Communicator (communicator) wrote,
Communicator
communicator

Coalition politics

For the Tories, PR is a very difficult card to play. They must always seem about to offer it, in order to secure Lib Dem support inthe Commons. But once they do offer it, it becomes in the LDs interest to precipitate a vote of no confidence. Hence PR has to be trailed as permanently 'about to happen'. How long could they realistically keep that up? About six months tops I think. They might spin it out with a referendum, then a phased implementation over several years. Still risky though.

On the other hand, abandoning PR while giving Nick Clegg a cabinet seat (probably Foreign Office) and perhaps Cable as Chancellor is a much better strategy for the Tories. Not least because it gives Cameron an excuse to ditch his old friend/liability Osborne. This strategy locks the Lib Dems into the Tory project, and drains their credibility, while the Tories strengthen their electoral position (by faffing about with a commons committee and gerrymandering the electoral boundaries). Once they feel they have fixed things up enough, the Tories can ditch the Lib Dems. I think this would take more than six months, and probably ends with Clegg crossing over to the Tories.

It is in Labour's long term interest to stand back and let this happen.
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  • 35 comments

  • Phew what a scorcher

    I see Gove has backed down on climate change and it's back in the curriculum again.

  • GCSE Computer Science

    My book is now for sale

  • LJ Settings

    At the moment I have set up this journal so that only friends can comment. I hate doing this, but I was just getting too much Russian spam.