Scottish nationalists offer to help British opposition to power

LONDON: The Scottish National Party will work to make British opposition leader Ed Miliband prime minister after the May 7 election, nationalist party leader Nicola Sturgeon said on Tuesday.

In a televised debate between leaders of the four main Scottish parties, Sturgeon said she would help Labour leader Ed Miliband take over from his main rival, Prime Minister David Cameron.

"I don´t want David Cameron to be prime minister, I´m offering to help make Ed Miliband prime minister," Sturgeon said in a televised debate on Tuesday.

"Even if the Tories are the biggest party we will work with Labour to keep David Cameron out of Downing Street," she later added.

Cameron´s Conservatives and Miliband´s Labour are deadlocked in polls ahead of the vote, with neither party likely to win an outright majority.

Sturgeon´s SNP may have a kingmaker role, as the party has surged in support since a referendum on Scottish independence in September and is predicted to win dozens of seats from Labour.

SNP has said it could support a Labour minority government, but Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy did not give a clear answer when pressed on whether Labour would work with the SNP.

In the debate, Sturgeon indicated that the issue of Scottish independence had not been fully settled, despite voters rejecting the idea by 55 per cent to 45 per cent in the 2014 referendum.

Asked whether her party might seek another vote on whether to split up the United Kingdom in Scottish parliamentary elections in 2016, Sturgeon said "Well that is another matter."

"We will write that manifesto when we get there. I will fight one election at a time," she said.

Some members of the studio audience groaned in response to her answer, and one member told Sturgeon that Scotland had already voted against independence.

No clear winner emerged from the debate between Sturgeon, Murphy, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson and Liberal Democrat Willie Rennie, with much attention stolen by an audience member wearing an obvious fake moustache.