Last nights programme Five Days that Changed Britain made interesting viewing. Not only was it a useful insight into the dramatic twists and turns of trying to get an agreement to ensure Cameron would be come PM but it also showed how cleverly the Lib Dems got boxed into a corner.
Since then it is the Lib Dem Ministers who get wheeled out to make the announcements about cuts whilst the Tories continue with their untried and untested policies ( look at the break neck speed of the passage of the Academies Bill). The result is the Lib Dems fall in the polls despite the fact that really we all know these are ideologically driven Tory cuts.
Clegg in particular is in a very difficult position. His own constituency, Sheffield Hallam, has the highest percentage of people working in the public sector per head of population that any other constituency. They are the ones who are going to get hit the hardest. Alongside this the Lib Dem led Sheffield Council has just axed £6.7 million from this years budget, with a further £200million cuts over the next 4 years.
The decision to scrap the loan to Sheffield Forgemasters has not helped Clegg or the Lib Dems. This was an interest bearing loan that would have been matched by private sector support. It has cost Sheffield dear with the opportunity to be a world leader and to create some high skilled jobs walking out the door to another country ( has anyone factored in here the loss of tax revenues as well?).
Cleggs U turn on the cuts has been both spectacular and crass. See the excellent blog by Mehdi Hasan - http://www.newstatesman.com/blogs/mehdi-hasan/2010/07/nick-clegg-public-conservative. Clegg has moved swiftly from a position of urging caution to avoid a double-dip recession to the Tory jamboree of slash and burn.
I dont know who the Lib Dems are any more. And the more Clegg jumps and changes his postition the harder it is to identify what they are about. A recent Newsnight poll showed that 4 out of 10 Lib Dem voters would not have voted for the Party if they had known they would go into coalition with the Tories. Hindsight is a wonderful thing but if people had known that on May 5th then the outcome of the General Election would have been very, very different.