Clegg: It's Salmond, Farage or me

Nick Clegg has said no party will win an outright election victory and warned voters they face a choice between the Lib Dems, the SNP and UKIP over who holds the balance of power.

Launching his manifesto, the Lib Dem leader said he would seek to form a "coalition with conscience" that would not "lurch off to the extremes".

He pledged £2.5bn more for education after 2017 to boost opportunity.

The Conservatives and Labour have both insisted they can win on their own.

UKIP leader Nigel Farage, who published his party's own manifesto on Wednesday, has rejected suggestions he has made approaches to the Conservatives about a post-election deal, saying he would "only be speaking to the British people" between now and 7 May.

'Brain and heart'

He suggested a referendum on the UK's membership of the EU would be the main "red line" in any negotiations with another party, saying it would have to be a "full, free and fair" vote rather than a "stitch-up".

Key priorities

Lib Dems

Main pledges

• Balance the budget fairly through a mixture of cuts and taxes on higher earners
• Increase tax-free allowance to £12,500
• Guarantee education funding from nursery to 19 with an extra £2.5bn and qualified teachers in every class
• Invest £8bn in the NHS. Equal care for mental & physical health
• Five new laws to protect nature and fight climate change

Speaking in south London, Mr Clegg said no party would win enough seats to gain victory on 8 May and either the Conservatives or Labour would have to work with others if they wanted to take power.

He said the Lib Dems' "gutsy" decision to join the Conservatives in coalition in 2010 had been vindicated, saying they had turned round the economy and governed with "compassion and a sense of fairness".

Making the case for another coalition, Mr Clegg said a vote for his party would stop the Tories or Labour governing on their own, arguing the Lib Dems would "add a heart to a Conservative government and add a brain to a Labour one".

A "few hundred votes", he claimed, could make the difference between a "decent, tolerant and generous" government in the centre-ground and a "coalition of grievance" involving either the UKIP and SNP.

Mr Clegg said the manifesto was a blueprint for a "stronger economy and a fairer society"

Opinion polls suggest the SNP, whose former leader Alex Salmond is standing for Parliament, could make huge gains in next month's poll and Mr Clegg suggested it would be Mr Salmond, rather his predecessor at SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, who could end up "calling the shots".

"Somebody is going to hold the balance of power on May 8," he said. "It is not going to be David Cameron or Ed Miliband. It could be Alex Salmond, it could be Nigel Farage or it could be me and the Liberal Democrats.

"Only the Lib Dems can make sure the next government keeps Britain on track. Every Lib Dem you elect makes Labour's reckless borrowing less likely, makes George Osborne's ideological cuts less likely and every Lib Dem you elect is a barrier between Nigel Farage and Alex Salmond and the door to 10 Downing Street."

Announcing five key priorities on education, health, tax and the environment, he described it as a "programme for government not opposition".

In other election news:

• UKIP pledges to employ 6,000 former army veterans in the police, prison service and Border Agency and spend 2% of output on defence
• Labour launches what it calls its women's manifesto, with a pledge to allow working grandparents to share unpaid parental leave
• The SDLP, which had three MPs in the last Parliament, publishes its general election manifesto
• Former Cabinet Secretary Lord O'Donnell says civil servants will be preparing for "all sorts of outcomes" to the election, telling the BBC that minority government can be "made to work"
• The latest TNS opinion poll gave the Conservatives a two-point lead over Labour while a YouGov poll gave Labour a one-point lead over the Conservatives

Putting education at the heart of its plans, Mr Clegg said that once the deficit has been eliminated in 2017-18, funding for two to 19-year-olds would increase in line with economic growth.

This, he said, would ensure the amount of money per child was protected over the course of the Parliament, amounting to an extra £2.5bn.

Analysis by Sean Coughlan, BBC education correspondent

The Liberal Democrats are trying to stake out a claim to be the party that makes education a spending priority, by the promise of an extra £2.5bn.

Their education-friendly image had taken some hard knocks from the tuition fee U-turn and being in a coalition government that frequently clashed with the teachers' unions.

But they have put forward a spending plan which they hope will out-flank both the Conservatives and Labour.

Labour pledged to protect school budgets against inflation, while the Conservatives' offer was to protect per-pupil spending at a time of rising pupil numbers.

The Liberal Democrats' pitch is to combine both - promising to protect per-pupil spending in real terms , including for an extra 460,000 pupils.

But there is a tough warning from the Institute for Fiscal Studies that school costs are rising much faster than inflation and a looming school funding shortage will face whoever wins the election.

Mr Clegg said the extra cash was the equivalent of 70,000 teachers and 10,000 learning support assistants and amounted to £2.5bn more than Labour and £5bn more than the Conservatives would spend.

The extra funding, the Lib Dems say, will help limit class sizes and increase the availability of one-to-one tuition.

The Conservatives have said they would protect the budget for 5-16 year-olds in cash terms, so that funding rises in line with pupil numbers but not in line with inflation or economic growth.

'Not modest'

Labour, on the other hand, has said it would ensure the budget for infants and pupils under the age of 19 increased in line with inflation but not in line with increases in pupil numbers or economic output.

The Lib Dem manifesto also includes pledges on balancing the books "fairly" by 2017-18, raising the threshold at which people start paying tax to £12,500 and "parity of esteem" between mental and physical health services in the NHS.

Schools minister David Laws, who helped write the document, said there was "nothing modest" about its commitments and they were underpinned by "sensible and cautious" assumptions about budgets, including a contingency fund in the event of lower-than-expected growth.

A Conservative spokesman highlighted the drop in per-pupil funding during the first phase of the Lib Dem education plan, when the budget would be linked to inflation.

"The Conservatives are the only party who are prepared to protect the money that schools get for each pupil," he added.

Labour said the Lib Dems had "broken their promises and backed the Tories all the way".

Unveiling its own plans on Wednesday, UKIP also called for a five-year ban on unskilled migrants coming in to the UK and £12bn for the NHS.

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