Today's Guardian, May 7th 2015, carries a very interesting piece by Seamus Milne which suggests that the Conservatives have a rather different strategy up their sleeve should the Election not go the way they would wish.
Where I have always understood that, in the case of a hung parliament, any party which can assemble an effective coalition of 323 or more MPs can form the next Government, Milne suggests that the Tories, facing a more fragmented vote across 7 or more parties, will now suggest that it is only the individual party with the most MPs that has any legitimate right to form a coalition.
And given the remarkable media support that the Conservatives have managed to assemble, should they actually seek to deploy this strategy, we will witness an serious assault on the democratic process, led by media interests who reflect the concerns of a wealthy and tiny minority in our society.
As I have said previously, the wealthy and powerful in society have far less need of representation than do the rest of us, yet it is they who manipulate the process, through their proxies, to strengthen their grip on the levers of power.
At a time when diversity in political opinion seems to be increasing and when there could be a better chance of compromise, the Tories may well be plotting a course towards an even more extremist future.