My phone tells me that on this day in 2015 i was in London helping @ed_miliband prepare for the general election tv debates, it's got me thinking about the role of debates in elections ahead of tonight - A THREAD (1/11) I say "helping" Ed, that's debatable. The stakes were very high for him so we spent an inordinate amount of time practicing and role playing. I played @nicolasturgeon, obviously - it was very handy for future fmq prep (2/11)

THREAD: I’ve spent hours, days even behind the scenes advising politicians on TV debate prep. I advised Alistair Darling in the #indyref, Jim Murphy in 2015 and even role-played Nicola Sturgeon for Ed Miliband. I took part in a few myself too Make no mistake - leaders, or at least their teams will take these occasions really seriously. Working on policy detail, building the political argument on top of that before refining a few soundbites