Nick Eardley
Political correspondent

We didn’t expect Boris Johnson to announce a big, expensive policy on National Insurance today.

It’s not all that clear he did either.

Remember it was a question from a voter - Claire Cartlidge - that got us here. It was her probing about whether Mr Johnson would cut taxes for people like her - or people like himself - that led to the Tory leader revealing his plan to cut National insurance payments for us all.

But - it’s not been a simple explanation. The PM originally told us his ultimate goal was to make the threshold £12,000. He later had to clarify it was actually £12,500.

Then he claimed the saving for voters would be £500. That could be true - but only over time. The annual saving is £105 if the threshold is £9,500. It could be a lot more if the threshold rises further - but we don’t have a timetable for that yet.

It’s a policy designed to be voter friendly. But it’s announcement hasn’t gone quite according to plan.

The Lib Dem leader was pressed on whether she'd block a Tory or Labour government if no party wins a majority. The BBC's political editor, who asked the questions, thinks there's something of a "pivot" going on in Jo Swinson's messaging...

You can also watch the clip via this link.

Speaking of Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP, we've just been sent their response to the Conservatives' announcement on National Insurance.

Spokesman Drew Hendry isn't impressed, saying that "if they really wanted to help people on low incomes" then the Tories would "fix and stop the roll-out of universal credit" which had been "devastating people".

He said raising the threshold of National Insurance would benefit the "better-off first" and "even more than those people on low incomes".

The SNP, in contrast, he insisted, had "a fair income tax and taxation policy."

Image source, EPA

Conservative minister and election candidate Michael Gove has ruled out the prospect of Nicola Sturgeon being granted a second independence referendum by a Westminster Tory government - even if her party wins a majority at Holyrood in 2021.

Out campaigning today, Mr Gove said such a vote would be a "waste of time".

"We're not going to grant that. We will say no, because she said that this was a once in a lifetime event. It erodes trust in politics if you say it is a once in a lifetime event and then you go back on that."

Mr Gove's comments came after fellow Conservative and Scottish Secretary Alister Jack appeared to suggest something slightly different.

He said on Tuesday the "democratic mandate for a Section 30 order", which would permit a legally binding referendum to take place, was a "matter for 2021".

Mr Gove said the Conservative Party's campaign north of the border was "going very well", adding: "Our biggest electoral asset of course is Nicola Sturgeon, because Nicola Sturgeon's insistence on a second independence referendum, come hell or high water, is not going down well on the doorstep."

Use the search box in our piece to find your constituency and the candidates who are standing on 12 December.

Image source, AFP/Getty Images

Things have changed a lot from the party's leader laying her claim to No 10.

Listen carefully, and you'll hear she is shifting her message to the country somewhat, to present herself as the person who can stop the Conservatives getting a majority.

Read the full analysis.

Mark Hutchings
BBC Wales parliamentary correspondent

The party's official response...

"We should increase the employee rate of National Insurance contributions for higher rate and additional rate taxpayers from 2 per cent to 4 per cent, raising an estimated £2bn a year.

"We will establish Employment Action Zones in rural and industrial areas with high unemployment where we will offer special exemption for employer National Insurance and enhanced tax credits for Research and Development.”

BBC Radio 5 Live

Lord Grade, the former ITV boss and chairman of the BBC, isn't holding back in his assessment of last night's debate.

"Very formulaic and just too restrictive", he tells 5 Live Drive.

"All the life and the spontaneity has gone out of it. Everybody rehearses like mad…

"It’s billed as a contest, and we want a winner and loser at the end of it. But in fact they hardly engage with each other...these debates are in danger of being suffocatingly boring and predictable."

Lord Grade - who says the best approach would be the two leaders left to slug it out uninterrupted - adds: "It’s on life support, this format - it’s not a format I would’ve bought running a television network in a million years."

Laura Kuenssberg
BBC political editor

It was really interesting talking to Jo Swinson earlier - she admits it would be a "big step" from where the polls are for her to have proper crack at No 10 - that's very different language to a few weeks ago.

While she repeated that "Lib Dem votes" wouldn't prop up either Johnson or Corbyn, she would NOT say she'd actually block either of them.

I understand the Liberal Democrats are discussing whether they'd abstain on the Queen's Speech seeing either of them into office, if they are allowed another EU referendum.

Jo Swinson also still holds out hope of a government of national unity in case of a hung Parliament.

Back to the Lib Dem manifesto event, where Ms Swinson says hers is the "only party with a radical and credible plan to tackle the climate emergency".

"We will not leave our children with a boiling planet," she says.

Ms Swinson goes onto the subject of education, saying: "The state of our schools is just not good enough."

She talks about the "Remain bonus" - what they are saying is £50bn saved from not leaving the EU - to reverse school cuts. More on that here.

She says they will help parents going back to work, by offering 35 free hours a week of childcare, 48 weeks a year.

"We will transform childcare so every family, every child can thrive."

You can find out more about the Liberal Democrats' key policies here.

Boris Johnson says in his interview with the BBC on National Insurance that the cut he's making gives £500 to every working person.

The BBC's political analyst Peter Barnes says that's only correct if he means £500 over five years.

The annual saving for most employees of raising the threshold to £9,500 is £105 compared with the situation now.

If/when they get to a threshold of £12,500 the annual saving will be £465.

Image source, Getty Images

Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn "are living in a fantasy land", Ms Swinson continues.

"If we leave the EU we are looking at years and years and years of trade negotiations," she says.

Boris Johnson has promised to "get Brexit done" if elected - and leave the EU by January. Jeremy Corbyn, meanwhile, has promised to "get Brexit sorted" by renegotiating a deal with the EU and holding another referendum.

Neither is an option Ms Swinson relishes.

She says it will be time spent on "something we will never have as good" as staying in.

"The solution is clear if you want to put an end to this," she says. "You need to vote for the Liberal Democrats."

She says they are the only party that can win "a significant number of seats" from the Conservatives "and deprive them of a majority".

Liberal Democrat leaderJo Swinson has taken the stage at her party's manifesto launch in a nightclub in London.

"We've wasted the last three and a half years" on Brexit, she tells the audience.

There is "no form of Brexit" that will be good for the country, Ms Swinson says. "It will make us less safe."

She says Boris Johnson and Jeremy Corbyn are "gambling with your future".

Boris Johnson has given his first interview to the BBC on his National Insurance announcement.

Asked whether it was an accidental reveal, he replied: "No, this is something if you remember, I campaigned on to be leader of the Conservative Party."

He said the party's "ambition" is to ensure workers will not have to pay National Insurance until they earn £12,500.

"That would reduce the burden of taxation, in particular for people on low incomes," he said.

"And that is the right way to go.I’m a believer in cutting tax where you possibly can."

He said the policy will "help drive consumption" and help "grow a stronger economy".

Asked about the timescale of his "ambition," Mr Johnson said "if we’re lucky enough to be re-elected" in the first Budget it will "go up to a £9,500 threshold".

"We will then take a further step and we will set out the timescale in the budget up to £12,500."

Image source, Getty Images

As the balloon-clad stage was set for her party's official manifesto launch event, Jo Swinson told the BBC's Laura Kuenssberg she believes Brexit "has become a national embarrassment for our country".

"When you speak to people in other countries looking at us and they look at us with puzzlement," she said.

The Lib Dem leader added: "The people who want Brexit don't agree on what Brexit looks like, and what that leads me to be concerned about is, I don't think there is a majority in this country for any specific form of Brexit."

Our political editor Laura Kuenssberg has interviewed Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson. We will be featuring interviews with other party leaders during the election campaign.

Ms Swinson suggested that her party could still deny Boris Johnson a majority, but she refused to say if she would actually block him or Jeremy Corbyn from taking office if they did not have enough MPs to govern on their own.

She told the BBC her MPs would not vote for either of their programmes for government, but did not rule out abstaining on a Labour or Tory Queen’s Speech which would allow them to take office, as long as they gave the Lib Dems another EU referendum.

Ms Swinson also suggested that there could be a government of national unity after the election if there was a hung Parliament, saying we should be "more imaginative about what happens" - and suggesting there were MPs in other parties that the Liberal Democrats could work with.

The Lib Dem leader also admitted her party was being squeezed in the campaign, and it would be a "big step" for her to become "prime minister".

Image source, AFP

Citing this report, external by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, Labour are saying that raising the NI threshold up to £12,500 would eventually cost the government £11bn a year.

"Everyone who relies on public services and social security will be wondering whether they will be paying the price," says shadow chancellor John McDonnell.

"Despite creaking public services, the Tories still think the answer to the challenges of our time is a tax cut of £1.64 a week," he adds.

That weekly figure is the party's calculation for how much someone will save under Mr Johnson's initial proposed rise in the threshold up to £9,500 next year.

Image source, Getty Images

Here's what we have learned today on the campaign trail, on a day that has featured a manifesto unveiling and, perhaps, an accidental policy slip.

• Coming up from 17:00 we'll have the official Liberal Democrat manifesto launch in Camden, north London. We've already seen what's in it as it was published earlier and the clear focus is on stopping Brexit to free up what they say will be £50bn to spend on public services. We'll hear from leader Jo Swinson at the event.
• Boris Johnson may have accidentally let slip a key manifesto policy during a grilling from factory workers. He has subsequently told the BBC that workers will not have to pay National Insurance until they earn £12,500 if the Conservatives are elected to power. The threshold will rise to £9,500 initially but the ambition is to go further in time.
• Criticism continues after the Tories Twitter "rebrand" during Tuesday evening's debate - but senior figures defend it
• Nicola Sturgeon says Jeremy Corbyn will have little choice but to back a second independence referendum if he wants to be prime minister and doesn't win a majority
• And the Liberal Democrats have confirmed they are suspending their candidate in Birmingham Hodge Hill, Waheed Rafiq, over anti-Semitic social media posts originally reported by Buzzfeed News, external

Image source, EPA

We're all familiar with the debate around HS2 - and the arguments from those for and against it. But it's not the only big infrastructure project the Conservatives say they plan to look at again.

The party has announced a "priority" review of the Oxford to Cambridge expressway if it wins the general election.

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said the party will "look at alternative plans" to the Oxford to Milton Keynes and M1 section of the scheme.

Campaigners against the link road have called on all parties to stop the scheme over concerns about housing.

Mr Shapps said the scheme will only "proceed" if it has "local support".