It might seem a strange moment for a LibDem to say this, with our party striding forward in the polls, but as always we should treat them with a pinch of salt. Indeed, let’s remember that some countries ban opinion polls during the last weeks of a campaign, so that they don’t become a deciding factor in themselves.

But the real scandal isn’t that the polls suggest that voters are now seeing through Messrs Brown & Cameron. The real scandal is how the percentages of popular vote transfer into seats. I expect arm-chair psephologists have already gone to the BBC website and used their ‘seat calculator’. And here’s what it predicts on the basis of one of today’s opinion polls, the one which is least favourable to the LibDems. Remember that all present results put the three parties so close to each other that it is ‘within the margin of error’:

Conservative — 33% — 239 seats

Labour — 30% — 291 seats

LibDems — 29% — 91 seats

A single percentage difference between Labour and the LibDems and Labour could have 200 more seats and be the largest party even though they do not win the popular vote. These figures — and the calculations are similar with so many other polls — surely demonstrate once again how bad, how unfit for purpose our electoral system is. The irony is that the party most adamantly opposed to electoral reform is the party with so much to lose through it: the Conservatives might think they have a right to a mandate, but the voting system they support might well decide otherwise.

What I didn’t have chance to mention is how discombobulating all this must be for many Conservatives. One leading Oxfordshire Tory who lives in the Banbury constituency was only last week describing ‘the Liberals’ as ‘dreadful’ and saying that in America ‘liberal’ is an insult, and that it should be here too. I say to you, Cllr Keith Mitchell: you are all Liberals now.

And that is the other point that wasn’t fully discussed on air: the amount of ground the Tories have given in creating a coalition agreement that has so much good LibDem policy. Some highlights:

• restoring the link between pensions and earnings
• raising the tax threshold significantly so as to help the poorest
• real reform of the banking sector
• introducing a pupil premium to assist those in the most deprived areas

I could go on but, for the sake of balance, I should point out that the Conservatives did have some lines in the sand. They have stuck to their position on immigration, insisting on a cap where possible — a policy that is not just illiberal, it’s unworkable. It fails to realise what a mess the system is in, partly of their own making. They have also insisted that ‘any transfer of powers’ to the European Union should trigger a referendum, without admitting that we should have the most fundamental debate on whether we are in the Union or not.

There are other areas where the agreement is worryingly silent: for Banbury, with the battle for the Horton and Bicester Community Hospital, it would have been good to hear more about the running of the NHS and Primary Care Trusts.

In other words, this is an agreement which includes, for us, painful compromises. There are distinctly old-style Tory policies, but alongside them there are real progressive successes. The challenge will be to ensure this coalition unlocks the possibility of further and more radical reform of our system, with the traditional forces of reaction themselves becoming agents of change. That is when we will have truly new politics.

Let me make it clear right from the beginning: the Conservatives can’t be trusted. After a General Election in which their leader, the man who is now buttering his toast in Downing Street, appealed to the lowest instincts of loathing and jingoism, in which their mantra was one of entitlement to power, combined with disdain for any radical change, and in which they began by allowing one of their frontbenchers to play dog-whistle politics, calling homophobes to their side, they remain a backward-looking, small-minded party, a party defined more by its phobias than any finer aspirations. Paradoxically, my distaste for them is what makes me stomach, just about, the coalition that has come into being.

Don’t get me wrong: my dislike of Tory politics is equalled by despair at the Labour Party. They too have become a party so instinctively of the right that they have lost the right even to mouth the word progressive — think how the divide between rich and poor has increased under their watch, while our civil liberties have been undermined in the name of a national security which has become more perilous precisely because of the unjust military escapades in which they embroiled us.

With whichever party negotiations had been successful, there would have been both ideological disagreement and a clash of approach. But, frankly, there was only one set of discussions that could have created a coalition. Discussions with Labour were not, on the present arithmetic, going to provide a workable majority, especially when some of their members would have rebelled on fundamental issues like voting reform. The only practicable possibility was an accommodation with the Tories.

It galls me to see Cameron holding the post of Prime Minister (he is patently unworthy for the role). It worries me that a Europhobe like Hague is Foreign Secretary (remember his own ill-fated General Election? ‘Seven days to save the pound’). It causes a sardonic smile to know that the boy Osborne is Chancellor (pass round the Coke and let’s toast him with it). But, with the results of the elections as they were, there was little chance of  them not being there. The alternative was, in effect, to attempt to force a snap election, which would have served to confirm the Tory logic that only an outright majority for one party in a first-past-the-post, two-party system was an acceptable verdict from the British electorate.

Given that they were going to place themselves round the Cabinet table, is it better for the Liberal Democrats just to watch them get comfortable, or should we be muscling in on the act? Better, surely, in the end, to be there, to be a brake on their worst instincts. We sully our hands, but we save our country from the fate of a simple Con administration.

This is politics as it begins (despite the Tories themselves) to mature. It is not enjoyable for our party — we would be in our comfort zone if we stood on the sidelines — but it is how business must be done: we don’t choose our colleagues, the electorate has done. The key, at this moment, is to take what’s happened as a catalyst for further maturation of our politics. A referendum on the Alternative Vote is not enough to provide fairer politics — we need an elected second chamber, stricter rules on outside earnings, recall of MPs, and proportional representation — but this one referendum can unlock further change. We will need to approach it as a change not sufficient in itself, but the start of a process of more fundamental transformation, offered to us by the party most allergic to reform. The next few years may well be replete with delicious irony.

There is a quotation often misattributed to Machiavelli, but actually of more modern origin (a prize to the first of you who identifies its source correctly): ‘My father taught me, keep your friends close, but your enemies closer.’ The Tories are sitting right in front of us, is that close enough?

I want now to thank all of you who supported our campaign for real change in North Oxfordshire, whether it be by being one of our local candidates, or delivering leaflets, or putting up a poster, or just turning up at the polling station and voting. It’s was so encouraging to find people coming forward, offering to help and wanting to be put of our movement. We have built up momentum and our next step is to ensure we not only keep that but we help it increase.

As you know, this was the first time I had stood for Parliament and I must say I thoroughly enjoyed the experience. If I were to pick out one element I found most rewarding it would be the visits to schools, listening to students’ views and engaging with them. But that was one high point among many. It was also a real pleasure to work with an enthusiastic and growing team, and to be standing in an area I know so well.

On election night, one of the journalists present asked me whether, if I was given the opportunity, I would stand again. I had a one-word answer: absolutely.

So, yesterday, urged on by the success of LibDems like Evan Harris (and realising that my intended also lives in a world that tweets), I joined twitter. I have not yet got the hang of it, but I enjoy the challenge of writing in only 140 characters — my challenge is to find as use up the characters with as few words as possible: the revenge of the polysyllabic!

You will have also noticed that my number of posts has decreased as the election comes closer and I am increasing my numbers on the doorstep to ridiculous levels. Keep the comments coming, though! I will read them around midnight.

So, that’s that out of the way. While your local candidates hust in churches, classrooms and town halls, the Leaders of the three main parties had the hall of the University of Birmingham in which to debate. Here’s a personal take on last evening.

The big headline is Labour’s failure to recover: Gordon Brown didn’t really turn up. He went through the motions, a breathless litany of numbers, without really getting across a strategy or agenda. People who vote Labour will do so despite the Prime Minister rather than because of him.

The debate was between Nick and Cameron. The snap-shot polls after the debate suggest that audiences divided nearly evenly between the two. Stop and read that sentence again: in an election that was said to be the Tories’ to lose, they just can’t land a knock-out blow. What Cameron did for me last evening was remind me (as if I needed it) why I am a Liberal — and how desperate our right-wing opponents are getting faced with their failure to have this election ‘in the bag’.

Cameron talked of his values but, scratch the surface, and what lay beneath was something mean-spirited and intolerant. His values are cheap and nasty. Let’s take two points:

Immigration — as I have said to electors, I have been delighted that immigration has become a live issue in this debate. It concerns many people but has been kept out of the spotlight for too long by two old parties who are too frightened to discuss it. Let’s have the debate but let’s be honest about it. What the Tories said last night hints at an agenda that is either unworkable or so statist it is frightening. There are illegal immigrants in this country — some have been here for over a decade. That in itself suggests how broken our system has been under past governments. We could, as a one-off, wipe the slate clean and begin again, accepting that those that have been here for over 10 years can apply to stay, be brought into the main economy and thus pay into society. Or — what else? Cameron seem to suggest that his government would round up people whose locations are presently unknown and divert resources to deport them. Don’t just think how many police officers it would take to knock on every door and forceably remove the inhabitants — officers who could be on the beat. Think also about how the government would have to gather the information to find these people and prove their ‘illegality’. That would demand a database of information, backed up, one presumes, by forms of ID — so much for Tory opposition to ID cards or the national identity database.

Second point, Europe. Here again, Cameron was most revealing in the implications for his own stance when attacking the LibDems. Once again, his attack was based on a lie: a ridiculous insinuation that the LibDems were gagging to get Britain into the Euro. That’s not in our manifesto and not on our minds. What we have said is that, if the economic situation suggested it would be in Britain’s best interests to join, then there should be a referendum — but the economic situation is clearly not going to suggest that for many years, at least. And, anyway, there is a much bigger referendum that must come first: whether we should be in the EU or not. As I’ve said before, the EU does frighten or anger some people and it’s right that we should have the fundamental debate. But Cameron, in his attack, by his very silence on this issue, revealed his party’s line: no referendum on in or out of the EU. That’s where the debate should be now, not in hypotheticals that are years away — but the Tories just don’t want to have that debate that would divide them and which they fear they could not control.

LibDem policies have undergone tough scrutiny and they have come through the test. The only way that the other parties can get close to hitting is by misrepresenting. And by beating about like that, they reveal their own underbelly. The Conservatives like to portray themselves as a patriotic party, but they have forgotten the British values of fair play and tolerance. They can only offer a rhetoric of fear. Nick’s so right to focus on an agenda of hope and of real, radical change.

In any other election, the eye-catching campaign for a ‘Robin Hood Tax’ would have caught the public imagination. But there has been so much drama, so many surprises and — since yesterday — such serious gaffes that this has been pushed down the agenda. And that’s a pity.

OK, so the Robin Hood Tax is a re-branding of a old proposal, the Tobin Tax named after the American economist who first proposed it in 1972. It’s a levy of a fraction of a per cent on every financial spot transaction, with the money raised intended to combat poverty.

OK, it’s controversial. Many journalists, and some economists, have thrown cold-water over it, particularly in the right-wing press. They say that it will hurt the poor by adding costs to transactions. Perhaps it concerns them more that they claim it will damage banks’ profitability.

OK, it can’t happen with a click of the fingers. To work properly, avoiding gaping loop-holes, it will need to be by international, cross-currency agreement.

BUT IT’S STILL A CAPTIVATING IDEA.

I’m under no illusions about the difficulties and the opposition the proposal will face but that’s no reason to fight shy of it. As the future of our finance sector is rightly at the centre of debate right now, this is precisely the time to have this proposal considered seriously and openly.

So, I’ve signed up to Robin’s band. I see I am the 46,000th person to do so (do I get some sort of prize? 0.005% of a chocolate button?).

And I’ll add what I see as essential first steps to getting a workable Tobin tax:

1. An agreement on the ring-fencing of the money raised — I personally would want to see it spent on international development, including mitigation of climate change. Others round the table might want it used for different purposes, but let’s have that discussion now.

2. Any agreement has to be international — it’s only through making this part of worldwide regulation that we are really going to get this work. We don’t want it to be yet another stipulation that financiers see as a challenge to their ingenuity in avoiding.

3. International agreement is much more likely now than it was a few weeks ago following the IMF’s proposals for taxing banks. The Tobin Tax needs to be thrown into that equation now and considered alongside the other proposals, as part of an overall package.

But none of this should be used as a recipe for delay: the extra funding to fight global poverty is needed urgently. Yes, there will be interminable meetings round oversized tables in anonymous conference centres, but a timetable for decision, in my own opinion, is essential.

In the meantime, we need to set about reforming our own banks in Britain, and making them once more safer institutions which give back to society. I’m proud that my party has got hard-nosed proposals to do that. I am also proud that my party has said in the Liberal Democrat manifesto that we support the principle of the Tobin Tax. Robin Hood’s men and women have swapped their clothes and are in head-to-toe in orange nowadays.

Now, there’s a headline you didn’t expect to see in this constituency.  But, if the Oxford Mail website is to be believed, I am set for an historic victory in this constituency. On latest figures, the Liberal Democrat candidate would gain 46%, far, far ahead of the Conservatives (10%) with Labour behind them (6%).

Obviously, I welcome this recognition that a return to Liberalism (for, truly, this was once a Liberal stronghold, a century ago) is best for North Oxfordshire. I blush to think that my performances at hustings might have consolidated our standing, but I do have a slight worry.

The same poll puts the Greens on 34%.

The voters of this constituency are ready, I am sure, for change, but somehow I sense that the sackcloth and hessian prescribed by the Greens might not be for most people living here. Green might be the colour of wellies but it is not the colour of politics.

Of course, it may be that Tory members have taken so seriously Mr Cameron’s message that green is the new blue that they ticked the wrong box. Even if we assume every Green is a closet Tory (or vice versa), the LibDems would, on these results, score a narrow victory.

Or maybe, just maybe, there’s something wrong with this sort of uncontrolled, unscientific poll.

I sigh. The asti spumante will stay on ice. For now.

One of the most enjoyable events of the election so far has been the ‘Question Time’ arranged at Banbury School by one of the sixth formers: well chaired, with a packed room, it also drew some of the sharpest questions to date.

One of the things that struck me during it was the number of young people in the room who were opposed to the European Union. They are, of course, not alone — I know there is suspicion and concern among other residents of North Oxfordshire. In that situation, I must say, the response from the two old parties that ‘it’s to our benefit to be in the EU’ might be true but it is certainly not enough.

Our political system has failed us in so many ways and this is certainly one of them: politicians have been too frightened to talk about ‘Europe’ so they have stifled any debate on the issue. I remember previous elections when the LibDems tried to push the issue onto the agenda but Labour and the Conservatives both ran a mile. Hopefully, finally, as our political world changes, they can’t hide any more.

We really do need to have a fundamental debate about our position in Europe. The issue is so important that it deserves a campaign of its own: an honest referendum on whether we stay in the European Union or get out — anything less would be dishonest. A vote on this or that treaty, a work of prose so leaden, so lengthy and so dull that very few would actually read it, would not get to the heart of the matter.

From what I hear from the young voters at Banbury School and elsewhere is that they do want that fundamental debate. If so, there are only two parties that will give them what they want: UKIP or the LibDems.

Of course, make no mistake: when we LibDems have enough seats and high enough share of the vote to force a referendum on the political establishment as part of the change to our politics, I will be on the other side of the debate from UKIP. As will be clear to those of you who have read other pages of this site, I will be arguing strongly that we should be reforming the EU to our advantage from the inside. Others, like UKIP, will call for withdrawal. The battle lines will then be drawn — but for now, getting a referendum is where the battle is.

The European Union is far from perfect — far too bureaucratic, far too little democracy. But it is made worse by a political élite that has failed to let us have the open discussion of the issue that we deserve. We can’t deny the geographical and cultural reality of our European identity, but we can and should have the opportunity to decide how we want to express that in the twenty-first century.

As reported on the Banbury LibDems website, one of my first acts of this general election campaign was to sign the Royal British Legion pledge ‘to do my bit’ for the Armed Forces family. I was very happy to do so and to commit to finding ways to help our troops and our ex-servicemen and women in Parliament.

Whatever we think of the government’s decisions on military escapades around the world, I think it’s important that we differentiate between the decision-makers and those on the front-line — between the donkeys in Westminster and the heroes out there. Of course, one of the best ways to support our troops would be to vote against illegal wars. I am proud to be of a party which voted consistently against the invasion of Iraq. I welcome the fact that Banbury’s most recent MP voted once against the war but I wish he had done so earlier and consistently, as the LibDems did.

And supporting the armed forces also means making the right choices about military equipment and weapons in the future. The biggest decision will be Trident, and I have given my line on that already. It’s interesting to see in The Times today that former generals are singing from the same hymn sheet — saying that if we want to invest in our forces, it may be best not to have a like-for-like replacement for Trident. Will Labour and the Conservatives listen to the advice of the experts, I wonder.