Home > Alex Massie

Monday 21 May 2012

Everyone Says a Tory-Lib Dem Deal is Impossible; Everyone is Wrong

Sunday, 25th April 2010

I am not surprised that Paddy Ashdown says the Liberal Democrats cannot work with the Conservatives. He would say that wouldn't he? After all, Ashdown came close to selling his party to New Labour, lock, stock and barrel.

Nevertheless, the idea that the Tories and Liberals cannot work together (though doggedly contested by this blog and a few others) is by now Westminster's latest piece of Conventional Wisdom*. I doubt that Andrew Neil likes to think of himself as a purveyor of the CW but there you have it: even he thinks a Con-Lib arrangement highly improbable.

Guido thinks differently and so do I. True, Nick Clegg would need to secure the agreement of his party before making any deal with Cameron and true too that this is usually seen as a major obstacle. However Clegg has already begun the business of burying Labour which itself opens the door towards either a formal or informal arrangement with the Conservatives. The latter strikes me as being preferable, not least since the Orange Bookers could be useful in keeping the Tories honest.

Sure the sandal-wearing georgraphy teachers that make up much of the Lib Dems' membership might be unhappy with any Tory-Liberal deal but their voices are not the only ones Clegg needs to listen to. Whereas a poll last year found Lib Dem councillors preferring a deal with Labour by a two to one margin an ICM poll conducted in August 2009 reported that 61% of those people who voted Lib Dem in 2005 prefer to deal with the Tories and just 26% would rather sleep with Labour.

Perhaps those numbers are now out of date but I see no reason why Labour's charms should have grown more alluring since last summer. Quite the contrary in fact.

Clegg should be able to go to his party and make a decent case that having delivered the Liberals' best result in 80 years he and his judgement should be backed and, furthermore, the mood of the country as a whole and the opinions of the people who voted Lib Dem should be considered important enough to trump the petty indulgences of Liberal Democrat activists and other loons. A general rule: when choosing between screwing the public and screwing the base, successful political parties screw the base.

Power is a tempting thing and it takes a strange kind of politician and party to turn it down. Why should anyone take the Lib Dems seriously if given the chance to govern they decide they'd rather, actually, you know, decline that opportunity?

Depsite the difficulties the argument for a formal coalition, rather than an unofficial arrangement, remains strong. The hurdles are not insurmountable and many more improbable and bizarre coalitions have been formed in other jurisdictions. Don't believe people who say it can't happen. It can.

*An exception: Matt d'Ancona's thoroughly sensible column on the subject.

Filed under: Coalition (2076 more articles) , Election 2010 (599 more articles) , Lib Dems (101 more articles) , Tories (273 more articles)

Previous Back to Alex Massie Next

Blogs: Martin Bright | Susan Hill | Melanie Phillips | Coffee House | Faith Based

Actions: Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comments (11)

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

Post comment

Rhoda Klapp

April 25th, 2010 5:20pm Report this comment

We'll find out what's unthinkable and what turns out to be possible when we see the seat numbers. Before then, it's all pointless speculation. Which is just another way of saying journalism, I suppose.

(I hope the useless tories win just enough seats to tell Clegg and his prostitute crew where to stick it.)

THX1138

April 25th, 2010 5:21pm Report this comment

Exactly wot I want a Con - Lib Dem pact, we get all the good things about Dave and the W11 modernisers and it keeps the anti EU, anti AGW Tory , anti Immigration "nutters" on the fringe. Perfect!

Beefeater

April 25th, 2010 5:46pm Report this comment

Yes, maybe they sleep together. But what would the offspring be?

paulg

April 25th, 2010 5:56pm Report this comment

Well we know that a lot of you guys on the libertarian wing on the conservative party(personally, i think thats just a fancy word for degenerate), would jump into bed with any one.

But most of us are conservatives: and we would not even consider it.

We'd prefer if the conservative party fight to defend the perogatives and liberties of the English people and; that is defending whats left of precious little of both.

daniel maris

April 25th, 2010 10:22pm Report this comment

Co-operation is not an impossibility. Coalition is.

I suspect Clegg would offer limited support for a limited period (maybe 1-2 years) in return for an inquiry into electoral reform. The Tories and Lib Dems do have a common interest in reforming the system.

Regarding electoral reform, is there any reason in this day and age why MPs shoudl not weild variable votes, according to the size of their electorate, so if the electorate is 10% above the average, they wield a vote of 1.1 and if it is 10% below, they wield a vote of 0.9. That would seem like a sensible reform to me. The Tories might also go with a reduction in the no. of seats combined with a supplementary bloc of members elected on regional PR lists.

This would be in their interests rather than Labour AV - an invitation to pro-Labour tactical voting.

Ben G

April 25th, 2010 10:41pm Report this comment

But if the most important policy area for the next few years is the economic recovery, how will Liberal economic policy ever marry with Tory economic policy?

Fergus Pickering

April 26th, 2010 4:07am Report this comment

Ben G, what IS Liberal economic policy? Whatever Uncle Vince says it is this week?

David Ossitt

April 26th, 2010 9:45am Report this comment

THX1138

“Exactly wot I want a Con - Lib Dem pact, we get all the good things about Dave and the W11 modernisers and it keeps the anti EU, anti AGW Tory , anti Immigration "nutters" on the fringe. Perfect!”

From a Blair loving turncoat this is proof positive that you are a political harlot.

AxelDC

April 26th, 2010 2:08pm Report this comment

Analyzing the polls from now and 2005, the only swing is from Labour to Lib Dems. The Tories are polling about where they were in 2005, so Cameron is basically profiting from Labour's fall, but has found little new converts. You would think that with Labour so unappealing, he would be closer to 40% now.

Since most of the boost in the LD is from disaffected Labour voters, propping up Gordie Brown is a bad idea. If I've abandoned Labour, it's not because I want GB back at No. 10.

The big obstacle is that the Tories will never back electoral reform, since they never get over 40% of the vote. The LDs have been getting less than half their share of the seats because of FPP, and if Labour finishes 3rd in votes but 1st in seats, the perversity of the system will be obvious to the most casual observer.

GM

April 26th, 2010 2:57pm Report this comment

You're wrong, sadly. It isn't the sandal wearing geography teachers in the Lib Dems who are the problem - although they would, it is true, be strenuously opposed. It is the Tory Party's own head-banging right-wing, who already think Cameron is too much of a leftie, who would kick up merry hell and probably try and oust him as soon as he so much as spoke to Nick Clegg. Cameron needs a majority, no matter how wafer thin, because he is finished as leader if he doesn't get it. And that includes in the circumstances of merely being the largest party. When the Tory Party replaces him for not winning, can you imagine Liam Fox doing a deal with the Liberals?