The doomed posed for one last snapshot
WE are nearly at ‘last orders’ time, with the band about to strike up Sinatra’s ‘My Way’. It is the closing week of Parliament and Lib Dem MPs, in particular, know they may be taking final, gulpy stock of this old place. Their party might yet make it back to power in Coalition with the Tories or Labour or Who Knows, but opinion polls are not wildly encouraging.
Yesterday Nick Clegg and his Lib Dem generalissimos posed outside the door of 10 Downing Street for a goodbye shot; shades of Capt Scott and expedition members about to set forth for the South Pole circa October 1911.
One day this snapshot may become a collectors’ item. History students will be asked ‘name those poor, doomed souls’ and may struggle with anyone beyond Nick Clegg and Vince Cable (who was yesterday wearing a ‘Third Man’ coat and trilby – he does love to look spooky).
The photograph’s line-up included a dinky little chap who seemed to be wearing Start-Rite shoes and his first suit from Marks & Sparks. Some of London’s more experienced political journalists asked me: ‘Who on earth is that boy?’ Simples. It was Simon Wright MP, the tiddler who beat Labour big-beast Charles Clarke in Norwich South at the 2010 election by 310 votes. Mr Wright, who is Cleggy’s bag carrier, may yet surprise us by retaining Norwich South but I’m not sure I would sell him a mortgage at the moment. Actually, I’m not sure I’d serve him a pint of shandy in a pub, either.
In the Commons, Mr Clegg held his last question time of term. Of Mr Cable there was no sign. Indeed, many Lib Dems stayed well away. There was no Sir Ming Campbell, no Simon Hughes, no Norman Baker, Jeremy Browne, Lynne Featherstone, Adrian Sanders, Sarah Teather, Dan Rogerson and plenty of other ‘giants’ of Lib Demmery. You might have thought they would turn out for Cleggy’s last show of the season. But Tim Farron was there. Mr Farron is the former party president who was yesterday savaged by Mr Cable for being ‘not credible’ as a possible future leader of the Yellow Perils. The violence among Lib Dems is sometimes startling.
Mr Clegg was his normal bouncy self, wading through the mire. Harriet Harman, his Labour shadow, was needlessly rude to him. You would have thought a possible valedictory occasion such as this might be a time for some generosity (will we see any today at PMQs? I fear not). Miss Harman asked him a short, silly question, asking if Mr Clegg was referring to himself the other day when he said politics was bust. Mr Clegg, with excusable hauteur, replied to Miss Harman’s j ab by saying: ‘ I wonder what answer I should give to that. No, of course not.’
Harriet has been semi-detached in the past couple of years. Is her heart still in it? Perhaps she is just trapped by her persona and has no idea of what else to do.
David Winnick (Lab, Walsall N) wondered if Mr Clegg would name his possible successors. ‘Er, no,’ said Cleggy.
OTHER MPs such as Steve Rotheram (Lab, Liverpool Walton), Stephen Mosley (Con, Chester) and even Peter Bone (Con, Wellingborough) were courteous to Mr Clegg.
‘We haven’t always seen eye to eye but I’ll go easy on him for once,’ said Mr Rotheram. Mr Clegg countered by saying that he ‘very much hoped it would not be the last time he and I interract in this House and in this configuration as well’. Was that a hint he would like to stay in Coalition with the Tories?
As for Mr Bone, long one of Mr Clegg’s most persistent critics, he suggested that history might be kind to the Deputy PM for ‘ being very courageous’ at a moment of national crisis in 2010.
‘He should take great credit for that,’ said Mr Bone. Don’t worry, Peter. I have a suspicion he intends to do just that.