David Cameron and Nick Clegg to 'relaunch UK coalition'

[T_i_B]

Source: BBC

David Cameron and Nick Clegg will appear together later to stress their continuing commitment to the coalition and the programme they agreed in 2010.

Former minister David Laws said the two would show "unity and shared purpose".

After disappointing results for both parties in local elections, there has been renewed tension between the coalition partners over the Queen's Speech, with Tory MPs demanding more purely Conservative policies. Some Conservatives have been setting out an "alternative Queen's Speech" - including a traditionalist Tory demand for a referendum on repatriating powers from Europe and an expansion of grammar schools - on the Conservative Home website.

Many Tory MPs want plans for a largely elected House of the Lords - a long-standing policy of the Lib Dems - to be shelved, saying it should not be a priority in the current economic climate. All three of the main parties supported Lords reform in their 2010 manifestos. But Conservative MP Peter Bone told the BBC that the Conservatives won by far the largest number of seats at the last election and the Lib Dems should now "get into line".



Read more: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17986209

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Wouldn't the Tories & Lib Dems be better off "relaunching" themselves independent of each other?

[marmar]

1. Can you relaunch the Titanic?

nt

[Crow73]

6. Why have the Tories not booted this douche?

[marmar]

7. Maybe 'cause Tories are all douches?

nt

[kristopher]

9. Maybe? nt

[Kelvin Mace]

12. Brilliant analogy!

Both of these guys have ZERO credibility with the public.

[harmonicon]

2. Why the Lib Dems stay is beyond me.

I can't believe they stayed in the coalition for the higher education tuition hikes. They have nothing to gain by being there, and everything to lose... not that they haven't resigned their party to marginal status for the next decade at the very least. These last elections were just evidence that people hate the coalition and both parties for taking part in it. The Lib Dems have fucked up at every single turn. Who the hell knows what could come next?

[T_i_B]

3. If they leave now...

...then they get kicked out by the electorate sooner rather then later. They are pretty much trapped at the moment.

Like I said in the OP, they would be much better advised to "relaunch" themselves separate of David Cameron. I think people have voted against the Lib Dem's separate to how they have voted against the Conservatives. (more broken promises and less credible, if less sleazy and less focused on the super-rich then the Tories)

They are hemorrhaging a huge number of votes by being little more then a proxy Tory party.

And equally, the David Cameron might want to be a little more distant from Clegg to appease the Tory right wing, who have taken all the wrong conclusions from the local elections.

[harmonicon]

4. It's just that they seem to have almost no say.

I do agree that they should relaunch themselves separately, and I think that should mean leaving the coalition. If they remain in, it should be largely in name only - no more rolling over for the Tories at every turn. How are they helping now? I have a friend whose sister is (was?) a Lib Dem counselor. He assumed she was going to lose her seat last week, and I imagine she did. It's of course not because of anything she's done, but by fact of being a Lib Dem at a time when their leadership is part of a failing government. I just don't see how they can do anything but hurt themselves by staying in - they're certainly not getting any of their platform passed into law. All they seem to be doing to my eyes is legitimizing what is effectively a minority government.

[T_i_B]

13. Depends whereabouts they are councilor for

They seem to still holding up in places where it's between them & the Tories with Labour nowhere but against Labour they are getting a real pounding.

As to their programme, the main things the Lib Dem's are trying to get done right now appear to be gay marriage and reforming the House of Lords. However, the Tory right appears to be redoubling it's efforts to scupper both policies, trying to claim that the government is too focused on these issues to the detriment of everything else.

This is utter rubbish on the part of the Tory right wing. The policies that have lost the Tories the most votes are their abysmal NHS reforms and George Osbourne's budget, which robbed from the poor to give to the rich. These are both ideological right wing policies and neither is popular. Right wing ideology is not going to turn the government's fortunes around. Listening to the voters might just work though and the Tory right clearly hasn't been doing very much of that.

[mwooldri]

8. Hear hear!

Nick Clegg needs to resign, the Lib Dems need to pull out of the coalition *now* (albeit with outside support of the Conservative minority government with a promise to not vote for a measure of no confidence in the government - a promise that can be yanked).

They are indeed losing voters - left and right. It's if you cut off both ends of a toothpaste tube and jumped on the middle. Both ends fly out and there isn't much left. 1,000 council seats losts since joining the coalition. Voting numbers lower than in the 1980's - even when combining the Liberal Party *AND* the SDP.

IMO Lord Ashdown (err pantsdown?) needs to take over the reins but that's me.

There is a reason why Waverley Borough Council in England went in 2003 from Lib Dem control of the council to 2011 and a complete and utter wipeout, all but one seat is Tory on that council now. Imagine a mid-sized city in the USA with 100% Republican representation... no Democrats... not even a true independent voice, and the state legislature being overwhelmingly Republican. That's what it is like in Waverley and Surrey. Fortunately the UK Conservatives are more sane than the US Republicans but that isn't saying much.

[LeftishBrit]

17. Because they're afraid of forcing an election in which they'd be practically wiped out.

[harmonicon]

19. Yes, but...

the longer they stay in this government, the more seats they'll lose whenever the next election is. If they got out now they'd be nearly wiped out. If they stay in this failed government for a few more years they may be completely wiped out.

[rurallib]

5. Clegg has to be one of the dumbest politicians ever

I don't follow Britain closely, but to think he would form a coalition with a group that was essentially the antithesis of what his party stood for baffled me.
But he has been their proud little soldier, leading his troops into places I am sure they never dreamed of going.

[truebrit71]

10. Clegg has destroyed the Lib-Dems for a generation...

...they were just starting to become a viable alternative to Lab/Con, but with his servile kow-towing to Con policies that are diametrically opposed to the Lib-Dem platform he has shown himself to be a political dunce.

The Labour party should have no problem winning an outright majority at the next G/E.

[T_i_B]

15. Labour's still got issues

It's not easy to see what the Labour party stands for policy wise, Ed Miliband is not wholly convincing as party leader and Labour still has a lot of baggage from the Blair / Brown years.

Labour are reliant on the Tories & Lib Dems cocking thing up in government and the Tories & Lib Dems in turn are increasingly reliant on dislike of the Labour party. None of them seem to have very much positive to say about themselves.

[truebrit71]

20. ..as it ever was...

....Labour will win because Camerwrong is getting more and more unpopular...

Works for me...

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. I was just cathcing up on my Private Eye reading

and one 'story', written at least 8 days ago, was:

Cameron launches relaunch of Tory fightback relaunch

Dave Cameron has used an appearance on the Today programme to launch a relaunch of the disastrous Tory relaunch which he launched a week ago.
...
"We're fully focused now on the job of devising a relaunch for next week after this relaunch goes tits up by Wednesday."

David Cameron is 45 (minutes away from having another relaunch).

Spot on, it seems.

[amandabeech]

14. Well, we'll see how long this relaunched vehicle stays in orbit.

I give nine months.

I'm sorry to see one of my ancestral nations hit the skids like this politically.

[LeftishBrit]

16. I think Cameron and Clegg have got to be the most incompetent leaders ever

Quite apart from their policies being rubbish.

'Wouldn't the Tories & Lib Dems be better off "relaunching" themselves independent of each other?'

Indeed - and I'm sure lots of their members think so, but neither party wants a snap election. And the LibDems at any rate, would be better off relaunching themselves independent of Clegg! I suspect the party will split into two or more factions if things carry on like this.

[Nihil]

18. that'll be breaking new ground for them ...

> I suspect the party will split into two or more factions if things carry on like this.

They could form a "Liberal Party" or maybe a "Social & Liberal Democrats Party"
or maybe a "Social Democratic Party" ... oh, wait, ...

It's not as if anyone is really going to give two shits what they call themselves
for the next couple of decades: they'll be as powerful a political faction as
the SWP or maybe UKIP - someone to be beaten by the Monster Raving Loony Party
and laughed off the stage as a traditional end to an election night ...



Mind you, it's only inertia that stops the same happening to both the Tories
and the Labour Party - as noted upthread, they are both being led by tossers
but momentum will stop them from imploding quite as messily as the LibDems
at the next election.

Wouldn't like to put money on a half-way decent turnout for the next national though.