“Quick, blame the Coalition!”

I will. When the Tories and Lib Dems went into coalition, they agreed on a compromise between their two manifestos. That’s how coalitions work.

Stop acting like the Lib Dems have a majority government, it doesn’t fool anyone.

Hardly surprising, given the numbers of rich bastards in their ranks.

If we get to the next election without the repeal of the HRA or FOIA, then the Lib Dems will have had a vast positive impact compared with any plausible Tory majority government. Even if AV fails and they haven’t managed to make a difference anywhere else.

Bit like New labour really attack the poorest in society welfare reforms while allowing the rich to get away without paying tax, they moaned about Cashcroft while having three of the same bastards in it’s own ranks, with Lord Paul.

I just think the Liberals are an easy target these days while New labour simple have nothing at all to offer, or is that Newer labour.

Let’s demand a general election now, this goverment doesn’t have a mandate for for their policies, most of which were not in the Lib dem or Tory manifesto. The people have been conned, let the people decide at a general election.

http://haringeygreens.blogspot.com/2011/03/support-tuc-demonstration-26th-march.html

I’m not sure I understand, John. The Conservative position was to increase Freedom of Information, why would it need the Liberal Democrats in the Government to stop the Conservatives from doing something they didn’t intend to do anyway?

FoI, while something Conservatives were nervous about for years before Labour introduced it, has turned out to be a powerful weapon not just for individual campaigners and groups in their dealings with the state, but also for right-wing newspapers and the Taxpayers’ Alliance lobby. It’s not going anywhere.

Hold on am I missing something here? Blame Labour for everything that’s wrong with society, make excuses for Tory excesses but don’t blame the Lib Dems for anything because they are the junior partner ? They done a deal at the crossroads and one day Lucifer will call in his debt, let’s just hope its sooner rather than later.

The argument that defenders of the LDs use, that it’s a shame they had to compromise on A and B (and C, D… Z) – but look what would have happened if the Tories were a majority Government! rather falls down. The Tories were never going to be a majority Government, because they didn’t have a majority – until given one by the LDs. And they’ve got absolutely nothing for it

Except the blame…

@ 7 Skooter

“Hold on am I missing something here? Blame Labour for everything that’s wrong with society, make excuses for Tory excesses but don’t blame the Lib Dems for anything because they are the junior partner ? They done a deal at the crossroads and one day Lucifer will call in his debt, let’s just hope its sooner rather than later.”

That’s fine, but then any concessions they make have to be weighed against what they achieved by forming the coalition. I’m not saying that a fair analysis would necessarily come out favouring the Lib Dems – obviously many people think that the sacrifices being made are far too great. But it doesn’t make sense to act as if they’re renaging on a manifesto pledge, like this article does. Unless specified otherwise, manifestos are supposed to list what the party would do if it found itself in power, not what it would do in a coalition government.

The Lie Dems have got jack shit out of their marriage to the tories except humiliation.

Their leader is a national joke , and should start wearing a clown outfit, with big shoes and a big red nose. Vichy Cable has become equally as laughable, in his puffed up belief in his influence in matters of Banking and Murdoch. How’s that working out Mr Cable? On Banks you have achieved noting, and on Murdoch you also achieved nothing.

As for the rest of the bunch of jokers they are all looking for their principals. Well hurry up because , if Clegg has any more say you will have nothing left.

“The increase in the personal allowance is undoubtedly an achievement”

Yep – an achievement funded almost entirely by a rise in VAT. In terms of regressive tax policy, this is a ‘perfect storm’; the poorer you are, the harder you’re hit by the VAT increase and the less benefit you get from the increase in the tax threshold. The idea that the Lib Dems deserve credit for ‘persuading’ the Tories to cut direct taxes even if that meant raising VAT is just absurd.

“The pupil premium wasn’t nearly as generous as they would have liked”

The principle of targeting funding at deprived children is laudable, but the marker of deprivation the government have chosen – take-up of Free School Meals – means the effects of this policy will be perverse. In Bradford (where my wife is a teacher), the effect will be to divert funding from very deprived mainly-Asian schools to somewhat deprived mainly-white schools. This is because a lower proportion of eligible pupils in mainly-Asian schools tend to claim FSMs (for a variety of reasons – cultural aversion to ‘charity’, poor English language skills among parents etc).

@9 chaise

I understand your sentiments but if you take the top down reorganisation of the NHS for example which was Not in either partys manifesto or the coalition agreement the Lib Dems should surely have come out and stated that they were totally against this policy, as outlined in today’s motion at the lib dem conference, but instead they have been seen as the enablers of this policy. It could be defeated if Lib Dems were truly the party of liberalism and democracy!

This is because Nick Clegg is more of a Tory than a Libral Democrate and now he needs to look after the boys! Just turn a Blind Eye as they would say.

Apologies: Liberal Democrat, I was typing to quick.

It’s been discussed at length before, but Clegg had no option but to enter power with Cameron.

1. Clegg’s long-term strategic objective is to get proportional representation, as this will benefit the Lib Dems by giving them fair representation for the 20-25% of the country that (pre-Coalition) supported them

2. To convince the country that PR was viable, Clegg needs to convince that Coalition government (as PR tends to lead to) is also strong and stable Government.

3. There were 4 options on the table in May 2010

4. Two of those – a Coalition of everyone but the Tories – or a minority Labour administration were not runners as Parliamentary arithmetic was against this being stable, and public opinion did not really support them either (see Clegg rejecting despite massive Labour concessions far, far greater than those the Tories offered).

5. Minority Conservative government, while tactically attractive as the Lib Dems would have squeezed far more concessions out of the Tories on an issue-by-issue basis (though risking a second election, a Tory/Labour majority and nothing) did not meet the stable Coalition test.

6. Leaving a Coalition in which the Tories have all the power as they know how few options the Lib Dems has.

I’m not harsh on Clegg’s decision to enter power with the Tories for that reason. The only issue that he has not worked out how to utilise the civil service and is getting royally screwed by the more experienced Tories at every turn. Clegg desperately needed a John Prescott-style ODPM with enough civil servants at his disposal to do the analysis to spot early on when he’s being shafted and misled by his colleagues and then do something about it. As it is, he has – as I understand it- a civil service staff of around 15 people!

As a result, very few policy battles are going the Lib Dems way. The Tories shafted Clegg on tuition fees with misleading analysis (the bottom 20% who Clegg claimed would benefit based on DBIS numbers are those “lucky” enough to die early or are mature students). The Tories are giving the Lib Dems policies provided they were in the Tory manifesto too (e.g. a watered-down pupil premium that – while more transparent and nationally rather than locally based – is less generous than the de facto premium that existed under Labour) and a lot of shit sandwiches (VAT bombshell, a pretend social mobility strategy, cuts to disability benefits, NHS privatisation, pretend civil liberties, etc, and all the blame while Cameron escapes the rap for all his U-turns under anger at Clegg from betrayed lefties).

If he could only get more civil service firepower I reckon things could be different

I simply hate these people (LibDems)

@12 – yes, this.
Since the election the Tories have thrown out all attempt at covering up their true intent and are governing with an ideologically driven attitude that would make you think they have an overwhelming majority. The Lib Dems have had the power to act as a brake and they haven’t. Clegg looks like this is all a wet dream for him, while Cable has talked tough to undercover reporters, but achieved nothing, washing away policies that weren’t just election pledges, but were key planks of party policy for a decade or more.

@17 – well put, the conservatives have been enabled to behave as though they had a majority which they never gained. There is no sign of any “moderating” influence on them from being in coalition. If this is supposed to demonstrate the benefits of coalition government and so pave the way for PR, it isn’t.

Sevillista, re Clegg ‘s long-term strategic objective. If so, then “Minority Conservative government,….. did not meet the stable Coalition test.” Got the timing wrong. Silly boy, couldn’t wait a couple of years, snatched his cake and ate it before the table was set. Now its eaten, he won’t be allowed any more.

@1 Chaise is someone posting under your name? You’ve been attacking the LDs for months now and you’re finally acknowledging that they’re in a coalition now, with all the compromises that come with being a minority partner in one?

Blow me over. Good comment.

@ 12 Skooter

“I understand your sentiments but if you take the top down reorganisation of the NHS for example which was Not in either partys manifesto or the coalition agreement the Lib Dems should surely have come out and stated that they were totally against this policy, as outlined in today’s motion at the lib dem conference, but instead they have been seen as the enablers of this policy. It could be defeated if Lib Dems were truly the party of liberalism and democracy!”

I certainly think the Lib Dems kinda invite being blamed for Tory policies by pretending they supported them all along, instead of saying “We’re opposed to this, but it’s the price we pay for being in a coalition and getting a vote on AV and so forth.”

@ 20 blanco

“Chaise is someone posting under your name? You’ve been attacking the LDs for months now and you’re finally acknowledging that they’re in a coalition now, with all the compromises that come with being a minority partner in one?”

I’m rather surprised that you say this, because I don’t think I attack the Lib Dems all that often. I’m not saying I never criticise them, but I don’t think I treat them as a pinata like a lot of left-wingers.

And I’ve always accepted that they’re acting as part of a coalition and therefore have to make concessions. So if I’ve ever given the opposite impression, it’s either because I was being unclear or because I was drunk