Nick Clegg and David Cameron: 'We have one key purpose'
Prime Minister David Cameron today declared that his new coalition with the Liberal Democrats would be united behind the "one key purpose" of giving the country strong and stable leadership for the long term.
With his new Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg standing alongside him in the Downing Street garden, he said that their alliance represented a "historic and seismic shift" in the political landscape.
"It will be administration united behind three key principles: freedom, fairness and repsonsibility," he told their first joint news conference.
"And it will be an administration united behind one key purpose and that is to give our country the strong and stable and determined leadership that we need for the long-term."
Mr Cameron said the appointment of six Liberal Democrats, including Mr Clegg, to the Cabinet was "a sign of the strength and depth of the coalition and our sincere determination to work together constructively to make this coalition work in our national interest".
"We have a shared agenda and a shared resolve to tackle the challenges our country faced: to safeguard our national security and support our troops abroad, to tackle the debt crisis, to repair our broken political system and to build a stronger society."
In a swipe at the outgoing Labour administration, he said rising unemployment figures revealed this morning were "another sign of the human cost of the economic mistakes of the past decade".
He added: "We understand that we are not going to beat these problems overnight and in particular no government in modern times has ever been left with such a terrible economic inheritance."
Under Labour, the country had suffered "a chronic short-termism in government", he said, claiming the five-year power-sharing deal would allow long-term decisions.
He said the coalition is ushering in a "new politics, where the national interest is more important than the party interest, where co-operation wins out over confrontation, where compromise, give and take, reasonable, civilised, grown-up behaviour is not a sign of weakness but a sign of strength".
Mr Cameron said it was a "remarkable and very welcome day".
