Gordon's Game

Labour supporter Hopi Sen chuckles:

Gordon has at the very least secured a far better deal for the Liberal Democrats from the Conservatives, and made it absolutely clear that if the Liberal Democrats do go in with the Conservatives that they have freely chosen to do so. They will be rightly responsible for their choice. This will be important in many different ways, whether or not a Lab-Lib alliance eventually emerges.

Polly Toynbee is all for a Labour-Lib Dem coalition:

Here at last is the historic chance to heal the pointless rift between two near-identical progressive parties, divided only by history, tradition and a rotten voting system. Clegg would badly misread the mood of this country if he opted for the Conservatives now – despite their "final" AV offer late today.

The Labour offer laid before the Lib Dems is, instead, a coalition of equals, forming a government under a new leader, together with the SDLP, Plaid Cymru, SNP and others. The conventional British view is that a multiparty coalition would be unstable, but that's how most of Europe is governed. It would be in none of their like-minded interests to bring down this coalition government.