The rose garden love-in a year ago was understandable in some ways but it was a political misjudgment
Looking at the opinion polls since the general election, and in particular at the results of last week's elections, many still ask why British voters are disproportionately punishing the Liberal Democrats and not their much larger coalition partners, the Conservatives. This is the wrong question. Conservative voters are not punishing the Conservative party because, broadly speaking, they like what the coalition government is doing. As a result, the Tory vote held up across Britain last week. The same did not happen for the Liberal Democrats because, quite simply, it is Liberal Democrat voters, or more accurately, a significant proportion of them, and not the electorate as a whole, who are punishing the Lib Dems. One in three people who voted Lib Dem in 2010 did not do so again on Thursday. Most of them switched to Labour, though with how much lasting conviction only time will tell. But the Lib Dems have to try to win them back, and they have to convince the two out of three who stuck with the party last week, some with many misgivings, that they were right to do so. The party needs to reconnect with them. It isn't complicated.
Nick Clegg began the task of reconnection with a strong performance on the Andrew Marr Show yesterday. The tone, the positioning and the main themes had been well trailed by other senior Lib Dems since well before last week's voting. The coalition would go on. The deficit reduction strategy was inescapable. The relationship with the Tories would be more businesslike. The distinctive and moderating Lib Dem voice would be louder. And there would be substantial and significant changes in the government's NHS plans.
These are the bare minimum of the messages that Mr Clegg needs to get across if he is to have serious hope of redressing last week's election setbacks and rebuilding confidence. Not that mood music is unimportant. If more attention had been paid to it earlier, the Lib Dems might be in a less grim position today. The rose garden love-in a year ago was understandable in some ways but it was a political misjudgment. So was the very public enthusiasm with which the then chief secretary David Laws embraced the deficit-cutting programme a few days later – memories of that are so strong that the often mooted return to office by Mr Laws would send a bad signal to the Lib Dems' lost voters. Even the arrangement of the Commons chamber, requiring Lib Dem ministers to be seen mingled with the Tories on the government benches rather than sitting in their own separate section, deserves attention. The Lib Dems need to be much tougher about mood and messages.
In the end, though, it is policies and discernible practical achievements that of course matter most. The damage that the Lib Dems did themselves over tuition fees remains huge. It may define the party for years, as the sterling crisis defined the Tories under John Major and the Iraq war Labour under Tony Blair. There is not a lot they can do about that issue now. But it only increases the need for the Lib Dems to draw and defend clear lines, within the coalition, on matters that are fundamental to liberal British voters. One of those issues is the future of the banks, where the party still has a chance to leave a truly progressive mark. Another is the priority given to the green economy. A third is an uncompromising assertion of the need to clean up the House of Lords democratically. A fourth is to hold the line on the Human Rights Act, one of the Lib Dems' important but unsung achievements so far. There are many others. But there is no disputing where the most important battle of the next few months will come. The destructive reorganisation of the NHS and the impact of the spending freeze are the immediate must-win battleground for Lib Dem credibility. Mr Clegg has to stop the Lansley reforms, and be seen to have stopped them. If he does not, then he and his party may pay an even higher price than they paid last week.