The eclipse of the Liberal party by Labour in the early 20th century was likened at the time to the fate of a healthy pedestrian mown down by a runaway omnibus. John Maynard Keynes, meanwhile, was always suspicious that “the Labour party’s secret sympathy with the policy of catastrophe is the worm which gnaws at the seaworthiness of any constructive vessel which it may launch”.

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As someone who had – until last year – spent his whole adult life as a Labour party member, and even stood for parliament as a Labour candidate, it is difficult for me to admit that I agree with these sentiments. For most of its history as the main alternative to Conservative rule in the UK, Labour has disappointed. And it has gone into meltdown every time it has lost office.

Lurches to the anti-capitalist left undermine its credibility and are then overcompensated for by lurches to the authoritarian right, leaving festering political wounds.

Contrast this with the Liberal supremacy of the 19th century, which locked the Tories out of government for decades and fundamentally reformed the United Kingdom.

When you add to its unreliable temperament the fact that Labour is a product of the industrial revolution, religious nonconformism and empire, it is hard to escape the conclusion that it really is out of place in 21st-century Britain, irreparably split between its socialist and trade unionist identities at a time when fewer and fewer people identify with either.

Labour always forgets how highly the British value competence and coherence in their political leaders

But I would go further and argue that Labour’s continued existence is now actually frustrating the cause of progressive politics, in England especially.

In its endless ideological wars, Labour always forgets how highly the British value competence and coherence in their political leaders. If presented with a disciplined Tory option, well to their right, and a leftwing shambles closer to their views, it seems many Brits will vote Tory. So we keep ending up with unrepresentatively rightwing governments. And by refusing to countenance electoral reform, Labour keeps the Tories in business as the default governing party in Britain.

Somehow we have to break this pattern. Austerity and neoliberalism aren’t working for Britain, or for continental Europe. But it is critical that we overcome the association in many voters’ minds between smart fiscal interventionism and socialist recklessness.

On the other hand, more central government control of the economy is unlikely to be the right idea for the information economy. But the thought of the Labour party embracing, for example, social entrepreneurialism, the circular economy or the digital revolution (“socialism with an iPad”) is somewhat risible.

Labour is now a party of flag-wavers, just as wedded to statism as ever: well meaning and socially engaged, for sure, but not problem-solvers. And I fear that by conflating “Keynesianism” with Chávismo, Corbyn’s Labour is now undermining those of us seeking a hearing for left liberalism among a sceptical electorate.

To be fair to them, though, you can see where the Corbynites are coming from. Labour professes to be a socialist party, and last year it elected a socialist leader. There is something going wrong when this can trigger such a violent reaction from its MPs. The left is very fond of pointing out contradictions. It should look in the mirror.

So, rather than seek to undermine a leader with an anti-capitalist mandate, I decided that I would leave Labour and join the Liberal Democrats. On civil liberties and foreign policy especially, I never fitted in on the Labour right either. So there was nowhere left for a pretty uncomplicated social liberal such as myself to go.

For sure, the task ahead for the Lib Dems is massive. But for mistakes over tuition fees to sink the political tradition of Mill, Gladstone, Lloyd George, Beveridge, Keynes, Grimond, Jenkins and Kennedy would be disastrous. And the fundamentals are with us. Young people are increasingly liberal, traditional class identifications are breaking down, and (under any leader) Labour is going to find it fantastically difficult to win a majority of seats in England.

So electoral reform will probably be in its interests too (remember, fewer than 1m votes separated the Labour and Lib Dem vote-share in England in 2010). With a more proportional electoral system in place, perhaps we will finally see that long-awaited realignment of the left at the same time, as we see the UK move towards federalism or break-up. But I am not going to wait around for that. British liberals need to be confident and coherent right now – not hide behind socialism. And I feel proud to be a signed-up member of the rehabilitation effort.