It’s a gaffe a day in British politics, as poorly-planned campaign visits are fast turning party leaders into laughing stocks. The latest victim is none other than Sir Ed Davey, who is currently on a UK tour to spread the word that the Liberal Democrats are putting the issue of sewage dumping at the top of their manifesto.
This morning, Davey joined local MP Tim Farron on a constituency visit to Windermere in the Lake District to campaign on water cleanliness. For that reason alone — never mind the fact that the Lib Dem leader is not exactly an, um, experienced paddleboarder — it’s certainly rather brave of Sir Ed to take to the lake. But the trip hasn’t gotten off to the best of starts. While taking a paddleboard out on the water on live television might have seemed like a fun idea initially, Mr S is rather confused (and not for the first time this election season) precisely what his comms team was thinking. The watersport novice’s ropey attempts meant that rather than focusing exclusively on the content of his campaign, the BBC reported, mid-fall, that Davey has so far managed to capsize his paddleboard a grand total of, er, five times. Goodness…
It’s not quite the take home message the Liberal Democrats would have hoped to have come from today’s visit. Davey remained in good spirits however, tweeting: ‘Still not as wet as Rishi Sunak.’ Ouch.
Watch the clip here:
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