The Leaders Debate Round 2

Okay...yes, technically this post is a few days overdue! But without a doubt the biggest PR event of the last week (bigger even than Gordon meeting Elvis!) was the second leaders debate.

Just as important as what they were saying was how they were saying it and how they came across.... As Im sure Nick Clegg will agree. Without a doubt he won the first debate, not on policies but on attitude. First time round he looked surprisingly relaxed and confident with one hand rarely leaving his pocket and he commanded presence on his podium. But not so much second time round.

First time round all Clegg had to do was turn up and prove he wasn't Cameron or Brown, but for this second debate he was under pressure and it showed. He started off over-confident only to seemingly melt under pressure on certain questions. the guy lacks gravitas, he seems nice enough, but do we really want Nice Nick running the country and representing us on a world stage? He also kept interrupting, which only served the upstart image he had acquired.

Not that Brown did any better. If he put a pound back into the economy for every time he said "I agree with Nick..." then the UK budget deficit would have been halved by now! He also had a tendency to laugh every time he disagreed with something. he may have been told to lighten up but smiling is one thing Gordon Brown should always avoid, it makes him more scary than the weeping angels form Dr Who. His see through use of number play on the figures was a desperate ploy and I wish he would learn to say Al Qaeda properly, because at the moment it sounds like he may have created a new terror threat!

And so on to Cameron. For a PR man, he really seems to have lost his grasp of the importance of image right now. This second debate had him looking jaded and dare I say it slightly scruffy...it really did look like he had let one of his kids do his tie for him. He did however come across as more confident in this second debate and made back some of the ground lost in the first. I do however, expect more from him, he seem off his game at a crucial time and should be creating more of a presence.

Overall this second debate was much closer, perhaps Cameron won it by a whisper. One thing we can say for sure is that the debates have thrown the election wide open. I do however think that the best way to make the final debate more interesting would be to give them each a light-sabre and let them fight it out that way see what happens!

Perry