Simon T. Kaye

Electoral reform, improbably enough, is now at the heart of everything. This is the long-discussed ‘dream scenario’ for the Liberal Democrats, and of course they’re terrified by it, even as Nick Clegg, Chris Huhne, David Laws & co. expertly manoeuvre us into the ideal equidistant central position for the last day or so of negotiations. The excellence of David Laws’ “Seven Rules” for coalition-bargaining cannot be underestimated here.

Yesterday, Gordon Brown launched his dramatic final gambit – he sacrificed his own political career so as to increase the likelihood of a fourth parliamentary term dominated by Labour politicians. Regardless of whether this actually works, I rather suspect that Brown has secured a spot in the history books (as well as a total tenure as PM which longer than that of James Callaghan) thanks to the gentle levering from power which Nick Clegg has done so carefully over the last few weeks. We all knew Brown was going – and he used his career as a weapon.

The Tories’ response revealed for the first time the deeper outline of the deal that is taking shape between themselves and the Liberal Democrats. They have taken their common ground on environment, education and civil liberties. The Lib Dems appear to have made the large-scale concession that cuts to the deficit must begin this year, rather than next year. I can only presume that a similar concession has been worked out on immigration, as David Cameron will surely face internal revolt if he doesn’t manage to cap non-EU immigration. Issues pertaining to the EU and Trident renewal must, quite rightly, have been put on the back-burner for now.

In return for these concessions, the Liberal Democrats seem to have got their tax proposals accepted, which is a significant victory, and have also picked up, after yesterday’s Corbomite Manoeuvre, assurance of a free vote on a referendum on electoral reform to the Alternative Vote System, along with the introduction of fixed-term parliaments.

However, there is a third plank to the Conservatives’ interest in electoral reform, and it is this third plank which has spooked Labour out of wanting what must otherwise seem like an appealing term as a strong opposition party with the prospect of powerful renewal under a new leader. The Conservatives will almost certainly make radical constituency boundary changes before the next general election. By equalising the size (in terms of population) of every constituency, they will effectively destroy the source of Labour’s strength. In 2005, their handsome majority of Commons seats only existed in Scotland and Wales. This year, they kept a better grip on their core seats than many expected, but were still wholly defeated by the Conservatives in England alone. The Scottish and Welsh constituencies tend to be less populous. The great worry in the high command is that, if these changes come in, Labour would have to win the next election in England as well: no mean feat.

Scratching out a (probably) unstable alliance with the Lib Dems is therefore perceived to be Labour’s last hope before a generation in the wilderness. This may be completely wrong – the next government is sure to be pretty unpopular as it deals with the deficit and Labour could revel in chastising the Conservatives and Lib Dems together. But the electoral mathematics gets very sticky indeed with the regulation of constituency size. The tories have clearly decided that they can afford AV as a trade-off with this advantage over Labour.