Jon Bright (London, OK): Nick "Radical within Reason" Clegg was up in Holyrood yesterday to visit the MSPs who had unswervingly backed Huhne throughout the leadership campaign, and lay out what his plans would be for a Scottish Assembly. He endorsed, apparently, both wholesale reform of Westminster and increased power for the devolved assembly, and accused those who were holding back on granting these powers of "feeding the beast" of separatism.
However, while receptive to other ideas, he ruled out a referendum on outright independence, saying (and living up to his name) that "certain parameters have to exist". While going further than Brown and Cameron, Clegg is still therefore wedded to two of their basic principles: that the union must be preserved, and that independence can therefore not be discussed. Admittedly political issues can be created by politicians as well as the public. But is the best way to defeat the independence movement really to simply not ask the question?
