Without a Clegg to stand on

Nick Clegg and his Liberal Democrats have had enough. After the failure of their push for electoral reform, they’ve decided to man up and no longer be the lapdogs, scapegoats, sacrificial lambs or any other kind of animal to their Tory masters. Simon Hughes tells us there will be no more unquestioning support for anything not in the coalition agreement; Clegg himself slammed the PM for partaking in a No2AV campaign riddled with ‘lies’; Vince Cable has attacked the Tories as ‘ruthless’; and Chris Huhne spends most of his time getting in the faces of his partners in government.

This seems to be good news for anyone hoping that the Lib Dems might have been there to drag the Tories away from typically Conservative policies, as is surely the point of a coalition government. As this is written, Clegg has just announced that the Lib Dems will be “a moderating influence” when it comes to NHS policy, and there will be a “louder Lib Dem voice”.
Fantastic. Except that it comes too late for us students.

The fact is that the referendum on electoral reform was the only major concession that Clegg’s party got when the agreement was being hammered out a year ago this week. In order to maintain that prospect they sold out all of their other principles for twelve months, including, most pertinently for us, the promise of the abolition of tuition fees.

When George Osborne announced the first budget of the new government, the Conservatives played a cunning trick which has represented the way this government has gone and, if deliberate, was a very clever piece of political manoeuvring (excuse the pun). As Osborne stood to speak, David Cameron shuffled sideways so that he was hidden behind his Chancellor and from the perspective of viewers at home was invisible – leaving Osborne flanked by Clegg and Cable. Unpopular and at heart Conservative policies with a neat reminder that the Lib Dems are in part responsible.

Some may be swayed by the newfound backbone that the party in yellow has acquired, but the fact that it took the loss of their one foundation block in this administration, combined with a thrashing in the local elections nationwide, to realise that the compromises they have had to make themselves are not worth a share in power – not if you have no real power anyway.

Still, let us try and be a little optimistic. It may be too late for governmental intervention on our pet issue, the tuition fees that are raping our country’s future, but perhaps Clegg and Cable, two of the greatest turncoats in modern British politics, might finally serve a purpose rather than partaking in a government that is following the same agenda as a Conservative majority.

We can only hope that new policies are from a genuine coalition of partners rather than simply a Conservative government with window dressing. It’s too little too late to redeem themselves in the eyes of students, but maybe they can re-establish a little of their self-respect.