Lib Dems reaping what they sowed.

Vote Lib Dem, get Tories, wasn't that what Labour said? How little the Lib Dems could have suspected they'd have been covered in quite so much blue when they did the deed, and got into bed with the Conservatives. Having become almost indistinguishable in the eyes of voters from the Tories whose laps they appear to be sleeping in, they were viciously punished by those same voters in the local elections on Thursday.

To entirely alienate your own support is political suicide, but that's what they seem to have been intent on doing since May. Their profile has been sufficiently low that they appear to be simply rolling over and becoming silent, nodding patsies, willing accomplices to the spreading of a virulent strain of neo-Thatcherism. What must have at first seemed to them a chance at a say, a hand in running things, power, could turn into a disaster which will push them further from that power than they've been in generations.

The AV vote turned into a disaster as well, with Clegg ending up being the unwitting standard bearer for the 'No' campaign. And their leader in Scotland has quit in what's been a disastrous week for them. You have to wonder if they're wishing they'd either done a deal with Labour or refused altogether and potentially forced another election. Thing is, in many ways they've got what they craved - a share of power, the referendum - and it's potentially killed them as a political force. Just a reminder that you have to be careful what you wish for. And what you vote for.

Tuition fees debate could define this Government

Most interesting to see the goings-on in Westminster today. With anarchy on our streets, mass hysteria, dogs and cats living together, Cameron sat behind Vince Cable as he delivered his speech, mugging furiously for the cameras as all MPs seem to do nowadays when they're sitting down. The moment, the very moment Cable sat down, he patted him on the shoulder... (Why do they always do that? Even when the Chancellor had to stand up and deliver a bitterly divisive austerity budget, he got congratulated by his front bench like he'd just won an Oxbridge debating competition. They should have been sitting there grim-faced.)

...anyway, he patted him on the shoulder and left the Chamber. He didn't even remain to listen to Cable's Shadow's response. Not only is this faintly discourteous, it also shows a lamentable complacency on his part, I think. With rumours of up to 20 Lib-Dems prepared to vote against the Motion (at least before Cable's latest amendments) and who knows how many abstaining, he could have been walking away from the first defeat the coalition faces since its formation.

I recognise that, as PM, he's probably got one or two other things to be getting on with this afternoon (that laundry won't do itself, and then there's the groceries to be collected...), but this could be a defining (and divisive) debate for the coalition. The debate still goes on as I type, some hours after the initial statement, but would it have killed him to show willing and sit there at least long enough to hear the Shadow's response?

A very, very interesting division bell will be rung this afternoon, I think.