Nick Clegg faces a fresh test of his authority as Lib Dems prepare to vote on plans for a more personalised NHS.
Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg has avoided a grassroots rebellion over his proposals for a shake-up of the NHS.
The Lib Dem leader is seeking to put a bruising revolt over Europe behind him as he gears up for his party's spring conference in Liverpool.
The party's spring conference in Liverpool voted overwhelmingly to back his plan to give patients the option to seek private treatment if needed.
But his plans for a decentralised NHS - with more private care - are expected to spark a grassroots rebellion.
But he was forced to offer concessions on locally elected health boards - with delegates voting for a third of members to be made up of local councillors.
It comes as the Tories accuse Mr Clegg of stealing their policies. Labour has also proposed a "personalised" NHS.
They also backed moves to limit private sector involvement.
The Lib Dems' NHS shake-up plans include directly-elected local health boards and greater use of the private sector.
'Patient guarantee'
Mr Clegg is also proposing a "patient guarantee" - which will allow people to go private if they can not get the treatment they need from the NHS.
But Lib Dem health spokesman Norman Lamb stuck to his guns over controversial plans to scrap free personal care for the elderly.
He denied this was the same as the former Conservative policy of a "patient passport".
The party is also proposing a "patient guarantee" - which will allow people to go private if they cannot get the treatment they need from the NHS.
'Vulnerable people'
The Lib Dem leadership sees this as central to its appeal to voters at the next general election but it has come under fire from some on the left of the party for being too similar to Tory policies.
The Tory policy was a "passport out of the NHS," he told BBC News, but the Lib Dem proposals only came in when the NHS had failed to provide.
Mr Lamb denied it was the same as the former Tory "patient passport" policy - or Labour's use of private treatment centres.
He told a rally in a room at the new Liverpool arena, as the conference opened on Friday evening, that the proposals were about putting patients first.
He said the Tory plans would have enabled the middle classes to opt out of the NHS altogether.
"When the health service fails to meet the standards to which vulnerable people are entitled, they should be allowed to look elsewhere for the treatment they need," he told a packed room.
But he said the Lib Dem proposals would be aimed at the poorest in society who had not been able to get the treatment they needed on the NHS.
But some activists are concerned about proposals to give local authorities the power to take over the provision of health care and the greater involvement of the private sector.
"There are voices in the party who are just hostile to any reference to the private sector," he told reporters.
The party's health spokesman, Norman Lamb, is expected to offer concessions to grassroots members in order to get the proposals through.
But, he added, the number of people opting to use private services would, in practice, be "tiny" - if the experience of Denmark, which the party had based its policy, was anything to go by.
This weekend's rally is also designed to prepare activists for what is expected to be a tough test at 1 May's local elections in England Wales and London.
'Passing squall'
The party's London mayoral candidate Brian Paddick had been due to speak at the opening rally in Liverpool but pulled out due to a diary clash.
Three of Mr Clegg's senior front bench team were forced to quit on Wednesday when they joined 12 colleagues in defying his orders not to vote for a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty. But Mr Clegg dismissed the furore as a "passing squall".
He said he had been right not to offer critics a free vote - suggesting that could have exposed even deeper divisions within the party over the issue.
