Ten things we learnt from Ed Miliband being grilled by young voters last night
The Labour leader was put on the spot on a range of topics, from his resemblance to Wallace to his approach to coalition deals
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Your support makes all the difference.Ed Miliband was the first party leader to appear on BBC Three's live Free Speech Q&A with young voters last night.
The "Ask Me Anything" show lasted an hour, with the Labour leader facing a host of challenging questions. This is what we learnt:
1. The Labour leader doesn't like being called Mr Miliband: "Call me Ed", he tells one audience member who stood up to ask a question. "No, I will call you Mr Ed Miliband," came the response.
2. Young voters ask great questions:
- "When your children are teenagers and you find a bag of cannabis in one of their bedrooms, will you take them to the doctors or police?" (Miliband says he'd be going to neither because he would be "discouraging them from using it.”
- "Do you regret stabbing your brother in the back?"
- "You're often portrayed as strange or weird or look like Wallace. Do you think this matters?"
3. He sits very low in his chair:
4. His biggest fear of becoming prime minister is not being able to spend enough time with his family.
5. The show's presenter Rick Edwards is a great John Bercow impersonator. He told a heckler in the audience: "You've had your say, shut up now."
6. Mr Miliband wants to be the "first politician to under promise and over deliver," rather than "over promise and under deliver".
7. He can drink a glass of water without looking weird:
8. He seems to be giving up on winning a majority: Asked whether he would rule out doing a deal with the SNP, Mr Miliband gave a less-than-convincing response: "I still want a majority Labour government".
9. But he did rule out one outcome: a coalition with the Tories.
10. Mr Miliband's critics might brand him a political nerd but the Labour leader said he hasn't read all of Thomas Piketty's book Capital, which is currently topping the book charts in left-leaning bookshops across the world.
Next Tuesday it's the turn of Green party leader Natalie Bennett of the Green Party, the SNP's Nicola Sturgeon and Leanne Wood, leader of Plaid Cymru.
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