Sketch: You don’t need a degree to detect Lib Dem misery
The Liberal Democrats are getting very good at hiding their misery. To the untrained eye they might even have looked bored.
But you and I know, dear readers, that this is not the case. Politicians are not supposed to break promises – or at least, not as publicly and humiliatingly as its MPs are currently doing. All of them pledged to oppose any increase in top-up fees before the general election. Now they are being asked to undergo the most staggering U-turn. No wonder they kept quiet in the Commons this lunchtime.
Their unhappiness was especially apparent during prime minister’s questions, when Ed Miliband attacked David Cameron for presiding over a “government of broken promises”. It was too easy for him to lay into Cameron’s failure to address “trust in politics”. The PM made sure the honours were even for another week running as he bashed Miliband for not having any policies. “We know what he’s against, but I think people are beginning to ask what on earth is he for?” he finished with a roar. There is still no clear winner in these early Miliband-Cameron bouts.
Meanwhile, back in the land of U-turns, the Lib Dems were squirming horribly. As the questions and answers raged back and forth, as the Tory backbenchers shouted and their Labour opposites jeered, the Lib Dems who were the subject of this abuse clung on stolidly. Perhaps they were trying to make themselves invisible – an easier task than you might think, given that they now only exclusively occupy two full benches on the government side. Julian Huppert, who stood next to Nick Clegg when his leader had his photograph taken with the pledge earlier this year, didn’t look such a pretty picture. Tom Brake glanced from one side to another nervously. Only Stephen Williams, who has been won over by the proposals, looked something approaching cheerful.
A good dose of gallows humour was present. When higher education minister David Willetts appealed to the opposition for cross-party support, Sir Alan Beith – who had remained more or less unmoved for much of the previous half-hour – sat forward, turned to his left, and chuckled out loud. He was following the lead of Bob Russell, who has been hitting new depths of moodiness in recent months, but grinned in hopeless abandon as Cameron spoke.
Their inaction contrasted with the wave of head-shaking which swept across the Commons chamber this lunchtime. Clegg started it, after Miliband told him to head “just a little bit further to the right”. The deputy prime minister shook his head a few times, before mouthing something which this reporter can accurately confirm was either ‘tame’, ‘lame’ or ‘shame’. Then came Miliband himself, who must get out of the habit of sitting forward in his seat as Cameron stands over him, answering his questions. It makes him look like a schoolchild. Four times, in response to one answer, he engaged in some pantomime histrionics, shaking his head, mouth gaping open, as he opened his palms out in a Gallic shrug. Eventually David Cameron was doing it too. These politicians just can’t help themselves.
The PM’s most interesting remark was his praise for the “courageous and difficult decision” his Lib Dem pals were making. To the untrained eye this might seem like a heartfelt statement of support. But ‘courageous’, as anyone who has watched Yes, Minister knows, is Whitehall speak for ‘career suicide’. From the looks on their faces, it looked as if many Lib Dems were finding it easy to read behind the lines.
As prime minister’s questions ground on the Lib Dems’ deputy chief whip Alistair Carmichael, whose job it is to make sure the party’s MPs look smart when they obey the government’s orders without question, entered the Commons and silently beckoned deputy leader Simon Hughes to one side. They were barely out of the chamber before beginning an earnest, serious conversation. These are the sorts of chats, we suppose, which are holding this coalition together. It doesn’t look much like fun.
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