One hundred days
Peter Hoskin 3:35pm
What’s the verdict, then, on Nick Clegg’s first 100 days as Lib Dem leader? Not good, I’d say. Sure, he got off to a solid start – making positive noises on public service reform and the economy. But things went rapidly awry with his appalling actions over the Lisbon Treaty. The bizarre way in which he forced his MPs to back down from a manifesto commitment has quite rightly attracted a lot of negative press. And there will be few more embarrassing incidents than that orchestrated walk-out in this – or in any other – Parliament.
What’s more, the subsequent recovery attempt hasn’t been all that impressive. Clegg’s started to peddle the anti-Westminster approach (Exhibit A: his interview on the Today Programme this morning), which – whilst laudable in itself – comes across as him riding on David Cameron’s coat-tails. Also, his Orange Book reform agenda seems to have been buried, perhaps in the face of internal party opposition. (Although we must award him plus marks for agreeing to a Coffee House Q&A).
Fortunately for Clegg, though, it’s only been 100 days. There is – one assumes – time for him to turn things around. He has a lifeline in the shape of the local elections, in which the Lib Dems have tended to perform quite well in recent times. A good set of results in May could be the perfect platform from which the Lib Dem leader can launch a more successful second hundred days. On the other side of the same coin, a bad set of results and Team Clegg might start getting very nervous indeed.
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Comments
salieri
March 27th, 2008 6:24pmThe plus marks for agreeing to field Coffee House questions - not all of them polite - should be in double figures. What about extending the same invitation to Mr. McBean - or would any one of his answers make your website crash overnight?
progressive pest
March 27th, 2008 7:04pmif you lads at the spectator's aren't that pleased with him , all the better for his centre-left credentials.
Liberal Lemon
March 27th, 2008 8:03pmI regret it but being pleasent, inoffensive and good on TV will get you a long way in politics. he's added a little over 2% to the Lib Dem rating in 100 days by not saying much but being visible. He won't get us back to pre iraq levels without substantial meat though. I'm also unconvinced he can ride the anti politics tide given his back ground. he looks a little to clean.
Jessica
March 27th, 2008 8:17pmWho cares about Clegg or the liberals I thought this was meant to be a conservative publication, cant we support our own!
Nick Kaplan
March 27th, 2008 9:02pmProgressive pest; I won’t dispute the latter part of your name, but one thing that has always annoyed me is how the left have monopolised the term progressive. As if ludicrous economic policies leading to stagnation, inflation, subsidised unemployment, protectionism, legalised robbery (redistribution is a horrifyingly misleading term, wealth is not initially distributed, it is earned!), red tape and a myriad of other evils, combined with cultural and moral relativism destroying any sense of personal responsibility or morality, anti-patriotism (or multiculturalism) leading to the decline in national identity and deeply patronising nannying by an overgrown leftist state (all of which are key features of the ‘progressive’ left) are anything but regressive for both society and for individual liberty. Pestering yes, progressive.... I think not.
Nicholas
March 28th, 2008 7:46amNick Kaplan well bowled sir!