Britain is likely to end up with a short-lived minority government

HAVE the Brits finally become European, a discussion paper by the European Council on Foreign Relations think-tank asked last week?

No, they won’t be joining the Eurozone, certainly anytime soon, and popular British (or, more accurately, English) attitudes to the EU are still decidedly hostile. UKIP, the United Kingdom Independence Party, which wants to withdraw entirely, came second in their European elections last year, remember. But, in another sense, it’s a fair question.

How so? Well, across the rest of Europe coalition government is the norm. Here, of course, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael only dream of single-party government ever again.

But, in Britain, which hasn’t seen such a thing since the 1945, “coalition” is suddenly the word on all the politicians’ lips. Ever since that first televised prime ministerial debate, the polls have been showing neither the Tories nor Labour anywhere close to having a majority in the House of Commons. Some sort of new arrangement seems likely.

But a coalition? I very much doubt it.

It’s not as though Britain hasn’t been here before. Extend the frame of historical reference and British parliamentary politics has been nothing like as stable as has come to be accepted in our lifetime.

A government of national unity was established during the First World War, from 1916-1918, and again between 1940 and 1945. There were other “national governments” – Labour, Conservative and Liberal voluntary coalitions – during the economic hardship of the 1930s, led successively by Ramsey MacDonald, Stanley Baldwin and Neville Chamberlain.

There were other periods of multi-party government too, between 1915 and 1916, and under Lloyd George from 1918 until 1922. At other times, parties governed without a majority or were supported from the outside by the (Irish) Nationalist Party. Indeed, in the 35 years between 1910 and 1945, single-party majority governments only ruled between 1922 and 1923, and between 1924 and 1929, led by Andrew Bonar Law and Stanley Baldwin, both Conservatives.

What has to be borne in mind, however, is that neither of the major British parties – which, in terms of seats, still means the Tories and Labour, irrespective of the votes each polls – wants to be in a coalition.

Conservative and Labour activists and MPs usually have more respect for each other than they do for the Liberal Democrats. Nick Clegg’s followers are regarded as supreme opportunists, campaigning from the left in Labour constituencies while pretending to be good centrists in Tory seats.

Compare the three manifestos, however. On the core economic question – how much do you want to take from the relatively rich and give to the relatively poor? – the Lib Dems are more redistributionist than either. That is not to say there is not some common ground with the Conservatives. Both parties hate ID cards, something an Irish government would, incidentally, be obliged to introduce if they became mandatory in Britain because of the common travel area. And both parties want to give parents more school choice too. The gap between them on the environment, foreign aid and the powers of local government is not what it once was either.

Does this, however, add up to enough common ground to form a programme for government? I very much doubt it.

True, David Cameron and Nick Clegg are personally warmer than either is with Gordon Brown, a hard man to like if ever there was one.

But their policy differences are substantial. That’s true in terms of economics and attitudes towards financial services – the backbone of the British economy. It’s also the case that, on Europe, the Lib Dems and the Tories are poles apart, loving and hating it in turn more than either lets on to the British electorate which regards the issue as a bore. On defence, and nuclear weapons in particular, the differences are very public.

So what about the alternative? Unlike the Tories, Labour might be prepared to accept the findings of a royal commission on electoral reform. If the Liberal Democrats secure roughly the same number of votes as the other two but only a fraction of the seats, you can understand their obsession with the topic. But the Conservatives are diehard opponents, for self-interested and democratic reasons.

So what stands in the way of a Lib-Lab coalition if Gordon Brown could be eased out of the picture? Not much in policy terms. Labour isn’t going to give up power over ID cards – or any other issue at this stage, frankly. They expected to lose to the Tories fairly and squarely this time and can’t quite believe there is a chance they will retain office.

But even if Labour and the Liberals are natural soulmates – they had a voting arrangement in the 1970s and a formalised consultative process in Tony Blair’s time – what would the Lib Dems have to gain from governing alongside a party very clearly on its way down? Having gone to the polls on the message of change, it will be difficult for Clegg to explain why he was propping up Labour for another five years, making possibly 18 in total.

In some ways, that is a rather hard verdict given these harsh economic times globally. If he doesn’t score a majority, the man who will have won all the battles but lost the war will be David Cameron, not Gordon Brown. The latter has been cruising towards defeat almost since the day and hour he became British prime minister but blew the chance to confirm his mandate in a snap election.

CAMERON, on the other hand, had led in the polls for several years. His support wobbled at the start of the year before steadying again and then, briefly, nose-diving. The very latest polls suggest some recovery but not enough to guarantee total victory. That inspirational quality which was his hallmark has eluded him of late, just when it matters most of all.

So, if the Conservatives don’t pull it off, and a coalition is undoable, we’re into the territory the British parties were very used to dealing with in the first part of the 20th century – a hung parliament and a minority government. It would fall to Gordon Brown, as the incumbent, to try to get his Queen’s Speech programme through parliament. Some or all of the other parties might abstain, fearing another election or the Lib Dems might offer support at a price – the ultimate power without responsibility.

If Brown failed, though, Queen Elizabeth would call upon David Cameron to try his luck. Abstentions are again a possibility, especially as Labour cannot financially afford another election campaign so soon. And if, of course, either party is just short of a majority, the Northern Ireland parties and the Welsh and Scottish nationalists come into play, not just the Lib Dems.

But, at this stage, my bet is on a second election. None of the various minority governments in Britain has lasted very long. The exception was Herbert Asquith’s, and that was because he was doing the one thing the Nationalist Party wanted – introducing Home Rule.

Rather than becoming ‘European’ then, it seems British politics is going back to the future.