Liberal democrats

Wednesday

Alex Massie

The Liberal Democrats and the Fallacy of Sunk Costs

John McTernan makes the case: Paradoxically, it is the increaing unpopularity of the Liberal Democrats that will bind them closer to the Tories. It’s illogical, I know. Being in the Coalition has halved their support, so really they should leave as soon as possible. But they won’t, they’ll cling on for dear life. Economists know this as the “sunk cost fallacy” – ordinary people use the phrase “good money after bad”. Essentially, most of us have an aversion to loss, so we tell ourselves any stories we can think of rather than do the logical thing and cut our losses. For sure, some Lib Dems think that there will be an upside.

Peter Hoskin

Labour step onto the front foot

Talk about a Christmas miracle: Ed Miliband has set about the task of Opposition with ruthless efficiency today. As both Guido and Nicholas Watt have noted, the Labour leader is all across the broadcast news this afternoon, after upping the heat on Vince Cable and the coalition. His party’s attack comes in the form of a letter sent by the shadow business secretary, John Denham, to the Cabinet Secretary, Gus O’Donnell. It asks, mischieveously, whether Vince Cable has broken the ministerial code by promising to wage war against Rupert Murdoch, and whether Jeremy Hunt is impartial enough to step into the breach. And while nothing is likely to come of

Alex Massie Alex Massie

A Real Coalition, Not a Sham One

Mind you, Ed Miliband doesn’t understand coalition either. Fair enough. It’s not what he’s paid to understand. Still, according to Miliband (whom I keep forgetting is actually leader of the Labour party): Secretly recorded comments by Liberal Democrat ministers show the coalition government is “a sham,” Labour leader Ed Miliband has said. He described Vince Cable as “a useful prop for David Cameron as he seeks to pretend this is something other than a Conservative government”. “These are decisions of a Conservative-led government propped up by Liberal Democrat passengers. Passengers not in the front seat, not even in the back seat of the car, passengers who have got themselves locked

Peter Hoskin

The political year in ten videos

With Westminster winding down for Christmas, and Coffee House with it, it’s probably time to start looking back on the year in politics. In which case, here’s an opener: a chronological selection of ten videos that capture the some of the glories, iniquities and embarrassments of 2010. If CoffeeHousers have any alternative suggestions, then just shout out in the comments section, and we can add them to the bottom of this post. Here goes: 1.Terror on Downing St: The Movie A Taiwanese news report about the bullying allegations made against Brown in Andrew Rawnsley’s book. The computer animations are astonishing, to say the least: 2. Gordon Brown calls the election

Alex Massie Alex Massie

Cable’s Survival is a Sign of Cameron’s Strength

James understands the dynamics of coalition government rather better than Simon Heffer. This may not surprise you. Mr Heffer complains that by letting Vince Cable survive – albeit in gelded form – while dumping the likes of Lord Young for other more trivial indiscretions, the Prime Minister is guilty of setting double standards. One would be appalled if this were not the case. And the double standard – for such there certainly is since Lib Dems may, indeed must, be opposed to at least some parts of coalition policy – reminds us that this is a Tory government leavened by the Liberal Democrats, not a Liberal Democrat government with added

Daniel Korski

Grim parallels with Germany for Nick Clegg?

Germany is one of the few countries that Nick Clegg has been able to look to for tips on how to be a successful Liberal party in coalition with a larger Conservative party. In 2006, Guido Westerwelle even took a delegation of Free Democrats to a Lib Dem frontbench meeting. Coffee House once predicted that, if the AV referendum was won, Clegg could one day become Britain’s Hans-Dietrich Genscher, a permanent powerbroker. The parties are of course different in many ways. The Free Democrats are decidedly more pro-market and pro-business than the Liberal Democrats. They also have a lot more experience of government. Before the last election, the Free Democrats

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Minor indiscretions

The Telegraph’s latest Lib Dem revelations are embarrassing for the ministers concerned, but won’t cause the coalition much trouble. Ed Davey is caught being critical of the announcement to take child benefit away from higher-rate taxpayers and expressing concerns about the changes to housing benefit. Michael Moore, the Scottish Secretary, is captured expressing regret about the Lib Dem u-turn on tuition fees and saying he couldn’t work with Tories like Liam Fox “for very long.” Steve Webb, the highly numerate pensions minister, was trapped into revealing that he had written to the Chancellor about the child benefit changes because “the details aren’t right.” There are, the Telegraph tells us, more

Tuesday

James Forsyth

Broken Cable

To understand why Vince Cable survived today one has to understand the dynamics of the coalition. The Liberal Democrat rank and file have had to swallow a lot recently, but the idea that one of their Cabinet ministers was going to be moved for being rude about Rupert Murdoch would have been too much to bear. The backlash to shunting Cable sideways would have destabilised the coalition, so he stayed in place. But Cable tonight is a much diminished figure. He has been shown to be eager to be indiscrete, to be overly keen to air the coalition’s dirty laundry in public. His comments about being at ‘war’ with Rupert

Peter Hoskin

The poison has not yet been sucked from the Cable story

There we have it. After all the frenzy in Westminster this afternoon, Vince Cable is simply staying put as Business Secretary. But he does not stand unchastised. All his responsibilities for media competition – and that includes telecoms and digital, as well as television and print – will be transferred over to Jeremy Hunt. Which means that Cable’s war against Rupert Murdoch has ended before Christmas. At least he still has his nuclear option, I suppose. Many will say that Cable got off lightly – and they’d be right. Putting aside the Business Secretary’s suitability to arbitrate over the Murdoch case, his judgement has been stripped and revealed as faulty

Peter Hoskin

Cable to remain as Business Secretary, but with diminished responsibilities

1750: Here’s the Downing Street statement: “Following comments made by Vince Cable to the Daily Telegraph, the prime minister has decided that he will play no further part in the decision over News Corporation’s proposed takeover of BSkyB. In addition, all responsibility for competition and policy issues relating to media, broadcasting, digital and telecoms sectors will be transferred immediately to the secretary of state for culture, media and sport. This includes full responsibility for OFCOM’s activities in these areas. The prime minister is clear that Mr Cable’s comments were totally unacceptable and inappropriate.”

Peter Hoskin

Cable waltzes into trouble with an attack on Murdoch

Those choppy waters that I mentioned earlier? They’ve just become perilous for Vince Cable. The BBC’s Robert Peston has an extract from the Telegraph tapes that was omitted from the paper’s coverage – and it is revelatory stuff. In it, the Business Secretary discusses Rupert Murdoch’s bid to take majority control of BSkyB, and he drops this particular line: “And I don’t know if you have been following what has been happening with the Murdoch press, where I have declared war on Mr Murdoch and I think we are going to win.” Declaring war on Rupert Murdoch – and declaring that you’re declaring war – may be inadvisable for most

Peter Hoskin

Cameron and Clegg play the expectations game

You know the drill by know: a Cameron and Clegg joint press-conference, so plenty of easy bonhomie and political japery. And today was no different. The Lib Dem leader set the tone with his opening gag, aimed at Vince Cable: “I haven’t seen as many journalists in one room since my constituency surgery.” After that, it was pretty much a gag a minute. Underneath all that, though, was some serious business. Cable came up (“very apologetic,” apparently), along with his claims about Winter Fuel Allowance (“not true”). But, as Iain Martin has noted, the most intriguing moment was when Cameron claimed only that he “expects” the Tories and Lib Dems

Peter Hoskin

A tale of two quads

There could barely be a starker contrast between Danny Alexander’s interview with the FT today and the, ahem, Cableleaks. Unlike his fellow Lib Demmer, the Treasury Secretary knew that he was speaking to a journalist – and he keeps well within the lines when discussing the coalition. “My impression,” he says, “is that the Liberal Democrats support the coalition. People knew the first couple of years would be extremely tough.” Alexander saves his most enthusiastic rhetoric for the quad: the group of four ministers – David Cameron, George Osborne, Nick Clegg and himself – who met regularly during the spending review period to decide where the cuts would fall. As

Peter Hoskin

Leaked Cable

Loose lips sink ships – but can they sink sages too? Probably not, but Vince Cable has certainly entered tumultuous seas with the publication of candid remarks he made to a couple of Telegraph journalists posing as Lib Dem voters. In the tapes – which you can listen to above – the Business Secretary rattles on unrestrainedly about the inner workings of the coalition. The stand-out line is his claim that “If they push me too far then I can walk out of the government and bring the government down” – but there’s more, including: 1) The arguments that are being waged, and won. “We have a big argument going

Monday

Piotr Brzezinski

Ten things you need to know about the Localism Bill

Last week’s Localism Bill introduced a range of novel measures, from elected mayors to local referendums. We’ve put together a list of Ten Things You Need To Know about it, by way of a primer for CoffeeHousers. The bill marks an important leap into the unknown. The dangers are less political – it’s hard for Labour to attack the principle of decentralisation – than practical, because it involves a genuine and significant loss of control for the centre. Pickles and company can’t predict what councils do with the new “general powers of competence,” nor what will happen if and when a new community-run service goes awry. But these challenges will

James Forsyth James Forsyth

Writing the Laws

Even out of office, David Laws remains one of the most important figures in the coalition. He was one of only two Lib Dem MPs — the other being Danny Alexander — to attend Nick Clegg’s strategy session at Chevening on Friday morning. He’s also played a crucial role in rolling out the pupil premium, effectively working out of Michael Gove’s department.   So it is pretty much certain that he’ll return to government once the Standards’ Commissioner has delivered his verdict. Where Laws will be slotted in is far less certain. Today, the well-sourced James Chapman reports that he’s been lined up for a Minister of State job at

Sunday

Peter Hoskin

Miliband the Monk has more bleak poll numbers to contemplate

And the award for quotation of the day goes to the unnamed Labour MP who says, in the Sunday Times (£), of Ed Miliband: “We’ve got a new nickname for him: the monk, because he wants two years of quiet contemplation to work out what he’s going to do.”  And second prize goes to another Labour MP, quoted in the same article, for this: “I give him 18 months. Tops.” Words alone may not hurt Miliband, however acidic they are – but throw in another set of poor poll ratings for the Labour leader, and he is rather limping towards next month’s 100 day milestone. Today’s YouGov poll has a

Peter Hoskin

Cable hopes to generate light from heat

First Clegg, now Cable – the Lib Dems really are putting their all into this year-end attack on the bankers. In an interview with the Sunday Times (£) today, the Business Secretary speaks unequivocally and with some zeal. “We’ve got to…start shining a light onto what’s actually going on at the top of the leading banking institutions,” he says, “If you keep people in the dark, you grow poisonous fungus.” And just in case you were wondering which half of the coalition is wielding the anti-fungal torchlight, Cable makes sure to add that, “standing up to militant bankers is probably more difficult for [the Tories].” The subtext: we took on

Friday

Peter Hoskin

Cameron’s good will to all Lib Dems

Cameron wishes the Lib Dems well in the Oldham by-election. We know this because he said so, in Brussels this afternoon, no less than three times in thirty seconds. The Telegraph’s James Kirkup has the full transcript, here. The PM does caveat his well-wishing – adding that “we’ll be fighting for the same votes” – but his general effusiveness isn’t going to reassure those Tories who suspect he’d quite like a Lib Dem victory, really. Already the murmuring has started, with ConHome’s Jonathan Isaby casting an understandably sceptical eye across proceedings, this morning. What’s clear is that this Oldham by-election will be used as a political barometer by all sides.

Daniel Korski

Europe keeps vexing the coalition

That the Conservatives and the Lib Dems disagree fundamentally on Europe is a well-known fact. But how much they disagree is rarely put on display as clearly as in today’s European Voice. Andrew Duff, Liberal Democrat MEP and president of the Union of European Federalists, argues that the coalition’s European Union bill – David Lidington’s masterpiece – amounts to “legal pedantry” and will make the UK an “untrustworthy negotiating partner, particularly in matters of treaty amendment, which is such an important driver of European integration.” ‘At home, referenda will unleash the forces of populist nationalism. Facile coalitions of nay-sayers will form to block Britain’s progress in Europe. Regular referenda on