1. If three's a crowd, what is seven?
Gone are the "good old days", when broadcasters could simply put the three main party leaders in a room and let them fight it out. Whilst I applaud our country's transition to a multi-party system, I can't deny that it makes matters a lot more complicated.
Seven participants is too many. If every audience question requires seven responses, those watching are likely to forget what the question is, or just get tired of hearing the same answer echoed so many times. In open debate, the leaders couldn't really take each other to task because any head-to-head confrontation would quickly get derailed by another combatant, making meaningful discussion impossible.
It seems like an arbitrary number, and opened broadcasters to David Cameron's complaint that Welsh and Scottish parties were invited by Northern Irish ones were not. If we are going to allow in a party with just 5% of the national support and one MP, or a regional party that are only the third largest in the Welsh Assembly, why stop there? Alternatively, why not have the cut-off higher?
There were other ways to get around this. Whilst I have only jokingly suggested a tournament format, where leaders meet in regional semi-finals and must win to qualify to the main event, it wouldn't hurt to split the debates up. You could put the larger parties together, fighting to actually be PM, and then have the small parties compete for influence. You could have primaries for those on the ideological left and right. It didn't have to be this lopsided mess, where some smaller parties actually got more exposure than larger ones.
2. UK debates for UK parties.
Alternatively, we could divide the parties geographically. The heading might sound like a UKIP slogan, but it was odd to see region-specific parties in a nationwide debate. It would have made more sense to have smaller debates: one for the leaders of the parties in Wales, one for the leaders of the parties in Scotland, one for the leaders of the parties in England, and another for those looking to become PM of the whole lot.
This would not only reduce the number of parties in each debate, but make them a lot fairer. As it was, putting the SNP, Plaid Cymru and the Greens in the same room made little sense. The three parties are very close ideologically, and could be heard actively agreeing with each other and backing each other up during the debate. They are also not geographically in competition: the SNP only field candidates in Scotland, Plaid Cymru do the same for Wales, and the Green party are realistically only relevant in the south of England. The first two are especially close, with the two leaders good friends and vocal in supporting each other's parties.
Having them all together therefore allows them to gang up on the other parties, giving them an unfair advantage by having their same message repeated thrice. It is not far from inviting the leaders of Scottish and Welsh Labour to join Ed Miliband and support him. There is also a second unfair advantage for the regional parties: Sturgeon and Wood were able to mention "Scotland" and "Wales" in every answer, explicitly spelling out what they would do for their regions and attracting voters there, whereas Miliband was forced to keep his responses vague and general to the whole UK.
This gave them a vital edge in attracting votes in those regions, most of which will be gained at Labour's expense. It would have been much fairer to divide up the debates, and let the leaders of all Scottish parties say what they would do for Scotland, all Welsh parties say what they would do for Wales, and so on. Broadcasters did hold a separate debate for Scottish leaders, but having this on top of the others rather than instead of them only served to strengthen the advantage, by giving Sturgeon double the exposure.
Finally, it would simply have solved confusion and the above numbers issue. English and Welsh voters did not need to know what Sturgeon had to say, whilst Wood's words were irrelevant in Scotland and England. With some English voters left believing they would be voting for the SNP after the debate, broadcasting region-specific leaders in region-specific debates would have made a lot more sense, and avoided the boredom of having to listen to the same answer three times.
3. Where was Dave?
Our dear leader decided only to grace one debate with his presence, after protracted negotiations with broadcasters left them forced to work around him. If these debates are supposed to hold leaders accountable and showcase the options available, it seems deeply wrong that the Prime Minister and leader of the largest party isn't obliged to show up and face not only the questions of other leaders but also those of the British public.
The debates without him seemed skewed, with an inaccurate summary of the political landscape presented, which seems dishonest to viewers suddenly confronted with the false dichotomy and imbalance of Farage on the right and four parties on the left. The decision to stay out of the debates seems to hurt Cameron at first, making this an odd play unless he is supremely confident of strolling to victory anyway, but if we consider that he left Farage and Miliband to be ganged-up on by the three left-wingers rather than face the music himself, knowing that every seat the group gained would be taken from Miliband, it seems he should have been forced to attend.
4. Where was Nick?
As David Cameron didn't want to turn up to the debate, the BBC decided to save face by not inviting Nick Clegg and styling it as an "opposition" or "challengers" debate. Clegg wanted to participate, but was the only party leader refused. Even under this format it seems odd to not regard Clegg as a "challenger" to Cameron, when the Lib Dems are competing with the Tories more than the likes of the SNP.
This meant that the parties in direct competition with the Lib Dems were able to present themselves as the only voices of reason in contrast with Nigel Farage completely losing the plot again, even though Clegg had previously been the only leader willing to debate the UKIP leader one-on-one.
On top of this, the BBC didn't make clear why Clegg wasn't present, largely advertising the programme simply as a general election party leaders' debate, which implied that the candidates present were the only alternatives available. Taking this opportunity from a party much-maligned in the media, whilst giving additional exposure to those most likely to take their seats, the BBC may have cost them severely.
After the debate, political presenter Andrew Neill ended late-night programme This Week by saying: "we leave you tonight with some exclusive footage of best friends, Dave and Nick, who had far better things to do today than turn up to a TV election debate to discuss the future of the country. Nighty night, don't let the coalition bromance bite."
The show then cut to a montage of a man flying a kite with a young boy, whilst "Just the Two of Us" played in the background. The BBC's political representative therefore explicitly claimed that Clegg simply couldn't be bothered to turn up, not that they hadn't invited him, and then took further jabs at him by portraying him as a child and as on the same side as Cameron, all three being deeply politically damaging to the leader and his party.
This idea that Clegg followed Cameron in simply not showing up was repeated in other BBC programmes, and the Lib Dems are currently demanding an apology. It makes it odd to consider that Nigel Farage considers his party discriminated against, despite being given more exposure than any of the other leaders.
5. The audience
Once again at the risk of sounding like Farage, who attacked the studio audience as reflecting the BBC's left-wing bias when they had been selected by an independent polling company to reflect the UK's left-wing bias, I can't help but criticise the way people view these events. In 2010 we were overwhelmed with Cleggmania simply because he was a fresh face, and now the exact same people are flocking to the new blood of Farage and Sturgeon simply because they aren't the others.
As I noted above, plenty of English people have asked if they can vote for Sturgeon, even those who don't want an independent Scotland, simply because she is new. Leaders in these debates were hardly tested on their policy, and instead they were able to score easy points either by being a left-winger picking on Farage or by being Farage and a victim of the homogeneous left. The number of participants meant that questions could easily be deflected onto rivals and claims were rarely held to account, meaning that the audience were likely to leave supporting certain leaders for all the wrong reasons.
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