Brown’s just told us he’s stepping down as leader of the Labour Party. Gordon Brown was THE sticking point between Lib Dem and Labour negotiations (as part of forming a rainbow coalition of the losers), and so, unbelievably, Barnacle Brown has in fact stepped down

Worst still, formal negotiations with Labour have begun, apparently. The major hurdle for the Lib Dems out of the way, there’s now talk of an instant, no referendum bill to bring in Alternative Voting immediately.

As depressing, disheartening, demoralising and soul destroying as it may be, I don’t think the Lib Dems, still stinging from the 1974 Lib/Lab pact where they failed to get PR, can refuse that. Not without getting a concrete offer of PR from Cameron.

Lib Dem MPs were given the power to make this decision to guarantee that if and when one of the big two parties ever tripped up again, they’d make no mistakes – they’d get PR or bust, no matter what.

If they think they can get away with jilting the Tories and that the electorate will forgive them for putting.. well..  their own party’s self interest ahead of absolutely everything else? They’ll do it. No question. Short of having to tolerate a referendum on bringing back the death penalty, there’s very little Lib Dems will turn their nose up at to get some sort of PR.

What’s tragically disappointing is that even as a member of the Lib Dems (at one point) even I didn’t pick up just how single minded this party is on this issue. Seems I didn’t see that particular memo. Talks between them and the Tories appear to have stalled on a few issues. The MPs are refusing to sign it off in it’s current form – now we know why. They claim that economic stability is their top priority. Quite simply I’m not sure I believe that now.

So sod civil liberties. Sod sorting out the deficit this year. Sod the plans to scrap ID cards and the Digital Economy Bill. As long as the sodding Lib Dems get their sodding PR, everything will be just fine, right?

So thanks, Gordon. You might just get the last laugh after all.

UPDATE: So the Tories, it seems, have offered the Lib Dems a referendum on AV, while Labour have offered a bill to give us AV immediately, without a referendum (assuming they can get it through the House of Commons, which isn’t exactly 100%). It’s their final offer, and if they’re saying ‘final offer’ publicly, that means it is.

They have to do this deal now, surely? Surely? Don’t they? Please?