This is the third in a series of articles looking at the state of Thanet's politics in the run up to the 2010 elections. This post will look at the Thanet Liberal Democrat showing.

This Thanet Liberal Democrat article was inspired by Thanet and the general election and how the two main parties are using the internet by Michael Child.

We currently have exactly zero Liberal Democrat's in Thanet at any level. Just a year ago Labour and Conservative had written them off as an irrelevance and then they showed up for the Dane Valley by-election.

Thanet Liberal Democrat came from nowhere to come a close second in the Dane Valley by-election an onslaught against which Thanet's Labour party managed to not loose ground to but the Thanet Conservative Party were humiliated by.

This mass desertion locally from Thanet Conservative to Thanet Liberal Democrat may yet hand Thanet District Council to Labour but this is by no means a done deal. If Thanet Liberal Democrats are able to up their game they could see Thanet District Council in their hands or maybe more realistically in a join coalition with Labour.

Without the years of public failures and disappointments to slow them down Thanet Liberal Democrat candidates will have the best of all head-starts. I think I'd like to see them take a few safe seats from both parties just to shake things up a bit and focus councilors and MPs alike back tot he task of serving the people rather than themselves.

After the radical gains that the Liberal Democrats made in Thanet during 2009 I fully expect that Thanet will see a Liberal Democrat entry or two on the Councilors by party section of the Thanet District Council website. This is no bad thing with Conservatives overly confident in their power and Labour patting themselves on the back for victories handed to them only by Conservative failure the council is crying out for something fresh.

Could the Thanet Liberal Democrat group bring this freshness or is the ready and able third option just going to be more of the same?

It is too early to tell yet but I can predict that Thanet Conservative will continue to hemorrhage votes to Thanet Liberal Democrat right through 2010 with little hope of stopping. If Thanet Liberal Democrat are able to tempt away Labour voters too we could see a paradigm shift in Thanet Politics but this is not something I am expecting.

How will I vote in 2010? Will I vote for Liberal Democrats to rule Thanet? I am not sure yet. I'd like to see what they have to say for themselves before I even start to consider where my vote will go.

What about you? What are your predictions for Thanet's Liberal Democrats in 2010?