Liberal Democrat fury at the behaviour of the prime minister is all over this
morning’s papers. They are not just blustering because they lost the referendum – although, obviously, there is an element of that. They are also genuinely outraged that Cameron used
the fact that Clegg compromised to form the coalition that put Cameron in Downing Street as a weapon against Clegg personally and the likelihood of more coalitions if the alternative vote won. One
anonymous Lib Dem puts it like this to my colleague Andrew Rawnsley:
I am a journalist not a clairvoyant, and do not know whether we will look back on the aftermath of the AV referendum as the beginning of the break up of this government. But I do know that Cameron has injected poison into his cabinet, and that he did not need to do it.“For the Conservatives, having asked us to make these compromises, then to attack us for making compromises, is breathtakingly hypocritical. There’s bound to be payback. Some of it in unpredictable ways. David Cameron has made a big, big mistake. The coalition is going to be much less trusting. We’re no longer doing business with someone whom we think is honest and decent. We’re dealing with someone whom we think is Robert Maxwell.”
If the AV race had been tight, dirty tricks and character assassination would have been understandable. But the race was not at all tight. Cameron was cruising to a crushing victory. He might have been magnanimous and settled for winning by 60/40 rather than 69/31.
Instead he got greedy and did not restrain himself or his troops as they scrambled for every last vote.
Silly man. One day he will regret preferring short-term advantage to long-term gain.
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