DAVID Cameron has upped the Tories' campaign rhetoric by claiming that a Labour-SNP alliance following the General Election would be a "match made in hell'', that would wreck the UK economy.

 

In a double-pronged attack, George Osborne, also speaking on the stump in Cheshire, highlighted the Nationalists' desire to start HS2 from Glasgow rather than see high-speed rail extended first to Birmingham and Manchester, claiming such a move would cost jobs and investment in northern England and be a "£1bn blow to Crewe", a planned HS2 hub.

Campaigning in marginal seats in north-west England, the Prime Minister said voters could be ''sleepwalking'' towards an outcome that would put government into deadlock and bring economic recovery grinding to a halt. "The prospects of an SNP-Ed Miliband Government," he warned, "are very frightening."

He declared: "Make no mistake. If Labour and the SNP get into power, you are going to see an alliance between a party that wants to spend, borrow and tax more with a party that wants to spend, borrow and tax even more. It might be a match made in heaven for them but it is a match made in hell for the British economy."

Mr Cameron issued an appeal to people considering a protest vote or those who had previously sworn that they would never back the Tories, to vote Conservative to prevent an alliance between Labour and the SNP; "the party that would bankrupt our country and the party that would break up our country".

The Tory leader's alarm came as he set out plans for a new "Carlisle Principle" under which the UK Government would carry out annual reviews to ensure that actions taken by the Scottish administration under devolved powers did not have a detrimental impact on the rest of the UK.

But, in response, Nicola Sturgeon said Mr Cameron's remarks were borne out of "panic and desperation" and made clear she would resist his devolution review proposal, telling her party's manifesto launch in Edinburgh: "Let me say this to David Cameron: we will oppose any effort to undermine the Scottish Parliament."

In a bid for support from the English regions, the PM pledged that a future Tory government would set a goal that 60 per cent of new jobs should be created outside of London and south-east England; a target, he stressed, the Coalition had achieved over the past five years.

Speaking in Crewe - a marginal Conservative seat - Mr Cameron warned that a Lab-SNP alliance would see Britain's "deficit climbing up again, spending on welfare soaring again, businesses crushed again, jobs lost again. With Labour and the SNP, our economy will head into ruin again. And who will pay? You will pay; in higher taxes".

The PM insisted the economic recovery did not happen by accident but it could end by accident.

"I want to appeal to everyone; those wondering how to cast their vote. If you've voted Conservative before or never voted before or swear you'd never vote Tory, please think very carefully about the national outcome you want and how your vote really does affect that outcome. Because when you make your mark on that ballot paper, you are writing the future of Britain in permanent ink.

"Labour and the SNP - the party that would bankrupt our country and the party that would break up our country - government in deadlock; our economy heading for ruin. Is that what you want? A vote for anyone other than the Conservatives will deliver it," he insisted.

Mr Cameron claimed that under the influence of the SNP, Labour would ditch public projects south of the border.

"It doesn't take a genius to work out what the SNP will demand. That high-speed rail link? Only if you start it in Scotland. Those new trains? Cancel them. Those road upgrades? Forget it.

"In case you think Ed Miliband is going to stand valiantly in the way of the SNP's plans - wrong. Judge him by what he's already done. He has already sacrificed the A27 and Taunton link road. And we know why; because he has no political interest in these areas."

The point was echoed by the Chancellor in his campaign speech in Crewe.

Mr Osborne said: "Let's be crystal clear about the consequences for the north west of the (Labour) alliance with the Scottish Nationalists; which election experts now agree is Ed Miliband's only route into Downing Street...jobs lost in the north; incomes cut in the north; insecurity rising in the north."