of Jeremy Corbyn?'; in the New Statesman; 20 August 2015.

Ashley Cowburn & Daniel Boffey's 'Liberal Democrat activists say leaders took them down a centrist blind alley'; in The Guardian; 10 May 2015.

Caroline Lucas' 'My challenge to Labour: embrace a progressive, multiparty politics'; in The Guardian; 17 June 2015.

Rowena Mason & Frances Perraudin's 'Vince Cable calls for Labour and Lib Dem centre-left MPs to unite'; in The Guardian; 18 September 2015.

Matthew d'Ancona's 'No expectations: it’s the Lib Dems’ greatest strength'; in The Guardian; 20 September 2015.

Tony Blair's 'Jeremy Corbyn’s politics are fantasy – just like Alice in Wonderland'; in The Guardian; 29 August 2015.

Jonathan Cook's 'Red Neoliberals: How Corbyn’s Victory Unmasked Britain’s Guardian'; on Off Guardian; 21 September 2015.

Robert Peston's 'Will Blairites cross floor to Osborne?'; on the BBC; 16 September 2015.

Michael White's 'In a darker Britain, Tim Farron's social liberalism may not count for much'; in The Guardian; 17 July 2015.

Laurie Penny's 'What the Corbyn moment means for the left: At long last, the left is asking itself whether power without principle is worth having'; in the New Statesman; August 2015.

Tim Farron's Speech to Conference; in Paul Walter's 'IN FULL: Tim Farron’s leader speech to conference today'; on LibDemVoice; 23 September 2015.

Thomas Fazi's 'Greece, the breach remains open: "Whatever SYRIZA’s failings may be, they reflect the failings of the entire European left, of each and every one of us"'; on Open Democracy; 22 September 2015.

'Tony Blair says Labour 'left-wing' warning 'misinterpreted''; on the BBC; 31 December 2014.