The Spectator

The Spectator website's Steerpike is eagle-eyed as ever.The column reports that Rupert Murdoch has arrived in the UK to oversee his newspaper's coverage of the final days of the general election campaign.

Steerpike says:"[Mr] Murdoch is expected to run a tight ship across all News UK titles as polling day gets closer. ‘Labour has made it pretty clear that the party will be coming after the Murdoch empire if they get into power, and it’s safe to say Rupert isn’t planning to cower', Steerpike's mole says."

tweets:

Former chair of the Royal College of GPs Professor Clare Gerada has stepped down from her role with NHS England to campaign for the Labour Party.

She tells the BBC she believes that the only party that can save the NHS is the Labour party, adding that just talking about the NHS has now become a political issue in a way that it has never been in the past.

She tells the BBC she cannot stand by and watch the NHS "wither", which is why she has come out for Labour.

In a statement she said:

The Guardian reports, external that Ed Miliband will lay out in a Queen's speech 10 major priorities, including an "economic foundation bill" an "energy freeze bill", and a bill against zero-hours contracts.

There are provisions for families, with the Labour leader saying his government would make the increase to free childcare for working parents of three- and four-year-olds to 25 hours a week a priority in his first Queen's speech.

Primary-age children will have access to childcare from 8am to 6pm as part of the plans too.

The reduction in tuition bills would also be an immediate priority, as would Labour proposals on capping rents and curbing tax avoidance.

The "economic foundation bill" would implement a mansion tax and a tobacco levy to fund the NHS

We've not really done much in the way of royal baby news on the election live page but in case you're interested. The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge have welcomed a baby girl into the world. You can, of course, follow coverage of the Royal Family's new arrival here .

Image source, Vine

In past elections we've had MPs being egged, pensioners haranguing the prime minister - who can forget Gillian Duffy - and punches thrown - John Prescott anyone?

But this election, there's been barely a shout of disapproval - apart from some aimed at Nigel Farage in South Thanet, and that was swiftly dealt with by his security.

However, yesterday, footage emerged of a student appearing to pull his trousers down in front of deputy prime minister Nick Clegg.

Mr Clegg dealt with the bet/protest/we're really not sure, external very well, we thought.

BBC Breakfast

David Cameron earlier referred to his "career defining" moment on Friday when he gave a speech at an Asda store in Leeds said today the election was a career-defining moment.

Labour seized on the apparent slip up on Friday saying Mr Cameron was more focused on his CV and legacy rather than voters.

But Mr Cameron told BBC Breakfast: "I meant it. I meant it for the people I was talking to. I looked out at all these young people and I was thinking about their careers and what it will mean."

BBC Radio 4 Today

Former Scottish first minister Henry McLeish has said Labour leader Ed Miliband cannot afford to exclude himself from the possibility of being prime minster by refusing to talk to other parties.

He told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "I can't bind Ed to anything but look, you know well enough that the pragmatic political side will say 'I'm going for a majority, all this talk of speaking to anyone is out of the question'. On the other hand, the politics of reality say I would rather see Ed Miliband in Number 10, no matter the conditions.

"But certainly that's the big alternative to David Cameron. At the end of the day, Ed is not going to exclude himself from being prime minister by not talking to anyone."

BBC Radio 4 Today

Former Conservative Cabinet minister, Lord Heseltine, dismissed Ed Miliband's assurance that he wouldn't do a deal with the SNP if there's a hung parliament after the election.

Lord Heseltine told the Today programme earlier Mr Miliband would have no other option.

"I winced when I heard Ed Miliband say he wouldn't have any deals with anybody," he said. "The fact of the matter is, if he were - and I don't believe for a minute he will be - in a position to be prime minister, he would have no choice in one way or another, by back door intrigue, by word of implication as opposed to specific contract, to do a deal with the Scottish Nationalists."

Image source, Getty Images

David Cameron will later pledge that under a Conservative government, the basic state pension will rise to £7,000 a year by the end of the next parliament.

Promising to "reward" the hard work of older Britons with a comfortable retirement, the prime minister will say later that he wants Britain to be the best place in the world for the elderly to spend their later years.

Launching the Tory manifesto for pensioners, Mr Cameron will highlight the party's commitment to the "triple lock" on the state pension, which means it rises each year by whichever is higher out of inflation, average wages, or 2.5%.

He will say: "I have a simple view that if you have done the right thing - worked, saved and paid your taxes - you should be rewarded, not punished."

The Independent's, external poll-of-polls - which is compiled by professor John Curtice of the University of Stathclyde and compiles the results of the main pollsters from the last week - puts the Conservatives ahead for the first time in the campaign.

By the Independent's reckoning the Tories are now one point ahead.

The poll sees things as thus:

Conservatives: 34%,

Labour: 33%,

UKIP: 13%,

Lib Dems: 9%,

Greens: 5%.

Scotland will get no "special deals" from Labour if it forms the next government, Ed Miliband will say later today on a campaign visit to Hastings.

As he seeks to shut down debate over the implications of a hung parliament the Labour leader plans to dismiss Tory accusations that minority Labour government would be forced to do deals with the Scottish Nationalists as a "deflection" from the real issues facing the country.

Mr Miliband will call the claims a "distraction, offered in the final desperate days of the Tory campaign to divert your attention from the truth of their own record."

"Under a Labour government, there won't be any special deals for Scotland. But I will tell you this: if I am prime minister, there won't be any special deals for bankers or hedge funds or energy companies, either," he will say.

BBC Radio 4 Today

There might be an early period of negotiations, but the deadline is essentially 27 May, Dr Haddon added. That's the date set for the Queen’s Speech.

If Mr Cameron declares he will form a minority government then Lib Dem ministers will have to resign, she said.

One assumes the parties will decide in the early stages whether to try to do deals amongst themselves or whether to go it alone.

The power of the prime minister to threaten a new general election if he or she doesn’t get their own way, or as a method of bringing other parties to the negotiating table to do a coalition deal, has been diminished by the Fixed Term Parliaments Act, Dr Haddon said.

Confidence and supply deals will be important in confidence votes and finance bills, she added.

BBC Radio 4 Today

What is going to happen on the day after the night before? Which party is going to talk to which?

David Cameron, by convention, because he is prime minister, will get the first chance to form a government, even if he wins fewer seats, Dr Catherine Haddon of the Institute of Government told the Today programme earlier.

Edward Heath, as prime minister in 1974, was four seats short of Labour, but was still allowed to try to negotiate with other parties over the weekend after polling day to try to form a government, she pointed out.

It was only after he failed that Harold Wilson went on to form a minority Labour government.

It all still comes down to the arithmetic of what the other parties have in terms of seats, and what deals you think you could do to get minority legislation through Parliament, she said.

In 1923 Stanley Baldwin tried to stay on, even though other political parties wouldn’t support him, she added.

BBC Radio 4 Today

Labour's response to the SNP has been one of "fear, driven by a completely unanticipated move in nationalist support," in Scotland, Murray Pittock, Bradley professor at Glasgow University, tells the Today programme.

He adds: "Westminster has simply been always behind the curve, and they haven't understood what's going on."

Image source, PA

A new taskforce aimed at tackling youth unemployment would be set up within the first 100 days of the next government, the Liberal Democrats will pledge.

The plans, to be set out by party leader Nick Clegg, will aim to get 100,000 young adults into work, into apprenticeships or full-time education.

BBC Breakfast

“There is a moral aspect to all of this, which is encouraging people into work, that is one of the moral issues of our time.” Mr Cameron says of the government’s previous cuts to welfare – scrapping child benefit for the better off, and introducing the benefits cap, for example.

Mr Cameron says that when he came to power, one in fifteen people were on sickness benefits – and hadn’t been offered help to get back to work, Mr Cameron says. “That is a very important moral issue,” he says. Now there are 900,000 fewer people on out-of-work benefits, he adds. It is pointed out to the prime minister that 900,000 people is also the same number of people who are now relying on food banks.

Mr Cameron says the most important thing his government can do for those people using food banks is help them to get a job. He says food bank use went up ten-fold under the last Labour government. The Prime Minister says he doesn’t want to see people using food banks "but the best way to do that is to grow the economy and support enterprise."