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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: It has been a pretty good week for the Liberal Democrats, the party’s share of the vote in the Witney by-election shot up to 30% from 6.7% leaving its leader Tim Farron to claim that they are the comeback kids but is that a fair assessment?  Well Tim Farron joins me now from his constituency in lovely Kendal, a very good morning to you Mr Farron. Comeback kids, you also gushed you are back in the political big time, wouldn’t the former Prime Minister whose seat it was say something like ‘Calm down dear, you only finished second’?

TIM FARRON: Well indeed, the result in Witney was a stunningly good one for us all the same, we went up as you say from six and a half to thirty percent and leaping up from fourth to second, going over UKIP and Labour to give the Tories a good run for their money.  It was of course the 10th safest Tory seat in England, I still think however if you had given us another week or two we might well have nicked it, it felt like the momentum was absolutely with us in that campaign but if it was just in Witney that this was happening then calm down dear would probably be a fair thing to say to me but if you look around the country every single Thursday there are council by-elections and since May the Liberal Democrats have gained 21 seats from other parties and no other major party has gained a single seat from anybody so it does really feel as though we have turned a corner and are coming back.  I think also given our stance fighting for the right kind of deal for Britain if we leave the European Union, so that the government doesn’t if you like steal the votes of the 52% and make out they somehow voted something extreme that nearly all of them did not vote for, that kind of position and standing up for our health service and working hard for people and being the decent opposition that I think people in this country believe that we need, those things are playing in our favour at the moment.

DM: Does it give it a sense, Tim Farron, of how you might fight a next general election as the Liberal Democrats, you would target those areas that voted against Brexit, is that where the future lies for the Lib Dems?

TIM FARRON: No, I think that would be far too simplistic.  If you look at the gains we’ve made in the last three or four months, they have come pretty evenly from places that voted leave and places that voted remain and in Witney itself, I of course came across many voters who voted for us because of our position on Europe and our belief that Europe should have a strong role and be outward looking  and be open and tolerant as a country and linked in with its neighbours but I also came across people who voted leave and who voted Liberal Democrat because they felt Theresa May, David Davis and co were effectively stealing their vote and turning it into something else, people who felt that they voted to leave the EU but not to leave the single market and they were very worried about what the extreme position the Conservative government is taking will mean for their businesses and their jobs.  So our pitch is very much to people across the country however you voted on 23rd June and saying look, we all agree surely that Britain needs a strong decent alternative to the Conservatives.  The Labour party have shuffled off into a form of irrelevance, we will fill the space that needs to be occupied by a decent opposition.  

DM: Mr Farron, are you putting the party on election alert then?  There are suggestions that if Theresa May loses this Article 50 court case or something like that, she could go to the country sooner rather than later.

TIM FARRON: Well we took the view at the point that Theresa May became Prime Minister that she ought to have gone for an early election, in fact an early election that probably would have taken place last week.  We are therefore prepared for an early election, we think the country should have one specifically because of Theresa May’s lack of a mandate herself personally and the way in which the Conservative government’s whole agenda has completely been turned on its head since 23rd June in a way that nobody voted for in May 2015.  So yes, we are ready whenever it comes, whether it’s the election soon in the next six or nine months or whether it be an election in three and a half years as scheduled in 2020.  Either way what this country really needs is a decent strong alternative to the Conservatives, the Labour party have chosen not to provide it by going off to the margins and it’s bad for Britain, bad for our democracy – even if you support the Conservatives I’m sure you agree it’s bad for Britain and bad for our democracy for there not to be a strong energetic alternative and that’s what we seek to be.  

DM: You keep using that word democracy don’t you Mr Farron but isn’t the thorn in your side this call for a second referendum on the EU?  That’s been decided and a lot of Lib Dems voted to leave the EU, about a third of them.  

TIM FARRON: Democracy means that you don’t impose a deal that none of us know what it looks like and as we are seeing day by day, could end up being potentially catastrophic for everybody in this country.  You don’t impose a deal on the British people without them having their say and I accept the referendum result, however narrow, in June gave the government a mandate to negotiate our exit from the European Union, it did not give them a mandate to impose upon the British people something they didn’t vote for and as I say, I came across many people in Witney who had voted leave in June and voted Liberal Democrat last Thursday because they are very angry that Theresa May is imposing upon them an exit from the single market which will damage their jobs, their businesses, make their local shop prices and petrol prices go up and so on.  That should not be imposed on them.  What started with democracy in June should not end up with a stitch up.

DM: Mr Farron, we must end it there, thank you  very much indeed, leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron there.