Nick Clegg has been spoken of as a future leader of the LibDems since even before the voters of Sheffield Hallam elected him to the House of Commons last May. Indeed, it seemed that more column inches were spent bemoaning Mr Clegg’s absence from the party’s recent leadership contest than praising the merits of any the men who did stand.

To those of us who are not fascinated by internal LibDem gossip, his suitability for the job remained unexplained.

Until this weekend. In his comments on the award of a CBE to Andy Hayman, the Assistant Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police for Specialist Operations (who is in charge of terrorism investigations), Mr Clegg demonstrated why he would make the perfect leader for the Lib Dems.

Mr Clegg took to the airwaves to criticise the timing of the award. It should have been postponed “given that Forest Gate is still so fresh in everybody's mind". Mr Hayman might be a distinguished public servant but he should not have been given his award now.

Leave aside the fact that either Mr Hayman merits an award or he does not.

Leave aside that in his job – preventing terrorists from murdering us - Mr Hayman will do more to benefit his country in the ten minutes he spends having his morning cuppa than a politician such as Mr Clegg will manage in his entire career.

And leave aside that had Mr Hayman not acted on information that the house in Forest Gate was a bomb factory, and had it indeed been used to murderous effect, Mr Clegg would no doubt be calling for the Assistant Commissioner’s resignation.

In arguing that the Forest Gate raid has undermined Mr Hayman’s right to public gratitude, Mr Clegg must believe that the police should not act on information given in advance, in case it turns out to be wrong. Because the only guarantee that advance information is correct is to wait and see how things turn out.

In which case, since much of Mr Hayman’s work involves acting in advance of an incident, in order to prevent it, Mr Clegg must believe the Assistant Commissioner’s entire modus operandi is illegitimate. In which case the issue of timing is irrelevant; he would not merit an award in the first place.

In making an unprincipled, opportunist and illogical statement over the weekend, Mr Clegg has demonstrated why he really is an ideal leader for the Liberal Democrats.