If you don't think politics matters this is what you get: the Lib Dem campaign

AS I WATCHED the Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey treat the first week of the general election campaign like an episode of Total Wipeout, I thought of the old joke about a floating voter wandering into Liberal Democrat HQ.

- Tanya Gold

"I'd like a copy of your manifesto". "I am very terribly, sir, but we've sold out." "Everyone knows that! But I would still like a copy of your manifesto!"

Now the theoretical voter has the manifesto. Sir Ed is running on trivia and grins. It is gruesome to type out his campaign strategy, but I do, because politics is not the only thing that has declined in seriousness. At the unveiling of the Lib Dem battle bus, journalists were given prosecco, puzzles and party poppers: a Saga daytrip having a final thrill on the way to the grave.

Sir Ed fell off a paddleboard in Lake Windermere to express agony at sewage. Then he rode a bicycle down a hill in Knighton, Powys, sticking his legs out like the boy in Goodnight Mister Tom, possibly to say something about decarbonisation. Then he went down Ultimate Slip'n'Slide in Frome, Somerset, to well, I'm not sure.