******* Official Match Thread - ITV Leaders Debate *******

[Kuipers Supporters Club]

The leaders of seven political parties are gearing up for a live, two-hour televised general election debate.
The contest, announced after weeks of wrangling, will be the only time Conservative PM David Cameron and Labour's Ed Miliband face one another in a debate before polling day.
The Lib Dems, SNP, UKIP, Plaid Cymru and the Greens will also take part.

• The debate will be shown on ITV from 20:00 to 22:00 BST
• It takes place at Media City in Salford with a studio audience of about 200 people
• After a draw for podium places, the Green Party's Natalie Bennett will take the left-hand position followed, from left to right, by Mr Clegg for the Liberal Democrats, UKIP's Nigel Farage, Mr Miliband, Plaid Cymru's Leanne Wood, SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon and Mr Cameron
• Ms Bennett will speak first in the opening statements of the debate while Mr Cameron will speak last
• Each leader will be allowed to give an uninterrupted one-minute answer to questions posed by members of the studio audience
• There will then be up to 18 minutes of debate on each question; in all four "substantial election questions" will be addressed
• Leaders will not see the questions in advance and an "experienced editorial panel" will select them

 

[Ernest]

#massdebate seems to be the choice

 

[glasfryn]

2 hours
7 party leaders
= bunfight
+ waste of 2 hours

 

[MattBackHome]

I'm officially not bothering with this load of old bollocks. Gonna pile through a couple of episodes of The Walking Dead instead.

 

[carteater]

why is it so early, it's over a month before the erection #massdebate.

 

[glasfryn]

why is it so early, it's over a month before the erection #massdebate.

because after a month you will have forgotten all the shite they talk and someone else in the party can repair any blunders

 

[Cadiz Seagull]

No way can you have a realistic and meaningful debate with seven different debaters all with a different point of view and a different agenda.

Can someone please wake me up when it's all over.

 

[Tom Bombadil]

2 hours
7 party leaders
= bunfight
+ waste of 2 hours

Guaranteed two hours of idiot shouting at each other

 

[midnight_rendezvous]

I'm officially not bothering with this load of old bollocks. Gonna pile through a couple of episodes of The Walking Dead instead.

A post apocalyptic world filled with flesh eating zombies does seem preferable.

 

[midnight_rendezvous]

My predictions are;

Cameron & Clegg won't answer a question without waffling on about something totally irrelevant, Miliband will be slated purely based on his personality and nothing more, Farage will blame everything on immigration and Europe and the other three will be totally ignored even though they are probably more of an alternative to more of the same.

 

[MattBackHome]

A post apocalyptic world filled with flesh eating zombies does seem preferable.

Indeed.

Its a choice between watching a horde of soulless beings with dead-eyed stares uttering incoherent, meaningless vocalisations, looking to devour everything good in the world... or The Walking Dead.

HONK.

 

[Triggaaar]

Guaranteed two hours of idiot shouting at each other

Do you and the misses have opposing political views?

 

[shaolinpunk]

Are ITV showing the highlights immediately after it finishes?

 

[El Sid]

Will there be advert breaks.....

 

[Albumen]

The leaders of seven political parties are gearing up for a live, two-hour televised general election debate.
The contest, announced after weeks of wrangling, will be the only time Conservative PM David Cameron and Labour's Ed Miliband face one another in a debate before polling day.
The Lib Dems, SNP, UKIP, Plaid Cymru and the Greens will also take part.

• The debate will be shown on ITV from 20:00 to 22:00 BST
• It takes place at Media City in Salford with a studio audience of about 200 people
• After a draw for podium places, the Green Party's Natalie Bennett will take the left-hand position followed, from left to right, by Mr Clegg for the Liberal Democrats, UKIP's Nigel Farage, Mr Miliband, Plaid Cymru's Leanne Wood, SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon and Mr Cameron
• Ms Bennett will speak first in the opening statements of the debate while Mr Cameron will speak last
• Each leader will be allowed to give an uninterrupted one-minute answer to questions posed by members of the studio audience
• There will then be up to 18 minutes of debate on each question; in all four "substantial election questions" will be addressed
• Leaders will not see the questions in advance and an "experienced editorial panel" will select them

View attachment 64285

Shouldn't he be on the far right?

 

[DIFFBROOK]

You will not get a straight answer to a straight question. What you will get are the standard party lines which tell you absolutely nothing about what that party intends doing, but rather how Tory/Labour plans will ruin the country.

It will be a waste of time.

What I would love to see are the leaders come face to face and be questioned by real people -cos real people don't let them off the hook as easily as presenters seem to do. Plus real people will scoff if a lerader tries to patronise or simply avoid answering them. Think about how the only person who got the better of Thatcher was that lady asking about Belgrano and of course when Brown got done by that lady.

MPs hate facing the public, when at election time its cruicial that they do.

 

[Winker]

It will just be sound-bites and petty point scoring. They would be better off just interviewing Angela Merkel and letting her tell us how she will be running our country for the next 5 years.

 

[Gwylan]

You will not get a straight answer to a straight question. What you will get are the standard party lines which tell you absolutely nothing about what that party intends doing, but rather how Tory/Labour plans will ruin the country.

It will be a waste of time.

What I would love to see are the leaders come face to face and be questioned by real people -cos real people don't let them off the hook as easily as presenters seem to do. Plus real people will scoff if a lerader tries to patronise or simply avoid answering them. Think about how the only person who got the better of Thatcher was that lady asking about Belgrano and of course when Brown got done by that lady.

MPs hate facing the public, when at election time its cruicial that they do.

But that's not what happened last week. Both Cameron and Miliband got a grilling from Paxo (too much of a grilling according to some commentators) and then got asked a lot of soft questions from members of the public. Yes, Thatcher got tripped up by one question but that was 30 years ago - there hasn't been a single instance since of a member of the public asking a major party leader a question he/she couldn't answer - there are plenty of instances of professional interviewers giving politicians a hard time

 

[gripper stebson]

Are ITV showing the highlights immediately after it finishes?

Good work fella!

 

[Normal Rob]

7 leaders. There are 4 questions being asked, with a response from each leader, plus an introductory and a closing statement. That's 42 sections to start with. Being generous and saying that with no adverts (?) apart from following the program before the next one starts at 10pm, then that's 118 minutes of debate time. Cut that down to 116 to allow the presenter's speel/credits at the start. That's 2 mins 45 seconds per statement/reply without binfestery. It will not/cannot work well.