Sandy 4 St Albans

Today all the candidates sparred on Three Counties Radio’s Jonathan Vernon-Smith consumer programme.

The BBC was determined to give no hint of the lavish excess we have come to expect from Broadcasting House.  Arriving at the nondescript office building at 1 Hastings Street in Luton, we were shown to a totally empty floor, just carpet tiles and pillars, and then into a stuffy room with five chairs for the five of us and a chair for Jonathan.

A nice touch was a cuddly toy in party colours on each chair to mark where we should sit.

The debate was rather more robust than the previous decorous encounters in St Albans churches, not least because Jonathan was considerably more probing as chairman.

We covered traffic, public transport, Green Belt, MP expenses, immigration, schools, and free gardening for specified council tenants.  The questions had been recorded in St Albans by local residents and then played back to us.

You can hear the full debate here.  (You need to start listening 2.02 hours into the programme.)

We have one more face-to-face encounter this Friday speaking to sixth formers from various local schools all gathered at Nicholas Breakspear.  It really is just nine days to polling day.

Sighs of relief all round.