Lib Dem agriculture team faces tough battle in marginal seats

The Liberal Democrats’ agricultural team will afford a nervous glance at the statistics which reveal both the shadow Lib Dem Defra Secretary Tim Farron and the Lib Dem agriculture spokesman Roger Williams will need to fight hard to hold onto their seats.

The Tories would require a meagre 0.9 per cent swing of votes to win Tim Farron’s Westmorland and Lonsdale seat - the Conservatives 14th ‘most winnable’ marginal seat.

Conservative chairman Eric Pickles described it as ‘one of the seats we hope to win if we are going to change the Government’.

Mr Farron has a growing profile in Westminster and is seen as a hard working MP who is well liked locally, but there are fears among the party that the electorate could vote for a Tory government rather than their local MP.

Meanwhile a defiant Roger Williams, MP for Brecon and Radnorshire, spoke to Farmers Guardian while on the campaign trail this week: “I think the Liberal Democrats will do well because we have lobbied on vote-winning rural issues,” he said, listing opposition to EID and support for a badger cull and supermarket ombudsman as prime examples. 

However, a 5.1 per cent swing of votes would secure Mr Williams’ seat for the Tories.

In another notable marginal seat Countryside Alliance chief executive Simon Hart will attempt to upset the Labour applecart in the Carmarthen West and South Pembrokeshire seat where he needs a 2.7 per cent swing to force out Labour’s Nick Ainger.

The NFU has targeted all marginal seats with a series of on-farm meetings and hustings with both sitting MPs and prospective candidates. “There are so many small majorities, farmers could decide the fate of many MPs,” said a spokesman.

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