Q&A with Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg - catch up here

[KateMumsnet]

Hello all

At lunchtime today we'll be holding a live, in-person Q&A session with Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, with an audience composed entirely of Mumsnetters.

With luck (and a decent wireless connection) we'll be live-blogging the whole thing, so do join us between 12.45 and 2pm to hear how the DPM responds to MNers' searching questions - and let us know what you think as the session unfolds.

Where is everyone

Also, ask him how he feels about the existence of the verb "to Clegg" as in "you said you wouldn't whine about pudding later if I bought you an ice cream when we were out - and now you are totally Clegging me out"

What went wrong after the last election, we believed you and voted for you, but have heard nothing much from you since? We've been told your average man/woman needs to suffer, so that we can get rid of the debt this country is in, and now we've found out that actually we've all suffered for nothing, as the country is in more debt. Wages don't rise, but costs are rising all the time, we can't afford holidays, days out, meals out, to repair our cars, to decorate our homes, we can barely afford our mortgage, whilst clearly the politicians do not know what it is likely to suffer under the changes made like this. And I consider myself lucky that I still have a roof over my head and can feed and clothe my children (a year ago it didn't look like I could for much longer - my husband was out of work and had to fight for every penny of benefits, although he'd been working for twenty years and had never claimed before, and we could only just feed ourselves from the money received, running up huge mortgage arrears, unable to buy clothes and shoes etc.)

@MrsAidanTurner

where do we watch it? I am confused ( and lost)

Don't be lost! We'll be updating this thread from the event, and also on our Twitter channel, so you can follow along that way. We also have our video people here, so there will be a video of the questions - we'll let you know when that is ready.

I'm with JaneMumsnet at the event, it's v exciting! Come and say hello if you're here too.

Sorry, that should read: what it is like to suffer under the changes made like this.

No sorry - no live video feed although we are videoing it and will upload some clips ASAP (today hopefully). For now will just be the usual low-fi text-based system we're afraid...

Just waiting for Nick to get here from PMQs and then we'll be underway.

Kate

Thanks

Hully has already put exactly what I was going to ask...please do ask him that question

Dh and i are at the moment unsure who to vote for having previously be a lib voter. I know dh is still furious re your student tuition kick in the teeth but as mentioned before im interested in the private rental market! We both sitting on an undecided fence at the moment!

OK Nick Clegg is here and we're ready to go...

What's the turn out like?

I am looking forward to something even better than the Women's Institute roasting of Tony Blair- don't let me down!

What are the chances of a Lib-Lab coalition?

Waiting for blog updates!

First question from an MNer: 'In the event of another coalition, which of your politicies would you negotiate on?'

Clegg says: the era of single party government is probably over, long term. Coalition government is becoming more likely - so all parties need to decide which policies they will dig their heels in on. We put our priority policies on the first page of our last manifesto - and that's probably what we will do again. Balancing the books, raising the personal allowance, a commitment to green politics/environment, filling the £8bn NHS funding gap and funding mental health, and expanding school spending are what's likely to be on there.

Next question: what have you learned from the tuition fees saga?

Answer: that no matter how proud we are of some of our achievements in government, if there's one policy you don't implement that's what people will remember. There's no point me whinging about that. I didn't have a mandate to deliver the full LibDem manifesto in government. The tuition fees deal we got was the fairest we could get - and despite predictions that it would shut out disadvantaged kids, that hasn't happened. The old fees system involved paying upfront - the new system is in effect a progressive graduate tax (and I wish we'd called it that!) and more and more youngsters are now going to uni.

On the future of higher ed: we're not going to make implausible commitments - we've learned that lesson. I think the pinch point in the system isn't tuition fees repayments; it's upfront living costs for students. If there was any spare cash knocking around, that's where I'd spend it.

Poor turn out here, what do you think your party's chances are of ever getting a seat again?

" If there was any spare cash knocking around, that's where I'd spend it."

in grammatical terms, that is the 'second conditional' and is usually used to describe an unreal and impossible future.
EG 'If I were queen I would chop off your head"
Not happening is it?

"we're not going to make implausible commitments" = "you can be sure we'll disappoint you, so don't give us a hard about it, mmkay?"

You said we could comment... so

The era of single party government is over precisely because people feel betrayed by left-wing parties turning right-wing in power, confused by the rhetoric and spin into not knowing where the problem lies, and so we're all turning to the fringes in desperation.

The tuition fees were not a minor policy compromise- it was a major pledge, one which caused many to vote for you. And you turned on us.

No spare cash knocking around? Britain is the 6th richest country in the world. We are not poor so stop pretending we are.

I understand the need for compromise but you are compromising the ordinary people out of existence and then offering very feeble excuses.

Next q: I'm work at a Citizen's Advice Bureau - and we see more and more people who are being failed by the welfare system. The Big Society has failed.

A: There was undoubtedly a need to reform aspects of the benefits system - it was Byzantine, too much means testing, some incentive to not work. The fundamental principle of Universal Credit, which doesn't undermine the incentive to work, is broadly a good thing and that's what we've tried to do. Increasing the personal allowance takes 3.3m low-paid people out of tax altogether, and we think some of the other childcare and school provisions have helped lower earners.

I'm uncomfortable about welfare sanctions though - I think they're a bit too trigger-happy; the guillotine comes down too quickly. It's fair enough to attach strings to benefits payments, but we need to look at how effective they are - we're looking at a possible traffic light/yellow card system that might provide considerable help to people who get caught out by the rapid imposition of sanctions.

[Nick follows this up by saying how civilised the session is compared with PMQs; an MNer points out that this is because of the female-dominated nature of the audience]

The MNer who asked the question follows up with some details of a RL CAB case she's dealing with in which a young man was forced to spend a night on the streets before any local agencies were allowed to offer him any help.

yawn

Q: do you feel personal responsibility for the demise of the LibDem vote?

A: If you spend all your time in politics worrying about how to curry popularity, you'd never do anything. Government involves doing difficult and unpopular things. I didn't come into politics to make the biggest cuts in a generation - would I have chosen to come into government at a different time? That would have been lovely. But you have to deal with the cards your dealt. I'm not embarrassed; I'm incredibly proud. I think we stepped up the plate and have been plucky, brave and done the right things for the right motives.

Q: In a coalition this time around - Labour or Conservative?

A: it's not a matter of personal whim; we did what we did because it was the only way the numbers would add up to a government. It will be the same this time around; perhaps only one combination of parties will give a stable government - that will be the starting point for it all.

Q: Are you going to build more houses in the south-east?

A: Yes. New garden cities in an arc between Oxford and Cambridge. We've had some disagreements with the Conservatives about this in government.

If coalitions are likely to be the thing of the future - do you think these should be included on ballot papers?

I would hate my vote to result in any right leaning government again - I wouldn't have voted for you previously if I'd known you'd get into bed with the Torys, and I won't vote for you again because of that possibility.

'you didn't have a lib dem mandate'. Yes that's what I'd heard you believed. The tories didn't have a tory mandate. Look at how many people are voting, where, and the first-past-the-post system that somehow always favours the tories. Go look at coalitionsin New Zealand and see how they work too, not by one party abandoning integrity.

Again, what about this odd mis-match between most people's left-wing leanings and the right-wing government, I could add the total lack of trust we have now in our un-representative career politicians, helped alongnicely by you.

For Britain's sake man grow a spine, learn what's going on out there and do something about it.