The election results last week clearly did nothing to help the relationship. The Lib Dem leader, Nick Clegg, has tried portraying his team as the moderate forces within the coalition that helped contain the always-reaching Tories. The Tory leader and Prime Minister doesn't quite see it that way. Though Labour took http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifa beating in Scotland, they did show some success so they have to be smiling a little watching this show. Clegg can't move quickly enough to put some distance between himself and the Tories.
In a speech on Wednesday to mark the anniversary of the coalition and the start of a second phase, he will promise to blow his party's trumpet more and spell out where it has moderated the Conservatives' position through what the Lib Dems describe as their blend of social fairness and economic efficiency.
But the claim that the Lib Dems have softened the impact of some Conservative policies was rejected by David Cameron, who said in interviews: "I don't accept the whole idea that the role of one party is somehow to moderate the other. The Conservative party, under my leadership, has changed. It is a new and different Conservative party."
In an indication of the more public disputes ahead, he also refused to give Clegg credit for imposing a rethink on the government's NHS reforms.
