Clegg plays tough guy in shouty Q&A with Lib Dem activists

Nick Clegg has just battled his way through a rather more grumpy than usual question-and-answer session at the Lib Dem spring conference. Normally, these sessions are an opportunity for the party to let off steam – they’re obviously far more robust than the sort of thing you’ll see in the House of Commons as they involve party members complaining about things that worry them, rather than telling Clegg how pleased they are with the Coalition’s record. And normally Clegg performs well: Q&A sessions are his strength.

But this was a more robust session than usual, with considerably more steam: activists weren’t just anxious and keen to grill their leader, they were grumpy. They were particularly annoyed with the way the Lib Dem leader dealt with their questions about secret courts, and after a series of questions about benefit reforms, one member stood up and shouted a complaint that the conference wasn’t getting enough time to discuss serious reforms.