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[/audioplayer]One of the most remarkable features of this parliament has been the sangfroid of the Liberal Democrats. Nothing seems to shake them. The mood of the two main parties is often dictated by the latest opinion polls, but the Liberal Democrats simply laugh off each record low. They weren’t even rattled by the British Election Study, which claimed that on its current performance the party will only win one seat.
What explains this calmness under fire? First, the Lib Dems are determined not to give the media the pleasure of seeing them squeal. Secondly, they know that national polls miss important parts of the story. The Liberal Democrats have collapsed where they don’t have an MP — in the Rochester by-election, they received less than 1 per cent of the vote. But where they do have seats, they are still fighting hard. Moreover, they have confidence in their strategy. They believe that when voters expect a hung parliament, worry about Labour’s capacity to run the country and distrust the Tories’ motives, the Lib Dems will prove attractive.
But the strategy has hit a major snag: they are being written out of the election script. The SNP has taken the role that the Lib Dems were expecting to play. When the two Eds, Miliband and Balls, and other members of the shadow cabinet appear on television, they are grilled not on their terms for a deal with the Lib Dems but on whether they could make common cause with the SNP. Nicola Sturgeon’s speech in London last week, reiterating the nationalists’ demands in the event of a hung parliament, eclipsed Nick Clegg’s attempt to set out his priorities.
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