Nick Clegg looks forward to fresh thinking from Power2010

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Nick Clegg looks forward to fresh thinking from Power2010

28.10.2009 // by Guy Aitchison

Guy Aitchison: Salman Shaheen has just posted an exclusive interview with Nick Clegg MP on the excellent Third Estate group blog in which he asks the Lib Dem leader a probing question I suggested on behalf of Power2010.

This was my question:

At the height of the expenses crisis, you responded to David Cameron and Gordon Brown's attempts to position themselves as democratic reformers by pointing out that the Lib Dems alone had consistently called for reform of a "rotten" Westminster system. Power2010 has received nearly 2000 submissions from members of the public beyond Westminster who also want democratic reform. But what are you doing to mobilise people's anger with the way we are governed beyond engaging in the very routines of Westminster village politics that puts them off in the first place?

And this was the Lib Dem leader's reply:

Well, it would be odd if we didn't use the platform that Westminster gives Liberal Democrat MPs to make it clear where we stand on political reform," Clegg says. "We've always favoured a much more open, transparent and responsive system of government. And whether it's freedom of information or the way in which MPs get elected, we've always led the way in calling for change. The others just lag behind, and - as we've seen after 12 years with Labour - they see constitutional change as a sort of refuge from other political crises, running to talk about it when they're in trouble and drifting back into their establishment ways the second they think they're out of the woods.

As a party that has always been held back by the first-past-the-post electoral system, it is, perhaps, natural that the Lib Dems alone should remain consistent to their message on democratic reform. "For us, changing the way politics is done is a central part of what we're here to do," Clegg says. "But you're right: speaking up in Westminster isn't enough. That's one of the reasons I meet people every week in town and village halls around the country. People can come along and ask me, to my face, anything and everything they like; believe me, they do too! One of the great things about Power2010 is that it's asking for your ideas, from people well beyond the bubble at Westminster. I'm really looking forward to reading what people come up with after November 30th. Politicians don't know it all, and we have to ask people directly if we're to know what they want.

You can read the rest of the interview over at The Third Estate.