It is the most fascinating, unpredictable and nerve-racking election of all time, and Thursday will not conclude the drama. It will merely be the end of the first act. The campaign has had two surprising aspects. The first was the Liberal upsurge. The second, the Labour Party's self-control. That is almost at breaking point. Just away from the microphones and cameras, the tensions are cracking. As soon as Big Ben starts to strike 10 o'clock on Thursday evening, there will be an eruption which makes Iceland seem trivial. Peter Mandelson will need a police escort. The unfinished political realignment of the early Eighties will be resumed, leading to the end of the Labour Party as we have known it.
In the negotiations, Nick Clegg will be in a much stronger position than David Steel was in 1981. He will have many more MPs than Lord Steel had, and he has more political self-confidence. Nor will he have to worry about rivals. There are no big beasts of the calibre of Roy Jenkins and David Owen to push the Liberal leader away from the limelight. Lord Mandelson? He almost joined the SDP Mark One in 1981. After 1994, he helped Tony Blair to create the SDP Mark Two. Is it now time for Mark Three? Will he now help to finish the job of creating a centre/centre-left party, which marginalises socialism? But Nick Clegg will lead it. The least that he can hope for is to be Leader of the Opposition after the next election.
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