The BBC interviewer subjected the Lib Dem chief to a relentless onslaught of his leadership on both foreign affairs and domestic popularity.
Laura Kuenssberg humiliated Ed Davey (Image: BBC)
Laura Kuenssberg brutally tore apart Sir Ed Davey this morning over his ludicrous claims about Donald Trump and his failure to take advantage of Labour’s chaos to boost the LibDems. Sir Ed Davey was appearing on her flagship Sunday morning interview show to promote his new policy of issuing WW2-style ‘war bonds’ to boost defence spending by up to £20 billion.
However, he sparked disbelief when claiming UK’s diplomacy with Donald Trump hadn’t played a part in getting him to back down over threats of invading Greenland. Sir Ed argued that the victory on Greenland had instead been secured by the EU’s threat of retaliatory tariffs. The claim prompted Ms Kuenssberg to point out that Sir Ed doesn’t know the inside of Donald Trump’s head.
Sir Ed claimed Britain hadn’t played a part in getting Trump to backdown over Greenland (Image: BBC)
He argued: “How did we get Trump to back down on Greenland? It wasn’t the UK, it was the EU saying ‘we’ve got a bazooka of retaliatory tariffs’ that hit the US stock market. No doubt President Trump’s billionaire friends said ‘hang on a minute, this is hitting us in the pocket Donald, maybe you should back down’.
Ms Kuenssberg asked: “Have you been inside Donald Trump’s brain? I mean, look, lots of people have been making guesses.
“David Lammy said it was about UK pressure, and who knows, maybe it was a bit of both.
“But you certainly can’t claim categorically why Donald Trump stepped back.”
Ms Kuenssberg then turned to Sir Ed’s leadership of the Liberal Democrats, which despite winning huge numbers of seats in the 2024 election is now appearing to stagnate in the polls.
The Lib Dems have been overtaken by the Green Party in many polls, largely thanks to their new charismatic leader Zack Polanski.
Ms Kuenssberg pulled up stats showing that the Lib Dem membership is miles behind both the Greens’ and Reform’s.
She argued: “Let’s talk about your standing, then. Because the Lib Dems had a great general election in terms of bums on seats but when you look at recent polling you’ve been lagging behind Reform, the Greens have been romping it up.
Ms Kuenssberg called Sir Ed out on his membership (Image: BBC)
“You have more than 10 times the number of MPs than Reform, but if you look at party membership we’ve been taking look at the numbers. The Green Party’s now at 170,000, Reform at more than 270,000, and your numbers are way down behind at 59,000.”
Sir Ed Davey insisted he is really proud of his members, but insisted membership “isn’t the key metric that I’m focused on.”
“I’m focused more on winning. I believe we have a moral responsibility to win.”
Last week The Guardian reported that a significant number of Lib Dem MPs are becoming “frustrated” by Sir Ed’s “overly cautious approach” and failure to cut through.
One MP said: “Morale is low… no one is saying get rid of Ed. But what they are saying is that those around him need to move with significant pace towards the development of a national story for the party to tell. We need to be a bit more serious about being the third party.
“Reform are assuming a place in the national debate, and so are the Greens. We are content to not do this. And it isn’t good enough.”
