General Election 2010: Nick Clegg says Conservatives have the right to govern - Telegraph.
Nick Clegg has said the Tories have a right to try to form a government.
Some think that means he's blown it.
Me? No, I don't think so yet. I'd do the same if I was him right now.
The reality is Cameron can't deliver a majority.
When that's clear he goes to labour and then says to them, now accept my terms.
And Labour could deliver a majority with the Lib Dems and minority parties.
Clegg could be making a right fool of himself.
He could be acting smart.
Time alone will tell.
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Clegg is a political negotiator: its his background. But the LibDems are a fairly independently minded bunch and I’m not sure Clegg could “deliver” them to the Tories without a cast iron PR referendum which he won’t get.
Brown clearly can’t stay on. A new unelected labour PM straight after an election would also be an affront.
So it looks like we’ll get a second election later this year. Please make the campaign 2 weeks rather tan a month.
Time alone will tell.
The Labour result is the worst that any sitting government has ever suffered (29% of the vote). It is the most unpopular government in history. Anyone who believes in democracy should bear that in mind at all times.
MF
It’s why very clearly they can’t form a government – at least by themselves
Richard
MF, if a minority Labour government isn’t on the cards, (and shouldn’t be) neither is a minority Tory government. 36% of the vote is not a mandate by any standard. As has been the case for years, the majority of people have voted for parties of the centre-left. A Labour-Lib Dem coalition is the only sane way forward. Let’s be frank, how could the Tories and the Lib Dems form any real coalition when they disagree so fundamentally on, to take just 2 examples, the EU and electoral reform?
The only way forward is for Clegg to allow the Tories to form a minority govt and hope they hang themselves in the process. If Cameron tries any gerrymandering, it should be possible to block it. Labour need to get a new leader and freshen up.
The first party to sense an advantage will bring about a general election
The campaigning for that general election has just started!
“36% of the vote is not a mandate by any standard”
It’s what Labour had from 2005-2010 and they didn’t see it as a problem until they realised in 2009 that they might lose.
The risk for the LibDems is huge. If they back Labour will they accept Gordon Brown as the leader? If they don’t, how does a leader get chosen? How can the public have an unelected leader foisted upon them so soon after an election dominated by leader’s debates?
What will the country think if they prop up Labour? Is there not a risk that the coalition falls apart quickly (it won’t even make a majority on its own)? Will horse trading alienate the country and mean that they would actually lose any referendum on electoral reform if people see that in practice electoral reform would make it impossible to vote out a despised government?
My view is that it is likely that there will be another election in the next 12 months. If the LibDems back Labour then they run a real risk of looking like Labour-lite. Let’s remember, 10 days ago Clegg saw his party as the main party of the left: if he gets this call wrong it could be the end of the party.
I don’t know what the right call is, but it is a very difficult position for Clegg.
Classic clip here of Gordon Brown arguing on the 1992 election night that John Major should resign if he doesn’t get a majority.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J7enLKrxLrI&feature=related
It’s a difficult position for Clegg but it’s a difficulty that his predecessors would have given their eye-teeth for!
“36% of the vote is not a mandate by any standard”
It’s what Labour had from 2005-2010 and they didn’t see it as a problem until they realised in 2009 that they might lose.”
Which is why FPTP needs to be junked, as it leads to the ridiculous situation where a party has a minority of votes but a majority of MPs. That’s how we got 18 years of the tories and then 13 years of New Labour, both following the neoliberal economics and politics that have have landed us in the present mess. James is right, the only sane thing is for an alliance of the progressive parties (labour minus GB, Lib Dems, Green etc) to push electoral reform and progreesive economic and tax policies.
sickoftaxdodgers,
be careful what you wish for. there will not be a permanent alliance of progressive parties – they may hold power most of the time but ever now and again you would get a conservative government reliant upon support from UKIP and possibly the BNP. It has the potential to be a divisive system.
We need to change things, that much is clear. But the huge bias against the Tories through unfair boundary distributions and the ridiculous situation where Welsh and Scottish MPs can vote on matters that only affect England needs to be looked at. And I suspect it will end with a separation of the Union and potentially a permanently left wing Wales and Scotland and right-wing England.
A few thoughts here:
1. If we had a form of PR as our voting system, wouldn’t we be facing the same hung parliament situation that we face today? No doubt, there would be a different split of seats between the parties, but this strikes me as making the current situation even worse in terms of horse trading and weak decision making.
2. If I was Clegg, I would hate to be in this position. As the “kingmaker’ he must be seen to be using his power in the best interests of the nation. Any parochial demand that the Lib Dems may make could be interpreted as a massive act of self interest that is not supported by a majority of the electorate. He must use his power wisely.
3. It’s clear that Brown is toast. He has presided over a huge loss of seats for his party and they need to junk him as soon as it’s clear what the new government looks like. To quote from a former politician “he may be in Government, but he’s not in power:.
4. I remain to be convinced by Cameron and his team, but I am willing to give them a chance after 13 years of spin and lack of achievement.
No MF, what I am saying is that an alliance of the progressive parties as represented by MPs just elected is needed to push through electoral reform in the current Parliament so that we get a proper democracy. The bias in the electoral system is against the progressive majority who vote for parties that represent progressive ideas of the left and centre left. The combined SDP and Labour votes represented far more people than the Tories did, yet they got 4 terms in a row with majorities in Parliament. That’s not democracy.