What is the point of the Daily Telegraph?

 

The Daily Telegraph asked today, with an air of mockery and condescension, “What is the point of the Liberal Democrats?” It is a question that tells us far more about the Telegraph than about the party it seeks to dismiss. Once a serious conservative newspaper, the Telegraph has increasingly become a vehicle for grievance, culture-war sensationalism, and ideological nostalgia. Its critique of the Liberal Democrats is less an analysis than a reflex: liberalism bad, Europe worse, nuance intolerable.

The Liberal Democrats, whatever one thinks of their electoral fortunes, are easy to caricature if one ignores history, policy, and principle. The Telegraph’s column does all three. It presents the party as vaguely Europhile, politically redundant, and ideologically confused — a relic clinging to a worldview Britain has supposedly rejected. This narrative collapses on contact with reality.

The true test of a political party is not how loudly it shouts but whether it has been on the right side of the defining decisions of its era. On that measure, the Liberal Democrats’ record is notably stronger than that of either of the two larger parties — and stronger, too, than the editorial line of the Telegraph itself.

The Liberal Democrats opposed the invasion of Iraq when much of the political and media establishment cheered it on. That decision was not fashionable at the time; it was rooted in scepticism about executive power, a demand for evidence, and a refusal to confuse patriotism with obedience. History has judged that position kindly. The Telegraph’s cheerleading for the war has not aged well, and this cannot simply be dismissed as history when once again serious questions about the legitimacy and legality of an invasion is being questioned.

The Liberal Democrats opposed the reckless deregulation of finance that culminated in the 2008 crash, warning — again unfashionably — about systemic risk and the social consequences of casino capitalism. They warned about the erosion of civil liberties under successive governments, from identity cards to mass surveillance. They opposed Brexit not out of disdain for voters, as is lazily claimed, but because they understood — correctly — that it would weaken Britain economically, politically, and diplomatically.

Being right too early is not political irrelevance; it is political integrity.

Central to the Telegraph’s attack is a now-familiar caricature of the European Union: a foreign, anti-democratic superstate that Liberal Democrats supposedly worship out of naïve idealism or metropolitan snobbery. This is not analysis; it is dogma.

The EU is not perfect — no serious Liberal Democrat has ever claimed otherwise — but it is a voluntary association of democratic states pooling sovereignty in areas where cooperation delivers tangible benefits. The idea that Britain was “ruled” by Brussels was always a myth, one the Telegraph repeated so often it came to believe it. Laws were negotiated, not imposed; British ministers sat at the table; British MEPs voted on legislation. The EU constrained British governments in exactly the same way trade agreements and international law always do — by setting rules we agree to follow in exchange for access, stability, and influence.

Liberal Democrats understood that sovereignty in the modern world is not about theatrical gestures but about capacity: the ability to shape outcomes. Brexit did not restore sovereignty; it diminished it. Britain now follows many EU rules without a say, trades with more friction, and exerts less influence over its own neighbourhood. That outcome was not an accident. It was the logical result of the Telegraph’s long campaign to replace reality with grievance.

The Telegraph’s deeper hostility is not to the Liberal Democrats as a party but to liberalism itself. It treats the word as an insult — shorthand for weakness, decadence, and betrayal. Yet liberalism is not an eccentric doctrine imported from Brussels or California; it is one of Britain’s most enduring political traditions.

At its core, liberalism is about individual dignity, equality before the law, freedom of expression, and limits on state power. It is about toleration, pluralism, and the idea that no single group has a monopoly on national identity. These values are not “woke”; they are the foundation of a free society.

The Liberal Democrats are unapologetically liberal. They defend minority rights not because it is fashionable but because rights that depend on popularity are not rights at all. They support LGBTQ+ people, migrants and refugees not out of performative virtue but because equal citizenship demands it. They reject the politics of scapegoating because it corrodes social trust and distracts from real problems.

The Telegraph, by contrast, has increasingly embraced a worldview in which liberalism is treated as a pathology and intolerance is rebranded as common sense.

There was a time when the Daily Telegraph represented a thoughtful, intellectually serious conservatism. I could read it and, while not necessarily agreeing with its arguments, respect the journalism behind it. In what seems a different era, the Telegraph valued institutions, restraint and scepticism of demagoguery. It understood that patriotism did not require hostility to outsiders, and that disagreement did not require dehumanisation.

Today’s Telegraph increasingly mirrors the obsessions of populist insurgency: relentless hostility to Europe, moral panic about gender identity and a fixation on grievance framed as national decline. Articles about economic reform or social cohesion are crowded out by click-driven outrage and exaggerated threats to “common sense”.

The paper’s flirtation with Reform-style politics is not accidental. It reflects a shift from conservatism to reaction — from governing a diverse country to resenting it. In that context, Liberal Democrats are not merely opponents; they are symbols of everything the paper now despises: openness, compromise, and complexity.

Which brings us back to the original question — though not the one the Telegraph intended to ask.

What is the point of the Daily Telegraph today?

If it exists to inform readers honestly about the world, it is failing. If it exists to challenge power, it does so selectively, rarely turning its scepticism on movements it favours. If it exists to foster debate, it increasingly prefers mockery to argument and insinuation to evidence.

A newspaper that treats cooperation as betrayal, pluralism as weakness and liberal democracy as an elite conspiracy is not performing a public service. It is cultivating resentment. When fear of cultural change replaces economic analysis, when trans people become a punchline and migrants a menace, journalism slides into activism — and not the admirable kind.

Multi-party politics is not a bug; it is a feature of a plural society. Millions of voters do not see themselves reflected in either a socially conservative Labour Party a nationalist-tinged Conservative one or Nigel Farage's Reform. They want competence without cruelty, reform without rupture, and internationalism without naivety. That space is real, and it is growing.

Liberal Democrats have been effective locally, influential in Parliament, and crucial in holding governments to account — from exposing surveillance overreach to blocking the worst excesses of authoritarian legislation. They articulate a vision of Britain that is outward-looking, socially liberal, and economically responsible. That vision has not failed; it has been repeatedly vindicated — not least at the last election in which is secured its best ever result since 1918. The Telegraph dismisses 72 MPs as an irrelevance for no other reason than it would like them to be.

While the Telegraph portrays liberalism as an elite affectation, disconnected from “real” Britain, it is its own worldview that increasingly feels anachronistic — trapped in a nostalgic fantasy of sovereignty, homogeneity, and cultural stasis.

Britain is diverse. It is interconnected. Its future depends on cooperation, not isolation; on evidence, not vibes; on inclusion, not exclusion. Liberal Democrats accept that reality. The Telegraph resents it.

In asking what the point of the Liberal Democrats is, the paper inadvertently invites a more uncomfortable question about itself. A newspaper that once prided itself on reason has abandoned it for outrage. One that once defended liberty now routinely undermines it. One that once championed debate now prefers derision.

If the Liberal Democrats’ purpose is to stand for liberal democracy when it is under attack, then that purpose has rarely been clearer.

And if the Daily Telegraph no longer recognises the value of that, perhaps it is time to ask — sincerely this time — what its point now is.