6.33am: Will Cleggmania start to fade? That's probably the question of the week. I'm not sure whether we'll get an answer today, but at least we might be in a better position to guess by the end of the day.
I'll post a full round-up of what's in the papers later. But my colleague Hélène Mulholland was looking at the first editions as they came in last night and here's what she spotted.
The Guardian's front page story reveals that two of the businessmen who helped lead the charge against Labour's national insurance rise have been nominated to be working peers by the Conservative party.
The peerage nominations have been accepted by the appointments commission and will be announced imminently. But the disclosure is bound to raise questions over the party's continued interest in appointing prominent donors and supporters as working peers.
The Times has put a still from the Tory party leader's election broadcast on its front page under the headline "David Cameron ditches broadcast attacking Labour to target Lib Dems". It describes the decision to replace a broadcast which attacked Labour's record with a direct and personal appeal to voters not to be seduced by Clegg as "the most explicit response yet to Mr Clegg's success in the polls".
Labour had fun at Mr Cameron's expense, identifying seven examples in the four-minute, 35-second broadcast of him using phrases identical or similar to Mr Clegg, says the report.
The prospect of a hung parliament has created speculation about who Mr Clegg would support in power, assuming that it was not the Liberal Democrat leader himself in No 10. Mr Brown has begun internal discussions about Labour's negotiating positions if the result is not clear-cut.
An informal list of so-called "red lines" is already being prepared. These will mark out areas of the manifesto on which Labour is prepared to compromise.
The Daily Telegraph devotes part of its front page to a fellow pupil recalling Nick Clegg as a school boy. It seems to be an attempt to flag up his credentials as a member of a privilege public school. The Telegraph's Edward Roussel, who was at school with Clegg, recalls:
When it came to gritty competitive sport, Nick lacked the killer instinct. He was the nice guy of the team and no match for a fiercely competitive group that included Michael Sherwood, now co-CEO of Goldman Sachs Europe, Gavin Rossdale, the lead singer of the rock band Bush, and Alex Michaelis, the architect.
Underneath, there's a story about the fact that Gordon Brown will have access to key economic figures before the party leaders' television debate on Sky this Thursday. This means he'll be the only leader to know before the debate whether Britain has fallen back into recession, according to the Telegraph. The chair of the UK statistics authority said the situation was "unacceptable".
Brown is launching Labour's plan for growth today and Cameron is talking about his plans to deal with unemployment. Nick Clegg is holding a press conference at 7.30am. He'll be telling us about the Lib Dem plans to break up the banks. In Scotland the SNP is launching its manifesto. And Lord Mandelson is on the Today programme at 8.10am. I'm heading into Westminster now where I'll be reporting what Clegg has to say.
7.33am: Nick Clegg opens the press conference. He says the allegations against Goldman Sachs are extremely serious and that the government should stop using the bank as an adviser until the allegations have been properly investigated.
But there's a wider point, he says. The banks in general have been "cosseted". Banks have been run for the benefit of "vested interests" and not for the benefit of society as a whole.
Trying to grow businesses without money is like trying to grow plants without soil.
The Lib Dems want a new approach, he says. This would include breaking up the banks, so that investment banks and retail banks become separate institutions. The Lib Dems would also force the banks to lend more money because at the moment they are "hoarding money for their own purposes", he says.
Clegg says the other main parties would not introduce reform. Labour was "asleep at the wheel" when the banking crisis occured. Gordon Brown made a mistake and it was the biggest mistake in modern political history. And the Tories would not face up to the banks, he says. They have become the "party of choice" for bankers.
Right at the end of his introduction, Clegg responds, obliquely, to the party political broadcast released by David Cameron last night. He says Cameron can change his PPB, but that he can't change Britain.
7.43am: Here is the Clegg quote on Cameron. Last night Cameron tried to claim the mantle of change-maker in British politics. Today Clegg is trying to snatch it back.
I see that David Cameron, over the last few weeks, [has] changed his policies, he's changed his ad agency and last night he's now changed his election broadcast. But that does not mean he can change Britain. The only party that now stands up for real change, real change in the old economic and political order in this country, are the Liberal Democrats.
7.50am: They're taking questions now.
Q: Would the British economy be smaller under these plans? And are these plans non-negotiable?
Clegg says his plan would help the economy, because it would get more credit flowing. And he says he has always made it clear what his four priorities are.
Q: Are all bankers greedy?
No, says Clegg. He says his father was a banker. Old-fashioned bankers are more furious than anyone else about some of the banking practices going on now.
7.57am: Q: If economic bubbles can burst, can political bubbles burst too?
Clegg replies: "Yes." He does not elaborate. But that is an admission that the Lib Dems could start to go down in the polls.
Another journalist asks whether Clegg would support the party with the most voters or the most seats in a hung parliament. Clegg refuses to be drawn on this.
Q: Is raising the tax threshold to £10,000 "a deal-breaker"?
Clegg says "greater fairness in tax" is a priority for the party. It is something the Lib Dems would fight for. (He mentions "greater fairness", rather than the specific policy, suggesting that the party would be willing to compromise on this.)
8.13am: Andrew Neil from the BBC asks why Clegg is claiming that he can clean up politics when he claimed near-maximum expenses for his second home. Clegg says that he takes the view that his Sheffield home is on loan from the taxpayer. When he sells it, he will return any profit made to the taxpayer.
In response to another question, Clegg says: "I don't think anything is cast in stone." The election situation will change, he says. But people are "enjoying the idea that they have choice".
Clegg says the Conservatives are telling people that they deserve to get elected because they are the only party that can get rid of Gordon Brown. He goes on:
That's not a choice. That's a contest of mutual loathing.
8.20am: I'll sum up the Lib Dem press conference in a moment. But first I'm listening to Lord Mandelson, who has just started his interview on Today.
Mandelson says Clegg does need to be taken seriously.
Q: If people want change, why should they vote for Gordon Brown?
Mandelson says there is more "flux" in the campaign and the polls than at any time since he entered politics. The challenge for Brown is to demonstrate that he has used the banking crisis to learn some lessons and that he can offer change. The economy has to be rebuilt on new foundations. There also needs to be more emphasis on public services, and the political system needs to be reformed.
8.32am: Mandelson is being interviewed alongside Liam Fox, the shadow defence secretary. Fox says if the public want change, they should vote Conservative.
Q: Why has your campaign not taken off?
Fox does not really answer. But he says the Tories are not going to become "mired in a negative campaign".
James Naughtie asks Mandelson if the government will stop employing Goldman Sachs (as Clegg said it should earlier - see 7.33am)
Mandelson says this argument does not take into account the fact that the banks are international.
And that's it. The interview's over. That did not really take us anywhere. I'll get back to Nick Clegg, and sum up the main points from his press conference in a moment.
8.46am: Here are the main points from the Lib Dem press conference.
Nick Clegg dismissed the Conservative suggestion that David Cameron is the only leader who can bring change. Clegg said: "I see that David Cameron, over the last few weeks, [has] changed his policies, he's changed his ad agency and last night he's now changed his election broadcast. But that does not mean he can change Britain." (See 7.43am)
Clegg said that people were supporting the Lib Dems because they liked being offered a choice. He said that instead of offering voters a choice, Labour and the Conservatives were just offering "mutual loathing". Clegg said:
People are enjoying the idea that they have got more choice. In every walk of our life we have choice, whether it is the mobile phones we use, the cushions we buy in Ikea, the banks we decide to bank at, the holidays we take. In all these things we've got choice. But uniquely in British politics 45 million people are being told by the two old parties, "you've got no choice, you've got to pick either me or him, either David Cameron or Gordon Brown". And now I think the Conservative message is "please pick the Conservatives because we really, really hate Gordon Brown". That's not choice. That's just a contest of mutual loathing.
Clegg acknowledged that the Lib Dem bubble may burst. In what could be seen as a warning to his party not to get complacent, he said:
There's a great deal of fluidity around. What goes up can do down. Polls will change. There will be stories, gaffes, scandals, spats, literally in the next two and a half weeks, so what's happening now will seem very different next week, just as last week felt very different to this week. I don't think anything is cast in stone.
Clegg called for fundamental reform of the banking system. Clegg said: "Most people, except perhaps Gordon Brown, now recognise that too much centralisation in politics has led to wasteful bureaucratic public services and a command-and-control state that leeches power away from people. I believe the same analysis can be made of our economy." Further details of the banking plans are now on the Lib Dem website.
9.13am: Alex Salmond, Scotland's first minister and the leader of the SNP, was on the Today programme earlier. He said that a "balanced parliament" would be a people's parliament, "infinitely preferable" to a majority Tory or a majority Labour government.
I have more experience of running a balanced parliament than anyone else ... because I've been doing it for the last few years as first minister of Scotland, so I know exactly how it works and exactly how you can wring concessions and achieve objectives within that context.
He also said the SNP's priority would be to block the cuts that he claimed Labour, the Conservatives and the Lib Dems were planning for Scotland.
I have not really registered the phrase "balanced parliament" before, but I think we're going to hear it a lot more in the next two weeks. The SNP seem to use it regularly. Does anyone know who coined it? It makes the point that the term "hung parliament" is pejorative, even though many would argue that there is a lot to be said for no one party having an overall majority.
In this short essay on the LSE website, Stuary Wilks-Heeg says the term "hung parliament" only came in in the 1970s. (He claims my colleague Simon Hoggart was the first journalist to use it, in a Guardian article in 1974.)
Wilks-Heeg says that with Britain moving towards a multi-party system, it might be better to ditch the term "hung parliament" and replace it with the SNP phrase, or alternatively "negotiating parliament", the term favoured by David Owen when he led the SDP.
9.20am: Gordon Brown has just made a statement about the air travel crisis in Downing Street. He said the airports were taking advantage of a "window of opportunity", but that passenger safety would always be a priority. The crisis doesn't seem to be having any impact on the election campaign yet, but it's difficult to tell. Perhaps we'll see some polling figures before the week is out. By the way, you can keep up with all the latest information on the continuing chaos caused by the Iceland volcano on the Guardian's live blog.
9.33am: The Press Assocation has written up a story about Clegg's exchanges with Andrew Neil about his expenses. (See 8.13am) They've got some nice quotes that I missed. Clegg said: "Crucially, it's not my home, it's yours, it's the taxpayers." That prompted this exchange.
Neil: If it's our house, can we all stay for free?
Clegg: I know there's new politics, but there's a limit.
9.58am: The Conservatives have released a quote from the speech David Cameron will give this afternoon when he launches his plans for welfare reform. The details of the plan aren't new. But what's interesting is that Cameron is trying to brand it as part of his "big society" agenda. Cameron will say:
The old way – the big government way – has failed. It's time to tackle welfare dependency a new way – the big society way. We're going to change the whole way welfare is done in this country so everyone takes responsibility and plays their part. This is our new welfare contract: do the right thing and we will back you all the way. But fail to take responsibility – and the free ride is over.
Yesterday Cameron said the big society was the only new idea to emerge during the election campaign. But other Tories think it does not work as a campaigning device. In today's Guardian Nicholas Watt reports on the views of one unnamed senior Tory, who said:
The big society, which is great for governing the country, is no good as an election strategy. It needs to be dumped because nobody understands it on the doorstep. We need to spell out in specific terms what we plan to do. Let's talk about our plans for cancer drugs.
10.13am: The Chingford Strangler is still on form. Yesterday Lord Tebbit said that David Cameron should focus on bursting the "Clegg bubble". On his Telegraph blog, he had given some indication as to how he thinks this should be done.
The imperative for the Tories is to establish that Mr Clegg is a pro-immigration sycophantic Europhile with no policy whatsoever, beyond defence cuts, to reduce the crippling burden of the national debt.
10.37am: Here are some of the best political stories and articles in today's papers.
Edward Roussel in the Daily Telegraph recalls being at Westminster School with Nick Clegg. "Westminster School ... was and still is singularly competitive. The hallmark of success, though, was to achieve glory while giving the impression of making no effort at all. Nick was less talented at this game than most: He was overtly academic: a disciplined teenager, fluent seemingly in all known languages, who completed his homework on time every time."
The Financial Times says Cameron will change his body language in the next leaders' debate. "The problem was not with what David was saying, it was the way the presentation came across," one aide said.
And the FT says Cameron's "drive to transform the Tories has failed to change the male-dominated public profile of his shadow cabinet". It says only 6% of respondents in a survey recognised a picture of Theresa May.
Andrew Grice in the Independent reports on a poll saying Lib Dem voters would rather see Gordon Brown become prime minister in a hung parliament (or balanced parliament - see 9.13am) than David Cameron.
But Rachel Sylvester in the Times says it is easy to imagine Nick Clegg forming an alliance with Cameron.
Peter Oborne says in the Daily Mail that Clegg is "a prime specimen of the British political class who has reinvented himself as a rebel and an outsider".
Michael Gove tells the Independent in an email interview that the first thing he would do in government would be to rename his department the Department of Education.
10.47am: There's a good website called thestraightchoice, which is getting people to send in images of election leaflets and posting them on the web. Every day it sends out a press briefing highlighting any trends it has identified. Today it says that immigration, not Europe, is increasingly the headline item on national UKIP leaflets.
11.07am:Some Labour ministers have been remarkably polite about the Liberal Democrats in recent days. Ben Bradshaw, for example, was clearly thinking of what might happen in a hung parliament when he said yesterday: "We have a lot in common with the Liberal Democrats and will work closely with them no matter what happens."
But Jack Straw seems to remain immune to Cleggphilia. The justice secretary was in Leeds yesterday for the launch of Labour's Yorkshire manifesto, and he attacked the Lib Dems quite aggressively.
One thing I could guarantee if the Lib Dems were in any form of power is that crime would rise. Look in the tin, not on the label – they're proposing to ban all courts from imposing any prison sentence of less than six months. In my area I know where I've got these young criminals who, when all the other options have run out there, they're locked up.
It gives a respite to the community, gives the police a chance to make a new assessment, and yes they might go to prison but they're less likely to do it again. What the Liberal Democrats are proposing would lead to a rise in crime.
Straw also said that proposing to raise the income tax threshold to £10,000 was "a bit like going into McDonald's and ordering lobster thermidor – very nice to have but not on the menu."
Jonathan Reed has got more in the Yorkshire Post.
11.40am: Here's a mid-morning summary.
The Liberal Democrats are continuing to threaten Labour and the Tories, according to three overnight polls. Two of the polls, YouGov and Opinium, show the Lib Dems ahead of Labour. The third shows the Lib Dems level-pegging with Labour. There are more details at UK Polling Report and I'll post the full figures myself soon.
Nick Clegg has accused the two main parties of offering not choice, but just "a contest of mutual loathing". At a news conference this morning, he explicity rejected the claim made in the Conservative party broadcast last night that David Cameron was the candidate who could bring change. Clegg also warned that there was a "great deal of fluidity" in the campaign and that the Lib Dem bubble could burst. In a separate interview, Lord Mandelson said there was more "flux" in politics than at any time since the 1980s. (See 8.20am and 8.46am)
The Conservatives have claimed that rising inflation is "worrying news" for families. In response to this morning's figures showing higher than expected inflation figures for March, Philip Hammond, the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, said: "Gordon Brown's decision to freeze tax allowances while inflation is soaring means that people will pay more of their income in tax - the last thing they need when they are already struggling to balance their budgets. A hung parliament could lead to an even weaker pound and even higher inflation, with the risk of higher interest rates to tackle it."
Alex Salmond has urged voters in Scotland to back the SNP to deliver a "balanced parliament". At the SNP's manifesto launch in Glasgow, Salmond said Labour, the Tories and the Lib Dems all had a "cuts agenda" for Scotland. (See 9.13am)
The BBC has announced the dates of Jeremy Paxman interviews with David Cameron and Gordon Brown. Paxman will interview Cameron for half an hour at 8.30pm on Friday, and Brown at the same time a week later. At one point it looked as if Cameron and Brown were going to refuse to be interviewed by Paxman.
Cameron has said that the Tories would adopt a "big society" approach to welfare reform. He made the comment in a statement ahead of a speech he will deliver this afternoon on Tory plans to tackle unemployment. Some Tories have criticised the "big society" rhetoric because they think it is meaningless to voters, but Cameron clearly is not convinced. (See 9.58am)
The Liberal Democrats have published plans to reform the banking system. (See 8.46am)
11.59am: Total Politics has produced a spoof election video, to the tune of Bucks Fizz's Making Your Mind Up. It's pretty dire, but if you're desperate for some light relief, you can find it here.
12.21pm: The SNP manifesto is now available on the party's website.
12.26pm: As promised earlier, here are the full details of the three overnight polls:
YouGov in the Sun:
Conservatives: 33% (up one from YouGov 24 hours earlier)
Lib Dems: 31% (down two)
Labour: 27% (up one)
Conservative lead: Two points (compared to one-point Lib Dem lead)
Lab to Con swing: 4.5% (from 2005 general election result)
ComRes, for ITV and the Independent:
Conservatives: 32% (up one from ComRes 24 hours earlier)
Lib Dems: 28% (down one)
Labour: 28% (up one)
Conservative lead: Four points (up two)
Lab to Con swing: 3.5% (from 2005 general election result)
Opinium, in the Daily Express:
Conservatives: 32% (down seven from Opinium in the Daily Express last week)
Liberal Democrats: 29% (up 12)
Labour: 26% (down five)
Conservative lead: Three points (down five)
Lab to Con swing: 3% (from 2005 general election result)
The two organisations that have been publishing daily tracker polls – YouGov and ComRes – show Lib Dem support going down. This is worth noting, but it's too early to know if it is a trend.
12.32pm: My colleague Paul Lewis is on the stump with Nick Clegg today. He's just sent me this:
Nick Clegg has just spoken at an agricultural college in Chippenham. I'd love to tell you what he said – but I didn't hear it, and neither did anyone else.
Part of the stunt here involved two teams of students taking apart a pair of 1949 Ferguson 20 tractors and putting them back together again. They were making so much clattering noise that Clegg was inaudible.
Sensing a problem, their teacher, John Dixon, told them to stop. He said: "Lads can be competitive sometimes, and we told them to stop but they just carried on." For eight minutes and 44 seconds.
12.41pm: And Jonathan Freedland, who is travelling with Brown today, has sent me this.
On board the Gordon Brown Express, Peter Mandelson, en route to Oxford for the launch of Labour's business manifesto, laid into his Tory shadow, Ken Clarke, just now: 'I'm a Heseltine – I'm an intervener before breakfast, lunch and dinner.'
Unlike Ken Clarke, he said, 'who does not believe in an industrial policy ... he's not a Heseltine'.
At his side, the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, also attacked Clarke, saying: 'You can't have a climate change sceptic as business secretary.'
12.47pm: Gordon Brown is about to do an interview on Radio 1. As you can guess, I'm more of a Radio 4 man. But I'm tuned in, and I'll be blogging what he says.
12.53pm: Brown starts with an explanation of what the government is doing to deal with the volcanic ash crisis.
As I've said before, it's not yet clear whether this is going to become an election issue.
But the Tories are trying their hardest to wring some advantage out of it. Theresa Villiers, the shadow transport secretary, has just put out this statement:
A number of issues are not clear, and we have not had a detailed public statement from ministers since Sunday.
The substantial backlog of flights is going to mean massive disruption for weeks to come, but there have been no detailed public statements of how this will be handled.
All political parties need to focus on exactly how we are going to get stranded Britons home as soon as possible, so clarity from Gordon Brown and his ministers is essential.
Villiers has also issued a list of 15 questions about the crisis for the government to answer.
12.58pm: Brown is taking questions now from Radio 1 listeners. Andy works for the NHS. He wants Brown to say what he will do to prevent job losses.
Brown says he will halve the deficit, but he won't take money out of the economy this year.
There are some pictures of the exchanges on the Newsbeat website.
Brown's answers aren't particularly interesting so far, but his accent is – there's an estuary English twang in his voice, a bit like Tony Blair.
1.06pm: Now it has got interesting. Brown has just criticised Sir Thomas Legg for penalising him for paying his cleaner too much.
He did not mention Legg by name, but referred to him when he was asked why he had to pay back the money he had claimed for cleaning.
What the guy basically said was that I should not be paying the cleaner a minimum wage.
It was not wrong to have cleaning expenses. I was just paying her too good a wage. I was paying her more than the minimum wage. And he told me I had to pay that back.
To be honest, I'm not going to employ anybody without paying them a decent wage.
One of the questioners wanted to know what sacrifices Brown had made because of the recession. Brown said he had taken a pay cut. He explained that he had only accepted a cabinet minister's salary instead of the full prime minister's salary to which he was entitled.
1.39pm: The interview is over now. It was surprisingly tetchy. Brown got angry when asked to justify the money he claimed to pay his cleaner. Last year, when Sir Thomas Legg was ordering MPs to repay money, ministers complained privately that they were being penalised for paying decent wages to their cleaners and gardeners. But I've never heard Brown say that publicly.
He also revealed that he had taken a pay cut that would be worth more than £50,000 a year. One of the questioners asked Brown about a promise he made when he appeared on Radio 1 in September last year. Brown said at the time that he would be willing to take a pay cut to help pay for support for the unemployed. But that did not happen, the questioner said. Brown insisted it did.
Yes it did ... Of course I've taken a pay cut. I do what I say I'll do ... My salary is at the same level as a cabinet minister, and not the prime minister's salary. I ordered that ... I have said that I would take a pay cut and I asked that a pay cut be enforced upon me. And I have not taken the usual pension of prime ministers. I'm not in this for the money.
According to this House of Commons factsheet, the prime minister's salary for 2009-10 was £197,689. The salary for a cabinet minister was £144,520. I knew that Brown had foregone a pay rise. But I did not realise that he had accepted a pay cut on this scale.
1.49pm: Paul Lewis may not have been able to hear what Nick Clegg had to say when the Lib Dem leader was visiting an agricultural college in Chippenham, but the Tory candidate in the seat, who was at the gates of the college with a group of supporters, was able to get a hearing. My colleague Steven Morris has sent me this.
Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones, the self-styled Black Farmer (he sells sausages under that trademark) is keen to make sure the Lib Dems know they have a battle on their hands.
"We don't want the Liberal Democrats to think they can swan in here and claim their territory. I want them to know that in Chippenham there's a fight on. We're not going to do it like the London boys where everybody has got to be nice. What we want people to make a decision on is which of the two candidates they feel is going to really look after the interests of the community."
Emmanuel-Jones has called David Cameron a "toff" in the past. So is Cameron coming to Chippenham to support his campaign? "I don't know what these London boys decide to do. They're all London boys," he says.
1.56pm: Nick Clegg may have found himself drowned out this morning by some agricultural students practising tractor repair. But in Russia they treat him with proper respect. One of the Russian papers today is carrying a story describing him as a "Russian aristocrat". My colleague Luke Harding has sent me this from Moscow.
Is there no limit to Clegg-mania? It seems that not only Britain but now even Russia has fallen under Clegg's mesmerising spell, with today's Izvestiya newspaper hailing the Lib Dem leader as a genuine "Russian aristocrat". Under the headline "Russian aristocrat wants to be British premier", the paper picks up on Clegg's emphatic victory in the first leaders' TV debate and on his Winston Churchill-like popularity ratings.
But a blue-blooded Russian toff? In fact, Izvestiya is not far off the mark: Clegg's father (also Nick) is half-Russian. Nick Clegg Sr's parents, who married in 1932, were Hugh Anthony Clegg, a subeditor on the British Medical Journal, and Kira Engelhardt. Kira was actually a baroness: her mother Alexandra Moullen was the daughter of Ignaty Zakrevsky, a former attorney general of the Imperial Russian senate and one of tsar Alexander III's top lawyers. Like Clegg, Zakrevsky was also a passionate internationalist: he built a pyramid in his back garden and died in Cairo in 1906.
2.13pm: It seems to be quite a lacklustre day. There have not been many developments since I posted a mid-morning summary at 11.40am. But here's a lunchtime update anyway.
Brown has defended his behaviour on pay and expenses. In a tetchy exchange with listeners from Radio 1's Newsbeat, he appeared to criticise Sir Thomas Legg, the auditor who ordered Brown and hundreds of other MPs to repay money. Brown said he had only had to repay money for his cleaning bills because Legg thought "I should not be paying the cleaner a minimum wage". Brown also said that he had taken a pay cut and was now only receiving a cabinet minister's salary, rather than the prime minister's salary to which he is entitled. This would be equivalent to more than £50,000 a year. (See 1.06pm and 1.39pm.)
The Tories criticised the government for failing to provide "a detailed public statement" about the flight ban crisis. Theresa Villiers, the shadow transport secretary, released a list of 15 questions which she said ministers should answer. (See 12.53pm.)
Lord Mandelson said Nick Clegg "does have to be taken seriously". In an interview in the London Evening Standard, Mandelson said Clegg had "entered the fray and appealed to a lot of people who feel Labour has had a good innings, that it's time for someone else's turn, but who have looked at David Cameron's Tories and balked at them becoming the government."
I'm off for a break. My colleague Paul Owen will be taking over for now.
2.21pm: Paul Owen here. BBC2's The Daily Politics is hosting a debate on crime featuring Alan Johnson, Chris Huhne and Chris Grayling, the three main parties' spokesmen on home affairs.
I switched on to find Andrew Neil asking Grayling, the shadow home secretary, if he had ever hugged a hoodie.
"Well, I've got a 13-year-old son ... " Grayling began, before Neil interrupted to insist that only hugging "a hoodie on the street" counted. Grayling didn't seem to have hugged one of those.
2.25pm: The three are now debating the use of statistics on whether crime has risen or fallen. Grayling has been criticised over this before. Today he seems to be implying that the perception of crime is more important than the actual figures.
2.29pm: My colleague Jonathan Freedland has sent this snippet:
Confused scenes on the Brown express: en route to a Q&A at a Swindon school but Tory council have banned all media from premises. Not clear if it's because of child confidentiality or a ban on electioneering – but risk for Labour is wasting a chunk of the PM's time on an event no one will see.
2.31pm: Grayling is now saying that the liberalisation of licensing laws was a mistake. Johnson, the home secretary, disagrees, and says only 7% of shops and hotels have a 24-hour licence. He says "in terms of the lateness of time it's changed by about 21 minutes" and says that the police wanted closing times to be staggered. Again Grayling is relying on anecdotes for his evidence while Johnson backs up his point with statistics. Huhne, the Lib Dem home affairs spokesman, raises the issue of supermarkets selling alcohol at "pocket money prices", allowing young people to drink cheaply at home before going out.
2.37pm: Huhne defends Lib Dem policy on making a distinction between people carrying a knife and those threatening or attacking someone with it. Grayling disagrees, then attacks Johnson over the release of prisoners before the end of their sentences. "Two weeks" before, says Johnson.
2.41pm: Grayling is pressed on why the Tories have ringfenced the international aid budget, but not that for policing. He mentions efficiency savings that could get "more for less" out of the policing budget, and, pressed further, says that international development is important for how the UK sees itself as a country.
Johnson claims cutting the ID cards scheme (as the others propose) will not save money because the plan will pay for itself through charging the public for the cards. Not sure how welcome the public will find that reply.
2.47pm: They are all asked whether they have ever broken the law ("apart from motoring offences"). All three say no.
2.49pm: Just had a quick check back at the list of ministers who came out as having once smoked cannabis after Jacqui Smith, then the home secretary, said she had done so in 2007.
Johnson, then the health secretary, said he "did the sex and rock and roll but not the drugs".
2.51pm: Grayling is grilled on the Tories' policy towards the DNA database. He gives an impeccably liberal answer about "your teenage son" being wrongly arrested for shoplifting – should he have his DNA kept on file? Johnson jumps at the chance to present the Conservative stance as being weak on crime. My colleague Alan Travis analysed this whole issue in depth here.
2.55pm: Grayling says he "regrets the confusion" over his comments about gay people staying in B&Bs.
2.56pm: The three are asked to sum up their policies on crime and policing.
Huhne says he supports doing "what works to cut crime", and says he wants to roll back "intrusions into our hard-won civil liberties".
Grayling also says the public "want your civil liberties back and don't want to live in a database state". He calls for "proper punishment for criminals but also effective rehabilitation so they don't offend again".
Johnson calls for effective neighbourhood policing and characterises the others as wanting to restrict the police's use of the DNA database and politicise police forces (the Tories want elected police commissioners and the Lib Dems want direct election of police authorities).
3.53pm: Presumably in an effort to engage younger voters, Dermot O'Leary has been quizzing Brown, Cameron and Clegg for interviews to be broadcast on BBC Three tomorrow night.
I've just had a quick read through the Clegg transcript. At first glance, the most interesting bit was when he was asked whether he had always voted Liberal:
Clegg: Yeah I've always - I'm just trying to think, um ...
O'Leary: Just to clear that up, you have always voted Liberal?
Clegg: I've always voted Liberal, absolutely. Um ...
The Lib Dem leader was also asked whether it was true that Joanna Lumley was supporting the party.
Clegg: Well, Joanna and I know each other because we campaigned, or I campaigned with her, and she was the star, of course, on the Gurkha thing ...
I've been very involved in the campaign to give the Gurkha rights, and we kind of email each other and stuff, but no – no she I think quite rightly is saying and she's quite rightly said she wants to keep put of any party politics.
Clegg also revealed he had a Che Guevara poster in his bedroom when he was younger, so he's obviously a closet Marxist ...
3.58pm: Hi. It's Andrew Sparrow taking over again. Earlier (9.20am) I asked who coined the term "balanced parliament".
Thanks to the wonders of the internet, I've had an answer – it was Judy Steel, David Steel's wife. She's written a post in the comments section explaining how it happened. (At least, I'm assuming it's her – I haven't had time to check. But it's hard to imagine why someone would be making it up, so it's probably a safe assumption.) This is what she said (at 12.11pm):
Re: Andrew Sparrow's question: Who invented the phrase "a balanced parliament"?
I did, in the 1980s, and offered it up to my husband, David Steel, then leader of the Liberals, as an alternative to the pejorative and doom-inducing word "hung" – I can't remember which election it was.
But he used it, and so did some others in the Alliance. I am glad it has now come into parlance again and recommend its use, to commentators as well as party activists.
Incidentally, David also invented the battle bus – look back to records of the 1979 election, his first as Liberal Leader.
Must go and deliver leaflets and deliver meals on wheels for our daughter, Catriona Bhatia, who is planning to make Scotland Tory-free again by running a vigorous campaign in Dumfriesshire Clydesdale and Tweeddale – the bookies' odds against her have shortened considerably over the last couple of days.
This is my first blog!
Judy Steel
4.05pm: Brown's visit to a school has not been going well – the local council banned the media from the premises.
Given that these visits are all about securing media coverage, that was a bit of a disaster. Labour officials said the decision was "outrageous" and that Tory-dominated Swindon was being party political.
But the visit has perked up since then. My colleague Jonathan Freedland has sent me two dispatches. First this:
Ed Miliband has just had a Sharon Storrer moment, accosted by an outraged voter outside a Swindon school.
Publican John Doyle said: "I've worked my arse off under your regime and I'm going to go bankrupt again for a second time around."
He owns two pubs, one in Wootton Bassett. Already hailed by some of my colleagues in the press as Britain's Joe the Plumber, he says he's backing the Lib Dems. Doyle has now been invited inside the school to speak to Brown directly.
And then, 20 minutes later, he sent this:
After meeting Brown, the angry publican – John Doyle – now says he will back Labour, not the Lib Dems. Says he was very impressed by Brown, who "really listened" to him and his concerns. Only 59,999,999 voters to go!
4.20pm: With election experts saying the rise of the Lib Dems could lead to Labour coming third in the election in terms of share of the vote – but still winning the most seats – the Conservatives have been under pressure to explain why they are so committed to first past the post.
David Cameron has defended FPTP on the grounds that it allows the electorate to kick out an unpopular government. He has just used this argument again, in a stump speech in Burton on Trent, but this time he admitted the Tories deserved to lose in 1997.
Let's not give up the thing about our electoral system that really works. When you are fed up with your government, when you want change, you can throw them out of office.
It happened to us in 1997 and I think, if we're frank, we were a bit tired, we had run out of steam, we probably deserved it.
4.22pm: Gordon Brown has launched Labour's plan for growth this afternoon. There are some details on the Labour party's website, and you can read the 22-page plan here.
4.30pm: My colleague Luke Harding has filed more about the "Russian aristocrat" Nick Clegg. There is a full story on the Guardian's website. He says:
In common with other dispossessed Russian aristocrats, Clegg can even lay claim to a ruined manor house.
Zakrevsky, his great great-grandfather, lived on a large estate in modern-day Ukraine, not far from Kiev.
The crumbling estate is currently occupied by an agricultural college, but still boasts a two-storey classical mansion, annexes, and a large park. It also has a pyramid.
4.42pm: Swindon council has rejected the suggestion that it banned the media from covering Brown's visit to a school for party political reasons (see 4.05pm). A spokesman said that Eric Pickles and Andrew Lansley had been banned from taking journalists with them on a visit to council premises. The spokesman cited the Local Government Act 1986, which says the authority "cannot allow electioneering on any council premises or property in the official pre-election period".
4.53pm: In Northern Ireland, Sinn Féin has withdrawn its candidate from the South Belfast seat in the hope that its nationalist rivals the SDLP will withdraw theirs in another seat, Fermanagh & South Tyrone, thus maximising the chances of a nationalist winning in both seats rather than a unionist.
Henry McDonald has the full story here.
4.56pm: I was on Tony Blair's battlebus in 1997. During the campaign, Labour press officers devoted quite a lot of energy to keeping Blair away from someone from Tory HQ dressed up as a chicken trying to make a point about ... well, I can't actually remember. Anyway, the tradition lives on. David Cameron is being pursued by a Daily Mirror chicken. But Cameron, unlike Blair, has adopted a novel way of dealing with the problem (see picture above). This is from the Press Association news agency:
The Tory leader came face to face with the bird – one of several people in costumes sent out to follow him around the country by a national newspaper which accuses him of failing to answer its questions on Lord Ashcroft – as he took his campaign to the streets of the marginal seat of Tamworth.
But Mr Cameron, who had been braced for the confrontation, tried to turn the tables by giving the bird man a hug, removing his chicken head to talk to him face to face and asking him what question he wanted to ask.
5.18pm: The BBC have released a transcript of an interview that David Cameron has done with Dermot O'Leary for the First-Time Voters' Question Time, which is going out on BBC3 tomorrow night. There are a couple of good lines that are worth noting.
Cameron said that Chris Grayling's comment about B&B owners being entitled to turn away gay couples was "wrong". Grayling has apologised for his remarks, and the Tories have pointed out that Grayling voted for the law that would make it illegal for a B&B owner to discriminate against a gay couple. But I don't think Cameron himself had actually condemned the remark before. But he told O'Leary: "What [Grayling] said was wrong and he shouldn't have said it."
Asked why he did not sack Grayling, Cameron replied: "Because he immediately came out and said that what he said was wrong and he voted the right way and he was embarrassed about it and he's given interviews about it and I am prepared to leave it there."
Cameron said the Conservative party was "quite anti-establishment". He said that the Conservative party "isn't the establishment any more" and that Labour is the establishment. He went on: "I think the Conservative party is quite anti establishment in terms of saying: 'Look, we want to put you in control.'"
5.30pm: I've received a couple of responses to the Labour plan for growth released earlier today (see 4.22pm). The CBI is broadly positive. Their full response is on the CBI website, but here's a flavour of it:
This plan broadly reflects the policies that Labour set out in the budget and in its election manifesto. It demonstrates a recognition of the priorities needed for the economy to prosper, although many of its proposals are modest in scope ...
The proposals for energy, transport and infrastructure add up to a sensible package which should help attract the investment needed to get the UK well-positioned for low-carbon growth.
The Conservative party's response is less generous. It consists of a two-page press notice contrasting claims made in the document with facts about Labour's record. For example, it points out that the document commits Labour to "retaining our internationally competitive position on corporation tax" even though the UK has gone from having the 11th lowest corporate tax rate in the world in 1997 to having the 23rd lowest corporate tax rate now.
5.40pm: And while Tory HQ has been sending out emails trashing Labour's plan for growth, Labour have been sending out emails rubbishing David Cameron's welfare reform plans.
Cameron issued a brief statement about his plans this morning (see 9.58am). Full details are now available on the Conservative website. But Yvette Cooper, the work and pensions secretary, has said that they are "a pale imitation of Labour's plans, but without the investment, guarantees and the jobs to make it work". She said:
The Tories would cut jobs and cut funding to get the unemployed back to work. They pretend to talk tough, but won't match the new rules and requirements Labour's already introducing. They can't get tough on people for refusing jobs because they're cutting the jobs for them to go to.
5.52pm: Andrew Hawkins, the chairman of the polling firm ComRes, has just released this on Twitter.
ComRes has one humdinger of a poll out later today
There are rumours, being passed on by Spectator editor Fraser Nelson and others, that the poll is going to show Labour in the lead. But that's gossip at this stage. It might not be true and I can't stand it up. I'm just passing it on for anyone interesting in the workings of the Westminster rumour mill.
6.05pm: Nick Clegg has been speaking to the Foreign Press Association this afternoon. According to the Press Association reports, he said a couple of interesting things.
Clegg said he thought Britain's "special relationship" with the US was over. "I would argue that if we want to prepare ourselves for the future and not be imprisoned by the past, if we want to understand the future challenges of the world and understand how we can play an effective role in not just reacting to the world but shaping it according to our values, our interests, we are going to have to release ourselves from this historical spell that says that a position of default Atlanticism should guide everything we do in the world," he said. He went on:
I think it's sometimes rather embarrassing the way Conservative and Labour politicians talk in this kind of slavish way about the special relationship. If you speak to hard-nosed folk in Washington they think: "It's a good relationship but it's not the special relationship."
This is actually very sensible and mainstream. Last month, in a little-noticed report, the cross-party Commons foreign affairs committee said that the term "special relationship" was "potentially misleading" and that it should be avoided. But in some circles questioning the "special relationship" is deemed heresy. It will be interesting to see how Gordon Brown and David Cameron react to this if it comes up during Thursday's debate (which will focus on foreign affairs).
Clegg claimed the era of two-party politics is over. He has been speaking about this often during the campaign (for example, see 8.46am), but his remarks to the FPA went further. He said:
Whatever happens for the rest of this campaign, one thing that is never ever going to change again is that we are never going to return, we are never going to turn the clock back as Gordon Brown and David Cameron want to do, to that cosy little stitch-up between the two parties where they think only they can speak on behalf of the nation. That's gone; that world is gone. The only people who don't realise it are David Cameron and Gordon Brown ... I think it is a liberating thing, it's unpredictable, but I think the shift from duopoly to pluralism is now irreversible in British politics.
6.27pm: It felt a bit quiet at lunchtime. But now it's hotting up. The BBC News at Six is still leading on the air travel ban crisis. At some point soon this may well become full-blow election issue – ie with David Cameron making it the theme of a press conference – but we are not there yet. Nevertheless, there have been several other developments on the campaign trail. Here's an evening summary:
Nick Clegg has said the era of two-party politics is over. (See 6.05pm.)
The Tories have raised £1.45m in significant donations during the first week of general election campaigning, new figures have revealed. This is nearly twice as much as raised by Labour.
Gordon Brown has launched Labour's plan for growth. It has had a warm reception from the CBI, but the Tories have attacked it. (See 4.22pm and 5.30pm.)
David Cameron has released details of his plans to tackle unemployment. Yvette Cooper has dismissed them as "a pale imitation" of Labour's plans. (See 5.40pm.)
Clegg has said that Britain should recognise that the "special relationship" with the US is over. (See 6.05pm.)
Ed Miliband has been accosted by an angry publican. These encounters don't really prove anything at all, but the broadcasters like them because they make good television. (See 4.05pm.)
I'm off home now. My colleague Hélène Mulholland is taking over. Thanks for the comments.
6.48pm: Evening. Hélène Mulholland here. Let's cut benefits for those who refuse work. Not my words, but those of the Tory leader, David Cameron, on the Conservatives' latest campaign poster.
Check out my colleague Simon Jeffery's blog, where comments on the Conservatives' latest election offering are already going strong – in more ways than one.
6.54pm: Midnight is the deadline for voter registration.
People had until 5pm to apply for a postal vote, but those wanting a proxy vote have until next Tuesday.
At the last general election, over 44 million people registered, but just 61.4% of these used their vote on the day. The Electoral Commission estimates that around 3.5 million people who were eligible to vote in 2005 didn't bother to register.
We won't know how many people registered until the election is over, but it would be interesting to see how the interesting twists and turns of the past few days affect the numbers determined to take part – even if they don't end up voting on the day.
The Electoral Commission, which is leading the drive to get people on the electoral roll, said more than 375,000 people had downloaded registration forms in the past 10 days. What do we think? High turnout? Last time it was fairly obvious who was going to win, but this time ... ?
7.10pm: The Tory campaign poster at the top of this page (also see 6.48pm) says exactly what David Cameron intends to do if he becomes prime minister – strip benefits from people who refuse to work. The Tories' message of change has just toughened up.
The party's plans to revolutionise Britain's welfare system would include a "work programme" commiting to offering "unprecedented support" to people looking for employment, including work clubs, training places and help starting new businesses.
This from Craig Woodhouse and Joe Churcher at PA:
Addressing supporters at Marston's brewery in Burton-on-Trent, Mr Cameron said: "We are a compassionate and generous and tolerant nation. To people who cannot work, to people who are disabled, to people who are looking for work: we will always help you, we will always stand by you.
"But we will not go on helping people who can work, who are offered a job, and refuse to take it.
"We cannot go on as we are, paying people who could work but who refuse to do so. That is a big change that's coming with a Conservative government."
The work and pensions secretary, Yvette Cooper, attacked the Tory welfare plans, saying: "They pretend to talk tough but won't match the new rules and requirements Labour's already introducing.
They can't get tough on people for refusing jobs, because they're cutting the jobs for them to go to."
7.31pm: The Times has a new Populus poll which shows the the Liberal Democrats have gained a record 10 points over the last week. It also indicates that more people now want a hung parliament.
The poll shows the Lib Dems are on 31%, just 1% behind the Conservatives, on 32%, who are down four points. Labour is on 28%, down five.
The biggest switchers to the Lib Dems, according to Populus, have been young people, with an 18-point rise, to 40%, among 25 to 34-year-olds.
Two-fifths of people under 35 back the party, although these are the least likely to vote.
Nearly a quarter of those backing the Lib Dems now did not vote in 2005. Women – 34% – are more inclined than men – 30% – to support the party.
An Angus Reid poll for Political betting has the Liberal Democrats leading on 33%, up one point on yesterday, while the Conservatives stay on 32%, and Labour lags on 23%, down one point on yesterday.
So Cleggomania is still very much with us. More polling coming your way later.
8.15pm: STV are putting on a leaders' debate for Scotland, which you can see here at 9pm.
It's billed as 'leading figures from the nation's four main parties'. The line up is:
Jim Murphy - Labour Scottish secretary
Angus Robertson - SNP Westminster leader
David Mundell - Conservative shadow Scottish secretary
Alistair Carmichael - Liberal Democrat campaign manager
8.23pm: Another poll puts the Lib Dems in the lead. The YouGov daily tracker poll for the Sun puts the party back on top, having dropped to second place yesterday.
It shows the Lib Dems three points up on 34%, three points ahead of the Tories, who are down two on 31%, while Labour is down one on 26%.
That's two fresh polls putting the Lib Dems in the lead, with another putting them just one point behind the Tories. (see 7.31pm).
8.30pm:The Observer's Andrew Rawnsley is on the BBC Campaign Show tonight, hosted by Jon Sopel, which starts at 9pm.
He, Sopel and Catherine Mayer will be grilling the Tory chairman, Eric Pickles, who's just posted some thoughts on today's events on Conservativehome.
8.37pm: Good news off the election beat and track: UK airspace will begin to reopen from 10pm tonight.
The Civil Aviation Authority chair, Dame Deirdre Hutton, said none of the no-fly zones caused by the volcanic ash cloud are currently over Britain.
The transport secretary, Lord Adonis, said all British airports could reopen and he expected them to remain open.
8.41pm: For those of you who haven't already spotted it, there's a nice piece on Lord Adonis by my colleague Michael White.
In terms of brainpower, enthusiasm and quiet ambition for his department, the transport secretary is one of those high-speed Class 390 Pendolino trains he so loves to travel in, preferably in the driver's cab.
9.15pm: News that the International Monetary Fund is calling for two new taxes on the banks to pay for future bailouts has been welcomed by Labour and the Lib Dems.
The IMF is calling for a "financial stability contribution" to pay for the "fiscal cost of any future government support to the sector", according to a report leaked to the BBC.
The levy, which would be imposed on all financial institutions, not just banks, would initially be charged at a flat rate, although it would eventually be modified so riskier institutions were charged more.
Gavin Cordon, at PA, writes that the chancellor, Alistair Darling, said these were "important proposals" that backed Labour's position that any tax on the banks should be levied internationally.
Darling said:
The recognition that banks should make a contribution to the society in which they operate is right.
Any agreement has to be international and unilateral attempts – as proposed by the Tories – would simply risk being undermined. It was the Labour government that first proposed an international levy, and we want proposals agreed as soon as possible.
The Liberal Democrat treasury spokesman, Vince Cable, also welcomed the report:
Many of the banks are still unwilling to acknowledge the massive debt they owe the taxpayer and that they are still underwritten by our money.
The Liberal Democrats understand that the old way of banking simply cannot continue, and this is a view shared by the IMF
.
I imagine a Conservative response will come through later.
9.46pm: Eric Pickles, the Tory chairman, had the grill turned on high when he appeared on the BBC Campaign Show a little earlier.
Jon Sopel was trying to pin him down on the precise difference between the Tories' welfare reform plans (see 7.10pm) and the policies that have been in place for years under Labour.
Pickles said the Tories were offering "something slightly different".
"If people are not prepared to work, we are looking to cut their benefits. We are looking about working alongside them."
Q: How is that any different to now?
"What we are not prepared to accept is people not taking on jobs when they are capable of doing so."
Q: How is that any different to now?
"You dont have to take the first job you're offered, but you have to take a job that meets the particular skills that you have. For a first refusal, you'd lose a month's benefit. Then it's a sliding scale. And it's just a work benefit, not benefit right across the board.
At this point, the Observer's Andrew Rawnsley, who was on the sofa alongside Time Magazine London bureau chief, Catherine Mayer, told him this "soft and waffly" answer is exactly what's wrong with the Tory campaign.
Rawnsley also told Pickles that, as party chairman, he has to take some responsiblity for the fact that his party "complacently" assumed it could squeeze the Lib Dems as an irrelevance and cruise into power on a simplistic slogan of change.
The Tories are now paying the price of their complacency in the polls, he said.
Pickles said he didn't think it was complacency: the televised debate had shown debates are important and they have changed the nature of British politics.
He said he thought David Cameron "did pretty good". Pretty good? "Remember, I'm from Yorkshire. Pretty good is like magnificent to you," he said.
What does Pickles want to see from Cameron in the next two debates. What should he do differently next time?
"All I want from David Cameron is for him to be himself," he replied.
Pickles conceded that Nick Clegg did very well and welcomed the fact that Lib Dem policies would now be discussed in more detail.
"I don't think people are going to be particularly enamoured with the idea that they want an amnesty for 600,000 illegal immigrants. I don't think they'll be wildly keen on the idea of releasing 60,000 prisoners from jail. I think there are all kind of issues, issues like Trident," he said.
But he went on to insist there is some "commonality" between the Lib Dems and the Tories. Examples given: green issues and civil liberties.
Readers, you may already be up to speed on this – but I feel compelled to point out at this juncture that Boris Johnson, the Conservative mayor of London, who the Tory party have been keen to show off during this election campaign, is also in favour of an earned amnesty, though he doesn't have the powers to do anything about it.
But that's an area of commonality the Tories would rather not draw attention to.
10.15pm: Another poll gives the Conservatives a nine point lead.
The ComRes poll, for the Independent and ITV News, shows the Tories on 35%, up three points on their last poll yesterday and in their biggest lead since March, while Labour and the Lib Dems both slipped two points to 26%.
The findings are at odds with other polls released tonight (see 7.31pm and 8.23pm), which showed the Lib Dems either leading or being very close behind the Conservatives. I'm going to put all tonight's poll findings in one post for easier reading, so bear with me.
The Guardian's Patrick Wintour reports that there are some high level cabinet disagreements emerging over the way Labour is running its campaign.
10.35pm: A summary of tonight's polls:
YouGov daily tracker poll for the Sun:
Labour – down one point on 26%.
Conservatives – down two points on 31%
Liberal Democrats – up three points on 34%
YouGov interviewed 1,595 adults on April 19 and 20
Populus poll for the Times:
Labour - down five points on 28%
Conservative - down four points on 32%
Liberal Democrats - up 10 points to 31%
Populus interviewed 1,501 adults by telephone on April 19 and 20.
ComRes poll for the Independent and ITV News :
Labour - down two points to 26%
Conservatives - up three points to 35%
Liberal Democrats - down two points to 26%.
ComRes interviewed 1,012 adults by telephone on April 18 and 19
Angus Reid poll for Political Betting:
Labour - 23%, down one point
Conservatives - 32%, the same as yesterday
Liberal Democrats - 33%, up one point
11.01pm: The Conservatives have sent me their response to the IMF proposals for two new taxes on banks for future bail-outs (see 9.15pm):
A Conservative spokesman pointed to several comments made by the shadow chancellor, George Osborne, in the past to show he is fully in support of a bank levy.
We have led the way in proposing a levy on the banks, so we welcome this IMF report. Sweden has already introduced a bank tax.
Germany and the Unites States are in the process of introducing one – the UK should do the same.
11.28pm: Apologies for the delay. Earlier tonight, Newsnight's Michael Crick alerted us to yet another poll – this time in Scotland.
Results of theSTV poll are likely to dampen the spirit of the SNP on the day the party launched its manifesto campaign.
The poll indicates they would gain just one seat at the general election. Not great news for the Conservatives, either.
Research found that, among those certain to vote, the figures are:
Labour: 36%
SNP: 26%
Lib Dem: 20%
Con: 14%
Other: 4%
If the results were translated into seats, Labour would win 40 of the 59 constituencies north of the border, while the LibDems would hold the 11 they won in 2005.
The SNP would gain the ultra-marginal Ochil and South Perthshire from Labour, and the Tories would again send a solitary MP to Westminster.
11.52pm:
Here's a taster of the stories in the early editions of some of tomorrow's papers which will help set the scene for the day.
The Guardian devotes part of its front page to reports of disagreements within the cabinet over the conduct of Labour's campaign.
{item51}In a sign of future tensions within the cabinet, the children's secretary, Ed Balls, has openly disagreed with the home secretary, Alan Johnson, about the prospect of Labour forming a coalition government with the Lib Dems after the election.
Asked about Johnson's willingness to countenance coalitions, Balls said: "Coalition politics is not the British way of doing government. Proportional representation takes you down to small parties holding the ring and leads to backroom deals."
However, it is also understood that some senior cabinet figures, including Johnson, are quite willing to widen the options on the proposed referendum on reform of the voting system to include a more proportional system.
Interesting, then, to see that the Independent has an interview with Gordon Brown in which he appeals for a "progressive alliance" of Labour and Liberal Democrat supporters to stop the Conservatives gaining power.
Mr Brown said his new "mission" and "offer" to the British people was the creation of a "new politics" after the MPs' expenses scandal.
He revealed a rethink in Labour's strategy in which the party will try to sell its sweeping constitutional reforms to highlight common ground with the Liberal Democrats and convince voters that it can still offer change after 13 years in power.
Nick Clegg is in more bullish mood. He tells the Telegraph that Brown is "a desperate politician" and suggested he would find it difficult to do a deal with the prime minister in a hung parliament.
"Brown systematically blocked, and personally blocked, political reform. I think he is a desperate politician and I just do not believe him.
"And do I think Labour delivered fairness? No. Do I think the Labour party in its heart has a faith in civil liberties? No. Do I think they've delivered political reform? No. They are clutching at straws.
The highly personal attack on Brown's integrity will lead to further speculation that the price for any deal with Labour would be that it ditches Brown as leader.
That's all from me tonight. Andrew Sparrow will be with you first thing tomorrow. Goodnight and sweet dreams.
Comments (…)
Sign in or create your Guardian account to join the discussion