Clegg more surprised than most at new popularity

LONDON LETTER:Nick Clegg is benefiting from voter anger rather than from anything he has actually done

THE IMAGE of a man who has found a winning lottery ticket on the ground and is desperately hoping that he can cash it before anyone finds out kept coming to mind when watching Nick Clegg in Wales this week.

Clegg’s soaring popularity after the first television leaders’ debate has surprised everyone in British politics, not least the man himself, who knows it could disappear just as quickly.

On a train from Swansea to London, the source of the popularity – besides a general aversion to Labour and the Conservatives – became evident in conversations with passengers.

No, it was not the Liberal Democrats’ high-minded policies – and they have some – or their calls that parties had to “be straight” with voters about the cutbacks to come after the election, regardless who wins.

Instead, the only policy that had percolated through to passengers on the 3.50pm train bound for Paddington was an old-fashioned bribe: the promise that no one will pay tax on the first £10,000 of income earned.

Indeed, the policy was popular even among those with whom it should not have been: those earning less than £10,000 or those up the income scale who seem not to have realised that the pension tax changes that would accompany the move could leave them worse off.

Clegg’s fate now depends upon the party’s other policies – a generally pro-European Union stance, support for an amnesty for illegal immigrants and less use of short prison sentences – not becoming much better-known to voters.

In the days since the debate, the Conservatives, in particular, have tried to focus on all three but, in the process, they have merely highlighted their own panic rather than scored points.

Before the election campaign began, the Liberal Democrats did not imagine a bright, new dawn, with scores of new MPs in a new House of Commons when it first meets on May 18th.

Instead, most of the private talk centred on the battle they faced to hold on to the 62 MPs that they already have – some facing a Labour challenge, others under pressure from the Tories – rather than making gains.

Polling research, meanwhile, indicated that the party’s vote was soft to the point of being flaccid: more than half of its declared supporters were ready to switch to another flag.

The flurry of polls since has shown an average 10-point rise for the third-largest party, which has constantly referred to the failure of “the old parties”, without noting that its roots are, in fact, older than any of them.

Likening it to the first break in a game of snooker, when the balls scatter everywhere, noted election expert David Cowling of the BBC says that “there has been nothing like it in any general election campaign since opinion polls began in this country in 1938”.

In the hours after Manchester, Labour’s Peter Mandelson was happy to “talk up Clegg”, since it helped to derail Conservative leader David Cameron, but some in Labour have begun to worry seriously in the days since.

The difficulty for the Liberal Democrat now is to convert sentiment into votes and then into seats: the number of late voting registrations indicates a mood to do something new, particularly among the young.

However, the road ahead, once stripped of the bunting, is hard: constituencies in UK elections generally are fought out between the parties who occupied the first two places on the results table on the night of the previous election.

This poses problems, since the Liberal Democrats are in third place in 340 of them, while Labour occupies that position in 130 and the Conservatives in 120. Clegg therefore needs a veritable tsunami on election night.

Substantial but insufficient increases for the Liberal Democrats means that Labour and Conservative battles are thrown into flux. In some places, a greater Liberal vote could safeguard a sitting Labour MP and a Tory in others.

In 50 of the Conservatives’ most marginal seats, the Liberal Democrats are in second place, when one takes into account the effects of the boundary changes made after the 2005 election.

In Labour’s 50 most threatened seats, the Liberal Democrats are second in just eight and fill that spot in only 13 of the governing party’s 100 most endangered outposts. So a Liberal Democrat rise, if it does not go too far, helps Labour.

However, the Liberal Democrats are split badly about what to do after the election: some despise Labour, others the Conservatives, while a not insignificant percentage wants to stay away from both of them.

If the surge continues, however, they may soon have to choose. Clegg himself cannot stand Gordon Brown and has found it difficult to work with him on the occasions he has had to do so since he became leader.

Although some, such as home secretary Alan Johnson, seem unfazed by the idea of having to do a coalition deal afterwards, Brown’s closest ally, Ed Balls, hates the idea with a passion.

The man who may come up smiling is, once more, Peter Mandelson. He and Clegg are friendly and a post-election alliance of whatever hue between the two parties would keep Mandelson central to affairs.

Balls would be weakened in such an event, while the prime minister would become even more dependent upon Mandelson. Nothing of importance would happen without his say-so – which is just what the noble lord likes.