Lib Dem leader admits election pledges are to be scrapped or put on hold

Published on Monday 11 January 2010 21:33

LIBERAL Democrat leader Nick Clegg has shelved key promises such as free tuition fees and personal care for the elderly as he admitted the country could no longer afford them.

Mr Clegg said that "shopping lists" would not wash with voters, who understood that the UK was heavily indebted.

But his move is likely to anger the grassroots party, who under a revolt led by former leader Charles Kennedy made Mr Clegg abandon plans to scrap free university education at the party's conference in autumn.

However the Lib Dem leader is banking on voters wanting honest appraisals from politicians.

Yesterday he told a London audience: "Bombarding people with gimmicks and promises the country can no longer afford, treating people like children, as if winning elections is simply about who can provide the best shopping list of policies to buy off voter groups one by one – nobody believes a word of it. Certainly not the voters, and probably not even the politicians."

He admitted that the party could not keep its earlier pledges such as giving everybody free childcare and to scrap tuition fees "under the timetable we had once envisaged".

A citizens' pension based on residency rather than National Insurance contributions would "no longer be firm commitments in our manifesto but would be put on hold until they become affordable again".

"People know that the world has changed, that money is not growing on trees, and when money is short you have to make choices, you have to set out priorities."

The change in policy was seized on by political opponents. Treasury Minister Stephen Timms said the Lib Dems had realised their plans did not "add up" and were making "U-turn after U-turn".

"Even now they still have their 22 billion promise on personal allowances they haven't explained how they'll fund," he said.

"Just like a large part of his own party, the British public are still no clearer about what Nick Clegg actually stands for."

Mr Clegg also drew criticism for abandoning his pledge for the elderly from the National Pensioners Convention.

Dot Gibson, NPC general secretary said: "The decision to abandon longstanding policies on free care and better state pensions is extremely short-sighted. Care services and state pensions are two of the most important issues facing older voters."