EVER since that hectic weekend in May when David Cameron and Nick Clegg buried their differences to form a coalition government there have been doubts about the extent of Lib Dem Party grass-roots support for the deal. Yesterday at the annual Party Conference the doubts were expressed in votes which overwhelmingly rejected the coalition's extension of school academies and free schools.
Michael Gove, the Conservative education minister who has pushed through these school proposals, may shrug his shoulders and point out that the vote means nothing because the Bill to establish them is already law. But Nick Clegg, the Lib Dem leader, cannot be so relaxed because he knows that there is other legislation in the pipeline on which there is a division between party and ministers (and even among ministers).
Mr Clegg can, of course, ride rough-shod over party opinion but if he does so he will pay for it in due course at the polling booths. The Conference resolution that yesteday rejected Mr Gove's policies could not have been more explicit. It said that the changes will depress educational outcomes for pupils in general and that they are a threat to the stability, fairness and viability of Britain's educational system. The party managers tried to water down those words but the members refused to do so. The mover of the resolution, Peter Downes, a former headmaster, called Michael Gove's policies costly, divisive and inept.
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