Summary

  • Five Westminster opposition party leaders took part in a debate, with Labour's Ed Miliband and the SNP's Nicola Sturgeon in heated exchanges

  • UKIP's Nigel Farage accused the audience - which was independently selected and broadly representative - of being "left-wing"

  • Leanne Wood, of Plaid Cymru, and the Green Party's Natalie Bennett took on Mr Farage over his attitude to migrants

  • In other news - Richard Desmond, whose publishing company owns the Daily and Sunday Express, gave £1m to UKIP

  • Nick Clegg said a vote for the Lib Dems could prevent a right-wing coalition of the Conservatives, UKIP and the DUP - or "Blukip"

  • There are 21 days left until polling day

Live Reporting

Tim Fenton, Andy McFarlane, Bernadette McCague and Tom Moseley

  1. Hadrian's Wall

    Reality Check

    Nigel Farage says he wants to see less government money going "over Hadrian's Wall". It's worth bearing in mind that it's not just Scotland over Hadrian's Wall - there’s quite a lot of Northumberland and a bit of Cumbria to be found there too.

  2. James Forsyth, Spectator

    @JGForsyth

    tweets:

    Huge applause from the audience as Sturgeon says it is a ‘disgrace that David Cameron isn’t here to defend his record’

  3. Ned Simons, assistant political editor, The Huffington Post UK

    @nedsimons

    tweets:

    Ed Miliband is doing Nick Clegg's centre-ground 'strong economy fair society' thing. #BBCDebate

  4. National debt doubled

    Reality Check

    Nigel Farage says that in the last five years the national debt has doubled from £850bn to £1.5tn.

    There are various ways of measuring the national debt. The most common is to look at public sector net debt, excluding the cost of the UK government maintaining stakes in Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group.

    The Office for National Statistics says that, according to this measure, net debt was £1,469bn as at February 2015.

    In April 2010, just before the coalition government came into office, this figure stood at £962bn, which is more than the figure UKIP has cited.

    Debt has risen significantly. But not by quite as much as UKIP says.

  5. Scottish polls

    Douglas Fraser, BBC Scotland Business Editor

    As the debate starts, a reminder of the most recent poll of polls in Scotland. It covers four polls, between 18 March and 9 April:

    • SNP 48%
    • Lab 27%
    • Cons 15%
    • Lib Dem 4%
    • Green 3%
    • UKIP 2%

    whatscotlandthinks.org

  6. Ross Hawkins, BBC political correspondent

    @rosschawkins

    tweets:

    Farage claiming his cuts will affect debt. But he's already said he'll spend all the savings.

  7. Tax avoidance

    Ed Miliband says he can raise £7.5bn a year by clamping down on tax avoidance. Paul Johnson from the Institute for Fiscal Studies says Labour, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats have all been "making up numbers" on tax avoidance. More in this Reality Check .

  8. Allegra Stratton, Allegra Stratton Political Editor, BBC Newsnight

    @BBCAllegra

    tweets:

    What a moment though: Men outnumbered by women in this TV debate. Who would have thunk it #BBCDebate

  9. Paul Waugh, PoliticsHome

    @paulwaugh

    tweets:

    Farage looking straight down the barrel of the camera. Not sure that worked for EdM or the PM last time #BBCDebate

  10. Leonie Chao-Fong

    @leonie_chaofong

    tweets:

    It all sounds rather familiar so far... Are they rehashing their opening statements? #BBCDebate

  11. Rising bills

    Reality Check

    Ed Miliband says that wages have not been keeping up with bills for the last five years.

    Actually, this graph from the ONS shows that inflation has been higher than earnings for most, but not quite all, of the last five years.

  12. Key priorities: Green Party

    Graphic showing Green Party election priorities

  13. Key priorities: SNP

    Graphic showing SNP election priorities

  14. Key priorities: Labour

    Graphic showing Labour's key election pledges

  15. Key priorities: UKIP

    Graphic showing UKIP election priorities

  16. Key priorities: Plaid Cymru

    Graphic showing key Plaid Cymru priorities

  17. Five minutes to go

    Just a few moments left for party leaders to fix their hair, powder their noses and go over their lines one last time.

  18. Nick Eardley, BBC News journalist, working on #GE2015

    @nickeardley

    tweets:

    Each leader will get 1 min to speak at the start. Order will be: Leanne Wood, Nigel Farage, Ed Miliband, Nicola Sturgeon and Natalie Bennett

  19. Robin Brant, BBC Political Correspondent

    @robindbrant

    tweets:

    On way in to TV debate @Nigel_Farage says £1m from Desmond will go on ads. Presumably in target seats. Standby Boston/Thanet hoardings.

  20. John Stevens, Daily Mail political reporter

    @johnestevens

    tweets:

    Team #Green tell me Natalie Bennett has not been boozing to prepare for tonight's debate