Summary

  • The leaders of seven UK parties took part in a two-hour live televised election debate

  • It was the only debate of the campaign which will feature David Cameron and Ed Miliband

  • They clashed on a range of issues including the NHS, immigration and the deficit

  • Snap polls taken afterwards gave differing verdicts on the winner

  • There are 35 days until the general election

Live Reporting

Tom Moseley, Andrew McFarlane and Bernadette McCague

  1. Tony Ziemianski

    @TonyoTimes

    Tweets:

    instead of building loads more houses and taking away land, apartments are the answer. #LeadersDebate #GetAnswers

  2. Unqualified teachers

    Reality Check

    Ed Miliband complains that there are 17,000 unqualified teachers in our schools.

    The total is 17,100 according to latest school workforce statistics (these are figures for England only).

    But it's worth mentioning that that was a typical number under the last Labour government too.

    As of 2012, academies and free schools have been able to hire staff without qualified teaching status. However, unqualified teachers working in local authority maintained schools (the vast majority under Labour) are either trainees working towards qualified status, an overseas trained teacher or an instructor who had a particular skill who can be employed so long as a qualified teacher isn’t available.

  3. Send us your views

    Email: politics@bbc.co.uk

    Fran Clark:

    Re students fees. Was it not Labour who brought in student tuition fees?

  4. Rental issues

    Ed Miliband says private renting can be "incredibly insecure". Labour would change the law to make three-year tenancies the norm, he says.

  5. Ben Page, Ipsos MORI

    @@benatipsosmori

    Tweets:

    Cam doing well on homes for young Brits #leadersdebate

  6. Alex Krasodomski, Associate at the Centre for the Analysis of Social Media, Demos

    @akrasodomski

    tweets:

    More than EIGHTY PERCENT of #leadersdebate tweets focus on personality not politics.

    Tweet by Alex Krasodomski showing Demos researchDemos

  7. Health 'tourism'

    You can review that clash between Nigel Farage, Leanne Wood and Nicola Sturgeon over health tourism via our online clip.

    Leaders clash over the NHS

  8. 'Old boys' network'

    Natalie Bennett brings things back to education, calling for "a much broader education that prepares our young people for life". Labour and the Conservatives would cut funding for Welsh education, says Leanne Wood. Plaid will "do all it can to end austerity" to be able to afford free tuition fees, she says. This shows "why we need to break the old boys' network at Westminster" says Nicola Sturgeon.

  9. Opinion polls

    Away from the debate, the first campaign outing by Panelbase has put Labour and the Conservatives both on 33% as well as giving UKIP its biggest share of the campaign so far, at 17%. Populus suggests a two-point Labour lead – 34% over 32% for the Conservatives. Meanwhile, YouGov turned in a two-point Conservative lead - 36% compared with Labour’s 34%.

  10. Coalition clashes

    After his coalition partner attacks Conservative education policy, David Cameron says: "With Nick Clegg, we sat in the Cabinet together, we took difficult decisions together." He criticises the Lib Dem leader's "pick and mix approach". They're criticising each other and they're both right, says Ed Miliband. Nick Clegg asks the Labour leader to apologise for "crashing the British economy".

  11. Patrick Mooney

    @patrick_mooney

    Tweets:

    Farage has an interesting idea about grammar schools but fails to address private schools #leadersdebate

  12. Jane Vernon

    @JaneVernon2

    Tweets:

    Nick I don't think anyone should ever forgive or forget your sell out on tuition fees, and I hope come 7 May they don't #Leadersdebate

  13. Conor Greaney

    @ConorEAGreaney

    Tweets:

    A lot of people on Twitter seem to criticise the leaders' appearances and not so much on their policies #sadreality #leadersdebate

  14. Young people

    The debate on young people has been thrown open to the floor. David Cameron says free schools are "a great institution".

    Debate

  15. James Forsyth, Spectator

    @JGForsyth

    Tweets:

    Cameron pivots to pensions in a question about young peoples’ prospects, clearly determined to shoe-horn that message in

  16. Tom Bradby, Political Editor, ITV

    @tombradby

    Tweets:

    At last, Clegg vs Farage feels like a real debate.

  17. Charlie Brooker, broadcaster

    @charltonbrooker

    Tweets:

    Not sure "Tough on AIDS victims" is going to be a popular campaign slogan. #LeadersDebate

  18. Young people

    A 25-year-old audience member poses the next question, asking what the leaders will do about the difficulties faced by young people including tuition fees and affording a home.

  19. Add to the debate

    Text: 61124

    Peter, Larne:

    As a British citizen from Northern Ireland, I am totally disgusted that the largest party here the DUP is not allowed to be part of the debate. It is the 4th largest party in terms of Westminster seats. Why on earth are the Greens and Welsh Nationals invited?

  20. Sturgeon most tweeted

    After the first hour of the #leadersdebate , SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon was the most talked about leader on Twitter.

    And there was a stark difference to the debates of five years ago, with Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg getting the least attention on the social media site.

    Here's the breakdown of how many mentions each of the leaders' Twitter names got up to 21:00, although - of course - it doesn't take into account whether the tweets were positive or negative:

    @NicolaSturgeon 11,919 @Nigel_Farage 8,468 @NatalieBen 8,218 @Ed_Miliband 7,574 @David_Cameron 5,273 @LeanneWood 5,171 @Nick_Clegg 2,345