Hardly A Peerless Party

The Lib Dems are crowing that they still have a significant parliamentary presence due to their 101 members of the House of Lords.

Might David Cameron abolish it just to get rid of them, out of sheer spite? Let's face it, who would oppose him if he did?

During the last Parliament, it became quite clear that the Lib Dems were being run from the Lords, by a clique of elderly grandees.

And the day after the Election, Shirley Williams turned up on the BBC to express little more than disbelief that, for example, Lord Deben, known to the rest of us as John Gummer, was among those who were "not going to be around the Cabinet table".

To her, it was the most obvious thing in the world that an unelected 75-year-old of whom she happened to approve ought to have had his pick of the top jobs.

She must have mistaken the Conservative Party for the Lib Dems.