Tom Richmond: The next 100 days will make or break coalition

"I think many people felt that a coalition Government by definition would be some sort of insipid mush, where different parties sort of haggle constantly with each other until they produce some lowest common denominator policies that do not really make a difference," said the Sheffield Hallam MP and Lib Dem leader.

"Actually, what we are finding out after 100 days we are being accused of doing exactly the reverse, which is doing things too quickly, too fast, too radical, too reforming."

Clegg has a point. The Government has held together remarkably well over the past three months, given the bankrupt state of the public finances, the cuts that need to be made and a Cabinet-level resignation.

Yet, while the elongated length of the coalition talks helped to develop goodwill between the Tories and Lib Dems for the frenetic 100-day opening burst, it is the next 100 days that will, in all probability, make or break the coalition.

Clegg should be wary. These three months include the party conference season that will, inevitably, be open season for the coalition's critics – and the media. Every nuance of every speech will be interpreted to see if there's any hint of a split or a dissent.

And, once the conferences are out of the way, there's the Comprehensive Spending Review where Ministers will actually have to spell out the precise nature of the cuts. Clegg, or Chancellor George Osborne, won't be able to nimbly deflect questions, as they did this week, by saying no decisions have been taken.

They will have to provide specifics – and then stick to their guns, rather than caving in at the first hint of criticism (as happened with free school milk).

Are they up to the job? Will they hold their nerve? Can they take their parties with them? They need to, for the sake of the country. But the size of this task means that the next 100 days will be more revealing than the first 100 days. Watch this space.

SAYEEDA Warsi, the Dewsbury businesswoman and Conservative Party chairman, was in hot water when she wrote to the four former Cabinet ministers contesting Labour's interminable leadership contest and suggested that they gave up their severance pay.

David Miliband, Ed Miliband, Ed Balls and Andy Burnham are among those entitled to a one-off, tax-free payment of 19,938 in addition to their basic salary of 64,766. Those who have accepted the money include Liam Byrne, Labour's chief secretary who left his successor a flippant note saying there was no money left at the Treasury.

At one point Baroness Warsi – who emphasised that she was a lawyer by profession – described the conduct of Labour ministers as "criminal". Many will agree with her sentiment, although political pressure meant she had to later explain that she was using the term as a "manner of speech" and did not mean it literally.

She had no need to do so, given Labour's legacy. But she was entirely right when she added: "To be a credible leader of the Labour Party, let alone leader of the country, they must show how they would plug the enormous hole in the nation's finances."

I REGARD Tony Blair's decision to give the proceeds of his memoirs to the Royal British Legion as "blood money". He's also doing so only because the former PM has made so much from the lecture circuit that he can afford to make a token gesture.

Yet, having set this precedent, I'm intrigued as to whether his successor – Gordon Brown – will make such a pledge when his book on banking, and also when his memoirs, come out. After all, he signed the cheques for the Iraq war while Chancellor of the Exchequer and repeatedly told us that he was driven by his "moral compass".

WITH typically forthright language, John Prescott accused Alan Milburn, his former Cabinet colleague, of being a "collaborator" when it emerged that the latter was to advise the coalition Government on social mobility.

I don't recall the former Deputy Prime Minister being so provocative when first Shaun Woodward, and then Quentin Davies, defected to Labour from the Tory benches – and then became high-profile Ministers.

Woodward became Northern Ireland Secretary while Davies was made Armed Forces Minister before joining his "comrade" Prescott in the House of Lords.

Were they collaborators?

IT'S refreshing to see that Nigel Adams, the new Selby and Ainsty MP, recognises the importance of tourism to the finances of UK plc.

Asked which government ministry he would like to run, he named to the Department of Culture, Media and Sport. Why? "Putting the Olympics to one side, DCMS can play a major part in promoting economic recovery through the creative industries and tourism," he says.

Let's hope Jeremy Hunt – the underwhelming Culture Secretary who is obsessed with the 2012 Olympics – takes heed of David Cameron's recent speech on tourism and enables proactive, and successful, organisations like Welcome to Yorkshire to get on with their work.

ONLY the BBC's Today programme could devote part of its edition yesterday on the 70th anniversary of the Battle of Britain to question the place in history of those brave RAF pilots celebrated by Sir Winston Churchill in his emotive and stirring "so much owed by so many to so few" address to the nation. Shame on them. If it wasn't for these heroes, the BBC might not be able to spout such nonsense today.