Lib Dem Conference: Can Clegg Fight?

I've been doing a lot of focus on the Tories recently - as, currently, they're the party I'm most sceptical about - but that doesn't mean I'm not prepared to put the spotlight on what Nick Clegg and his party are proposing. Speaking ahead of the Scottish Lib Dem Party conference in Perth, Clegg argued that, quite plainly, Labour has failed Scotland.

To which I would argue: are you sure about that? After all, Scotland now has its own Parliament, and Scottish MPs have more of a say on English politics than MPs representing English constituencies do in Scotland. That would seem to me to be a suggestion that Scotland has been allowed to become less dependent on England, which in many ways is beneficial.

However, Clegg is tapping in to an important battleground here. With the Conservatives only having one seat in the entire country, and opposition towards the leader of the Scottish National Party, Alex Salmond, occasionally venturing into very grim territory, this may be the Lib Dems' best chance of gaining a large number of seats: Labour have a whopping 39, compared to the Lib Dem's 12. If Clegg can convince them that his fight for equality and against local poverty will help improve the social standing of many Scots - and maybe it can - then the Lib Dems could potentially create a power base north of the border. What may benefit their cause is the fact that Labour see Salmond's threats of a referendum as being the important issue: if those two parties are to busy arguing over the potential break-up of the union, then perhaps we will see a divide-and-conquer strategy employed by the Liberal Democrats.

Either way, Clegg has a fight on his hands. If he doesn't gain more than the 11 seats Charles Kennedy managed to pick up in 2005, he will be seen as taking the party back towards the wilderness: and that could easily see him replaced by the more popular Vince Cable. He needs to convince: then he can conquer.