A year of Nick Clegg

Apparently Nick Clegg has been leader of the Liberal Democrats for exactly one year today. (Hattip to Iain Dale's Diary: Nick Clegg: A Year of Progress or A Year of Disappointment? as I wouldn't have noticed otherwise.) So what has happened in his year as leader?

Well to be honest not much. The Liberal Democrats have stabilised, have managed to have a year without a leadership election (the first since 2004) but generally have been rather obscure. Their biggest news story was the massive splits when Clegg decided to oppose calls for a referendum on the EU Constitution "Treaty", when they are the party that has called for referendums on such treaties before. (Liberals continue ditching democracy and And so continues the Lib Dem Muppet Show) So that's one strike against democracy. (However I'm not sure that Clegg himself is responsible for the party's youth wing ditching students and democracy - see Young Liberals abandon students and democracy.) Otherwise the party has continued to be all over the place when it comes to tax cuts and that's about it really.

What about Clegg himself? Well he hasn't really made a great political impact and he's best known for the admission of sleeping with thirty women. It confirms that there are times when the public have the right not to know but has otherwise made him into a figure of fun. (However Jeremy Vine came off even worse - see Never again!) Then there was the revelation and attempted cover-up about the fact that Clegg was a member of the Conservatives at Cambridge. (Clegg's murky past) But beyond that Clegg hasn't made any real impact.

Still he can take some consolation when compared to the Liberal Democrats's counterparts in other countries. In the last twelve months their Canadian counterparts have suffered their worst election results since federation and seen their attempts to pervert democracy backfire big time with the leader deposed (When was this put to the electorate?), Has Canadian democracy triumphed?, "Forest Gump as a Prime Minister will not go over well in Quebec" and Harper 1, Dion Nil), their Australian counterparts have disappeared from parliament and their Irish counterparts have voted to dissolve themselves (The end of the Progressive Democrats).