Liberal Democrats Party Conference: Nick Clegg speech

Liberal Democrats Party Conference: Nick Clegg speech; Clegg speech SOT The stakes could not be higher: not just one, but two, unions now hang in the balance. If we vote to leave the EU, I have no doubt that the SNP will gleefully grab the opportunity to persuade the people of Scotland to leave the UK as well. Then what? Do we want our children and grandchildren to live in a once great country now pulled apart? A Great Britain turned into a Little England, drifting friendlessly somewhere in the mid Atlantic? I have no doubt that David Cameron's referendum will be contested on the issue of jobs, economic security, the terms of any renegotiation and so on. But there's a big, enduring question which hangs over all of this: what kind of country do we want to be, what is our role, in this globalized world of ours? Open or closed? Leading in our own European backyard or isolated from our nearest neighbours? Because let's be clear: for all the huffing and puffing we're going to hear from those who want to leave the EU, they have no answer to that fundamental strategic question. Is America, Uncle Sam, going to help us out when we've cut ourselves off from our own European backyard? Of course not- we may share history and language, but the Americans have been unsentimentally clear that we are of less relevance to them if we are less important in Brussels, Berlin or Paris. The Chinese and Indians simply can't understand why we're even contemplating relinquishing our leadership role in Europe in the first place. That is why the ambivalence of the new Labour party leadership is so utterly perplexing. Over the years we've all got used to the isolationism of the Conservative party. But Labour? On a number of occasions in recent years I've seen the Labour party abandon its progressive principles to score short term tactical points: failing to support House of Lords reform; barely lifting a finger in the AV referendum; blocking pa...