Earlier this year, Louis Theroux claimed that he was Nick Clegg's 'fag' at school, a position that perhaps betrayed the now Liberal Democrat leader's lack of respect for those he saw as beneath him.It seems, some two decades later, such attitudes haven't changed.
Here is a rundown of the lack of regard Nick Clegg has had for certain people in the two and a half short months that he has been Deputy Prime Minister:
Mervyn King
Time after time, Clegg has used a private discussion with the Bank of England Governor as a handy excuse to explain his about turn on bringing down the deficit faster and more painfully than he campaigned for during the election campaign.
Any benefit of doubt that the public may have granted the Lib Dem leader over this has been blown out of the water today with Mervyn King's admission that he said nothing in that phone call that wasn't already in the public domain.
Nick Clegg, quite clearly, used the independent Governer of the Bank of England to cover his back politically in a particularly tawdry manner.
Proponents of Proportional Representation
If coalition MPs do manage to vote in a referendum and if the public does vote in favour of the Alternative Vote, when can we expect a second referendum to bring in the truly proportional Single Transferable Vote?
10 years? 20 years? 50 years? First Past the Post has been with us for centuries. Is that how long we'll have to put up with this baby step towards progress that AV represents?
Nick Clegg talked the talk during the election campaign about a fairer voting system but he's cashed in all of his chips at the earliest opportunity and with very little to show for it. Furthermore, if Labour are successful in scuppering the referendum then Clegg will look a bit foolish going back to pushing for AV+ or STV.
He has yanked around all of those who wish to see an end to the unfair First Past the Post system in order to get his feet under the coalition table. A shabby way to treat your best policy and most ardent fans.
Parliament
Nick Clegg might have been so excited about being 'the first Lib Dem to lead PMQs since 1922' (sic) that he forgot a few things about how it is meant to work when you speak on behalf of the Government but that wouldn't excuse his rather embarrassing defence that he was speaking in "a personal capacity" when he said the Iraq War was illegal.
PMQs is not, nor has it ever been, a platform for the Prime Minister to air their personal views. That wasn't even the case back in 1922 although, of course, we didn't even have PMQs back then.
Scotland
Not content with directly affecting the Scottish Parliament elections by holding his AV referendum on the same day (and not discussing it with the Scottish Government beforehand) not to mention suggesting scrapping Trident when his proposals didn't stack up, Nick Clegg (and Michael Moore) are pushing on with the Calman recommendations despite their party's stated preference being further devolution.
Sheffield
Nick Clegg has stood idly by while a Tory donor has successfully campaigned for the Government to decide against giving Sheffield Forgemasters an £80m loan, a company that is within Clegg's own constituency. Not only that but the Tory donor had tried to invest in Forgemasters directly which makes one raise an eyebrow when he says the public sector can fill the funding gap.
Any self-respecting constituency MP would step up and speak up for their local company and workers. Clegg seems to be doing neither.
Voters
We are stepping into the unknown to a certain extent with this coalition a Government, a feeling that is both exciting and scary. However, one of the first things that the coalition agreed on was to have five year fixed terms despite this never being an issue during the election campaign and despite four year terms being the norm over the past few decades.
Cameron and Clegg have ridden roughshod over the electorate to ensure they can squeeze out another year in power and I think it is an undemocratic poor show from both men and an early example of how Clegg's promise of 'a new politics' during the election campaign was nothing but empty rhetoric.
It has felt like a long time since the General Election but this five year term must look like an eternity for Nick Clegg and the rest of his party as their poll ratings slide terrifyingly (for them) and tantalisingly (for the rest of us) towards the single digits.
It does seem, genuinely regrettably, that Nick Clegg is rapidly losing sight of what he stands for and seemingly uncaring about who he steps on in order to stay at the top.
Neither situation can last forever and a new direction is required if Nick Clegg isn't singlehandedly going to bring down the coalition.
10 comments:
Nick Clegg has stood idly by while a Tory donor has successfully campaigned for the Government to decide against giving Sheffield Forgemasters an £80m loan, a company that is within Clegg's own constituency.
Except it's not. Forgemasters is based at the old English Steels River Don works, which is in Clive Betts' Sheffield SE constituency, far away over the other side of town from leafy Hallam, and even further away in terms of demographics.
Cameron has been astonishingly clever in the way he's managed to delegate blame for everything to his new "fag". The Libs should leave the coalition while they still retain some dignity.
It does seem that David Cameron, who at first seemed to have missed an open goal in terms of getting an overall Conservative majority has played his hand incredibly well:
- He can play to the public at large that he has been consensual and moved to the middle ground in forming a coalition (regardless of the actual behaviour of the government)
- His partners are in no financial position to fight another election so in practice he has a strong majority
- The LibDems are taking a large share of the flak for unpopular decisions
- I can see a lot of people voting No at the AV referendum because they don't like the way this coalition is acting: behaviour that will be just fine for Dave
Jeff, I think the way people are lining up to attack Clegg actually shows how effective he is being as Deputy PM and how much the Lib Dems are influencing the Government. Unfortunately, we can't get everything we want, but that's the nature of coalition.
I think it's more insulting to Scotland to suggest that they can't answer a simple question about the voting system at the same time as casting their vote in the Holyrood election. It's much better to have both on the same day than spend an extra £17 million having them on different days.
Re Sheffield, Burkesworks has already said it - it's not Nick's constituency. Even so, Labour promised money that wasn't there and, frankly, I don't think giving a loan to a private company which is doing well should take priority over things like introducing the pupil premium.
Given the way the Tories were trying to wriggle out of Calman when the report was published, I think it's good that the Lib Dems have ensured that those reforms will be enacted.
Don't tell me PM's don't give personal opinions at PMQs or use it to score political points. At least Nick made a point that was consistent with his position. If he had said anything else, he would have been eviscerated for going back on his principles.
And as for the economy, it's clear that Labour left a huge mess. I'm not convinced of the need to completely pay off the deficit in 5 years, to be honest, but I do think we need to take action to get us out of the mess. Vince Cable has also said that conversations with Mervyn King during the eurozone crisis convinced him of the need for earlier action. I think that those events, which happened during the election campaign, were a bit of a game changer.
There are things that the coalition government is doing, especially on welfare, that I really don't like and will find very difficult to live with, but I think there have been many positive changes from the Labour days.
Caron
It's NOT the ability or otherwise to understand different types of ballot paper. It's the fact that in the lead-up to a combined date, the London-dominated media will be focussing on the AV Referendum result(Is this the end for the Coalition, etc?) and the very important Scottish Election will be overshadowed. Ditto Wales.
It's also the fact that Cameron/Clegg did not consult the Scottish Parliament about the clash of dates (probably they didn't even know that we're having an election).
Thanks Burke, it seems I've gambled and lost on that one. I knew they were both Sheffield-based at least. Even still, many workers for the company will live in his constituency and his contribution has been limp at best.
Spending £80 may not be the best use of taxpayers money but the involvement of a Tory donor deserves scrutiny and certainly deserves a response from the DPM.
I hate this "it's more insulting to Scotland to suggest that they can't answer a simple question about the voting system at the same time as casting their vote in the Holyrood election" straw man.
The point is that the debate in the media will give a disproportionate platform to Labour, LibDem & Tory because there is a UK wide political vote on the same day. The effect is implicit and insidious rather than explicit and open. Nobody is suggesting that people will be confused - just that the focus of the campaign will be in London - and after the GE campaign this year, we know how this could affect the Labour/SNP split of the vote.
"Jeff, I think the way people are lining up to attack Clegg actually shows how effective he is being as Deputy PM and how much the Lib Dems are influencing the Government"
Nurse, The Curtains Quick!
No it's because he has disowned almost everything he stood for before May. This is not jealousy at his orgasm-inducing performance it is first and foremost anger and secondly a large degree of schadenfraude.
I have a stack of leaflets delivered to my home in Glasgow North (and I'd love to see the expenses return!) telling me how LibDems were going to give tax cuts to the poorest and opposed a VAT rise to 20%. All utter lies as it turns out. You didn't have to go into coalition and you didn't have to vote for these rises.
Clegg is out of his depth.
anonymous: 29 July, 2010 13:01
dcomerf:
Clegg is not only going against the spirit of the Gould report recommendations by holding two polls on the same day he's going to have to change the law to make it possible.
When refering to the holding of the local and Holyrood elections at the same time Gould says:
All this considered, we are convinced that combined elections are not only a disservice to the local councils and candidates but also to the electorate as well. In essence, the local government elections are not simply about ensuring a reasonable number of voters show up at the polls on polling day. More important is that they engage with the campaign in a meaningful manner and make a knowledgeable decision on their ballot paper. Therefore, we recommend separating the Scottish parliamentary and local government elections, preferably by a period of about two years.
This applies equally to holding the AV referendum and the Scottish parliamentary elections on the same day.
The legal problem is because:
An order created when the Scottish Parliament was set up specifically prevents the authorities from holding a "combined poll", where two polls are wrapped together in one. While an exception is made for local government votes, the body which oversees elections in Scotland - the Interim Electoral Management Board - has written to Scottish Secretary Michael Moore to warn he must change the law if he wants to press ahead with such a move.
The Scottish elections will be overshadowed by the AV media circus coming from London and the SNP will be sidelined in the media again. All courtesy of Nick Clegg who is riding roughshod over the recommendations of the Gould report and who will have to gerrymander the law to get his AV poll run at the same time as the Scottish elections.
Never trust a Lib-Dem.
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