Get involvedpublished at 13:24
Text: 61124
Alan, Eastbourne:
Would the Daily Telegraph print a letter on its front page, from the TUC, urging people to vote Labour? No, I thought not!
Summary
Conservatives welcome a letter from over 100 company bosses backing a “Conservative-led government”
Labour publishes its own letter signed by “people from all walks of life” as it pledges a crackdown on zero hours contracts
Lib Dems discuss plans to triple paternity leave to six weeks
Ed Balls and Nick Clegg take their campaigns to Scotland
There are 36 days until the general election
Get involvedpublished at 13:24
Norman Smith, BBC assistant political editorpublished at 13:23 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@BBCNormanS
Quote MessageI am confident, and he is confident, that Nick Clegg will be returned in election as our leader -Vince Cable #wato
Vicky Young, chief political correspondentpublished at 13:22 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@VickiYoung01
Quote MessageClegg will need Tories in Sheffield Hallam to get behind him if he's to win. Poll showing Labour ahead might help persuade them. #GE2015"
Merry campaigningpublished at 13:19
Carole Walker
Conservative campaign correspondent
Quote MessagePerhaps it was just a little early to be raising a glass in celebration, but David Cameron and George Osborne were merry enough without sampling the produce as they toured the Marston’s brewery in Wolverhampton. Its boss Ralph Findlay is one of the 103 business leaders who signed the letter to the Telegraph backing their economic policies. Mr Cameron stood in front of barrels of Thatcher beer to hail what he called the “unprecedented intervention” in the election campaign, which he said sent a “very powerful message” about the risks Labour would pose to the economic recovery. Tory sources don’t deny they drafted and organised the letter, but point out that more than 100 individual businessmen chose to sign it. They dismiss suggestions they care more about big business than those struggling on zero hours contracts, saying the priority is to create jobs. The greatest significance is that another day of this election is focused on their favoured battleground - the economy.
Pic: David Cameron's brewery visitpublished at 13:16
Image source, PAPerhaps we should open up a caption competition for this one...
BBC's Laura Kuenssbergpublished at 13:13 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@bbclaurak
Quote MessageSenior Lab source says they're 'very happy' to have campaign day where big biz lining up against them,while they focus on zero hrs crackdown
Get involvedpublished at 13:12
Text: 61124
Les Robinson, Welwyn Garden City:
How are the public supposed to vote based on truth? Sadly they can't. It's purely down to a choice of personalities.
Kitchen politicspublished at 13:10
Image source, GettyThis morning saw London mayor Boris Johnson launch the Conservatives’ campaign to make progress in the capital. He joked the Tories were the party of "kitchen ownership" while Labour was the party of "kitchen concealment". Describing Ed Miliband as a "polytechnic sociology lecturer", he warned that the Labour leader wants to initiate an “orgy of regulation and state socialism” - and suggested he would do so while “peeking out of Alex Salmond’s sporran like a baby kangaroo”. "I don't mind if he is so lazy he would rather not go downstairs to make a cup of tea shortly before binge-watching Breaking Bad or whatever he does,” he told his audience in Mill Hill. “I mind very much that he is instinctively and intuitively hostile to the liberating policy of home ownership.”
Chris Buckler, Lib Dem campaign correspondentpublished at 13:07 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@csbuckler
Quote MessageA change of colour for the Lib Dems. It's a blue battle bus in Scotland today."
Get involvedpublished at 13:02
text: 61124
BBC News website reader:
I currently work for the world's largest brewer. On a four hour contract through an agency, I work in a very skilled high pressure environment within the brewing process. I am currently working 48 hours per week and have been doing so for 13 months. If the company deems I'm not required that week, I will be dropped like a hot potato, getting anything from four hours upwards. The above brewer only made 11 billion in profits last year!! Ridiculous and completely unfair.
Sheffield Hallam pollpublished at 12:57
And here’s the actual numbers from Lord Ashcroft’s poll in Nick Clegg’s Sheffield Hallam constituency. This was based on a poll of 1,001 residents between 22-28 March - the data table are here, external . The constituency voting intention figures break down like this:
- Labour 36%
- Lib Dem 34%
- Conservatives 16%
- UKIP 7%
- Other 7%
Chris Ship, ITV News deputy political editorpublished at 12:55 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@chrisshipitv
Quote MessageAccording to @LordAshcroft, seat in Cambridge held by @julianhuppert is looking much better for LibDems. So at least 1 LibDem in next Parly?"
James Chapman, Daily Mail political editorpublished at 12:54 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
@jameschappers
Quote MessageHealth warning on 'Clegg facing defeat' poll in Sheffield: @LordAshcroft isn't naming candidates. Name recognition worth several points?
'Patronising'published at 12:53
Daily Politics
Live on BBC Two
The TUC general secretary, Frances O’Grady, is being asked about her links with the Labour party. “Clearly Labour’s values are much closer to trade union values – that’s about wanting a fairer society,” she says. Ms O’Grady isn’t happy with Andrew Neil’s “patronising” suggestion that she talks from a Labour script. “As a trade unionist my job is to stick up for working people regardless of who’s in power,” she insists.
Zero hours - your experiencespublished at 12:52 British Summer Time 1 April 2015
Email: haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk
Caroline, 38, in London, spoke with the BBC: I was on a zero hour contract two years ago when work dried out so I signed on for four months. In those 4 months, the council made a complete mess of my claim, because of the zero hour contract, they only gave me half the amount I was entitled to and it took three months of arguing with them and giving them proof again and again (they conveniently kept losing the papers) that I had no income. In those four months I worked about four hours, which I declared. Now two years on the council turns around and tells me I went back to work and I have to repay three months of my benefits! It's an absolute joke!
Get involvedpublished at 12:51
Text: 61124
BBC News website reader:
The SNP have no power over zero hours contracts. So thousands of Scots will vote Labour! To be sure.
Polling hazardspublished at 12:51
So what does Lord Ashcroft actually have to say about his latest polling data? “The mix of results this time round underlines the lack of any uniform swing and the hazards of trying to calculate seat numbers on the basis of national vote shares,” he says. On the Sheffield Hallam seat, where Nick Clegg is currently in second place, the Lib Dems are trying very hard. “The highest contact rate of all was from the Lib Dems in Sheffield Hallam, where 76% said they had heard from Nick Clegg’s team; we will know in 35 days if it has paid off.”
PM on business backingpublished at 12:50
Image source, PAQuote MessageWe speak for the millions who want jobs and want those jobs to be maintained. What's happened today is an unprecedented intervention by some of the country's best-known businesses, coming out and saying the Conservative long-term economic plan is right, it's working, it's generating jobs, and the Labour alternative would risk the recovery and risk job losses."
David Cameron, Prime Minister
Wheeling out businesspublished at 12:46
Daily Politics
Live on BBC Two
The Telegraph letter from business leaders is being picked over on the Daily Politics. “The letter is quite clear - they believe the Conservatives are the way forward if you want jobs and opportunity,” Sajid Javid says. Chris Leslie manages to verbally roll his eyes without actually doing so. “Typically before a general election the Conservatives will wheel out a key set of supporters,” he says. Vince Cable plays down its significance, saying it’s from 100 figures out of five million British businesses. “What this group are saying is they want continuity, and as the business secretary I wouldn’t oppose that by any means,” he adds.
Get involvedpublished at 12:41
Email: politics@bbc.co.uk
John:
Hello! Great interaction today. Are you able to find out if Ed is promising energy price freeze for business too and if so is it for all business (large and small) or just SMEs, please? That is news to me and will be a massive bombshell. For consumers it will hurt the energy companies, but for business too?