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Next Tuesday marks the first live discussion where Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg will be sitting side-by side.

Questions about how to get more women, ethnic minorities and people with disabilities into parliament will be asked by several MPs. The discussion will be chaired by Commons Speaker John Bercow.

Gordon Brown will certainly relish the chance to expose what he sees as David Cameron’s lack of substance on fundamental issues of fairness and opportunity, and Nick Clegg will want to differentiate himself from the two men by what he says.

We still await an annoucement about the live televised debates, but I welcome this positive news.

I am pleased that technology is being called upon to run a web forum during the question-and-answer session.

Although, many members of the public will raise questions about impartiality, even if the session is being moderated by the Speaker.

Proceedings will be aired live on BBC Parliament next Tuesday. I urge everyone who has the time to watch it to do so; Check your TV guide for the time and make a note in your diary!

The Conservative Party have announced a series of policies.

George Osborne wants to give tax breaks to new businesses and David Cameron wants to ‘reform’ welfare.

Work and Pensions Secretary Yvette Cooper described the proposals as “a carefully packaged con”.

Cutting the deficit is a priority for the party, so won’t these spending annoucements add to the deficit the party are so concerned about?

National newspapers like the Guardian must devote their columns and editorials to a serious scrutiny of Tory policy.

This week, Andrew Marr was criticised by viewers, MPs and Lord Mandelson for asking the Prime Minister whether he was dependent on prescription drugs “to get through”.

And today Mr Marr asked David Cameron a question about his wealth that seemed to be quite pointless.

“A lot of people don’t understand quite who you are and quite what you stand for, even now, and when they hear you talking about tax and hear you talking about jobs and so on, they make the criticism that basically you are a very, very rich man, you’re a wealthy man and you’re a toff and you don’t really understand the people out there,” he said.

Like the interrogation about prescription drugs, Mr Marr was not going to settle for the Conservative leader dodging the question. He was keen for Mr Cameron to establish the truth in reports that him and his wife Samantha Cameron have assets worth £30m.

“So what is the real figure, would you say? If 30 million’s wrong, what is the real figure?”

Mr Cameron briefly made a joke of the situation, remarking that Marr “well you’re very happily, you want to come and you can look through all my bank statements.”

He then sarcastically offered Marr an invitation to his house, suggesting “you can come and have a look.” Mr Cameron sneakily avoided answering this question by saying that “our main asset is the house that we own in London.”

There is a perfectly logical argument among the less wealthy whether Mr Cameron can understand the financial constraints of working people when he is a multi-millionaire. Although, one may argue that a wealthy politician may direct his policies towards allowing more people to be more economically prosperous and self-reliant.

The ‘Tory toff’ slogan is not a vote winner.  Take a look at the Crewe and Nantwich by-election campaign.

Whether this is pure opportunism or a man who is honestly looking for ways to cut the nation’s debt as much as possible is another argument, but David Cameron is making his political opponents look not on top of things.

Yet again, the Guardian have done a fine job in reporting political news and Allegra Stratton’s piece entitled ‘Counting the cost of David Cameron’s 25% pay cut for ministers’ is an article that is well worth reading.

On one hand, this seems like a ridiculous gimmick because after all most David Cameron’s frontbench do not even need to work if they do not want to. They are wealthy millionaires with a home in South London and another in the countryside.

Politicians have to take pay cuts when public sector workers such as doctors, nurses, teachers and local council officials are having pay freezes or receiving less than previously agreed in pay increases. Those, including the politicians themselves are wrong when they say that politics is merely public service- it is a career: They spend most of their time in Westminster and are payed a good salary for it.

The likes of Alan Duncan think that the country is stupid. He is a millionaire yet believes that his salary is not enough and that “MPs live on rations.”

David Cameron’s salary caps will only give him kudos if he can convince the public that all his cabinet are behind these cuts and that they really mean them- including Mr Cameron himself.

This morning’s edition of the News of the World featured an article by Lord Mandelson challenging his party to “roll its sleeves up” and not hand an election victory to the Conservative Party “on a plate.”

The Business Secretary’s analysis is that once voters head into the voting booth, they will ultimately make a decision between “the substance of Gordon Brown versus the shallowness of David Cameron.” Mandelson also made a reference to the government’s bank bailout saying that the Prime Minister “averted a Great Depression.”

Well the structure and day to day operations of the banks may have been rescued, but many families and businesses have and are not being rescued by the banks.

The problem about constantly taking about an ‘economic record’ is that the majority of the British people do not see the Labour government to have had any sort of economic competence. On one hand, Gordon Brown is seen as the most successful and most powerful Chancellor of the Exchequer in modern British politics, but people in their droves are quick to attack his economic record on news website comment boxes: A party that gives, but then takes by increasing taxes; Brown is blamed for selling 60 per cent of Britain’s gold reserves between 1999 and 2002, while some even blame him as being the cause of what is a ‘global’ economic crisis.

Then there is the credibility of Peter Mandelson himself. He rarely stays out of the headlines.

This is a man who had to resign from the goverment twice. No need to remind you what for. The public are more sick of this man than Gordon Brown.

And it doesn’t help when there are two separate reports about him today in the national newspaper: One report suggests that he may become an MP again so he can challenge for the leadership and another says that he tried to persuade Trevor Phillips to quit his job as CEO of the Equality and Human Rights Commission in exchange for a ministerial position. A Second Secretary of State post?

Most of the country now think he is too powerful and the ‘de facto’ Prime Minister in all but name, after it was revealed that Mandelson sits on 35 Cabinet committees.

Labour must find a senior figure to be the spokesman of the party. I do not mean someone to unseat the Prime Minister, but someone who is not tainted by scandal and seems to have some ounce of credibility among the British people: That starts with Alan Johnson.

As many political commentators have pointed out, David Cameron may have a double digit lead over Gordon Brown in several reputable opinion polls but he is not “sealing the deal.”

On May 6, I wrote a blog post titled ‘If you want to be Prime Minister, seal the deal!’ wondering whether a opposition leader could ever be elected without offering much substance. After all, there is saying that governments lose elections and opposition parties win them. But funnily enough, Tony Blair who David Cameron has been compared to in terms of offering any sort of charismatic appeal to the electorate, won a massive 1997 landslide not only because the public were sick of Major, but because of his charm, but most importantly there were some concrete policies:  Constitutional reforms, improving and investing in public services, peace in Northern Ireland…..

Gordon Brown and other Labour ministers have talked about how when voters step into the voting booth, they will make a choice based on investment, and a party that is building Britain’s Future. How tired and worn out the statement my seem, Brown may have a point.

For a moment, let’s take a look at the three main parties.

Labour will never be willing to cut. They will always want to pump millions of pounds into schools, hospitals and infrastructure projects. The problem with Labour is that they seem to address one problem and then inadvertently cause another. Take the EMA system for instance. There are probably better examples.

Another problem is that the other political parties can not do any better than the incumbent government. When Labour annouce a new program to build thousands more ‘affordable’ homes, they may be insufficient, not as affordable as the government thinks and the contractors may take a while to start the work, but we have to ask ourselves one honest question: Do we think we would get a fraction of these homes under a Tory goverment?

Johann Hari of the Independent was spot on when he said on Question Time Extra that cuts were about the human impact, not whether people liked Brown or not.

Then there is the Lib Dems- the only credible oppostion in British politics. Where they seem to stumble is that they have not worked out yet how their policies may work in practice, but it is a start.

I welcome debates not only between leaders but with party ministers too.  Darling, Osborne and Cable going head to head.

It is clear that Brown’s messgae of Labour investment and Tory cuts does not wash with the British people, but one interesting thing I picked up during PMQs was that he says that Labour are bringing foward investment and the Tories are not. Perhap he should emphasise his argument on why the Tories want to cut spending straight away and stress the human impact.

If we cut straight away, if you house is on fire the emergency services may take longer to arrive at your home if there was less firefighters.

In a live televised debate with Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan looked into the camera and asked the American people “Will you be better off then you were four years ago.” And we all know who won the election.

Yesterday Conservative leader David Cameron began campaigning for the European and local elections on June 4.

The seats of 72 MEPs will be decided in a widely contested election, which has raised concerns about the BNP gaining a seat in the European Parliament.

But instead of echoing the sentiments of some politicians, but mainly clergy who have spoken about the need to root out extremist parties such as the BNP, Mr Cameron chose to attack not just the government, but the Prime Minister.

Mr Cameron told voters ‘that enough is enough’ and said that the forthcoming elections represented an opportunity to “give this weak, useless and spineless government a message they won’t forget.” 

 The Conservative Party will always win first prize for the party with the most colourful rhetoric and the most colourful pre-modifiers and analogies, but they are losing the battle of substance.

Mr Cameron is obviously a very intelligent man, so why not give the public, just a little, and that is saying something, a little insight into how life would really be different under a Conservative government.

It is staggering how Mr Cameron has failed to seal the deal. Are his advisers effectively carrying out their job?

I understand that the Tories cannot begin to think of releasing budget forecasts or speaking of spending commitments because the economy may begin to steadily grow or shrink.

Last week, an under fire Mr Brown delivered an impressive speech to open the Welsh Labour conference in Swansea, asking the Tories just how many schools, hospitals and other public services they would cut….

Could a opposition leader ever be elected without offering much substance?

Barack Obama met with Conservative leader David Cameron at the US ambassadors residence in Regent Park.

I wonder whether they found any economic consensus.

Mr Brown may have warned Mr Obama to watch out for that Cameron, who leads that “do nothing party.”

Yesterday, I spoke to Cleland Thom, one of the UK’s leading journalism trainers who gave his views on the general election.

Today I spoke to Shane, founder of political blog: Events, Dear Boy, Events. For those of you who do not know, the term Events, Dear Boy, Events comes from former Prime Minister Harold McMillan who used the words to express how unforeseen events of national emergencies such as the death or a prominent figure or a humanitarian crisis can affect the course of a government, but especially an incoming administration.

Shane said: “The election may be close. Then again it might not. The outcome hinges on how long this recession lasts. If it goes deeper, beyond 2009, then the Tories will almost certainly win. But if it is a much lighter, with Britain beginning to come out of it by the end of the year, then the contest will be much closer – with the Liberal Democrats playing kingmaker if it’s a hung parliament (although people said that at the last election too). But if the Lib Dems do become decisive then don’t assume they’ll side with Labour. They may see it as propping up a failed regime and support the Tories instead – especially if they have fewer seats than the Conservatives.

“I agree that Labour and Conservatives have a clear distinction that hasn’t really been seen since 97. But at the moment the Tories have the upper hand – Gordon Brown has presided over the near collapse of our financial institutions. Remember Gordon continuously declaring an end to boom and bust when he was chancellor? Brown has been responsible for our exposure to the global crisis and to try and get us out will land the country with a national debt of £1 trillion. People are rightly concerned.

“There is a lot of disaffection over Labour. They seem to have run out of ideas. Brown has made a small comeback recently, bringing back Peter Mandelson, but it will only delay the invertible. Many people see Cameron as more of a Prime Minister-in-waiting than any Tory leader since Labour came to power. His frontbench team, however, needs fine-tuning so that he gets the best people in the shadow cabinet ready for an election campaign.

“Although there was talk of a spring election Brown will most certainly leave it to the last possible minute, hoping things improve. He had his winning chance when he was thinking about calling an election back in 2007. He was enjoying popularity after his first summer as PM but when the Tories rallied at their party conference Brown embarrassingly backed down. It was downhill from there.

“An interesting point to remember is that, whenever the election comes, Labour has a built in advantage in the electoral system. Conservative Home highlighted yesterday that a 10% Tory lead translates into a Tory majority of 34. But if Labour had a 10% lead then the Labour majority would be 136! The Conservatives have to work harder to win!

But all in all I’m confident that in 2010 we will see Prime Minister Cameron on the steps of 10 Downing Street.”

If any other bloggers have any views on the British general election, please do not hesitate to leave a comment or contact me at samsondada@gmail.com

I think that when Gordon Brown decides to call the election, it will be definitely be one of the most eagerly anticipated elections in British politics and possibly more than the 2008 American presidential election.

Obama ran a superb race, and while doubts lingered at the back of our mind we knew he had the presidency sewn up months before November 4.

Political commentators are absolutely spot on when they say that for the first time in a while, there is a clear distinction in policy and ideals between the Labour Party and Conservative Party. It is no longer one party merely coming to power by capitalising on the failures of another.

Margaret Thatcher and John Major kept Labour in opposition for 18 years, while the birth of Tony Blair and New Labour has kept the Tories in opposition for 11 years.

A weakening John Major famously called the general election on 17 March 1997 as his five year term ran out.

To kickstart my search for what some of the public think about the outcome of a general election, I thought of no one better than friend and mentor Cleland Thom, one of the UK’s leading journalism trainers.

As it points out on his online profile page, he has dined with MPs such as Justice Secretary,  Jack Straw and former London mayor Ken Livingston. He also happened to interview a certain….Baroness Margaret Thatcher! Ever heard of her?

Cleland said: “I think Labour will win it – the public will see Gordon Brown as a safe pair of hands regarding the economy, and also someone who’s trying his best to help. But it will be close – maybe a hung Parliament, with the LibDems holding sway … and Vince Cable becoming Chancellor.  The Tories’ only hope is to bring back Ken Clarke as Chancellor.

I think the election will be in May – before the economy gets worse (and it will – much, much worse). Brown will stand on a ‘Back me or sack me’ mandate in terms of handling the economy. And Britain will be in debt for ever more.”

Will a different Prime Minister be welcoming  world leaders to Number 10 or can Brown hold what ever nerve he has?