The Green Party has asked Lib Dem voters not happy with Nick Clegg joining forces with the Tories to talk to the Greens instead.
Green Party MSP Patrick Harvie said “Lib Dem members and supporters did not work hard over the last weeks and months to see their party become a wholly-owned subsidiary of the Tories“. He said the Liberal Conservative coalition decision “will be the death-knell for the Lib Dems here in Scotland“.
Caroline Lucas MP, leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, said:
“The Lib Dems have shown themselves to be not so much a party of change as a party of changing its mind.
“The Lib Dems have made themselves known as a party of dirty tricks in election campaigns. But now, Nick Clegg has carried out the biggest Lib Dem dirty trick so far, betraying all those people who voted Lib Dem because they honestly thought it would bring about electoral reform.”
The Green Party say that they back true constitutional reform, not only proportional representation but also fixed-term Parliaments, a written constitution, votes at 16, limits on corporate donations to political parties, and what they describe as a whole host of other measures dear to Lib Dem activists’ hearts.
The Independent this week reported unease over the formation of the coalition. Lib Dem MPs were reportedly holding their tongues as they tried to present a united front but they admitted the party would lose supporters who would not understand Nick Clegg’s decision to form a coalition government with the Conservative party. The Lib Dems are likely to lose people who are anti-nuclear energy to the Greens who have confirmed their “unequivocal opposition to nuclear power“.
