Most of us are not members of the Green party, and many are not much involved in party politics. But we all feel it’s crucial that Caroline Lucas, the Green party’s sole MP at this time, should be re-elected in her Brighton constituency on 7 May.
Over the last five years, Caroline has eloquently addressed many of today’s most pressing issues – from accelerating climate change to sustainable farming, from human rights to a just and sustainable economy. This leadership matters all the more at a time when the mainstream parties are finding it so hard to address these challenges properly.
A clear sign that Lucas is more popular than her party.
Ed Miliband will be on BBC Radio 1’s Live Lounge at 5.30pm. He will also be answering questions live on @LBC at 5.30pm. Perhaps that consultancy firm taught him how to be in two places at one time as well. Either way, you can can listen to the Radio 1 interview when it happens here and watch the LBC interview below.
I’ll post a summary of both interviews afterwards.
A little before midnight, the well-wined Ukip leader stood on a chair in a small Italian eatery in the Kent town to bellow out a rendition of New York, New York to the delight of his dining companions.
That performance came after several renditions of Hi, Ho Silver Lining, with Farage hollering down the phone to whoever happened to be calling.
Nigel Farage celebrates St George’s Day with a pint. Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
A little unsteady on his feet, the Ukip leader then rounded off the night with The Wild Rover outside on the pavement, as aides persuaded him that moving on to a nightclub, or revisiting his teenage days of skinny-dipping were not sensible for a party leader two weeks before the most important election of his life.
My colleague Jessica Elgot has just drawn my attention to a Conservative supporting Hindi-language song that has just been released.
In a bid to give the Conservative election campaign that final push to victory, the party’s Friends of India have commissioned an undeniably catchy Hindi-language song about David Cameron.
The tune is sung by Navin Kundra, a British-Indian singing sensation who has six Asian Chart number one singles to his name.
Entitled ‘Neela hai Aasma’ (Blue Sky), the song is an upbeat number played over images of David Cameron meeting British Indians and visiting the country, dressed in traditional attire.
The lyrics, which perhaps sound less weirdly hypnotic in the original Hindi, translate as:
”The sky is blue and glorious, this is the colour of Britain’s pride, let’s join together with this blue colour, let’s join hands with David Cameron, who will take us forward together.
“Your dreams will be fulfilled, he’ll keep his commitments, the job which David has started, he’s determined to finish, stay with him, trust him.”
Non-Hindi speaking Brits can join in the chorus, which is simply: “David Cameron, David Cameron”.
The Conservative Friends of India describe it as a call to action for 1.6 million British Indians and “a first in British election history”.
“David Cameron has done more than any other British Prime Minister since World War II to help build a strong and positive relationship with India and engage actively with the British Indian Community,” the group said.
“I want to overhaul [the] Prevent programme,” Ed Miliband said in reference to the government’s current counter-terror strategy, in a wide-ranging interview with The Muslim News – covering issues ranging from the Trojan Horse scandal in Birmingham schools, to foreign policy and housing.
“The reality is that the people I talk to in the Muslim community are absolutely full square with the idea that we’ve got to make sure that we work with our young people to stop them being dragged into this perverted (terrorist) ideology,” he said, adding: “The way to do it is the Prevent programme working with communities.”
Miliband added that anti-Muslim hate crime would be outlawed and said: “It will be the first time that the police will record Islamophobic attacks right across the country.”
It has emerged that Ed Miliband has been taking “leadership lessons” from a private consultancy called Extended Mind. The company offers to “build leadership skills” using business psychology and neuroscience. Miliband told Sky News he takes advice from a “range of people”, adding that he’d leave it to others to judge his performance.
The Conservatives have cited this news as an example of Miliband’s authenticity. The party’s Michael Ellis said: “There’s nothing authentic about Ed Miliband. He’s had to hire someone to tell him how to act like a leader. Even after all his extensive coaching, could you imagine him standing up to Putin on the world stage? He should ask for his money back.”
The brutal maths of this election mean that, while Labour and the Tories are headed for roughly the same number of seats, only Labour has a clear path to 323 seats; their potential partner, the SNP, are set to win nearly twice as many seats as the Tories’ best option, the Lib Dems, and the minor MPs on either side largely cancel each other out.
So for Cameron to win, he needs to win more seats than Labour – considerably more. We think he needs to win around 20-25 seats more.
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