Oral Answers to Questions

Kerry McCarthy Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[The Deputy Prime Minister]

I am not sure that the hon. Gentleman has yet got his head around the politics of coalition. [Interruption.] He raises these questions month in, month out. His party did not win the general election; that is fact 1. Neither did my party; that is fact 2. Fact 3 is that we need to compromise for the benefit of the country as a whole; and when we compromise we enshrine that in a coalition agreement, which is like a deal. When one party does not abide by a certain part of that deal, it is perfectly legitimate for the other party to say that it will amend the terms of that deal. That is the meaning of coalition politics.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

T2. The Deputy Prime Minister, not for the first time, disappointed many people this week by refusing to support calls for the editor of The Sun to take the long overdue step of dropping page 3, saying that it would be illiberal to do so. Does his version of liberalism really prevent him from taking a public stand against the objectification of women? Whose interests is he most interested in protecting?