On the first full day of their annual conference, Britain's third party, the Liberal Democrats, have had the unprecedented experience of hearing from one of their own members about what it's like to be in government.

Jim Wallace, who's the first serving minister from the Liberal tradition since 1945, said that sharing power with Labour in the new Scottish parliament involved hard choices.

He said it entailed leaving what he called the comfort zone of easy opposition.

But he said that as Deputy First Minister, he would not compromise on the planned abolition of tuition fees for students at Scottish universities, the reward the Liberal Democrats were offered when they agreed to enter into a coalition with Labour.