7 Jun 2011

Nick Clegg wins over Lib Dems on NHS reforms

Peace in our tea-time in the Liberal Democrats? It was only March when the party rose up against its leader at the party’s Spring Conference, throwing out Coalition health policy.

At the meeting with the Parliamentary party currently under way, Nick Clegg told his MPs and peers that he thought health reforms were now in the right place. Critically, Shirley Williams, one of the figureheads of the Spring conference revolt, just congratulated the Lib Dem leader on what he’d achieved. Moles in the room tell me that the mood is “generally positive”, and if there has been anything seriously critical said yet I haven’t heard it.

Earlier, when I caught up with the Tory backbencher Nick De Bois – author of the fightback “red lines” email trying to make sure the Lib Dems don’t dilute the reforms too much for Tory tastes – he sounded reasonably on-side as well.

But even if this is the beginning of the end of the parliamentary row, David Cameron needs to win over support in the medical profession (the BMA called his speech “a step in the right direction”). They will be key to winning over public opinion.

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