Enter Nick Clegg with another self-assured article for a national newspaper. A few weeks
ago, it was his defence of the coalition’s Budget for the FT that caught the eye. Today, it’s his case
for welfare reform in the Times (£). These may be arguments, about dependency and disincentives, that you’ve
heard before – but here they’re packaged in a particularly clear and persuasive way. Just what’s needed as the welfare wars, between Labour and the coalition, spill back into newsprint.
Writing about the article, the Times frames it as “Nick Clegg [putting] himself on a collision course with his party” – and you can see why they might think that. The tone of the piece, particularly when Clegg writes that the state must not “compensate the poor for their predicament,” is more forceful than the party faithful might be used to.
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