Nick Clegg "we didn't win the election"

[Lozzer]

I hear this every time he breaks a policy or promise, and every time I do, I just feel disappointed. Not disappointed that the Liberals didn't 'win', but because Clegg has the audacity to suggest he ever believed that they could 'win'.

You can't 'win' an election with an electoral system based on First Past The Post, it doesn't function like that. In my sleepy little town, the majority of people didn't vote for the Conservative candidate, but he won anyway. Why? because 1 in four votes was sufficient to ensure his election. This rule applies to most of the United Kingdom, so any alternative party to the Conservatives or Labour have the obstacle of the current system against them. Clegg knew this, hence his advocacy of Proportional Representation, which I might add, he's now surrendered in the compromise for power. It's impossible under FPTP for them to acquire a complete majority, particularly if you haven't a 'safe-seat' already. Again. Clegg is aware of this, and yet he keeps reiterating that all of these 'compromises' come as a result of not 'winning' the election. The Liberal Democrats could only have ever 'won' if they attained over 250 seats in the results So far as my knowledge of history goes, this has never happened, and furthermore, it can't happen.

The man could claim that he had to raise intuition fees because he couldn't drive a racing car through the corridors of Parliament, neither make sense.

[Rum]

I hear this every time he breaks a policy or promise, and every time I do, I just feel disappointed. Not disappointed that the Liberals didn't 'win', but because Clegg has the audacity to suggest he ever believed that they could 'win'.

You can't 'win' an election with an electoral system based on First Past The Post, it doesn't function like that. In my sleepy little town, the majority of people didn't vote for the Conservative candidate, but he won anyway. Why? because 1 in four votes was sufficient to ensure his election. This rule applies to most of the United Kingdom, so any alternative party to the Conservatives or Labour have the obstacle of the current system against them. Clegg knew this, hence his advocacy of Proportional Representation, which I might add, he's now surrendered in the compromise for power. It's impossible under FPTP for them to acquire a complete majority, particularly if you haven't a 'safe-seat' already. Again. Clegg is aware of this, and yet he keeps reiterating that all of these 'compromises' come as a result of not 'winning' the election. The Liberal Democrats could only have ever 'won' if they attained over 250 seats in the results So far as my knowledge of history goes, this has never happened, and furthermore, it can't happen.

The man could claim that he had to raise intuition fees because he couldn't drive a racing car through the corridors of Parliament, neither make sense.

On the other hand if you know you aren't going to win you can make promises you can't keep!

Hoisted by their own gonads in this case!

[HomerJay]

Clegg could have won under FPTP but didn't. And now probably never will.

yougov shows support for the libdems is 8% (4% in the north east) so hopefully they are a spent force now. This also means they are over-represented in parliament, I don't think many people will want an election that favours more libdems in power, Clegg's blown it.

[Pensioner]

[mistermack]

From what I remember, when he signed that promise, he never said a word about it being, "only if we win the election".
If he won the election, there wouldn't have been a vote. So he was obviously talking about a hung parliament. GUILTY !!!!!

[Lozzer]

Clegg could have won under FPTP but didn't. And now probably never will.

yougov shows support for the libdems is 8% (4% in the north east) so hopefully they are a spent force now. This also means they are over-represented in parliament, I don't think many people will want an election that favours more libdems in power, Clegg's blown it.

No, he could never have.

[Rum]

The reality is that they have had to compromise to make a coalition work. Part of that reality is they have to do things that go against their political values and principles.

Looking at it without too much cynicism, perhaps they calculated that this was the lesser of two evils. The economic situation being what it was, a re-election would have been a nightmare.

More cynically perhaps - they saw the chance to grab more power than they ever could have hoped for.

[Thinking Aloud]

The man could claim that he had to raise intuition fees because he couldn't drive a racing car through the corridors of Parliament, neither make sense.

I love the idea of "intuition fees".