The curtain falls on a successful coalition

When in 2010 David Cameron struck a deal to rule in partnership with the Liberal Democrats, he wrong-footed both the pundits and much of his own party. Conservatives are not known for their love of coalition; the best-known denunciation of such an arrangement was uttered by the Tory Benjamin Disraeli, who angrily declared that “England does not love coalitions”.

For most of the next 150 years Disraeli was mostly proven right. But the era of majoritarian rule may now be over. On Monday parliament dissolved, bringing to a close Britain’s first full coalition since the 1940s. It formed when a period of strong government was urgently needed to grapple with a towering fiscal deficit. After an inconclusive election, only a Tory-Lib Dem coalition stood a chance of avoiding continuing instability. The alternatives — Conservative minority rule or a “rainbow” coalition led by Labour — may have fractured within months.

Mr Cameron’s unexpected gambit was greeted with much Disraeli-esque foreboding, not least because the Tory leader had spent the campaign warning of the “bickering, horse-trading and arguing” that would attend any such arrangement. Yet the coalition endured and even thrived, despite the apprehension of the larger partner and the political near-immolation of the smaller. Its politically divided nature failed to prevent it carrying through a full programme of government. This extended beyond the hard slog of fiscal consolidation into wide-ranging reforms, in education, healthcare, the welfare system and pensions.

As time has passed the quarrels have increased in number and volume; each party has at times thwarted the other, notably in the arena of political reform. But this cannot all be blamed on coalition: the worst parliamentary ruptures brewed up within the Conservatives as they waged their interminable civil war over Europe

The Lib Dems deserve particular praise for their conduct. Britain’s traditional third party was widely seen to have deteriorated into a mere vehicle for protest since last sharing power. Yet leader Nick Clegg held his party together with surprising ease, and provided the government with some of its best personnel. Ministers such as Danny Alexander, Steve Webb and Vince Cable will depart from government having left an impressive mark.

This performance is all the more remarkable given the brutal way British voters treat the minor partner in a coalition. Mr Clegg’s left-leaning supporters deserted within months, appalled at his support for austerity and the sight of their vote propping up a Tory administration. The rest eroded steadily as the Lib Dems struggled to demonstrate their distinctiveness from within the confines of government, and other minor parties scooped up the protest vote.

The odds are against May’s election delivering a result any more decisive than the last. But in spite of the coalition’s success another such arrangement is not necessarily the most probable outcome. The Lib Dems look condemned to an electoral bloodbath that may leave them unwilling or unable to repeat the experience. A minority government surviving from one vote to the next cannot be discounted.

UK politics is nevertheless forever altered by the experience of coalition. Scaremongering about indecisive election results will never again possess the same force. Voters will have become more accustomed to their politicians arguing, bickering and horse-trading; a coalition is merely an arrangement for this to happen more in the open. Britain is unlikely to wait another 65 years to repeat the experience.