Nick Clegg will be the main guest on tomorrow’s Andrew Marr Show, in the third of Marr’s major party leader New Year’s interviews.

You can watch the show 9am tomorrow on BBC1 or live online at the BBC website. Or catch it afterwards on BBC iPlayer.

Nick Clegg travelled to Sheffield today to launch a £950m regional growth fund, including a £36m government loan to Sheffield Forgemasters.

From the BBC:

Deputy Prime Minister and Sheffield Hallam MP Nick Clegg said it would support apprenticeships and equipment.

The coalition had cancelled an £80m loan to Forgemasters to build parts for nuclear power stations as part of a review of Labour’s spending decisions.

Forgemasters said the newer, smaller loan would be used to prepare for future contracts.

Graham Honeyman, chief executive of Sheffield Forgemasters, said: “We’re putting in other plant and equipment to make sure that we’re ready for the future of nuclear and other industries as well.

“We will have access to up to £36m. That will be spent on areas like the melt shop, the forge and the machine shops. Over a period of 18 months we will be able to put new plant and equipment in.

“This loan will be used for plant and equipment enhancements for the forge and machine shops to expand the business. It will also provide additional training and further refinement of our manufacturing processes and firmly underpins the country’s place at the leading edge of engineering technology.”

Here’s what Nick had to say in Sheffield today:

We’ve been able to announce today that Forgemasters will receive a multimillion pound loan, so that this world-beating company can take on more people, create more apprenticeships, invest in new equipment on the shop floor.

I’m acutely aware, of course, as a Sheffield MP, how much controversy there was last year because the previous Government’s loan was not affordable at the time. And so I’m so pleased that now we are able to work in partnership between this Government and Forgemasters because this is a world-beating company – not only famous here in Sheffield, but famous around the world for the great work that it does. It’s very exciting: this is a fund where we use your money, taxpayers’ money. And for every pound of taxpayers’ money, the private sector puts up about six pounds, and that will create and safeguard 325,000 jobs in areas like this which for too long were dependent under Labour on handouts from Whitehall.

What we’re doing is investing in success, building jobs that last in areas which for too long were just simply dependent, over-reliant on the beck and call of Whitehall.

This company, for instance, exports over eighty per cent of the things it produces here. And I think it would be more difficult for world-beating companies like that to do that if we were on the margins of what is the world’s largest borderless single market. We have got 500 million consumers on our European doorstep and I think it’s right – if we want to create jobs and create growth – that we’re at the centre of that European debate and not on the fringes of it.

This evening, the Scottish Lib Dems’ latest election broadcast was shown on BBC1, BBC2 and STV. In it, Tavish Scott talks about Liberal Democrat successes in government at Westminster, and the Scottish Liberal Democrat plans for Scotland – providing jobs and economic growth, restoring excellence in education, and keeping services local.

In case you missed it, here’s the first Scottish Lib Dems’ election broadcast, from earlier this month, with Tavish Scott and Charles Kennedy:

Video also available on YouTube.

According to Danny, the Government’s priorities are:

• To build on the decisions taken in the emergency Budget last June, and in the Spending Review
• To take steps that will help support the economy as it moves back to health again
• To promote fairness during difficult economic times, e.g. increasing the personal tax allowance

There’ll be an open thread on Lib Dem Voice later this morning, where you can discuss Budget 2011.

Video also available on YouTube here.

Video also available on YouTube here.

In this short film from Channel 4′s “Political Slot” Tim Farron, Floella Benjamin, Chris Huhne, Paddy Ashdown and Steve Webb talk about what Liberal Democrats are doing to make Britain a fairer, more democratic, greener, liberal country.

Tim says,

Normally, if you like Liberal Democrat ideas, ideas is all they remain. But for the first time in 65 years, the Liberal Democrats are in power, making a huge difference.

…and with the help of his colleagues, sets out the changes the party wants to make over the next four years.

Tim rounds off:

Last year we could have bottled it, we could have stayed in opposition. Instead we chose to make a difference. And that is what we’re doing.

Also on YouTube here.

Thanks to Pete Dollimore and Rob Fenwick for their help in rescuing this footage from an old video tape.

Also available on YouTube here, and for a young Lembit Opik see here.

Thanks to Pete Dollimore and Rob Fenwick for their help in rescuing this footage from an old video tape.

Business Secretary Vince Cable impressed the judges in the Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special, scoring 36 points for a quickstep with Erin Boag.

The show, which was recorded before the Telegraph published Vince’s comments to their undercover reporters, was broadcast last night.

Vince revealed his nerves in an interview before the programme was broadcast, and said that he would not be watching on Christmas Day:

Going on Strictly was really quite scary. You know if you break down you risk making a fool of yourself. I was extremely nervous beforehand. The atmosphere, band and flashing lights are quite extraordinary. Even if you have been in the House of Commons at Prime Minister’s Questions, it is still quite a challenge remembering the basic technique and keeping it all together. Strictly really is hard.

During the show, judge Craig Revel-Horwood rated Cable’s performance, saying,

You had total control and leadership. I thought it was really, really good. However, you have a tendency to lean slightly to the right.

Video also available on YouTube here.

Full details and directions to Oldham East and Saddleworth campaign HQ are here.

If you choose your delivery round carefully, you can see some pretty scenery in the constituency – Chris Davies MEP gives us a glimpse of the countryside while urging us to turn up soon:

Video also available on Youtube here.

Next, Lib Dem President-elect Tim Farron takes us behind the scenes at Campaign HQ – those leaflets won’t deliver themselves…

Video also available on YouTube here.

Full details and directions to Oldham East and Saddleworth campaign HQ are here.

This Party Election Broadcast is much simpler than the first, with Nick Clegg doing a “talking head” for all but 20 seconds of it. The pared-down message is that the Liberal Democrats are different, and that voters have a choice.

The brief opening sequence is a montage of Lib Dem supporters saying,

This is my election. It isn’t up to politicians to decide who wins; it’s up to me.
Don’t tell me there are only two parties. And I choose something different this time.
My vote will make a difference. I choose the Liberal Democrats.

Also available on YouTube here.

(Also on YouTube here.)

Nice use of simple format, but done in an energetic and interesting way. Striking contrast with Labour’s broadcast: Clegg is on screen all the time; Brown was absent from Labour’s.

Have fun speculating whether all those pieces of paper are CGI or whether some poor intern got the fun job of scattering and then gathering

Miriam Gonzalez Durantez (Nick’s wife) also appears in the programme. At first I was dismayed that Miriam might be wheeled out as yet another politician’s wife, dreading revelations about socks or other foundation garments…

Until I watched her in this extract :

I don’t like that name: “political wife”. I’m the wife of a politician… I don’t have a role. I’m just married to him…

…It’s a personal choice and I think it’s perfectly possible to have a normal life where you let people see how you live, and I understand that they may want to look into it.

But one thing is to let people have a look at your life so that they get to know the politician, the person, and a different thing in my view is to put together a sugary-coated image of yourself in the hope that that brings you votes. It’s not that I wouldn’t do that – it’s that Nick would never agree to do that either. So it has to be possible, because that’s what we are going to do.

The Sunday papers have already portrayed Miriam’s support for her husband with a tinge of disdain: “middling”, a refusal, “too busy“.

The Telegraph, in a purse-lipped reminder of its priorities for her, refers to “Miriam Clegg” – a name by which she is not even known – then calls her “Mrs Clegg” nine times in the rest of the article. Gosh, is it really still the 1950s?

Nick’s not some poor latchkey husband. Miriam Gonzales Durantez is a mother of three young children and has a successful career whilst clearly being supportive of Nick’s work. However, the mainstream media will misrepresent Miriam’s choices as long as their view of a “good” politician’s wife remains as hackneyed as their binary view of politics.

What’s actually being reported here is a media mindset, which is not to be confused with the news, nor indeed the facts. It’s patronising to voters to suggest that the men who lead the three main parties need to be buttressed by the constant presence of their wives – whether on the campaign trail or the conference platform.

The notion that there’s only one type of politician’s spouse is as unrealistic and outdated as the traditional image of one acceptable type of family. Life’s not like that. Voters aren’t like that.

Political families already come in all shapes and sizes, and people had better get used to it. You might not think it, given the coverage, but politicians can be female, gay, parents, child-free, married, single or in civil partnerships.

To concentrate on the Leader’s wife is also to ignore the work of other women in the Liberal Democrats. The Lib Dems’ real “First Lady” is their President, Ros Scott; we have excellent women MPs in Jo Swinson, Lynne Featherstone and more. Hundreds of women in the party, myself included, will be working hard in the coming elections. While we’ll do our bit, Miriam will do hers.

Will tonight’s interview give Too Much Information? Watch ITV1 tonight at 10:15 to find out.

Wonders the BBC website:

Will they be won over or continue to waver?

And once he has answered the questions that the people want to ask, will they prove to be the answers they want to hear?

Watch Nick on the Politics Show at noon, Sunday 21st March, BBC ONE.

You may find the opening contains an electoral statistic which sounds rather familiar. I wonder if this post will make it to national TV next…

It is, of course, the most highly anticipated Question Time ever with a colossal media storm surrounding the invitation of BNP leader Nick Griffin. The evening news says that there are massive protests outside BBC TV Centre, with twitter reports that staff are almost under siege. Across the country, protests are happening at regional BBC offices.

For the Liberal Democrats, it’s leadership contender and Shadow Home Secretary Chris Huhne taking up cudgels for the yellow corner. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi will be in the blue corner, and Lord Chancellor Jack Straw in the red. The celebrity non-political punter will be Bonnie Greer. Stephen reported earlier on with Griffin’s response to his co-panellists – and handy links to what other Lib Dem bloggers are thinking about the approaching debate.

If you’re tuning in, you can join the simultanous online Twitter debate here at #bbcqt, or the LDV debate in the thread below. Meanwhile Lib Dem blogger Mark Thompson will be liveblogging events via CoverItLive at his own blog.

For the Liberal Democrats, perennial favourite former party leader Charles Kennedy will be responding to public questions Joining Charlie will be Ben Bradshaw, Theresa May, Dr David Starkey and Dambisa Moyo

If you’re tuning in, you can join the simultanous online Twitter debate here at #bbcqt, or the LDV debate in the thread below. Meanwhile Lib Dem blogger Mark Thompson will be liveblogging events via CoverItLive at his own blog.

The series opens tonight in Bournemouth, setting of this week’s Lib Dem conference. The party’s representative is David Laws, the MP for Yeovil who succeeded Paddy Ashdown. A leading light of the ‘Orange Bookers’, who aroused the hostility of may Lib Dem activists for proposing a social insurance model for healthcare in the lead-up to the 2005 general election, he has gained growing respect even among his critics for his forensic approach to education policy as the Lib Dems’ shadow secretary of state for children, schools and families.

Joining David on the panel will be deputy Labour leader Harriet Harman, Tory peer Lord (Michael) Helestine, former Minister of State for Trade Lord (Digby) Jones, and the new editor of the Spectator, Fraser Nelson.

If you’re tuning in, you can join the simultanous online Twitter debate here at #bbcqt, or the LDV debate in the thread below. Meanwhile Lib Dem blogger Mark Thompson will be liveblogging events via CoverItLive at his own blog.