SNP launches legal bid against third TV debate

Alex Salmond is preparing to take out an action in the Court of Session on Tuesday which could lead to the Labour-Liberal-Tory debate being taken off Scottish screens. The First Minister says the BBC must either include an SNP politician on Thursday's debate or organise a fourth debate with the Nationalist voice heard.

The radical move comes with both the SNP and Plaid Cymru, the Welsh nationalist party, having expressed outrage during the campaign over their exclusion from the two previous debates, which have dominated the General Election campaign so far.

The SNP leader has now launched an appeal for 50,000 from ordinary members and supporters, which he says is required to pay for the Court of Session action. If a ruling goes in favour of the SNP, the courts would impose an interdict preventing the debate being broadcast in Scotland.

Salmond said last night: "The decision by the BBC, who are meant to be Scotland's national broadcaster, paid for by our licence fees, not to have the country's political make-up properly represented next Thursday is a democratic disgrace.

He added: "Elections, to be democratic, have to be fair. And it is not fair to Scotland – or to Wales – to exclude the governing parties of our countries from TV debates which are now totally dominating all the election coverage. The legal papers are being drawn up and if a financial appeal is successful, we propose to lodge papers at the court first thing on Tuesday morning, seeking justice and fairness."

He went on: "The court action we plan means we are asking that Scottish interests are properly represented when the final leaders' debate is held in Birmingham on Thursday – or that a further and fair leaders' debate is organised before polling day. We want Thursday's BBC debate to go ahead, but we also want Scottish viewers to be given a fair picture of the choices on offer to them at the ballot box on May 6th. And in Scotland that picture includes the SNP."

Around 14 million viewers have so far watched the two events, including well over one million voters in Scotland.

The only opportunity voters will get to see Salmond argue the SNP case in a formal TV debate will be when he locks horns with Scottish Secretary Jim Murphy, Lib Dem MP Alastair Carmichael and shadow Scottish Secretary David Mundell in a Sky Scottish leaders debate this morning.

The SNP says it does not want to prevent Scots from watching the UK leaders' debates, but claims that the party's exclusion has put it at a massive disadvantage when it comes to persuading voters to vote for its candidates.

A final appeal by the SNP and Plaid against the broadcasting of the debates was turned down by the BBC Trust last week, in a move which appears to have prompted Salmond's unprecedented move.

The legal initiative will be seen as a high-risk strategy by Salmond. If the action leads to the broadcast being pulled north of the Border, he could face a backlash from tens of thousands of Scottish voters who are eagerly awaiting the third debate.

The debates have captured the public's imagination, and have prompted the political parties to concede that the rest of the campaign this week is largely irrelevant. But SNP leaders believe they need to take a stand over their exclusion. They argue that specific Scottish debates, which include SNP representatives, have not been enough to compensate them for not being involved in the main UK event.

The decision to focus legal action on the BBC, and not Sky or ITV, which broadcast the earlier debates, is deliberate, as the SNP point out that the national broadcaster has its own rules on impartiality. These specifically state say that the broadcaster must show an even hand to parts of the UK such as Scotland in network-wide political programmes.

In rejecting the SNP and Plaid claims last week that the parties were being unfairly discriminated against, the BBC Trust, the body which oversees the corporation's rules and guidelines, decided that because the two parties were only fielding candidates in their own parts of the UK, they did not merit a place.

The broadcaster argues that the Lib Dems, Labour and the Conservatives could be treated differently because they have candidates right across the UK.

The SNP's case against the BBC is based on guidelines laid down by OfCom, the broadcasting regulator which defines the SNP as a "main party" in Scotland, along with the Tories, Labour and Lib Dems. These 'main' parties must receive equal footing.

The SNP has also highlighted separate BBC guidelines which state that the broadcaster must be "aware of the different political structures in the four nations of the United Kingdom and that they are reflected in the election coverage of each nation."

The guidelines add: "Programmes shown across the UK should also take this into account."

However, the BBC argues that it clearly set out how "impartiality will be achieved" before agreeing to stage the debate this week.

A statement declared: "The BBC has also announced it is to hold subsequent leaders' debates in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland – part of a range of measures to ensure that the SNP, Plaid Cymru, Northern Ireland and other parties have appropriate opportunities to be heard."