LIBERAL Democrats Winning Here – that line has been on many of our poster boards up and down the UK during various elections in the last 20 years but, let’s be honest, it has become a bit of an oxymoron more recently!

Where once we held cities such as Bath, Taunton, Sheffield and Liverpool, they all came crashing down as the party went into coalition government. Our councillors reduced from the thousands to the hundreds, and at the last general election the number of MPs was slashed from 57 to 8. A painful night and I should know because I was one of them, narrowly losing to my Conservative opponent.

It appears, however, that there is life in the party yet. Local election academic pollsters Rallings and Thrasher recently predicted the party could see an upswing, winning 100 new council seats on May 4 with Labour and Ukip being the biggest losers. And even in Brighton where there are no elections, over 250 new members have joined the Liberal Democrats since the last general election.

Locally the main battle ground next month is the election for East Sussex County Council. And though predicting outcomes in politics can be a mug’s game, particularly nowadays, I’m prepared to stick my neck out.

Ukip and Labour will lose seats, the Tories will lose a few and gain a few, while the Lib Dems will gain seats without losing any. And as I’m chairing our county council campaign, I think I have my finger on the political pulse.

But when it comes to predicting the results across the UK with any degree of accuracy, where is Mystic Meg when you need her?

Stephen Lloyd is a former Liberal Democrat MP for Eastbourne