Uk politics

The Lib Dems leadership might have hoped that it had moved on from tuition fees. But tonight’s League of Young Voters fringe was dominated by the topic. Lynne Featherstone, a Lib Dem Minister, says that she would like to shoot the Lib Dem negotiating team for not making the issue a red line in the coalition negotiations. Quite what her Lib Dem ministerial colleagues who were on that team—Danny Alexander and David Laws—will make of that remains to be seen. Tim Farron, the party president, was more judicious in his language. But he did say that the negotiating team should have realised that the electorate’s sense of what the party’s red lines should have been, should have been taken into account more.

Lib Dem conference rallies are always a little like spending Christmas with a family you don't know: quite baffling but rather endearing. There's the uncle who tells the same jokes every year (Paddy Ashdown, telling the conference that he'd been asked in the street by a 'little man' whether he 'used to be Paddy Ashdown' - mercifully the members found it hilarious, again), some confusing singing (an award-winning a cappella group who kept the delegates giggling by singing 'stuck in the middle'), a bit of sweariness (Ashdown, again, claiming the Libs were 'too nice' and didn't have any 'proper shits') and things that just don't make sense unless you're part of that family (a Lib Dem activist on stage telling the audience that she was 'starstruck to go campaigning with Baroness Ludford').

Thank heavens for Ed Miliband, eh? The leader of the opposition remains the single most compelling reason to hope the Conservatives remain in power next May. A shame, then, that cabinet ministers appear determined to promote the idea that a Labour victory would be garlanded with at least some silver promise. Chiefly, Chris Grayling would no longer serve as Justice Secretary. This is a non-trivial consideration that's worth pondering before anyone casts their ballot next May. There is some dispute over whether the Conservative's plans to rewrite Britain's human rights legislation can really deliver all they promise; some disagreement, therefore, over whether they're as dangerous as they initially appear. Is a half-baked nonsense worse than a fully-baked monstrosity?

David Cameron has yet again delivered a belter of a party conference speech, peppered with announcements. His performance is a reminder of why, even now, he remains the Tory Party’s greatest single asset. His speech was a powerful invocation of the strengths of Conservatism, perhaps the clearest he has given from a conference stage. It was passionate, eloquent and, overall, the speech of a Prime Minister. What a contrast with the Ed Miliband's attempt last week. There were promises galore. The advantage of holding a party conference before the Liberal Democrats is that you can scoop their policies – in his case, announcing another increase to the tax-free income tax threshold from £10,500 to £12,500.

It is easy to inflate the importance of speeches made at party conferences. Particularly when those speeches are the last such set piece events before a general election. But they are still, in the end and at bottom, a distillation of what matters most to a leader. A guide to his priorities; a demonstration of his faith. Somewhere along the line David Cameron has lost that faith. He was elected leader of the Tory party in desperate times and became Prime Minister in dismal times. In both instances he triumphed, at least in part, because he persuaded his audience that though he might look like a traditional Tory he was in fact a rather different type of Tory from those voters had grown fond of despising. Once upon a time, you see, David Cameron had a story to tell.

Like all MPs suspected as potential Ukip defectors, Chris Kelly is being hounded by colleagues, whips and journalists all desperate to find out what he's up to. He and his family are distressed by the pressure that the MP is under and suspect that Ukip are putting his name about to create a smoke screen around the next defector. Kelly has told his long-term girlfriend that he is not defecting. His girlfriend's mother is Nadine Dorries, who says Kelly is so loyal to the government that she's quite 'disappointed' he doesn't take more principled stands against it. But she is confident he will not defect. Neither, in case you're wondering, will Dorries.