Summary
•David Cameron has said that the prospect of a nationalist party calling the tune in Westminster is “frightening”. In a sometimes bad-tempered interview on the Andrew Marr show he said “the SNP do not want to come to Westminster to contribute to a government. They want to come to Westminster to break up our country.” Cameron did not rule out a deal with Ukip, saying he had no plans for such a deal, arguing he was only 23 seats short of a majority. He also spoke about giving voters the chance to buy up to £4bn worth of Lloyds bank shares at below-market prices if the Conservatives are returned to power.
•Nicola Sturgeon told Andrew Marr that it would not be “democratic” to rule out another independence referendum in the next parliament. She said she didn’t “believe it’s right for me or any other politician to say regardless of the circumstances and regardless of public opinion, I rule it out.” Sturgeon insisted the SNP would be in a “very, very strong” position if Miliband leads the largest party. She said it was possible “to change the direction of a government on individual issues without bringing that government down”.
•UKIP leader Nigel Farage said David Cameron must take some of the blame for the deaths of hundreds of African migrants in the Mediterranean because of his “fanaticism” in toppling Colonel Gaddafi. He also reiterated criticism of the BBC audience in this week’s leaders’ debate, writing “It was important, I felt, for the audience at home to realise what was going on in that room.”
•Nick Clegg has been on the campaign trail in Portsmouth where he said the Lib Dems would consider forming a government with the second largest party as long as the first had been given enough chance to form a government. He also called on David Cameron to rule out a deal with UKIP.
•Ed Miliband was mobbed by a hen party in Chester. As he came to greet the women, a friend of the bridde-to-be to be noted “the stripper had just arrived”.
Updated
The Economist says that David Cameron’s fighting attitude in today’s Andrew Marr show shows he is not, as some Tories believe, “too posh to push”.
David Cameron fights back: The Economist's round-up of today on the British election campaign http://t.co/03hVXzFTGL pic.twitter.com/lNxLI7fv5y
— The Economist (@TheEconomist) April 19, 2015
Here’s a few excerpts:
On Andrew Marr’s BBC programme this morning the prime minister launched his fight-back. The prospect of a Labour Party government supported by the separatist Scottish National Party (SNP) was “very frightening”, he claimed, warning English voters of this “group of nationalists from one part of our country” who plan to “come to Westminster to break [it] up”. He was even more thrusting when talking about his party’s policies on things like child-care and housing. On its new right-to-buy policy (see below), in particular, he exuded conviction, proclaiming that he wanted “more people to have the security of a good job, earning more of their own money, owning their own home”.
But the Economist notes that on occasion, Cameron looked dangerously close to losing it and looked “for all the world as if he wanted to lamp” Marr.
Nonetheless, Mr Cameron does not yet seem to have hit an altogether convincing note in this campaign. At times he crossed the line from “passionate” to “irritable”—he even whinged that Mr Marr had been tougher on him than he had been on his other interviewees (Vince Cable of the Lib Dems and Nicola Sturgeon, the SNP leader). “You’re wrong on every count,” he snapped at his interviewer at one point, looking for all the world as if he wanted to lamp him.
On the Sturgeon interview, the Economist reckons she is still dodging the big questions:
In her appearance on the Marr programme, Ms Sturgeon again refused to answer two big questions facing her party. The first is: would the SNP’s existential support for a Labour government be unconditional, or come with strings attached? The second is: will the SNP seek another independence referendum in the next parliament? Pushed on these two points by Mr Marr she ducked and weaved. “Scotland will only become independent if a majority of Scots want it to be”, she said emptily. That she has thus far managed not to confront these giant uncertainties head-on is a function of her undeniable political skill. But surely Scottish voters deserve answers?
On the stubbornly close polls, it notes:
Some commentators believe the polls may still swing to the Conservatives in the closing days, as voters opt to stick with the party in power. But Peter Kellner, YouGov’s president, says in the Sunday Times today that such a swing, even if it does occur, seems unlikely to be enough. Labour has been winning the campaign, both on the airwaves and on the ground, and the approval rating of Labour’s leader Ed Miliband is now at its best level in two years. The SNP has vowed to block a Tory government, as have the Welsh nationalists; add their seats to Labour’s likely total and the result is above the crucial 323 level.
Interesting piece in the Sunday Times (£) today about the list of draft bills Ed Miliband has “handed to Sir Jeremy Heywood, the cabinet secretary, as Labour makes plans for a new administration.” Here’s a snippet:
Ed Miliband will reinstate the 50p rate of tax within weeks and grab more powers for Downing Street if he becomes prime minister, The Times has learnt.
The measures are among a list of draft bills already handed to Sir Jeremy Heywood, the cabinet secretary, as Labour makes plans for a new administration.
Mr Miliband wants strengthen the Downing Street machine as he seeks to assert his authority over Whitehall and the Treasury in particular, according to Lord Falconer of Thoroton, his adviser on a transition to government.
As the Labour leader tries to shed his reputation for indecision, he would make more political appointments to the civil service and reinstate a “delivery unit” reporting directly to him at No 10.
[...]
Lord Falconer revealed yesterday that draft legislation for about five priority bills had been prepared.
These include abolishing the rule that penalises council tenants who have a spare bedroom, repealing the Health and Social Care Bill, which introduced sweeping NHS reforms, setting in train a house-building programme and devolving power to the cities and regions.
An emergency budget, held within weeks of the government being formed, would set a new 50p top rate of tax and abolish the “non-dom” tax status as well as putting “fiscal responsibility” into law. The freeze on energy prices, expansion of apprenticeships and ban on zero-hours contracts would also be introduced early on.
Lord Falconer, anticipating claims that Labour was being presumptuous, said voters had a right to know that a Miliband government would seek to act quickly and not engage in “languorous discussions”. He added: “You need a few clear priorities so that the civil service knows what you want to do.”
Mr Miliband would revive the No 10 “delivery unit” — a progress-chasing body that reports to the prime minister — as well as strengthen the Downing Street policy unit, the peer said.
Labour would adopt rather than scrap new freedoms that allow ministers to make more political appointments, but would seek to calm relations with senior civil servants nettled by the plans for “enhanced ministerial offices”.
Reuters: UK's Cameron says Labour-SNP power deal would be frightening http://t.co/SyaxjG5saT
— NewsBlogged (@NewsBlogged) April 19, 2015
Thanks to reader withnalianbum, who has linked to the full text of Cameron’s Andrew Marr Show interview this morning.
As he says, “it’s definitely worth a read”.
More from Frances Perraudin who is reporting from Portsmouth where Nick Clegg has been speaking today. Clegg has said the Lib Dems would consider forming a government with the second largest party as long as the first had been given enough chance to form a government.
.@nick_clegg has been back out on the campaign trail, this time with @geraldvjuk in #Portsmouth #GE2015 pic.twitter.com/nGPVqZpvHK
— Liberal Democrats (@LibDems) April 19, 2015
Nick Clegg has said that his party would theoretically be willing to form a coalition with the second largest party after the general election, as long as the largest party is given the “time and space” to attempt to form a stable government first.
He was speaking on a trip to Portsmouth South, which the Liberal Democrats hope to win back from disgraced independent MP Mike Hancock, who resigned from the Lib Dems after being forced to apologise for serious misconduct against a constituent who claimed he had sexually harassed her. Clegg said: “I’m just making the old fashioned point that legitimacy is everything, particularly when you move into an era of coalition government, which was why I was so adamant last time that the party with the largest mandate, not withstanding the fact that they didn’t have a majority, should be given the time and the space to try and assemble a government.”
The Liberal Democrat leader said that he didn’t think a coalition with Labour after the 2010 general election would have lasted six months, as “it didn’t have the basic legitimacy in the eyes of the British people”.
He added: “Very few people, perhaps with the exception of [Daily Mail editor] Paul Dacre, think this present coalition is illegitimate. It flowed from the choices of the British people, and that that was my starting point.”
“Then you ask me … what if that party which has got the greatest mandate but doesn’t have a majority is unable to assemble a government? Would you then, for the sake of stable government, have to consider an alternative? Of course you might have to.”
“But the first step is the very important step and – I’m being very complicated about this – the second step is not going to be legitimate unless you’ve seen the first step properly undertaken.
“Just for the sake of argument, if a larger party, with more votes and more seats, can’t or choses not to create a stable government, then we need a government in this country. At the end of the day, one way or another, a government needs to be formed. All I’m saying is that that first step is an essential one because anything that follows it won’t be seen as legitimate unless that first step is properly pursued.”
- This post was amended on 20 April 2015. Mike Hancock was forced to apologise to a constituent who accused him of sexual assault, as part of a high court settlement. He did not admit to sexual assault in his apology, but serious misconduct. This has been clarified.
Updated
Speaking this morning on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show the Lib Dems’ Vince Cable said working with either the Conservatives or Labour would be “difficult” for the Liberal Democrats.
The Lib Dems wanted to “work with other parties in the national interest” in a post-election government.
He also said the public wanted “moderation and stability”.
Scheduled Tory cuts were “potentially horrendous” and Labour had not said how it would reduce the deficit, he added.
Cable said Prime Minister David Cameron would need the Lib Dems for “stability” and “competence” because otherwise his options for support were UKIP and 30 to 40 of his own Tory backbenchers “who hate his guts”.
The Lib Dems had been “competent on economics and making the numbers add up” and had combined that with “fairness and social justice”, he added.
Cable said he had no preference over whether his party governed with the Conservatives or Labour, if there was another hung parliament.
“We have to respect what the public want... and we have to be able to work with other parties,” he said.
Vince Cable telling Andrew Marr Lib Dems will work with anyone. I think we all knew that already.
— Ross Ahlfeld (@Zuckerbeckers) April 19, 2015
Meanwhile my colleague Frances Perraudin has been hanging out with Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg, who has been addressing a Liberal Democrat rally at the top of the Spinnaker tower in Portsmouth.
. @nick_clegg talking to @libdems activists in #Portsmouth in support of @geraldvjuk pic.twitter.com/wCCvfeiEbu
— Portsmouth Lib Dems (@portsmouthld) April 19, 2015
He has called on David Cameron to rule out cutting a deal with Ukip:
This morning, David Cameron refused to rule out on five separate occasions entering an alliance with Ukip.
David Cameron, don’t treat people as if they are stupid. You and everybody else know that you and the Conservative party are not going to win a majority in the election.
I’ve ruled out a deal with the SNP and Ukip - why won’t you do the same?
My message to Conservative voters in constituencies where the Liberal Democrats can win is very simple: if you want to stop us being dragged off to the left by a Labour/SNP alliance or stop our country being dragged off to the right by a Conservative/UKIP alliance, then vote for your local Liberal Democrat candidate.
Every Liberal Democrat MP is a barrier between Nigel Farage and Alex Salmond and the door to 10 Downing Street.
Speaking on the Daily Politics Show this morning Angela Eagle said Labour would “talk to any party” to secure backing for a Labour lead government.
Angela Eagle says Labour "will talk to any party" to secure backing for a Queen's Speech http://t.co/D9QohpHItU pic.twitter.com/SCtxYMQjrg
— PoliticsHome (@politicshome) April 19, 2015
Eagle, shadow Leader of the Commons in the last Parliament, said Labour were “absolutely convinced” they could secure a majority, but admitted that Labour was preparing for talks with other parties. She said:
We’ll speak to any party that has got representation in the House of Commons in order to try and build a majority for a Queen’s Speech that the country desperately needs for a change of government.
There was an awkward moment when Eagle was forced to admit that she hadn’t put a picture of Ed Miliband on her leaflets. She said she was busy when photos of candidates with the leader were being taken.
Presenter Andrew Neil said it was “pretty clear” that Labour would talk to the SNP while drafting a Queen’s speech.
Angela Eagle makes it pretty clear on Sunday Politics that minority Labour gov would talk to SNP while drafting a Queen's speech
— Andrew Neil (@afneil) April 19, 2015
UKIP leader Nigel Farage has spoken about the tragic event.
Nigel Farage says 'fanaticism of Cameron and Sarkozy' caused large numbers to flee Libya http://t.co/zYfpCsMwQL pic.twitter.com/eRwtT7Emx3
— ITV News (@itvnews) April 19, 2015
This from my colleague Rowena Mason:
David Cameron must take some of the blame for the deaths of hundreds of African migrants in the Mediterranean because of his “fanaticism” in toppling Colonel Gaddafi, Nigel Farage has said.
The Ukip leader said Cameron and other European leaders must take responsibility for destabilising Libya when they ousted the dictator, arguing migrants were not attempting to cross the sea in such quantities before then.
He made the claim after around 700 migrants are thought to have drowned off the coast near Tripoli. It comes after another disaster in which around 400 migrants drowned near the island of Lampedusa last week.
Farage’s analysis differs from that of the UN Refugee Agency which blames anti-immigrant rhetoric from politicians across Europe, including Britain, for blocking attempts to introduce large search-and-rescue operations in the Mediterranean.
The Ukip leader said: “It was the European response that cause this problem in the first place. The fanaticism of Sarkozy and Cameron to bomb Libya - what they have done is to destabilise Libya, to turn it into a country of much savagery and a place where for Christians the situation is virtually impossible.
“We ought to be honest and say we have directly caused this problem. There were no migrants coming across from Libya in these quantities before we bombed the country and got rid of Gaddafi, however bad he may have been.”
Farage said he did not have a problem with offering refugee status to “some Christians from those countries”.
He made the comments on the BBC’s Sunday Politics despite being locked in a row with the broadcaster about the make-up of the audience in last week’s challenger parties debate.
During the debate, he questioned what he saw as a left-wing bias in the audience. Ukip is now considering a formal complaint to the BBC after party lawyers fired off a letter of requesting details of the company used to select those who were there, how the company was chosen, who at the BBC was involved in the instruction of the company and what research had been done into the ownership of the company and political make-up of its staff.
Farage told the Sunday Express: “There is certainly potential for complaint. I can’t comment on whether there will be a legal complaint because there are precise details about broadcasting legislation, so I will let my lawyer deal with that.”
Political commentators and many on Twitter are asking why the terrible migrant deaths in Libyan waters are not forming part of the election debate. This weekend it emerged that up to 700 more migrants are feared to have drowned just outside Libyan waters, in what could prove to be the worst disaster yet involving migrants being smuggled to Europe.
Ask Cameron - meddler in Libya and Syria - why the #Royal Navy isn't helping Italy save #migrants in the Mediterranean. #Marr
— Roy Bland (@roybland) April 19, 2015
Astonished Andrew Marr didn't ask about Libya in main interview with Cameron. #Marr
— Jason Beattie (@JBeattieMirror) April 19, 2015
The Spectator has written a leader calling for attention and action to be given to the urgent problem. Here is an extract:
As Libya collapses into violence, its great friends in London and Washington have effectively turned a blind eye. There is a general election on, and everyone would prefer to think about other things. In Britain, politicians speak proudly of increasing the foreign aid budget to 0.7 per cent of the national income, but the money sent to Libya has not created a successful state. The country has had seven prime ministers in four years, and its promising democratic beginnings have yielded to sectarianism. As in Iraq, the ultimate victors look like being Islamic fundamentalists — from whom Libyans are now trying to flee in vast numbers. Italy, the closest European country, is taking almost all of the strain.
Thanks to PCSmith below the line for pointing us to the most unlikely story that has been floating about this weekend: Ed Miliband’s mobbing by a flesh-hungry hen party. As PCSmith points out, the Mirror have had a bit of fun with it.
Perhaps not my favourite moment in this campaign, but almost certainly Ed’s.
Speaking on Sky News’s Murnaghan Labour’s shadow chancellor Ed Balls said Labour will not get involved in deals with a party that wants to break up the United Kingdom in an interview.
He later added: “We’ve seen this morning a desperate prime minister with a faltering campaign. He had no answer on NHS funding, refused to rule out a coalition with Ukip and said food bank use was soaring because of better advertising. He has nothing to say about a better Britain for working families so he’s talking up the SNP as his last best hope of clinging to power.”
The FT’s chief political correspondent Jim Pickard has pointed out why this is significant:
Ed Balls on SNP: "We're not going to start getting involved in coalitions OR DEALS with a party that wants to break up the United Kingdom."
— Jim Pickard (@PickardJE) April 19, 2015
Balls comments are significant because they rule out "confidence & supply" informal deal with SNP - any arrangement would be hand to mouth.
— Jim Pickard (@PickardJE) April 19, 2015
Balls also said that he wanted to see Lloyds and RBS in private hands. Speaking on Murnaghan show, he said: “I want Lloyds and RBS back in the private sector to get our money back to get the national debt down. Of course I do.” He added:
I am not going to do it by discounting the price at sale, which ends up with a big rise in prices afterwards, which means the killing goes to institutional investors and doesn’t go to the tax payer and the national debt.
I hope David Cameron and George Osborne now admit they got the Royal Mail sale badly wrong. I promise you this - I will not short change the tax payer on Lloyds and RBS.
If you can’t get enough of Nigel Farage criticising what he sees as left-wing bias in the BBC - in last week’s challengers’s debate he complained that the studio audience was “remarkable [...] even by the Left-wing standards of the BBC”.
Well, he’s at it again in the Daily Mail today. Here’s an extract:
The BBC has had a rough few years, and deserved them. It has been rocked by the Savile affair, the overpayment of talent, and of course at every turn its political bias is rightly called into question. The latter is why I didn’t hesitate, about a third of the way into last week’s televised leaders’ debate, to comment on the make-up of the audience in the room at Methodist Central Hall in Westminster.
Early on in the debate, the subject of housing came up, and I seized the opportunity to challenge the other panel members. Would any of them take up, as even my nine-year-old daughter can, the challenge to admit that mass migration into the UK has worsened the housing crisis? Would any of them say, ‘Yes, Nigel, five million immigrants to Britain since 1998 probably has increased the demand for housing’?
Of course they wouldn’t. And the audience clearly agreed with them – that this was nothing to do with immigration, and it’s just coincidental that a massive population boom in this country has coincided with a housing shortage. Fingers in ears: ‘La-la-la. We can’t hear you, Nigel.’
Well they heard me all right, after I gauged the reactions in the crowd to my own comments, and those of the other leaders on stage. I knew the audience was far from the ‘balanced’ and ‘representative’ sample of people that we had been promised by the event organisers, the BBC.
I was firm, but polite. I said: ‘There seems to be a total lack of comprehension on this panel, and indeed among this audience, which is a remarkable audience even by the Left-wing standard of the BBC. This lot’s pretty Left-wing, believe me.’
IT WAS important, I felt, for the audience at home to realise what was going on in that room.
‘Nigel, it’s never a good idea to attack the audience,’ crowed Miliband, smug as you like. He didn’t get it, and I bet he still doesn’t. Why should he? While he’s no stranger to a rough ride by the media, he’s not under the persistent assault that Ukip is – he doesn’t have to stand up for his party and its members on an almost hourly basis, against one smear or another. But I do, and I’ll continue to. Taking the BBC to task for their biased audience was a legitimate extension of that.
Not sure the Conservatives will be that overjoyed with the news that they have come top in one survey: the Polifiller.com cliché counter.
Polifiller.com have gone through the major parties manifestos to check for the presence of buzzwords ( as submitted to us by political correspondents, editors and opinion formers).
Here’s the league table so far:
Conservatives 200 clichés
Labour 58 clichés
UKIP 51 clichés
Greens 49 clichés
Plaid Cymru 48 clichés
Liberal Democrats 44 clichés
SNP yet to publish
According to Profiler the Conservative manifesto features ‘long term economic plan’ while there was a return for the ‘Big Society’.
‘Balance the books’ and ‘those at the top’ feature prominently in the Labour manifesto.
‘Real change’, ‘the people’, ‘foreign criminals’ and ‘metropolitan elite’ appear frequently in the UKIP manifesto.
The Greens’ clichés of choice are ‘long term plan’, ‘Westminster bubble’, ‘bottom up’ and ‘vested interests’.
Plaid Cymru favour ‘the people’, ‘our people’ and ‘stand on their own two feet’.
The Liberal Democrats include ‘package of measures’, ‘those who need it’, ‘there is more to do’, and ‘a return to boom and bust’.
Scotland’s Labour leader Jim Murphy has said Cameron should focus on what the Tory party is doing, rather than focusing on the SNP
Cameron on Marr seems fixated by shouting about SNP rather than taking about Tories.He really is their Cheerleader in Chief. #DesperateDave
— Jim Murphy (@JimForScotland) April 19, 2015
Politics Home have this handy list of key Cameron quotes from the Marr interview
Key David Cameron quotes from the Andrew Marr Show http://t.co/Gr9d13WawV
— PoliticsHome (@politicshome) April 19, 2015
Piers Morgan, who likes banging on about inheritance tax in his Twitter feed apparently, doesn’t think Cameron was much cop this morning.
Cameron's panicking. He's had a dreadful campaign. Labour & SNP have all the momentum. #marr
— Piers Morgan (@piersmorgan) April 19, 2015
Updated
Sturgeon wasn’t the only one putting forth their views on the Andrew Marr show this morning. Conservative leader David Cameron went hard on Sturgeon and the SNP saying that it would be a “frightening prospect” for a nationalist party to hold the balance of power in a UK government.
The Guardian’s Patrick Wintour has this report from the morning interview:
David Cameron warned the prospect of the Scottish Nationalists holding the balance of power in Labour administration was a frightening prospect claiming it would be the first time a nationalist party held sway over the direction of a UK government.
In a combative and sometimes ill-tempered interview on the Marr programme, Cameron also warned road programmes in the South West might be under threat as the Scottish Nationalists demanded more from a minority Labour government.
Speaking on the BBC Marr programme, He said:” This would be the first time in our history that a group of nationalists from one part of our country would be involved in altering the direction of our country, and I think that is a frightening prospect”.
He added the SNP do not even want our country to succeed that is why it is so calamitous.
He asked voters to question whether their road by-pass is going to be built whether their local hospital is going is going to get the cash it needs. “Frankly this is a group of people that would not care what happened in the rest of the country. The rest of the United Kingdom - Wales, Northern Ireland and England - would not get a look in and that is the prospect we face if we don’t get the majority Conservative government that is within our reach.”
With the Conservatives trailing in some polls, but ahead in others, Cameron is maximising the threat of SNP holding sway at Westminster to frighten potential Labour voters back into the Tory camp.
In some of his most vehement language, he came close to suggesting the SNP have no right to influence Westminster since they are committed to the break up of the UK.
He said “the SNP do not want to come to Westminster to contribute to a government. They want to come to Westminster to break up our country “.
He said Labour are already planning to cancel road programmes, and added “Imagine what it would be like if SNP MPs are backing up a weak Prime Minister”.
He said Miliband needed to rule out any arrangement with the SNP. He has already ruled out a coalition, but the SNP has said it would be possible to have a loose arrangement on a vote-by-vote basis with Labour.
[...]
Cameron refused to rule out a deal with Ukip, saying he had no plans for such a deal, arguing he was only 23 seats short of a majority. He said he would be taking his argument to the streets.
He said Ukip were going to be lucky to get one seat, adding he was not going to talk about anything but securing a majority.
Admitting he was animated and angry he said it’s not a negative point to say the economy would not be as strong as it is if Miliband was in charge because Miliband had opposed every single reform.
He defended his plans for a right to buy for housing association tenants, adding he will build extra houses since councils will be asked to sell expensive properties and replace them with new properties. If a council house worth £1bn were sold off, it would be possible to build 9 or 10 houses or flats. The Housing Association industry, he said, was populated by people that happily lived in owner occupation.
He said he was making a retail offer on Lloyds bank shares for the first time saying the government had put £20bn into rescuing the bank; I want to get the money back. We have already recovered billions, but at the same time people being able to own shares on healthy successful British banks is the kind of country we should be building”.
He defended the growth in the use of food banks saying the increase had been due to greater advertising of their existence at job centres by the coalition government.
Pressed on specific cases of hardship due to sanctions on welfare benefits, he said “If you are asking whether it is right to ask people to turn up for interviews, fill in a CV or to apply for a job should have to do those things before getting benefit then that is right.”
He insisted he looked at individual cases and pointed out there was a hardship fund, but rejected an overall review of the benefit sanctions system for the unemployed, insisting a compassionate system was in place. The crucial route out of poverty was jobs, he said, adding two thirds of people getting jobs were British.
ConservativeHome founder Tim Montgomerie, thinks - unsurprisingly - that while Marr gave Cameron a grilling, Sturgeon was given “an easy ride”.
Fair point by Cameron. #Marr being as feisty with him as with Osborne last week - but @NicolaSturgeon and Cable got easy rides.
— Tim Montgomerie ن (@montie) April 19, 2015
The Guardian’s data editor Alberto Nardelli suggests its the numbers, not Sturgeon that will lock Cameron out of Downing Street.
If anything, it will be the arithmetic (i.e. voters), not @NicolaSturgeon, that will lock Cameron out of Number 10 https://t.co/r47S1NGNcg
— Alberto Nardelli (@AlbertoNardelli) April 19, 2015
Right-wing journalist Toby Young tweets that Sturgeon has set out how she will hold Ed Miliband to ransom.
Nicola Sturgeon explains on #Marr how she'll hold @Ed_Miliband to ransom http://t.co/KFjm9nv0Qn
— Toby Young (@toadmeister) April 19, 2015
Here’s a clip of Sturgeon on Marr:
Good morning and welcome the Guardian’s election live blog, which we’re running every day until polling day on 7 May and - if neither party manages to have a break through moment between now and polling day - for some time after that.
I’m Lexy Topping and I’ll be doing my best along with my colleagues in Westminster to keep you informed on today’s campaign events. You can get in touch with me on @lexytopping and I’ll be keeping an eye below the line too, so please do join in the debate.
Morning summary
The deadlock continues. An Opinium poll in the Observer has the Tories four points ahead on 36 while YouGov in the Sunday Times shows a three point Labour lead on 36 and ICM for the Sunday Telegraph has deadlock on 32. The lack of a clear leader has led the two leaders to make similar and unusual overtures to voters outside their natural core supporters, with Ed Miliband wooing soft Tories and Cameron making a plea to Lib Dems and Ukippers to stop Labour and the SNP.
The big picture
It’s still really all about Scotland: the SNP’s offer to help support Miliband, how big Labour’s losses will be north of the border, and the Tories trying to hammer home the dangers of the SNP in partnership with Miliband with a new attack ad showing Sturgeon as a puppet master.
The story so far...
- Nicola Sturgeon has said on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show that she cannot rule out another independence referendum because it would be undemocratic. She is still offering to support a Labour government, despite Miliband rebuffing her advances
- Cameron has warned the prospect of a Labour government supported by the SNP is frightening. He got a fairly rough ride on the Andrew Marr Show, and bristled when he was confronted with quotes saying fox hunting was his favourite sport.
- The big announcement being plugged by the Tories is a retail offer of Lloyds Bank. They are comparing to the famous sell-offs promoted by the “Tell Sid” adverts of the Thatcher years.
- the Sunday Times reports that the palace is getting increasingly worried about the Queen getting dragged into the mess of who will become prime minister. Our own Nicholas Watt actually reported this some time ago.
Latest polling with Guardian poll projection
Your Sunday reading list
Ed Miliband interview: I want to reach out to Tory voters
John Rentoul: If you want to save the union, vote... er...
David Cameron: The first votes are being cast: The choice is a better Britain or Sturgeon’s hostage
Nick Clegg interview: still likely to be one of the big boys
Jay Rayner on the Janner child abuse allegations: I saw the establishment close up
If today were a song...
Sunshine on Leith by The Proclaimers. The SNP are riding high in the polls.
My colleague Rowena Mason has done this write up of Nicola Sturgeon’s interview on the Andrew Marr Show this morning, pointing out that Sturgeon refused to rule out a second referendum in the next parliament.
Scottish National party leader Nicola Sturgeon has said it would not be “democratic” to rule out another independence referendum in the next parliament.
She said she had no plans for another referendum “at this stage” and something “substantive” would have to change that was bigger than just a poll showing a new shift towards pro-independence feeling.
However, she said categorically it ruling out was not possible because that was an issue for the Scottish people.
“There is a democratic lock on this question of another referendum and independence,” she said. “If there is to be another one, Scottish voters would have to vote for a proposition in a manifesto and give a party, presumably the SNP, a majority in the Scottish parliament to get that legislation through. I cant impose that. Democratically, I don’t believe it’s right for me or any other politician to say regardless of the circumstances and regardless of public opinion, I rule it out.”
The big issue is whether the SNP will promote another independence referendum in their manifesto for the 2016 Scottish parliament elections.
The SNP leader has previously refused to rule out another referendum in the life of the next parliament during the Scottish leaders’ election debate last week, but she expanded on her reasoning in an interview with the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show.
The SNP chief was pressed on the issue as it looks increasingly likely that her party could have around 50 MPs in the House of Commons after the election, potentially holding the balance of power.
She has offered to support a government run by Ed Miliband to lock David Cameron out of Downing Street, while claiming the general election is not about independence.
Observers have pointed out that the SNP could in fact have no leverage as Miliband could simply present a Queen’s Speech and dare Sturgeon to vote it down - thereby empowering the Tories.
Speaking on Friday, the Labour leader said: “The first budget of a Labour government is going to be written by Labour government … It is not going to be written by Nicola Sturgeon or Alex Salmond or anybody else in the SNP. I could not have been clearer – how other parties vote on a Labour’s Queen’s speech frankly is a matter for them.... My message to Nicola Sturgeon is ‘thanks, but no thanks’. If you want a Labour government, my message is very simple: vote Labour.”
However, Sturgeon insisted on Sunday that the SNP would be in a “very, very strong” position if Miliband leads the largest party.
She said it was possible “to change the direction of a government on individual issues without bringing that government down”.
The Conservatives have campaigned heavily against the idea that Miliband could be reliant on the SNP, saying the party still wants to break up the union. The Tories have released a new poster showing Miliband as a puppet with Sturgeon pulling the strings.
