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| David Cameron 'accepts single multi-party TV debate' | |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| David Cameron has accepted the broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the beginning of April, Conservative sources have said. | David Cameron has accepted the broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the beginning of April, Conservative sources have said. |
| The prime minister previously said he would not participate in a debate after the start of the campaign on 30 March. | |
| However, Labour has said it still backs the original plan for three debates. | |
| The BBC's political correspondent Alex Forsyth said there appeared to be some "movement" to break the apparent stand-off between the parties. | |
| Weeks of wrangling between the political parties and the BBC, Sky News, ITV and Channel 4 has cast doubt on whether the leaders debates first held in 2010 will be repeated before the 7 May poll. | |
| Mr Cameron has rejected taking part in a head-to-head with Labour's Ed Miliband and said his "final offer" was to participate in a seven-way debate with the leaders of Labour, the Lib Dems, UKIP, the Green Party, the SNP and Plaid Cymru before the end of March. | |
| 'Election specials' | |
| But, in a statement, senior Conservative sources said: "The PM accepts broadcasters' offer of one, seven-way debate at the very beginning of April." | |
| They accused Labour of "trying to veto that deal". | |
| In response a Labour source told the BBC there had been no formal proposal for new debates and they had accepted the three debates proposal made last month. | |
| The Spectator's political editor James Forsyth said that as well as one debate, a series of "election specials" involving the party leaders has been proposed during the campaign. | |
| This would see David Cameron and Ed Miliband interviewed by Jeremy Paxman and then questioned by a studio audience in a Sky/Channel 4 special on 26 March, an event in which the two men would not share the stage. | |
| On 16 April there would be a "challengers" special involving the SNP, UKIP, Plaid and the Greens and finally, on 30 April, David Cameron, Ed Miliband and Nick Clegg would each have separate half hours in a Question Time-style event with David Dimbleby. |