Televised leaders debates in the 2015 general election could be staged before the actual campaign begins, Prime Minister David Cameron suggested today.
Following speculation that he may block a repeat of the TV clashes which dominated the 2010 election, the Conservative leader insisted: "I want the debates to take place."
But he said that the format could be tweaked to ensure that the rest of the campaign is not overshadowed.
Mr Cameron told BBC1's Andrew Marr Show: "I want the debates to take place. They were good in the last election."
But he added: "I thought they took up too much of the campaign, so I think we could start them a bit earlier.
"My only regret is that if you are leading a political party, the election campaign is a moment when you really want to get around the country, you want to have arguments and interviews, and I found the whole election was just the run-up to the debate, the debate, and the analysis of the debate.
"Now we've got a fixed-term Parliament, we can stretch those things out a bit."
Mr Cameron said there was "lots of time for negotiation" over the exact format of the broadcasts before the election scheduled for May 2015.
But he made clear that he does not believe that the UK Independence Party leader Nigel Farage should be invited to take part alongside himself, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg and Labour leader Ed Miliband.
"I think the debate predominantly should be about people who have a prospect of becoming Prime Minister," said Mr Cameron.
Asked if he thought that Mr Farage was among the figures who could potentially become PM, he replied: "I don't think so, no."
Mr Cameron once against dismissed suggestions that he should take part in a televised debate with Scottish National Party (SNP) leader Alex Salmond ahead of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.
"Alex Salmond wants the question to be about anything other than the question," said Mr Cameron.
"So he would like the debate to be the SNP versus the Tory Party or Scotland versus England. It's not - it's a debate between Scots.
"What it should be is between Alistair Darling, leader of the No campaign, and Alex Salmond, leader of the Yes campaign.
"Let them debate. But he wants to change the question. He's a canny guy but I saw that one coming."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article