BBC Radio 4

Image source, AFP

George Osborne says Tony Blair's warnings about the EU aren't "borne out by the facts". He says the majority of people in Britain want to stay in Europe but see the EU reformed. "That is the Conservative position and if you want that say, if you want that referendum, there is only one way to get it." The answer, he makes thoroughly clear, is to vote Conservative.

BBC Radio 4

“The job isn’t done,” George Osborne concludes after listening to a report on The World at One about the situation in the Black Country. “We’ve made a lot of progress, we’ve got a lot more work to do.” He doesn't waste much time before saying the Conservatives have a "long-term economic plan" for the West Midlands. Investment in transport, science, universities and apprenticeships will ensure the country doesn't place all its bets on the City of London, he says.

BBC Radio 4

Shadow Europe minister Pat McFadden tells The World at One that Tony Blair’s big speech today isn’t the first time Labour has used the European issue in the election campaign. Pursuing a referendum for principled reasons is one thing, he says of David Cameron. “To do it through the absence of leadership is much, much worse. To do it because you can’t even face down your own eurosceptic backbenchers who will never be satisfied with anything he negotiates is a complete absence of leadership.”

BBC Radio 4

BBC Radio 4

Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham is up next on BBC Radio 4. He doesn’t think it’s “good enough” for Jeremy Hunt to offer sweeping “unfunded” promises about paying for the NHS. Norman Lamb, the Lib Dem Health Minister, says his party would spend more on the NHS in line with economic growth after the deficit is cleared in 2018.

Chris Traverse:

BBC Radio 4

Image source, Reuters

The battle over the NHS is very much hotting up this lunchtime on The World At One, where Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt is being pressed on whether he'll accept the NHS needs the extra £8bn NHS England's Simon Stevens has demanded every year after 2020. "We will give whatever they need. It might be more than £8bn, it might be less," he says.

Ed Miliband wraps up with a little dig at Nick Clegg. He says there’s two ways of approaching an election campaign. One involves making “all kinds of promises to people and let’s see if we can make them in government and I hope people don’t catch up with me in government when I break those promises”. He pauses, then smiles and wiggles his fingers as he adds: “Not to be rude, it’s the Nick Clegg school of political leadership.” The session is now over.

Reality Check

Image source, Getty Images

The former prime minister Tony Blair says the Conservatives have put an EU exit “on the agenda" by promising an in/out referendum if they win the election. What would be the timetable for a referendum?

David Cameron has pledged to hold an in-out referendum on the UK’s membership of the EU in the first half of the next parliament – ie by the end of 2017 - if a Conservative government is elected in 2015. He also pledged to renegotiate the UK’s relationship with the EU before the referendum is held.

That means a future Conservative government would have up to two and a half years to negotiate a new deal, which in the context of the EU is a very tight deadline. For example, one area for the renegotiations already highlighted is restricting EU citizens’ access to welfare benefits. David Cameron believes this would lower EU immigration. While some of those measures could be achieved through changes to the EU legislation, others could potentially trigger an EU treaty change, a process which requires unanimity of all member states and ratification by all national parliaments and which, last time round, took 10 years to complete.

Ed Miliband gives his response to George Osborne’s comments about Labour’s fiscal plans. “The Tory figures are wrong, wrong and wrong,” he says. “The figures they’re basing them on are wrong and made up… the Conservatives can keep saying it, all it shows is they have nothing to say about the future of our country. It is the most negative, poor and pathetic campaign being run by the Conservative Party.”

Here's the first question from a journalist - and it's about the Tony Blair speech, of course. Why didn't the ex-PM appear alongside his party leader? "He can speak for himself," Ed Miliband says. He insists Mr Blair's intervention is "quite important" on its own terms.

Simon, Cambridgeshire:

There’s a lot of laughter in this Q&A - it’s a format which Ed Miliband is very comfortable with, having regularly taken Qs from Labour delegates at the party’s annual conference for years now. He’s asked about a spelling mistake on a voter’s polling card, which states that “it is an offence to vote more that once.” Miliband, laughingly, says this is “not acceptable and we should go and tell someone off about that”. He adds: “Spelling will be better under a Labour government, I can promise you that.” Sounds like an excellent ideia.

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John Morris from the Peace Party says nobody wants war and says his party believes the UK should "eventually" spend no money on defence.

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The SNP's general election campaign director, Angus Robertson, has been speaking about Tony Blair's intervention on Europe.