I'm not against coalitions in general. I'm against signing a pledge saying that you will oppose tuition fee rises, on the back fo that getting a lot of votes that get you some power, then when in power arguing in favour of and pushing for the biggest rise in tuition fees in the history of our country. These two things are not AT ALL the same.
I was talking about the manifesto commitments, not the pledge (I agree Clegg going back on the pledge is scummy of him, particularly the way he's done it).
But you said: "If they promise to do X and being a coalition means !X then they can just as well not join the coalition". Now given any two parties will have different manifestos, forming a coalition will have to mean abandoning some manifesto commitments in favour of others. (Figuring out which are the "less important" and the "more important" bits is one of the most interesting/terrifying parts of coalition negotiations.) But it's clear that forming a coalition will have to mean !X for some X or other in the manifesto (for all concerned parties). So your quote seems to imply you think parties should never form coalitions.
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andrewducker) wrote2010-11-13 11:20 am
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But you said: "If they promise to do X and being a coalition means !X then they can just as well not join the coalition". Now given any two parties will have different manifestos, forming a coalition will have to mean abandoning some manifesto commitments in favour of others. (Figuring out which are the "less important" and the "more important" bits is one of the most interesting/terrifying parts of coalition negotiations.) But it's clear that forming a coalition will have to mean !X for some X or other in the manifesto (for all concerned parties). So your quote seems to imply you think parties should never form coalitions.