Nick clegg

Thursday

The Tory right are the true liberals of this parliament 

In yesterday’s speech to commemorate 12 months of the coalition, Nick Clegg promised a stronger liberal identity in the future. His party was ‘not left, ‘not right’ but ‘liberal’ and would judge other parties by their commitment to liberalism. Above all, and despite professed disavowal of tribal politics, he claimed that the Lib-Dems were ‘more committed at heart to fairness than the Conservatives’. Critics of the coalition on the Tory backbenches are often dismissed as the Tory Right, a term intended to paint them as disgruntled reactionaries who can’t reconcile themselves to partnership with the Lib-Dems. But a closer look at the issues being raised by the Tory rebels shows

Wednesday

Jonathan Jones

The Coffee House A-Z of the Coalition: T-Z

Here are letters T to Z in our A-Z guide the coalition’s first year. A-F are here. G-M are here. And N-S are here. T is for Tuition fees “Broken promises, there have been too many in the last few years.” So said Nick Clegg in a Liberal Democrat video during the last election campaign. It was favourite theme of his — and one that he deployed both during the TV debates and in signing a pledge to scrap tuition fees. This was to be a New Politics. Clegg was to be its champion. Shame it didn’t quite work like that. The coalition agreement was damaging enough to Clegg’s aura:

Jonathan Jones

The Coffee House A-Z of the Coalition: N-S

Here are letters N to S in our A-Z guide the coalition’s first year. A-F are here. G-M are here. N is for No Nothing has frayed coalition relations quite like the AV referendum has. This was always going to be the case, but the viciousness it inspired has still been fairly shocking. Need we remind you of Chris Huhne’s outburst in Cabinet last week? Or of George Osborne’s stinging riposte? Even David Cameron seems to have relished taking it out on his coalition stablemates, trashing their pet policies with a vigour that would have been unthinkable only a few months ago. As Tim Montgomerie reveals in his exhaustive guide

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

Lib Dem polarity

For the Lib Dems this was the first day of the afterlife. Booted off the AV-train which was supposed to fast-track them to power, the minority party now looks politically homeless. Everyone in parliament makes jokes about them but the gags never raise a laugh. Pity intervenes. At today’s session Ed Miliband was haranguing Cameron for ‘dumping on’ his ministers as soon as their policies run into trouble when he broke off to indulge in a Lib Dem-kicking moment which he felt would cheer his troops. ‘And the poor deputy prime minister,’ chortled Miliband, ‘gets dumped on every day of the week!’ Sad laughter followed. No one’s heart was in

James Forsyth James Forsyth

A mixed bag for the coalition at PMQs 

So much for the de-Flashmaning project. At PMQs, a tetchy Cameron doled out his usual number of insults, comparing Ed Miliband to Eddie the Eagle Edwards. Frankly, I don’t think this really matters as long as Cameron appears to be in control of his temper, which isn’t always the case. But Ed Miliband definitely raised a chuckle when he told Cameron to ‘calm down, dear.’ But, perhaps, the most noticeable thing about today’s PMQs was the behaviour of the Liberal Democrats. Nick Clegg joined in with all the jeering at the Labour front bench, something which he very conspicuously didn’t do in the last few weeks. Chris Huhne happily chatted

Jonathan Jones

The Coffee House A-Z of the Coalition: A-F

The coalition is 1 today. Unfortunately, we can’t serve jelly and ice cream over the internet — but we can write an A-Z to mark the first year of Cameron and Clegg’s union. Below is the first part of that, covering the letters A to F. But, first, a little piece of political nostalgia for CoffeeHousers. A year ago today, this happened: And now for the A-Z… A is for Andrew Lansley Rap John Healey, make way for MC NxtGen. The Loughborough rapper may not be part of Her Majesty’s Most Loyal Opposition, but his three-minute denunciation of the coalition’s health reforms — video above — did the job better

Tuesday

Peter Hoskin

Breaking Laws | 10 May 2011

When David Laws resigned from government last year, his return was thought to be only a matter of time. Today, it is looking considerably more indefinite. Not only has Cameron been talking down the prospect of a reshuffle any time soon, but the Evening Standard is reporting that Laws has been found guilty of breaching six — six! — Commons rules related to his expense claims. No word, yet, on the details, or whether there will be any formal punishment for the former Chief Sec. But it doesn’t look good for him, nor for his ministerial prospects in the short-term. Sky’s Sophy Ridge tweets that certain Lib Dems are “still

Monday

Daniel Korski

Can Lansley stay?

The Prime Minister, it seems, is now finally accepting what everyone else has been saying for a long time: that the NHS reforms were dangerous and would hurt the government. If Nick Clegg forced a re-think — even one that is supported by many Tories — then he may, in the end, play a greater part in delivering the next election for Cameron’s party than many triumphalist right-wingers now realise. For CameronCare was badly-timed, poorly-delivered and strikes at the heart of the PM’s message that the Conservative Party can be trusted. Large-scale reforms need time. Time for people to accept a problem. Time for people to accept the solution.  Where

Sunday

James Forsyth

Why Clegg will get his way on NHS reform

On Andrew Marr this morning, Nick Clegg made clear that changes to the NHS bill are his new priority. He said that there would be ‘substantial’ changes to it and declared that ‘no bill is better than a bad bill.’ I suspect that Clegg will get what he wants on the NHS bill. When I spoke to one senior Clegg ally after the AV vote, I was told that Number 10 is ‘conceding everything to us in that area.’ My source went on to say that because of the Tories’ traditional weakness on the the NHS, the Tories ‘are mortally afraid of a row over the NHS with us on

Saturday

James Forsyth

The winners and losers from Thursday’s elections

After every election, the political stock exchange goes into a frenzy trying to work out who is a buy and who is a sell. Thirty-six hours after the polls closed, it is a little clearer who the winners and losers of this election season have been. Here are our selections: Winners Alex Salmond, the biggest winner of Thursday night. Salmond has achieved what the Scottish electoral system was meant to prevent, an overall SNP majority in the Scottish parliament. Salmond now has the votes he needs for a referendum on independence. Even better for him because any referendum ordered by the Scottish parliament would be legally dubious — not that

Peter Hoskin

Weapons-grade Cable

Which Lib Dem can be rudest about the Tories? Chris Huhne, you must admit, gave it a decent shot yesterday, describing his parties’ “extraordinary anger” with their coalition stablemates. Even Nick Clegg had a go, with a little swipe at Thatcherism. But I reckon Vince Cable’s remarks this morning will take some beating. The Tories – on his utterly unscheming, non-partisan account – are “ruthless, calculating and very tribal”. Although he did add that, “that doesn’t mean to say we can’t work with them.” How very broadminded of him. The trick of the next few days will be sifting out the Lib-Con separations that have Downing Street’s blessing from those

Friday

Jonathan Jones

Clegg versus Huhne, at a local level

While the Lib Dems lost control of Nick Clegg’s city of Sheffield to Labour, losing 9 councillors, they won every seat up for election Chris Huhne’s constituency of Eastleigh. They even took Labour’s only council seat in the borough. It is worth remembering that the Lib Dems are waging very different types of battle in these two areas: against Labour in Sheffield and mainly the Tories in Eastleigh. Of all the Cabinet members, Huhne ran probably the most anti-Tory campaign in 2010, and many predicted a strong backlash against the Lib Dems in Eastleigh for going into coalition with them, perhaps with Labour supporters refusing to back them tactically over

Peter Hoskin

Surprise, surprise … the Lib Dems are taking a battering

If you fell asleep expecting heavy losses for the Lib Dems, then you will not have been disappointed upon waking up. At time of writing, around 100 English councils, comprising roughly 2,400 councillors, have declared their results – and the yellow brigade have already lost four of them, along with 270 councillors. There’s some way to go yet, so the picture could alter, but Labour appear to making sweeping gains, while the Tory vote is holding unexpectedly firm. As it stands, the local wing of Cameron’s party has actually gained a council, along with 22 councillors in the process. Stir in the likely result of the AV referendum, and the

Thursday

James Forsyth

It’s all over bar the counting

The polls have now closed tonight. But there’s no exit poll and no results are expected for a few hours yet. Indeed, I’m almost tempted to say we could do with some of those much talked about electronic counting machines. We are, though, already seeing recriminations over the AV vote. Paddy Ashdown, who is in very fiery form on Question Time, has already told The Guardian that ‘So far the coalition has been lubricrated by a large element of goodwill and trust. It is not any longer.’ In an attempt to bring the temperature down, a no gloating order has come down from Tory high command. Expect to hear an

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Calamity may lead to concessions for Clegg

If the expected happens today, the political debate will rapidly move to whether Cameron should offer some concessions to Clegg to bolster his position. I hear there are two camps in Downing Street on this question with Steve Hilton a particularly ardent advocate of the no more concessions line.   Hilton’s position may surprise some but makes sense when you consider how his public service reform programme has, as Ben Brogan writes today, already been diluted for political reasons.    My current expectation is that there won’t be many concessions to Clegg. One well placed Tory told me last night that “Clegg picked the question and the date. He can

Peter Hoskin

Election day is here at last

The usual form, on mornings such as these, is to put up a post setting the scene for the elections ahead – although, really, there’s not much more to add than was said yesterday. Apart from a readers’ survey in the Metro this morning, the only poll to hit after yesterday’s ICM bombshell is a YouGov one for the Sun, and it gives No a 20-point lead. Even given the complications of turnout and geography, it looks as though Team No are heading for a straightforward victory. As if to underline his increased personal involvement in the campaign, and perhaps tie himself that little bit closer to the eventual result,

Wednesday

James Forsyth

New ICM poll has No 36 — thirty six — points ahead

Tonight’s ICM poll is even worse for the Yes campaign than last night’s ComRes poll. The poll, in tomorrow’s Guardian, has Yes heading for defeat by a margin of more than two-to-one and in every single region of the country. The turnout adjusted numbers are No 68, Yes 32. If these last two polls are accurate, and it is difficult to estimate what the turnout will be tomorrow, it will be a monumental humiliation for Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats. Defeat on this scale would take Lib Dem nervousness about what the coalition is doing to the party’s brand to a whole new level. Indeed, its effect would be

Lloyd Evans Lloyd Evans

A session of Dickens, Ernie the Milkman and Jack Dromey

There was an eerie, eve-of-battle calm about today’s PMQs. The real bust-up isn’t due till Friday. The votes will be in, AV will be out, Clegg will be down and Huhne will be calculating his next move. Before today’s session everyone expected Labour to co-ordinate an ambush and try to light Cameron’s ever-combustible fuse. But the chamber was under-populated and the opposition hadn’t troubled to devise a battle-plan. Miliband carried the fight to the PM. With an assured forensic performance he methodically built up the case against Cameron as a promise-breaker, a question-dodger and a budget-slasher. Cameron dealt with the assault by absorbing rather than repulsing it. But at the

Tuesday

James Forsyth

Clegg’s implicit attack on the Tories

Up until a few months ago, David Cameron and Nick Clegg tried to avoid doing big set piece broadcast interviews on the same day. This was driven by a desire to both maximise the coalition’s dominance of the media agenda and to avoid having to give a running commentary on what the other had said. But this rule has gone out of the window as the AV referendum has got rougher and rougher. So, following on from their both doing separate interviews on Andrew Marr on Sunday, they both were on the Today Programme this morning. Clegg even told Justin Webb to ask Cameron about the split between the two

Sunday

Fraser Nelson

How a degree of separation will strengthen the coalition

Almost a year ago, David Cameron and Nick Clegg staged their love-in at the Downing Street rose garden. As I say in the News of the World (£) today, this era is now at a close. When they come back from the 5 May elections, Clegg and Cameron have agreed that they cannot go on as before. An agreement has been struck for an amicable separation. Not divorce — the coalition will keep going. But Cameron and Clegg will put clear blue (and yellow) water between them and drop the pretence that they agree on everything. The coalition is about to enter its Phase Two.   Clegg’s analysis is that