Party Conference Preview: Liberal Democrats

By Rob Fraser, Senior Account Manager, Linco

The Liberal Democrats arrive in Brighton for their autumn conference in an odd bind: parliamentary strength with limited national profile. With 71 MPs making them the largest third party in over a century, we all assumed we’d be hearing plenty from Sir Ed Davey and his team. But recent polling from More in Common found 53% of Britons simply have no view on how Davey’s doing, while Lord Ashcroft research found the public overwhelmingly describe him as “weak”. With polling sat stubbornly around 11% since the last election, the Lib Dems need to better articulate what they stand for.

Members of the Connect team are in Brighton throughout the conference and here are the four questions we will be looking to answer:

Can the party cut through in a crowded field?

Andy Burnham's arrival in Downing Street has further complicated things for the Lib Dems. Under Starmer, Davey made some headway by outflanking Labour on Trump, Israel and big tech, but Burnham has now taken up that same progressive positioning himself, leaving less obvious open ground on the left. Meanwhile Reform and the Greens, both with fewer than ten MPs, have managed to cut through the noise and make their voices heard, albeit in a style that doesn’t come naturally to Lib Dems.

Will the party show a more combative edge?

There's a clear appetite inside the party for Davey to be "bolder, braver, more distinctive” (in the words of Bobby Dean MP) and for a proper "air war" alongside the ground game. Rising star Josh Babarinde, now shaping party strategy as party president, has been pushing a harder line on Europe, challenging Burnham to back a new customs union rather than going quiet after agreeing with Labour's Brexit diagnosis. Personnel changes reinforce the shift towards a sharper, more disciplined operation with James Holt, one of the party’s former comms chiefs, returning as political director. Can Davey resist the urge to wriggle into a wetsuit on the Sussex coast in favour of more pointed policy attacks? Time will tell.

Does the NHS and social care still speak to voters?

Health and social care remains Davey's signature issue, informed by his personal experience as a carer, but it's become an area of overlap with Labour rather than a dividing line now Burnham’s in No 10. The test at conference is whether the party can push this into a concrete retail offer rather than a shared talking point that blurs the distinction with Labour. Or perhaps the party needs to dial up its messaging on other issues too? The economy and cost of living remain the most important issues for voters, but few could articulate the party’s current economic policy.

Can Davey define the party against the Conservatives, not just Labour?

The Lib Dems know their main political rival remains the Conservative Party, which will be looking to win back ‘blue wall’ seats across southern England. Polling indicates Kemi Badenoch is now more popular than Davey (incidentally, the same voters who describe Davey as weak describe Badenoch as sensible) and the Lib Dems should be wary of what a resurgent Conservative Party would mean for them given their apparent failure to make inroads in traditionally Labour-voting parts of England. Still, Badenoch’s continued efforts to fend off Reform on issues like ECHR and net zero gives the Lib Dems a reprieve for now. Davey knows that working too closely with Burnham risks the party looking like a wing of the Labour Party. Managing both fronts at once, without conference simply reading as pro-Labour "consensus", will be the real test.

These four questions point to the same underlying tension: the Lib Dems have never had more parliamentary firepower, but this strength hasn't translated into definition. Brighton is the moment to decide whether that definition comes from sharper attacks on Burnham, a harder line against the Conservatives, or a retail offer distinctive enough to escape both. Get it right, and the party has a genuine platform to build from. Get it wrong, and 71 MPs risk being remembered as a parliamentary peak the party never knew what to do with.