Yesterday’s Mail carried Lib Dem deputy leader Vince Cable’s clarion call for his opposite number at the Treasury, Labour Chancellor Alistair Darling, to resign. (He was later joined by Nick Clegg – you can hear the interview with him HERE – who is looking for another scalp after taking Speaker Michael Martin’s a fortnight ago). Here’s an excerpt from Vince’s article:

It’s time to get MPs off the front pages and the economy back on. This cannot happen when key figures in Government (and Opposition) are tainted by scandal themselves and lack moral authority.

There is a danger that the public’s thirst for swift justice will be met by lynching a few backbench villains in a kangaroo court.

We will then be told to ‘move on’ (before investigations reach the Cabinet or Shadow Ministers). This must not happen. There have been totally unacceptable practices involving big fish as well as sprats.

The biggest fish of all is the Chancellor, Alistair Darling, who is squarely responsible for the tax system and public spending. …

Until this crisis broke, I never engaged in personal, as opposed to political, criticism. I thought he was a fundamentally decent man doing an extremely difficult job.

When he was accused of ‘flipping’ homes and getting the taxpayer to pay his accountancy bills, I was stunned. I assumed that either a good explanation or a resignation would follow. Neither did. I then assumed that a proper independent investigation would be launched to clear his name. Nothing.

Then I heard him on the car radio telling me that all MPs were to blame, not him personally. My wife had to calm me down, otherwise I would have driven into a ditch with rage. I imagine that the vast majority of MPs, including Labour members, who have not been abusing the system, felt the same.

Here is the company finance director caught with his fingers in the till. He doesn’t explain. He doesn’t apologise. He just blames his colleagues for not stopping him. His moral authority has vanished. He must go, now. We need a Chancellor focusing on the national accounts rather than his own. There are some urgent economic questions to address.

Strong stuff. You can read Vince’s article in full HERE.

We’ve billed this CiL piece a Vince triple-bill, as we omitted to link to his last two weeks’ Mail columns (the sooner the paper sets up an RSS feed the better, as far as the Voice is concerned) – so here they are:

Why I couldn’t face life in the Speaker’s chair (25th May), and

Will YOU feel the heat in our ‘see through’ world? (11th May)