6.58pm BST

• The Lib Dem leadership crisis has intensified, leaving Nick Clegg looking weakened, but Vince Cable, his most serious rival, looking much more badly damaged after becoming associated with a plot to bring down the deputy prime minister. Lord Oakeshott resigned from the party at lunchtime after Clegg said that he faced disciplinary action for commissioning secret polling showing that the Lib Dems could do better with Cable as leader. The Lib Dems were "heading for disaster" under Clegg, Oakeshott said. (See 12.46pm.) The letter has brought discontent about leadership into the open, and may encourage more activists to openly debate whether Clegg should be replaced. But Oakeshott's underhand tactics have also angered some party members and Cable may well be tainted by his close friendship with Oakeshott and his revelation tonight that he knew more about Oakeshott's polling than he previously admitted.

• Cable has admitted that he was aware of the anti-Clegg polling being conducted by Oakeshott. He did not know that Oakeshott was polling in Clegg's constituency, and in Danny Alexander's, he said. But - contrary to the impression he gave yesterday - Cable revealed that he was aware of the other polling being carried out. That other polling included questions designed to show whether the Lib Dems would do better with Cable as leader. Earlier Sir Menzies Campbell said he would be surprised if Cable had know about this.

I shall be very surprised if Vince Cable was made aware of surreptitious polling, but that’s a question he will be able to answer.

• Senior Lib Dem figures have rallied behind Clegg after Oakeshott's resignation. Sir Menzies Campbell, the former party leader, has been giving interviews saying Clegg should stay.

I believe that Nick Clegg is the person with the courage and the resilience to take the party through the period between now and the general election, the general election too, and on into the next Parliament. And that’s my belief, but there’s a very pragmatic point to be made here and it is this: the last thing the party needs would be to go into a period of damaging introspection over the summer while it decides who it wants to lead it. And when you take these two things together, I don’t think there is any answer to Lord Oakeshott’s position, other than to say that it’s fundamentally flawed.

Simon Hughes, the former deputy leader and a justice minister, has also been giving interviews denouncing Oakeshott.

It's clearly completely unacceptable for somebody who is a party member, who owes his position entirely to the party, not to the electorate, entirely to the party, then to act in a way that is self-evidently against the interests of the party. Vince is working for the party and the government in China. We are working here. We have work to do and the party needs to concentrate on our objectives as well as our achievements ... The only person who has persistently acted in a way which strikes me as a close observer in ways that sought to destabilise the leadership of Nick Clegg, democratically-elected, the first Liberal Democrat leader in government ever, the first Liberal in government to lead the party since the war, the only person who systematically acted in that way has been Matthew Oakeshott.

Kirsty Williams, the Lib Dem leader in Wales (who is seen by some as a possible future leader herself), has also issued a statement saying Clegg is the right person to lead this party into the general election.

• Sir Menzies Campbell has accused Oakeshott of also trying to undermine him when he was party leader.



As a former leader of the party, there's some anecdotal evidence that I too suffered from Lord Oakeshott's intentions in the past ... Lord Oakeshot has conceived of himself as something of a kingmaker and he has gone beyond his confidence in this matter.

• Campbell has said that he expects some local Lib Dem parties to hold meetings over the coming weeks to discuss the party leadership.

As the chairman of Cambridge pointed out, we are nothing if not democratic and indeed it would be surprising if any of the constituencies mentioned in these polls did not have some consideration of what the possible impact might be on the futures of their Member of Parliament and I expect others will do it too. We are on occasion painfully democratic and I will not be surprised if there are more meetings of that kind.

Lib Dems in Cambridge have announced today that they are holding a meeting to discuss this (see 3.05pm) and local parties are also reportedly calling special meetings to discuss the leadership in Liverpool, Winchester, Luton, Hackney and Bermondsey.

• Danny Alexander, the Lib Dem chief secretary to the Treasury, has dismissed a new ICM poll commissioned by Oakeshott suggesting he is on course to come third in his constituency at the general election. (See 2.59am.)

That's all from me for tonight.

Thanks for the comments.