Lord Rennard has apologised for for encroaching on four women's 'personal space' [PA]Lord Rennard was absolutely very concerned personally not to do any possible damage to the party in the run-up to last week's local and European elections.
But Lord Rennard's mea culpa was not released as the ex-Lib Dem chief executive hoped to avoid damaging the party with European and local elections looming, Lord Carlile insisted.
Instead the revelation, which emerged last night, has heaped even more pressure on the Deputy Prime Minister after his party's rotten election results and an attempted leadership coup.
Lord Carlile told BBC Radio 4's The World At One: "Lord Rennard was absolutely very concerned personally not to do any possible damage to the party in the run-up to last week's local and European elections.
"So although this apology was seen, for example, by the party leader weeks ago now it was held back until the elections were over."
Asked if Mr Clegg told Lord Rennard to hold the apology back, Lord Carlile replied: "No, no, no, absolutely not.
"Chris Rennard went absolutely out of his way to ensure and try and make it absolutely clear that nothing further should happen in this case until after the elections."
Lord Carlile also claimed Mr Clegg and party president Tim Farron put out "misleading" press releases calling for Lord Rennard to apologise for his actions without seeing an independent report into his conduct by Alistair Webster QC.
"On January 16 the party leader and the party president issued press releases which, when three months later Lord Rennard was shown the report, were shown to be inaccurate and misleading," he added.
Nick Clegg has had a difficult week after his party's poor election results and a leadership coup [GETTY]Friends of Lord Rennard are now demanding he is reinstated to the party after complying with the recommendations of an independent inquiry.
The development puts even more pressure on Mr Clegg, who has just seen off a supposed leadership challenge.
His most senior colleague, Vince Cable, has been forced to deny plotting to oust him - a change being openly demanded by some MPs and activists.
Lord Carlile said Lib Dem members should be consulted on Mr Clegg's position as party leader.
"The Liberal Democrats have the internet addresses I suspect of at least 80 per cent of their members so it wouldn't be difficult to consult," he added.
"The old liberal tradition of consulting members could not be more sound than in this situation, so if I have anything to offer to this discussion it's 'stop listening to grandees sounding off, ask the members'."
Lord Rennard's expression of regret followed more than a year in which he denied a series of complaints about his past behaviour.
After police dropped an investigation into the allegations, a probe carried out for the Lib Dems by Mr Webster concluded there was "broadly credible" evidence he had violated personal space.
But Mr Webster found that no breach of party rules could be proved beyond reasonable doubt, and merely suggested Lord Rennard should say sorry to the four women.
Lib Dem president Tim Farron has been accused of putting out a 'misleading' press release [GETTY]However, he threatened a legal battle to overturn the punishment, arguing that he had not been allowed to see the full report and risked opening himself to civil damages claims.
A statement supplied to the party by the peer's lawyers this week made clear he was apologising after being given access to a redacted version of Mr Webster's findings.
The statement said Rennard recognised he may have encroached on "personal space" and that he would "therefore like to apologise sincerely for any such intrusion and assure them that this would have been inadvertent.
"He hereby expresses his regret for any harm or embarrassment caused to them or anything which made them feel uncomfortable."
Three of the four women have appealed against the findings of Mr Webster's report, while Lord Rennard has appealed against the disciplinary process for bringing the party into disrepute by his failure to apologise.
In January, Mr Clegg issued a press release saying it was "clear" that Lord Rennard had behaved in a way that caused the women distress, while Mr Farron said it was "clear" he had not behaved as a party chief executive should.
At the time, Mr Webster said of his investigation that there was "broadly credible" evidence that Lord Rennard had "violated the personal space and autonomy" of the women.
He said: "My view, judging the evidence as a whole, is that there is a less than 50 per cent chance that a charge against Lord Rennard could be proved to the requisite standard."
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