Politics

David Cameron will take to the stage in an hour to launch the Conservatives’ 2015 manifesto. Before he does, a short video will roll to introduce the themes of the document. We can bring you a teaser of that video now — watch above. The message in the short clip is based on how the Tories have turned around the economy over the last five years: ‘When Labour left power it left a note. It read: “there is no money”. ‘Five years on, notes of a different kind are turning people’s lives around. Job offers. Lower tax bills. Apprenticeship offers. Mortgage approval letters. Confirmation of school places. ‘These notes are

‘The economy has entered deflation,’ announces the BBC news presenter, as if this was a kind of recession. Au contraire. Shopping bills are shrinking, and this is unalloyed good news. The cost of living has been a problem in recent years, but now petrol prices are plunging and the cost of goods (i.e., shopping) is now 2.1 per cent lower than a year ago. The cost of services is up by 2.4 per cent, so technically that means zero inflation – contra the BBC headline. But the overall point holds: stuff is getting cheaper. [datawrapper chart=”http://static.spectator.co.uk/pICZY/index.html”] The prices of clothing is down month-on-month for the first time since the CPI inflation index was invented.

Today, it’s the Conservative Party’s turn to release its manifesto. Labour pushed out its own document ‘Britain can do better’ yesterday, so it’s Tories’ turn to try and better it. As with Labour’s manifesto, the big announcement has already been briefed out and has made the front pages of most newspapers: extending right to buy. To help guide you through the melée of stories and spin, here is a summary of today’s main election stories. 1. Thatcherism is back Unless the Tories have another big surprise in store, the centre piece of their 2015 manifesto is a pledge to extend right-to-buy for 1.3 million families in housing association homes. The Tories

‘Hell, yes, I am proud of this,’ said Nick Clegg in the first of the BBC’s leaders interviews, broadcast at 7.30pm this evening. He’s lucky to get such a slot to list his achievements: the Lib Dems are vying with the Greens for fifth place right now. And he performed pretty well, in my opinion, coming across as decent and reasonable guy, using humour – and even anger, what it was called for. Evan Davis seemed to be out to provoke him. He started by playing the Lib Dem election broadcast where Clegg piously said he was fed up with broken promises, then promised not to increase increase tuition fees. Yes, said Clegg, guilty as charged. Also,

As regular readers will be aware, Mr S has tracked the growing hostility toward the press at Labour Party events. Today’s manifesto launch was no different. The Labour leader took the extraordinary step of pre-butting jeers and boos from audience members toward journalists, by asking them to hear the media out: ‘Now, we’re going to take questions. I just want to say something in advance of these questions. I talked earlier about the kind of country we believe in. And what’s really important in the country we believe in is that we have a press that ask difficult questions and it’s really important that we hear these questions respectfully because

As Jim Murphy tries to turn back the SNP surge, he has been arguing that a Labour government wouldn’t result in endless austerity. He has repeatedly cited the Institute for Fiscal Studies’ finding that Labour couldn’t meet its deficit reduction target with no cuts at all after 2015-16. Now, Ed Balls and Ed Miliband have today been clear that Labour will bring in cuts post 2016. But they have avoided contradicting Murphy by name. Chuka Umunna, however, showed no such restraint earlier today. Under questioning from Andrew Neil, he declared: ‘The leader of the Scottish Labour party will not be in charge of the UK Budget.’ This comment was so