Are the SNP right to be launching a campaign against the BBC?

Well, given that the BBC are, by this debate set up, implying that the only three parties worth a vote at Westminster are the three completely national parties, then the SNP are well within their rights to do this since the BBC is breaking it's own charter by being partisan and not the impartial broadcaster it is supposed to be. They are also giving the three largest parties the most television time by some considerable distance, and this will undoubtedly affect the voting intentions of some people without giving the population the full story of which parties are available to vote for.

That said, it's a waste of time chasing it in the courts, because the BBC are not going to roll over whether they are in the wrong or not.

It's greatly interesting to see Scottish Labour rubbishing the SNP's intention to launch this action. Well, they would try, wouldn't they? They're getting free publicity in Scotland, where Scots have never voted Conservative in large numbers and the Lib Dems are not the party of the more populous areas where Labour and the SNP are becoming the primary adversaries.

I personally have now stopped buying a certain Scottish paper, the Daily Record, since it is so utterly biased towards Labour in its reporting as to be ridiculous. Unbelievably, the Sun is more evenhanded. And that's toilet paper.

Edit - Salmond has not stalled on a referendum of independence. There is no point in attempting to get a referendum act through the Scottish Parliament when all it takes for it to fail the first hurdle is Labour, the Lib Dems, and the Conservatives voting against it. And they have all stated their implicit opposition to it so it would fail at the first hurdle.

This is in spite of the oft repeated claim that Scottish people do not want independence. Labour etc believe they will win the argument, but it is they who do not see the need to actually consult the Scottish people on this. This ignores the political capital they would make on such a victory. They are cowards.

And specifically for the other answerer, where's your argument against the SNP's point which is that the BBC is not fulfilling its own charter which means it should be completely impartial? If they were to be truly impartial, they should allow every other political party in the UK the same amount of television exposure irrespective of allowing Alec Salmond onto the same programme.

Yes but these were never called Prime Ministerial Debates. BBC actually changed the name late on from Leaders to PM Debates, which alone is suspect.

How could a "UK Prime Ministerial debate" be appropriate when there is no election for the UK PM and, therefore, no candidates? We are not electing a PM.

MP Martin Bell - a man with 35 years’ distinguished service with BBC - said yesterday, the exclusion is “profoundly unfair” and "the issue is one of such fundamental democratic importance".

Most papers agree. Those people moaning really don't grasp the UK set-up and think we vote PMs or some other rubbish.

Mr.Salmond definately likes having his face on TV almost as much as he likes the sound of his own voice.

What the SNP fail to observe is that they are a minority party in Britain as a whole and are only represented in a country that has its own devolved parliament. Every political party, serious or not, could have taken this action but the stark truth is that the make up of the next British government is going to be one of Labour, Conservative or Liberal Democrats. It is a pure publicity stunt by the 'oh so holier than thou' Alex Salmond who has stalled on a referendum on independance in Scotland much as Gordon Brown did over the Lisbon Treaty - mainly due to the fact they would lose.

I pity the poor people that stumped up the £50,000!

Alex Salmond would do anything for a bit of free publicity ! Just ignore the toad featured buffoon !

Yes.

There is no right or wrong in Politics. to use this to get noticed, yes WRONG