Nick Clegg at the Ministry of Sound was never going to be a smash hit

http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/may/06/nick-clegg-ministry-of-sound-never-smash-hit

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"You couldn't make it up," said Nick Clegg, standing on a small makeshift wooden stage in a bar of the Ministry of Sound nightclub in south London to a few dozen party activists. Indeed you couldn't. All that was missing was a glitterball and for the interns, strategically placed behind Clegg, to start dancing round their hand – and man – bags to Ricky Martin. If there has been more surreal venue chosen to launch a party's local election campaign, it doesn't immediately spring to mind. Still, at least the Lib Dems must have got a good rate on hiring the club for the morning; it's owned by Lib Dem peer and party donor, James Palumbo.

These aren't good times to be a Lib Dem. The opinion polls show their support to be down to less than 10%, and I wasn't the only one to wonder if they had needed to bus in a few members from Kent to make up the numbers. The warm-up act soon put us right. "I'm Austin Rathe, head of membership and supporters," said a young man who looked as if he might have had to produce ID to get into the club. "Believe it or not, it's a great place to be actually. Over 1,000 people a month are joining the Liberal Democrats."

He forgot to mention how many are leaving or who have had their memberships renewed as a result of a computer cock-up. Even the Lib Dems question the accuracy of their membership figures. No matter, because Rathe had some heartwarming soundbites from members giving their reason for joining the party. "My wife," said one. That must have been Nick Clegg

No matter how much the Lib Dems try to persuade everyone they are now a slick, modern operation, there's something hopelessly amateur-hour about their organisation. It's their last remaining charm that you wouldn't trust them to put on a village panto and, true to form, they chose to prove how closely they had their finger on the nation's pulse by hosting a game of Play Your Cards Right – a show last popular on TV in the 1980s.

"So what we're going to do is get a volunteer up on stage to guess whether the next card detailing an item of Conservative or Labour council waste is higher or lower than the one before," said Rathe. "The winner will get a bottle of champagne." Up stepped Hamish to have a go. "Higher," he said. Er, no. It was lower. Polly was doing much better, but fell at the final hurdle after failing to guess the cost of a couple of llamas. The Lib Dems can't even give away a bottle of champagne right now.

Into this time warp strode Clegg, claiming the Lib Dems had been single-handedly responsible for ensuring that everyone had benefited from the economic recovery. His main target, though, was Ukip. "The local elections are different for us now. Bluntly, we are not the protest vote any more," he said. "Ukip is Britain's protest party now and they're revelling in it." The warning could not have been more stark. Just look what can happen when the electorate start to take a protest party seriously! Though, this wasn't perhaps the message Clegg intended.

Clegg continued in this vein, but his eyes looked dead and passionless as if his heart wasn't really in it. It was early, I suppose. He left without taking questions and the whole event was done and dusted in under 20 minutes. It's going to be a long two weeks for the Lib Dem leader.