Nick Clegg responds to "Lib Dem backs MK" rumpus
My colleague Tamsin Melville interviewed Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg on a variety of issues yesterday and asked him about the latest political advice of Tim Jones, the former Lib Dem leader on Restormel Borough Council. As every Conservative delights in reminding us, Tim Jones is now urging voters in the St Austell & Newquay constituency to support Mebyon Kernow's Dick Cole.
This is what Nick Clegg had to say:
"You know, if people want to make their own individual choices in favour of MK they're free to do so but I think that everybody knows MK hasn't got a hope of getting any MPs here and certainly hasn't got a hope of wielding any influence in Westminster. So talk about wasted votes - that is a wasted vote on a spectacular scale. I think the decision is quite different - do you support a party, the Liberal Democrats, which has Cornwall sort of coursing through its veins or do you vote for a party, the Conservatives, that is basically a party of the home counties? That's the choice."
I'm meeting up with Dick Cole in a hour or two and will invite him to reply.
I'm ´óÏó´«Ã½ Radio Devon’s Graham Smith, blogging on news, views and some fresh insights into West Country life, particularly the way government works locally and nationally.
Comment number 1.
At 1st Apr 2010, TheCornishRep wrote:Yes the LibDems, reeling under the blows from the expenses scandal as they are, have been know to say similar things about the SNP and Plaid in the past haven't they. And hey ho look in fact it is Plaid and the SNP who have truly lead the demand for change in their respective countries, and got it what's more.
In reality it is the LibDems who, on a UK scale, are a total irrelevance. Having LibDem MP's has simply meant that the Labour Gov has sidelined them and Kernow along with them.
The LibDems are only too happy to wave their St Pirans flags in the Duchy and then quietly relax in their publicly funding flats in London sitting in publicly funded rocking chairs.
A Mebyon Kernow MP would be a minor electro shock to the British political system and put Kernow back on the map in way it hasn't been for quite some time. So the choice is yours. 1) an irrelevant third rate and corrupt UK party or 2) a young and vital Cornish party.
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Comment number 2.
At 2nd Apr 2010, AccurateChronometer wrote:Who is Tamsin Melville and, by the way, who are you, Graham? You appear to have a ZERO profile apart from this very amateur 'blog'.How have you come to feel licenced to pontificate upon Cornish affairs?
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Comment number 3.
At 6th Apr 2010, Rob wrote:Upon reflection whats speaks volumes to me about this case is not just the fact that the Lib Dems are openly having to take MK seriously but that Clegg in his response does not defend Gilbert. The whole thrust of Jone's argument against Gilbert was that he did not have the qualities that Dick Cole did particularly the committment and principles. This seems to suggest that one Clegg has no idea who Gilbert is and two there can be nothing said in his defence. The liberals in Cornwall are founded upon strong personalities with strong personalities and Gilbert is not of this mould see for example:
I think the lib dems have inadvertently given Dick Cole a golden chance at getting elected.
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