Mr Clegg met former rugby league star Ikram Butt, who now manages the Connecting Communities project reaching out to Asian communities in Leeds, on a visit to Leeds Rugby Foundation at Headingley Carnegie. The Sheffield Hallam MP took part in a coaching session with schoolchildren before heading off to meet business leaders to discuss the impact of the recession.

"The kind of endless tough talking and points scoring on crime from the Conservatives and Labour gets you nowhere," he said. "We've got to do smarter things to stop people committing crime in the first place. If young people take pride in sports they try to look after themselves physically and it means they're less likely to get themselves into trouble. These are not magical answers by themselves, but if you do that combined with giving victims a greater say, making offenders explain what they've done and make amends, over a few years you will cut crime and cut reoffending."