BBC 2 Debate: Clegg v Farage - Wednesday 2nd April, 7pm to 8pm

[-:Undertaker:-]

BBC 2 Debate: Clegg vs Farage - Wednesday 2nd April, 7pm to 8pm

Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage are to go head-to-head on BBC television in a debate on Britain's future in Europe.

The hour-long debate will be shown on BBC2 from 7pm on Wednesday, 2 April, and will be hosted by David Dimbleby.

Mr Clegg's Liberal Democrats are the most pro-EU of the main parties at Westminster, while Mr Farage's UKIP advocates withdrawing from the EU.

Round two and the final debate is tomorrow as a reminder.

Planning to watch? If anybody has been following you'll notice an argument has broken out between the two over Russia, Ukraine and the Crimea - that's something that is pretty much certain to pop up I suspect.

[dbgtz]

Clegg got absolutely battered, especially in comparison to the first debate.

[Kardan]

Whoops, forgot to watch this one. Looking at the comments though, Farage seems to be well out on top, what I expected really (although still fairly surprised that they were pretty even in the first debate).

[-:Undertaker:-]

Nigel absolutely rattled Clegg tonight, by far much better than the last debate. Here are the two post-debate public polls:

Sky News Newsdesk ‏@SkyNewsBreak 23m

Guardian ICM poll: 69% think Nigel #Farage won debate on Britain's EU membership, 31% think Nick #Clegg won #NickvNigel

Sky News Newsdesk ‏@SkyNewsBreak 30m

YouGov poll: 68% of people think Nigel #Farage won debate on UK's EU membership, 27% think Nick #Clegg won, 5% don't know #NickvNigel

Well worth a watch for those who didn't see.

Whoops, forgot to watch this one. Looking at the comments though, Farage seems to be well out on top, what I expected really (although still fairly surprised that they were pretty even in the first debate).

First debate had 56% odd for Farage and around 36% for Clegg - far from an even result (a 20-point lead).

[Mark]

Clegg struggled to answer some of the questions which was just embarrassing really. Nigel wiped the floor with him, was to be expected really.

[Michael]

Very good debate, Clegg kept going onto his own agenda and it was quite funny seeing David Dimbleby referring him back to the question. I noticed at the end the handshake between them two, Clegg had one of those fake ''if I have to'' smiles whilst Nigel looked like he'd won the lotto.

[The Don]

Nigel absolutely rattled Clegg tonight, by far much better than the last debate. Here are the two post-debate public polls:

Well worth a watch for those who didn't see.



First debate had 56% odd for Farage and around 36% for Clegg - far from an even result (a 20-point lead).

You can't really rely on a poll 100%. As you said yourself the first debate was fairly even, definitely not as one sided as todays was apparently (have yet to see it!), gonna pop it on now.

[-:Undertaker:-]

You can't really rely on a poll 100%. As you said yourself the first debate was fairly even, definitely not as one sided as todays was apparently (have yet to see it!), gonna pop it on now.

Well you can rely on polling for what other people think to a large degree, but not what you yourself think of course. The polls last time suggested that Farage was ahead by 20 odd points, but I was much kinder to Clegg and thought it was pretty much even. This time though I think Farage hit it out of the park and the polls reflect this, with Farage scoring (according to the public) a 40% odd lead over Clegg.

Interested to know what you think when you've watched anyway. I just watched it again a moment ago.

[The Don]

I thought it started out rather equally with Clegg being slightly stronger, especially when he pulled out that UKIP leaflet with the native american on it. However Farage completely dominated the second half, especially when he was making points and Clegg kept pulling out the same old statistics and numbers which were irrelevant and besides the point, rather than actually stating his opinion on the topic. As Farage pointed out Clegg was supposed to be arguing in favour of the EU, instead it felt reminiscent of a person defending their obnoxious friend by saying "Well, he's not that bad". He just didn't get his points across and instead was answering to Farage rather than making any solid arguments himself. I think that question from Sheila sealed Clegg's fate because he couldn't turn around and say "I don't think the British public should be given choice on the matter", even though everyone in the room knew that's what he was thinking, instead he dodged the question and reiterated what he said last week.

[Chippiewill]

Clegg started off strong and I even thought he might have been ahead, but after about half an hour he got stupid, tried to make it personal and got his arse handed to him. I spent the last 15 minutes laughing at him as he clutched at straws throwing out ridiculous insinuations that Farage is somehow sexist, homophobic and racist. I think the ad hominem was pretty noticeable.