London: Tensions at the heart of Britain’s government prompted a minister from the junior coalition partner to quit, accusing Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservatives on Tuesday of lurching to the right and behaving as if they governed alone.

The resignation of Norman Baker, a Liberal Democrat and a junior minister in the Home Office, comes six months before a national election. It is the latest sign of increasing friction between the two coalition partners, who are keen to differentiate themselves in the eyes of voters.

Though disruptive, Baker’s decision is unlikely to destabilise the coalition since he wasn’t a member of the Cabinet and the leaders of both parties have said they want the alliance, the first of its kind since World War Two, to run its full course until May’s election.

His abrupt departure does, however, underline how the Conservatives’ shift to the right on Europe and immigration in response to the rise of the anti-EU UK Independence Party (UKIP) is placing new strains on the coalition.

Baker likened trying to get Liberal Democrat initiatives through his ministry to “walking through mud” because of opposition from Theresa May, the Conservative Home Secretary.

Baker, who clashed with May on drug, Europe and immigration policy, predicted coalition ties would worsen.

“The difficulty is that she believes she was running a Conservative department in a Conservative government and that the Liberal Democrats were almost there by default and that didn’t make for good coalition relations,” Baker told BBC TV.

“It’s become difficult. It was a constant battle to try to get things through and I think that’s unfortunate,” he said. “It has not been helped by the lurch to the right by the Conservative party to chase UKIP,” he added.

UKIP, which wants Britain to leave the EU and to curb immigration, won its first seat in parliament last month and triumphed in European elections in Britain in May, siphoning off support from the Conservatives.

Its rise has raised fears in Conservative ranks that it could split the rightwing vote at next year’s election and Cameron has tacked to the right on Europe and immigration in recent months to try to neutralise that threat.

Damian Green, a Conservative lawmaker, suggested Baker had quit because of a clash of personalities with May and because he was not a team player, a charge Baker refuted.

Lynne Featherstone, a Liberal Democrat lawmaker, was on Tuesday named as Baker’s replacement at the Home Office.

Cameron’s right-leaning Conservatives reluctantly entered a coalition with the centre-left Liberal Democrats in 2010 after failing to win an outright majority.

The two parties said at the time it was right to set aside their ideological differences to restore the country’s economy after the 2007/2008 financial crisis and to tackle its steep public debts.

Britain’s economy is now the fastest-growing in the EU and the public deficit has been cut by just under half since 2010.

Some lawmakers in Cameron’s party have been frustrated by what they see as the pernicious dilution of their policies by the Liberal Democrats and want the prime minister to dissolve the coalition early. He has not shown any inclination to do so.

Since going into coalition with the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats’ opinion poll rating has more than halved with some supporters disenchanted by what they see as their betrayal of their original principles.

With neither the Conservatives nor the opposition Labour party currently looking on course to win an outright majority next year, the Liberal Democrats may again find themselves wooed as a potential coalition partner, even if they win fewer seats.