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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: So then, there were yet more twists and turns in the proposals for televised election debates last week.  The broadcasters said they would invite seven party leaders to take part in two of the three debates so in addition to Mr Cameron, Mr Clegg and Mr Miliband that means UKIP, the Green Party, the Scottish National Party and Plaid Cymru would all be invited to take part but what about parties in Northern Ireland then?  Well the Democratic Unionist Party have eight MPs in the House of Commons, more than any of those four parties and Nigel Dodds is Deputy Leader of the DUP and joins me now from Banbridge in County Down, a very good morning to you Mr Dodds.  So you’ve written a letter to the broadcasters, your party has, and you say we should be allowed in.  The counter-argument of course is that politics in Northern Ireland is quite different and that by and large you are not taking on most of the parties invited to the debate.

NIGEL DODDS:  Well that’s not correct.  The reality is that the Conservatives do stand candidates here as do the Greens and as do UKIP but in any case the argument about politics here being different, once you begin to involve regional parties then you have to invite all regions of the United Kingdom to participate.  I can fully understand the argument that the debates should be between the two people who are going to become Prime Minister for instance or indeed that you have the main national parties standing in all parts of the United Kingdom but the broadcasters have now caused great confusion and caused great difficulty for themselves and for the British public by inviting some regional parties but not including all the regions and once you go down the road of inviting some regional parties that have their own distinctive arguments, whether they be in Scotland or Wales, you have got to apply exactly the same arguments for Northern Ireland participation, for a party like us, the DUP, that has eight MPs and could play a very crucial role in the next parliament.  

DM: But on that line of argument then Mr Dodds, you should be supporting Sinn Fein’s argument that they should be allowed to join in, the SDLP, the Alliance Party, the Independent Unionists, George Galloway’s Respect.

NIGEL DODDS:  Well it’s up to the other parties to argue their case, I’m here to argue the case for the party that is the fourth biggest in Parliament, that is the biggest party in Northern Ireland, not for parties for instance like Sinn Fein who don’t even come to Parliament or take their seats, I mean their participation at the election is going to be completely irrelevant because they are not even going to participate in Parliament but the reality is this, the broadcasters, someone amongst the broadcasters, some functionary, someone who is not accountable to the public in any shape or form, has sat down with a broadcasting committee and decided that this is the way it is going be on a sort of take it or leave it basis.  I’m not convinced that this will go ahead on this basis.  The last time the first proposal didn’t succeed because the Conservatives weren’t happy, we now have a situation where this proposal has been accepted by Labour but the Lib Dems aren’t happy, UKIP have said the DUP should be included, the Conservatives haven’t indicated yet what they are going to do.  This farcical situation that broadcasters have now got themselves into is as a result of adding some regional parties and not others.  If you are going to have an election debate in which some regional parties are taking part, you have got to include the DUP who are clearly going to play a significant role in the next parliament.

DM: Mr Dodds, thank you very much indeed, Nigel Dodds there, the deputy leader of the Democratic Unionist Party live from Banbridge in County Down.