Nick Clegg must make a Left turn to save the Lib Dems from disaster The Lib Dems sold the pass on the NHS (Mr Reeves admits that the Coalition's "politics of health were badly botched"), and vague promises of fairer taxes in hard times have alarmed middle-earners, who think Mr Clegg is gunning for them. The truth, unmentioned in Brighton, is that, in signing up to Osbornomics, Mr Clegg has helped impoverish the very people he wants to help. As the Resolution Foundation think tank shows in its new report, living standards for low- and middle-income households will be lower in 2020 than a decade earlier, even if growth returns. Mr Clegg, the avowed saviour of the squeezed middle, is also applying the pincers. No wonder everyone is confused. Today it falls to the leader to dispel that fog. Cleggites are hoping he will give a masterclass in leadership by extolling the Coalition while still showing that the Liberals are a viable political force and a natural party of government. That feat, akin to juggling blancmanges, would mean acknowledging that the Lib Dems are iron in their principles and endlessly malleable in their methods. Mr Clegg might, however, just pull it off when he assures the faithful, and the country, this afternoon that his is "one of three parties of government." If one thing unifies the Lib Dems, it is the realisation that the only thing worse than diluted power is its absence. Cleggites and Cableites alike are desperate for another coalition. But with whom? Mr Cable longs to waltz off into the sunset with Mr Miliband, while Mr Clegg, in his comments today, will give the clearest sign that he is also prepared to work with Labour to form a government in 2015. That may be a matter of necessity, but it is also shrewd positioning. New polling for the Fabians shows that 54 per cent of Lib Dem voters would consider switching to Labour, but only 36 per cent would countenance a Tory vote. While 43 per cent of Lib Dem supporters describe themselves as being on the Left of politics, only 8 per cent say they are on the Right. Lib Dem deserters since 2010 have split four to one in Labour's favour. Although the Cleggite core, bolstered by David Laws, is more naturally sympathetic to the Tories, even arch-Cleggites tacitly acknowledge that a coalition with Labour after 2015 is not only likely but desirable. A second deal with the Tories, should they win, would alienate any remaining supporters, crush all notions of independence and leave the Lib Dems as a rump doomed to extinction. Some senior Labour figures have welcomed Mr Cable's texts, if only because their last, disastrous effort to build a coalition was hampered by a dearth of mobile numbers for the Lib Dems. The Fabian findings, and the mood of conference, put an onus on Labour to start building proper bridges and the Lib Dems to start crossing them. That is not what Mr Clegg will say today. Nor, although he is said to admire Mr Miliband's reformist tendencies, is there much sign that this cordiality is reciprocated. Indeed, the Labour leader has said, unwisely, that he would never work in coalition with Mr Clegg. Such hostility ignores the fact that the Lib Dem leader, in joining forces with the Tories, took the only course open to him. Since then, he has sometimes played his hand abysmally. His complicity in a failed economic policy will haunt his party and may yet destroy it. But besides blunting many Conservative excesses, Mr Clegg has not lacked for courage or for grace under pressure. Those who see him as a dead man walking under-estimate him. Although it is almost impossible to see him surviving after 2015, it is increasingly unlikely - though not unthinkable - that he will go before. Mr Cable's ever louder hints of his availability may be proof in themselves that the leader is not for budging. Friends say that he has become "ruthless" in office. That is just as well. His next task, which begins today, is to prepare his party for the least worst fate that may be available: a coalition with Labour. The first step is to forge a coherent party with a single message, rather than a pick "n" mix bazaar from which Lib Dem MPs and candidates select the policies most likely to win them a seat. Much as Mr Clegg would like to tell his party today that it is a government-in-waiting, he will have to move, tacitly, towards the more plausible next chapter. The Lib Dems are, at heart, a party of the centre-Left, and that is where their best chance lies. As a check on Labour's tendency to illiberalism in any future coalition, they could become both popular and indispensable. That is not the script Mr Clegg would prefer, but it is better than the disaster movie he is stuck in. Though under-rated in many ways, he has proved a kamikaze leader. The smoking remains of tuition fees, the Alternative Vote and House of Lords reform should be sufficient warning of a possible denouement in which the party itself would crash and burn.