Steerpike

Nicola Sturgeon's style transformation over the past decade has been well-documented. The Mail on Sunday journalist Liz Jones went so far as to suggest that she had gone from being a woman with a 'Krankies haircut and orthopaedic shoes' to a 'golden halo of Princess Diana-like loveliness'. However, Mr S suspects that such naysayers may think differently about Sturgeon in her formative years if they take a glance at a portrait of her dating back six years. Speaking to Sky's Kay Burley, the First Minister of Scotland revealed that she has a saucy painting of herself hanging in her home. The oil painting of Sturgeon is by the French artist Laetitia Guilbaud, and went up for sale in 2009 at Glasgow's ArtDeCaf Gallery.

Today Nick Clegg revealed a new poster claiming that the Tories could form a coalition with Ukip. Speaking about the prospect of 'BLUKIP,' Clegg warned of the potential dangers of such a pairing: 'The prospect of a left wing alliance between Labour and the SNP has been well covered. What’s equally possible is an alliance that will drag Britain further and further to the right: BLUKIP – a bloc of right wingers from UKIP, the Conservatives and the DUP that could hold the balance of power. There is a very real danger that Nigel Farage and his friends could hold David Cameron to ransom.' Still, Mr S can't help but think Clegg is already pre-empting his own exit by photoshopping Nigel Farage's face onto his body for the pr stunt.

Last year Mike Read had to withdraw his Ukip Calypso song from sale after a number people complained that it was racist. So Mr S was cheered to hear that there could be a turn in the party's musical fortunes today after The Rifles voiced their support for Ukip. The indie band tweeted that Nigel Farage's party are the only party 'with the balls to make a change': Alas, soon after the tweet was published it was hastily deleted and the band claimed that their account had been mysteriously hacked. Given that their most successful song reached only number 26 in the charts, Mr S suspects that the retraction of their support will not come as a great loss to Ukip.

As regular readers will be aware, Mr S has tracked the growing hostility toward the press at Labour Party events. Today's manifesto launch was no different. The Labour leader took the extraordinary step of pre-butting jeers and boos from audience members toward journalists, by asking them to hear the media out: 'Now, we're going to take questions. I just want to say something in advance of these questions. I talked earlier about the kind of country we believe in. And what's really important in the country we believe in is that we have a press that ask difficult questions and it's really important that we hear these questions respectfully because it is who we are as a country.

Earlier this month the Sun's election website ran a story about their plans to back Labour. In the online article, they teased that the paper was backing Labour, something which would come as a shock given that their owner Rupert Murdoch has an ongoing feud with Ed Miliband. IT'S OFFICIAL: We're first out of the traps... http://t.co/nmQZX3lzAJ #SunNation pic.twitter.com/Tr4oxLI8x5 — Tim Gatt (@TimGatt) April 2, 2015 However, upon further reading of the article it became clear that instead of backing Miliband in the general election, they were simply supporting a rather dashing mutt called Labour in a greyhound race.

Is Labour's war on the media finally over? After Mr S reported this week that journalists were jeered for asking questions at a Tony Blair event, relations between the party and the media appear to have warmed. As Ed Miliband and Ed Balls head north of the border to campaign with Jim Murphy, it fell to the Scottish leader to make peace with hacks. Opening up their press conference in Edinburgh to journalists' questions, Murphy declared they would let some 'people' ask questions too, once the pesky media had been dealt with: 'It's only journalists with their hand up at the moment, but they're people too.' A notable warming in relations, Mr S thanks Murphy for clearing that one up!