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SCOTTISH First Minister Nicola Sturgeon pledged yesterday to use her predicted Commons clout to help make Ed Miliband prime minister after the May 7 general election.
The pledge came in a clash between rival Scottish party leaders in a television debate which saw Labour attempt to claw back its traditional voters.
Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davis floundered as she tried to defend her party’s record and keep its single remaining Westminster seat in Scotland.
Scottish National Party leader Ms Sturgeon repeated her call to Labour to work with the SNP — which is expected to return a record number of MPs to Westminster next month — to keep David Cameron’s Conservatives out of government.
But she was rebuffed by Labour’s Jim Murphy, who said the only way to keep the Tories out was to vote Labour.
He jumped on a recently leaked memo of a conversation between Ms Sturgeon and the French ambassador in which she allegedly said she would “rather see” Mr Cameron win the general election because she didn’t see Mr Miliband as “prime ministerial material” — comments she has dismissed as “100 per cent untrue.”
Mr Murphy asked the First Minister: “Nicola, do you want Ed Miliband to be prime minister?”She replied: “If there is an anti-Tory majority in the House of Commons after the election, even if the Tories are the biggest party we will work with Labour to keep David Cameron out of Downing Street.”
When he repeated the question she said: “I don’t want David Cameron to be prime minister, I’m offering to help make Ed Miliband prime minister.”
Ms Sturgeon also drew jeers when she suggested that an SNP win in 2016’s Scottish Parliament elections could mean another independence referendum.
Her predecessor Alex Salmond had described the vote as a “once in a generation” event.
But while Ms Sturgeon said next month’s election would have no bearing on a future referendum, she said what happened after 2016 was “another matter.”
Labour is still forecast to be the loser in Scotland in a landslide switch of Labour voters to the SNP on May 7.
