Liberal democrats

Imagine if seven Tory Cabinet ministers had resigned since David Cameron became Prime Minister. Then think about another seven being accused of having covered up alleged sexual misconduct by a senior party official. It would put ‘Back to Basics’ in the shade. It would be the biggest scandal the Tory party had faced. But this, proportionately, is where the Liberal Democrats find themselves today. Of the five Liberal Democrat Cabinet ministers appointed in May 2010, two have resigned — David Laws and Chris Huhne. Another two, Nick Clegg and Danny Alexander, are facing questions over the role they played in a cover-up of Lord Rennard’s alleged misdeeds.

In this week's Spectator, Julie Bindel explores the culture of 'inappropriate behaviour' in Parliament. Her piece, "Carry on Westminster", makes a number of revelations about the way parliamentarians behave towards women in the Westminster village, including the following: Nick Clegg was given a written complaint in March 2011 about Mike Hancock, Lib Dem MP for Portsmouth South. A constituent who told him that he 'cannot be trusted and is a liability to women, public, and your party'. Not only was there no investigation, but there was not even a reply. When the constituent took her complaint to the party, 'the Lib Dems did not want to know. If the police and Commons authorities had not acted, they told 'Annie' [not her real name], neither would they'.

By-elections are catnip for the media. But they are also, almost invariably, subject to greater scrutiny than they can reasonably bear. Only occasionally do they herald a new era or political realignment. Eastleigh is unlikely to prove an exception to that general rule. True, as Brother Payne suggests, Labour's likely dismal showing may demonstrate that Ed Miliband's still struggling to "connect" with southern voters but - though as a Miliband Sceptic it pains me to say so -  I'm not sure we should make too much of this. Similarly, UKIP's good showing is likely to be over-interpreted too. So, for that matter, will the Conservatives' (predicted) failure to win the seat, though this failure will cheer the anti-Cameron brigade on the Tory right.

A scandal broke in the Socialist Workers Party a few weeks ago after a woman member claimed a Trotskyist tribune of the working class had taken time off from promoting world revolution to rape her. The SWP did not behave as any decent person would and advise the woman to contact the police. In its paranoid mind, the criminal justice system conspires to discredit true revolutionaries, if given half a chance. Instead of involving detectives and judges, the party’s disciplinary committee set itself up as a kangaroo court, and "tried" the man it would identify only as “Comrade Delta”. The minutes show the paranoia with great clarity. One of the seven “judges” said that the SWP had 'no faith in the bourgeois court system to deliver justice'.

By-elections are notoriously hard to call. But everyone who comes back from Eastleigh says the same thing, UKIP are the party with forward momentum. This morning’s Populus poll bears that out. They are in third place with 21 per cent, with the Tories second on 28 and the Lib Dems ahead with 33. But, as the indispensable UK Polling Report points out, if you don’t reallocate some of the undecides to the party they voted for last time, UKIP are doing even better. The numbers then are UKIP 25%, Tories 26% and Lib Dems 31%. As I said in the magazine this week, UKIP are picking up support from all three parties. Things could get very interesting there if more Labour voters shift to UKIP as the best anti-coalition vote.

The good news for Nick Clegg—and the bad news for David Cameron—is that the Liberal Democrats are racing certainties to hold Eastleigh in the by-election next Thursday. As I say in the magazine this week, the Liberal Democrats' base in the constituency - they hold every ward in the seat - has given them an insuperable advantage. This victory means that Clegg will be spared the Spring conference crisis that would have followed a defeat there; for if the Lib Dems could lose Eastleigh where they are so well dug in, they could lose anywhere. Cameron, by contrast, will have to deal with an intensely restless party. The Tories' failure to take Eastleigh in these circumstances highlights just how difficult it is going to be for the Tories to take seats off the Lib Dems in 2015.

Labour's current plan to embarrass the Lib Dems over its clothes-stealing mansion tax policy is an Opposition Day debate in the Commons. But, in a mark of how serious the party is to score a political point on this matter, I understand that it is also considering tabling an amendment involving a mansion tax to the Finance Bill after the Budget. Labour sources tell me that this threat will be enacted if the government doesn't allocate time for an Opposition Day debate before the Budget. A source says: 'We want to be clear that we are serious about this. This is a test for the Lib Dems to see if they can keep just one of their promises. It's a test for Nick Clegg as leader.

One of the key strands of the Conservative campaign in Eastleigh is trust: not just because campaigners can remind voters about Chris Huhne, but thanks to a contrast they can draw between Maria Hutchings and Lib Dem candidate Mike Thornton. The party's latest poster underlines this: it accuses the Lib Dems of 'facing both ways on development' and contrasts quotes from Thornton on protecting green spaces and his voting record. The bottom of the poster says: 'Maria Hutchings has consistently campaigned with local residents against these developments.

It took a while for Nick Clegg to confirm that he would stay with his party to 2015, but today his colleague Ed Davey did him a favour (or perhaps not) and confirmed on his behalf that Clegg would stay not just through the next election, but would lead his party into the 2020 election. He told Andrew Neil on the Sunday Politics: 'I'm really very supportive of what Nick has been doing, I think he's the best leader we've ever had and I think he's going to lead the party not just into the next election but into the one after that.' Ed Davey is obviously trying to fend off accusations that he's abandoning the club sandwiches and aiming for the leadership himself, but he managed to make himself sound more enthusiastic about Clegg as leader than Clegg himself.

David Ward, Liberal Democrat MP for Bradford East, is unhappy that his recent comments about The Jews attracted such widespread criticism. You see: "There is a huge operation out there, a machine almost, which is designed to protect the state of Israel from criticism. And that comes into play very, very quickly and focuses intensely on anyone who's seen to criticise the state of Israel. And so I end up looking at what happened to me, whether I should use this word, whether I should use that word – and that is winning, for them. Because what I want to talk about is the fundamental question of how can they do this, and how can they be allowed to do this." As machines go, this one seems a pretty Heath Robinson contraption, idiosyncratically constructed and wildly inefficient.