Cable: anti-Corbyn Labour MPs and Lib Dems should work together

The Liberal Democrats and Labour MPs opposed to Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership will have to “work together” to create an “effective opposition” to the Government, Sir Vince Cable has said.

In some of the strongest indicators yet that a form of ‘Lib-Lab pact’ could be achieved, the former Liberal Democrat Business Secretary said he was already “happily engaged” with people in the Labour party “trying to create common ground”…

He said that “practical cooperation” with elements of the Labour party was possible and that the issue would come to the fore in the wake of the EU referendum campaign. [The Independent]

The reference to the European referendum is notable because it was cross-party cooperation on the pro-European side the last referendum on the issue back in the 1970s which helped pave the way to the creation of the SDP and subsequent Alliance with the Liberal Party.

Possibilities of co-operation between Labour and the Liberal Democrats is something I will look at in more detail in the next edition of Liberal Democrat Newswire, out on Tuesday. You can sign up for it here.