THE former deputy prime minister has told how he had grown “increasingly bemused” by Ruth Davidson's attempts to position the Scottish Conservatives as the party to safeguard the Union.
Nick Clegg has revealed his former coalition partners David Cameron and George Osborne aimed to sow discord between Scotland and England for "short-term political advantage" at the risk of precipitating a second indyref.
The former LibDem leader said his position at the heart of Government meant he witnessed Conservatives' efforts to find an electoral edge at the expense of what he describes as "the long-term interests of Scotland and the Scottish people".
He claims that following the SNP's landslide Holyrood victory in 2011 that delivered their mandate to hold a referendum, the Tories were determined to push through the vote "on their terms and their timescale".
Only the LibDems' involvement prevented the referendum from degenerating into "a confrontation between Holyrood and a belligerent Westminster government that refused to respect their mandate or accept the need to relinquish powers in any meaningful way", said the Sheffield Hallam MP.
Mr Clegg made his first intervention in Scottish politics since his party was heavily defeated in the general election.
It follows claims from party colleague David Laws that Mr Cameron made clear immediately after the referendum that he did not care about Scotland.
Writing in The Times, Mr Clegg said: "It was the morning after the referendum when the mask really slipped.
"As the result became clear, David Cameron and George Osborne's first reaction was to genuflect to their English backbenchers and antagonise Scottish voters by turning the debate immediately towards the divisive issue of 'English Votes for English Laws'.
"In doing so, they gave the SNP the grounds to cry foul and helped to foster a sense of grievance among some English voters that the Conservatives would harness very successfully at the subsequent general election with their spine-chilling warnings of what would happen if a weak Labour government was pushed around by Alex Salmond and Nicola Sturgeon."
Mr Clegg added that senior Conservatives view the SNP as a problem for Labour, as a Scotland dominated by SNP MPs make the prospect of a Labour majority in a general election virtually impossible.
He added: "The SNP and the Conservatives, whatever they might say about each other, now have a strong interest in talking each other up, not down."
A UK government source told The Times that Mr Clegg's claims were not true.
He said: "Only weeks ago, Willie Rennie declared that the Lib Dems were now free to support independence in in an attempt to win over SNP voters.
"Rather than fabricating nonsense from two years ago, they should explain that position first."
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