The Guardian has spent the last five years spewing poison in the direction of the Liberal Democrats. Now, a week into a majority Tory government, they finally realise what good we did. I suggest that this is not entirely a surprise. A cursory glance at the Conservative manifesto gave an indication of what would happen. David Cameron’s pronouncement, back in 2012, that he’d govern like a true Tory if it wasn’t for the Liberal Democrats, went unignored.

Here’s what they had to say in an editorial posted last night:

…yet it is true too that the Lib Dems were frequently a moderating, and on occasion a truly positive, force within the coalition. Even in social security, a field in which they ultimately proved disappointingly willing to fold, they postponed the serious Conservative assault for a couple of years. On the core liberal territory they proved more determined – defending human rights, seeing off the snooper’s charter and rallying to defend equality laws. It has taken precisely one week of majority Conservative government to remind Britain why, in the absence of a liberal party, one would have to be invented – and indeed, why one will now have to be reinvented and rebuilt.

They then acknowledge that Liberal Democrats are needed because their precious Labour party can’t be relied upon to stand up for civil liberties.

In all of these areas, most of the Lib Dems who could previously have checked and balanced in the Commons are no longer there to do so. Even if Labour were not as bewildered as it is right now, it could not be relied on to do the same. It is just as often authoritarian as it is libertarian, and – with the impressive exception of the early Blair years – it has been constitutionally conservative through much of its history.

It assumes that our recovery must be slow and painful. I’m not so sure that this is the case. Our politics is volatile and fraught. Look at the way the SNP have gone from also-rans to key players at both Westminster and Holyrood in just over a decade. All it’ll take is for something this awful government does to capture the public’s imagination and we could be back on track again. I’m not underestimating the scale of last week’s defeat, which was brutal and which I don’t think most of us have even begun to properly feel yet, but we do need to pick ourselves up and be there to be the voice of liberty and reform.

I’d also take issue that we merely postponed Tory welfare reforms. Let’s be clear, I opposed many of the coalition’s cuts to social security, notably the Bedroom Tax, the limitations on Employment and Support Allowance and the benefits cap. However, it’s wrong to say that Liberal Democrat ministers had no influence at all. There were many things that we absolutely put a stop to. For example, I understand that the Tories wanted to charge people to make appeals against benefits decisions and then make them pay back any benefits if their appeals were unsuccessful. Let’s see if that one raises its ugly head in George Osborne’s forthcoming budget. The effects of such a decision would be devastating.

Freed from the constraints of government, Alistair Carmichael is back on blistering reform, commenting on his Facebook page:

Where do you start? The North London left wing elite finally acknowledge Liberal Democrat influence in government – just a bit too late, guys. The time for this sort of commentary is past and maybe if it had come earlier then we might still be in there making the difference that you NOW acknowledge we made. What really gets me, though, is the reference to us being wiped out in “mainland Scotland”. Clearly they would love to say “wiped out in Scotland” but the technicality that people living in “island Scotland” returned a Liberal Democrat MP prevents them from doing so. I hope that the author of this self-indulgent piece of nonsense chokes on their quinoa tomorrow. Well, obviously, I also hope that someone else is on hand to perform the Heimlich Manoeuvre, just in the nick of time….

The Guardian would do well to recognise its own role in what happened to us last week. Our positive impact on the coalition didn’t suddenly become obvious this week. The signs were all there. The Guardian just chose to ignore them for five years.

* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings