Conservatives unveil first poster of 2015 election campaign
The Conservative Party has wasted no time in making the economy the centrepiece of this year's general election.
Today the Conservatives will unveil their first campaign poster of the year which highlights the party's message that the country is on the right economic track and can't risk a change of course. The poster says since the coalition came to power there are 1.75m more people in work and 760,000 more businesses have been created.
The poster also claims that the deficit has been halved, although this has been hotly disputed by some commentators.
David Cameron will launch the poster in Yorkshire and reiterate the Tories' argument that Labour cannot be trusted to manage the UK economy. The PM used his new year's message to warn voters that the country would suffer "chaos" if it abandoned the current economic strategy.
2015's general election is set to the most unpredictable for half a century. Labour and the Tories are both struggling to poll above 33-34 per cent of the vote. Both face serious challenges with the SNP and the Greens threatening Labour's left flank while Ukip could take several seats Tory seats.
Despite a narrow Labour poll lead, the Conservatives have reason to be optimistic with a strong lead on the economy and David Cameron polling yards ahead of Ed Miliband in terms of leadership. Oppositions find it extremely difficult to retain their poll leads over the government at this point in the electoral cycle.
The shadow chancellor Ed Balls came out swinging in an article for the Guardian claiming the Conservatives were taking an "increasingly extreme and ideological approach" to cutting public spending.