John Harris

The Lib Dems are hoping the announcement of their new leader this week will be the start of their fightback. But after an election in which they took just 8% of the vote, and even Vince Cable lost his seat, some insiders worry that voters have stopped listening. Is the malaise terminal?

Vince Cable has just hosted a farewell lunch for the former staff of his constituency office. “I’ve got quite a lot of things on the go,” he says. One is a sequel to his book The Storm, which was about the crash of 2007-8: the followup is somewhat imaginatively titled After the Storm, and is being readied for publication in mid-September. “And I’m taking my dancing quite seriously,” he adds, which means an inevitable mention of Strictly Come Dancing. In December 2010, he appeared on the show’s Christmas special, doing an admirable foxtrot alongside such celebs as June “Dot Cotton” Brown, and Fern Britton. So would he be up for being a proper contestant? “I haven’t been asked, but I could be,” he says, with a hint of his characteristic modesty.

So he is in the market? “I’m in the market … but they make their own choices.”

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