David Cameron and Nick Clegg. Photo credit: The Cabinet Office
The background
Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg’s declared this weekend that he would be prepared to form a coalition with Labour after the next General Election. Clegg’s party are currently one half of the UK’s Conservative/Lib Dem Coalition government.
Asked by the People if he could do business with Ed Miliband, Clegg replied: “Yes. If the British people said that the only combination which could work would be those two parties, in the same way as after the last election the only combination which could work was Conservatives and Liberal Democrats, it would be obvious that Liberal Democrats would need to do their duty.”
Clegg’s potential openness to a coalition with Labour is not shared by Labour leader Ed Miliband. He told The Independent that he would find it “difficult to work with” Clegg, an “accomplice” to the Tories. Meanwhile, 69-year old Business Secretary Vince Cable has declared his openess to becoming Lib Dem leader. He told The Financial Times that “the worship of youth has diminished — perhaps generally — in recent years” and voters have a renewed respect for “people who have had some insight into what is going on” (i.e. Vince Cable).
Clegg has stabbed Cameron in the back because he’s a desperate man
Writing at The Week UK, The Mole said that Clegg “has plunged a carving knife into David Cameron’s back to keep his post as Deputy Prime Minister.” The writer said that Clegg’s comments represent a “complete volte face, which the Tories will regard as an act of treachery.” “And the reason for this stabbing?” questioned The Mole. “Clegg is beginning to fear his days are numbered after Miliband and Ed Balls let it be known that Clegg would have to go, if they do a deal with the Lib Dems.” If MPs were at Westminster, “instead of lying in the sun on the beaches of Europe, there would be a full-scale crisis of confidence in the coalition as a result of this jockeying for position by Cable and Clegg,” insisted The Mole, which forecast that Cameron will have to launch a Cabinet reshuffle “to save his own skin.”
Miliband’s chances of becoming PM just shot up
George Eaton at The Staggers, The New Statesman’s rolling politics blog, said Clegg’s declaration was “significant because it was at odds with much of what he’s previously said on the subject.” Eaton insisted that Miliband would only countenance a ‘progressive alliance’ with the Lib Dems if Clegg were no longer leader. “Since there is a good chance the next election will result in another hung parliament, Clegg and Miliband’s comments are more significant than they may appear. It is worth noting, for instance, that Miliband has never ruled out working with Vince Cable, who openly displayed his leadership ambitions this weekend. … Should Cable lead the Lib Dems into the next election (with Clegg perhaps returning to Brussels to serve as the UK’s EU commissioner), it would significantly increase Ed Miliband’s chances of becoming prime minister.”
Cable’s re-emergence is a big deal
Writing at leading Tory blog ConservativeHome, Tim Montgomerie said that, “for Cameron it means that a Tory majority has to be his aim at the next election” given that “the chances of Cable choosing Cameron over Miliband as coalition partner are very small in the event of a hung parliament where Lib/Lab or Lib/Con pacts are both possible.” Montgomerie noted that Tory members may put Mr Cable at the bottom of the Cabinet league table “but enough of the general public have a different view. Cable’s re-emergence really is a significant political moment.”
