Calamity Logic
Guido had his good impression of Clegg diminished during his leadership fight with Huhne, which he won (just) on votes while Huhne won on style and determination. Interviewed yesterday Clegg tried to justify wriggling out of his manifesto promise to hold a referendum. He claimed that the Lisbon Treaty was too “measly and paltry” to hold a referendum on. He was then asked whether the UK needs a clear cut definition so that we can judge if something is constitutionally significant and therefore warrants a referendum?
Clegg: “I strongly agree with that. There’s some good organisations, an organisation which I think is great is Unlock Democracy which is putting forward some ideas about how we could get some sort of logic into when a referendum is appropriate or not.” (BBC 5 Live, 27 February, 2008)
That would be the Unlock Democracy group which put out a statement on Tuesday from its director Peter Facey criticising the Lib Dems for refusing to back a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty saying: “they should back down and support the Conservative amendment.” Logical?
