On the environment, we have to keep the doors open to the Liberal Democrats. Not be because their green policies are any better than ours, but because a Tory government would be an unmitigated disaster on the environment. David Cameron and Greg Clarke might talk a good green game on camera. But when they think no-one is looking – in the pages of the spectator, in blogs and even Tory PPC websites, it’s clear that climate scepticism is as much a part of conservative values as euroscepticism, fox hunting and a passion for the free market. A parliament dominated by those views could not deliver on the environment.
Melanie Smallman, national coordinator, SERA

We shouldn’t talk about hung parliaments until we know the election result. It’s defeatist and demoralises our voters and activists and in any case the current polls only put a six per cent gap between us and the Tories so we could still win a majority. Once we know the result I’m open to working with the Lib Dems in a hung parliament – anything would be better than a Tory-led government. But this is more in hope than expectation. Everything Clegg has said suggests that the idea of a “progressive anti-Tory alliance” is a Guardian-reader fantasy, and that Clegg – on the basis of policy, personality and political calculation – is far keener on the idea of working with Cameron. We have to try to win on our own merits – the Lib Dems aren’t the progressive cavalry coming to rescue us, they are another tribe of hostiles.
Luke Akehurst, Labour councillor and blogger

Labour would be daft to rule out a coalition with the Lib Dems, whatever Clegg says. Any Tory-Lib Dem coalition would depend on the small print, but one that backed instant public spending cuts could wreck the British economy by Christmas. Electoral reform is now essential if the public wants a three-way race in England or four way race in Wales and Scotland.
David Hencke

If the message that the Liberal Democrats take out of this election is that people are happy for them to prop up a minority Cameron administration then I’d be staggered. The message is quite clearly that people want to see political change. It’s an echo of what we saw last year but with less anger. I get a sense that people are rising to the challenge and thinking very deeply about what they want from politics. It is the job of all the parties to find a way of addressing that rather than horse-trade or pretend they have all the answers.

And if the question is change, then the answer most definitely is not Conservative. Nick Clegg would need to remember that if a hung parliament is the outcome on May 6th
Anthony Painter

I am standing in Chingford and Woodford Green and heard my opponent, Iain Duncan Smith, on the Today programme defending “strong government” as if arguments hadn’t changed since our economic and democratic crises. It is quite possible seats and votes will go in different directions and Labour will be faced with making a hung parliament work. It will mean, as Robin Cook used to say, winning the arguments as well as the votes. Consensus is needed in any case to deal with the debt, climate change and the national care service. But our corrupt voting system needs to change to make votes count and people matter.
Cath Arakelian, Labour Campaign for Electoral Reform