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David Warburton surprised nobody in Westminster by standing down on Saturday, fourteen months after losing the Tory whip. For more than a year it’s been clear that a by-election was looming in Somerton and Frome. Yet you wouldn’t know it judging from the quality of the local Lib Dem candidate there, Sarah Dyke. She has given a car crash interview to the Guardian politics podcast – hardly the most challenging of outlets. Asked by the amiable John Harris about deprivation in the area she replied that she had drunk her coffee a bit too fast, before asking:

What do you want to know? Something that’s a subject I don’t know anything about … I mean there’s pockets of deprivation. I mean, what can we say on that really? … I don’t feel that I’m prepared at all for this, Ami [the Lib Dem press officer]. And it’s all getting a little bit above my station, sorry.

The press officer in question suggests getting the candidate a glass of water before the interview is terminated. Ouch. Given the dire state of the polls, Dyke is odds on to romp home in this true blue Tory safe seat. Mr S is sure that her fellow politicians in Westminster will enjoy hearing similarly thoughtful contributions from the tongue-tied Lib Dem in future.

You can listen to the excruciating clip below….

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