Labour is today joining forces with families across England in a campaign to Save Our Sure Start children's centres from David Cameron's plans to cut their funding and prevent access to these valuable services for families on middle and modest incomes. Children's Secretary Ed Balls launched the campaign today as he welcomed the opening of the 3,500th Sure Start children's centre for parents and children across England. Families are invited to show how much they love their Sure Start centre at a new website www.saveoursurestart.com. The Tories would cut Sure Start from families on middle and modest incomes. Instead of the universal service Labour has created for all families, the Tories have said they would cut £200 million each year from the Sure Start budget - which could see one in five children's centres being forced to close. Labour's campaign is backed by ordinary families, children's champions and celebrity mums, including Arabella Weir, Jo Brand and actress Michelle Collins. Michelle Collins, celebrity Labour supporter and former EastEnders star said: "There's nothing more important than giving all children the best possible start in life.

• Viewers turned off by soft-soap Cameron
  David Cameron's super-soft interview with ITV's Sir Trevor McDonald flopped last night after it was revealed that the programme was watched by fewer than HALF those who tuned in to Piers Morgan's chat with Gordon Brown last month. The Prime Minister's prime time talk was viewed by more than 4 million, despite being criticised by some for concentrating on the personal rather than political side of Mr Brown. David Cameron last night hit back with a similar interview, but failed to even get close to the PM's viewers. Just 1.7 million bothered to watch the show. The Tory leader's error is that viewers have decided that they know enough about David Cameron, the man, but not enough about what he stands for. Gordon Brown however has a history of being guarded about his personal life and viewers were eager to learn more about him as a husband and father, as well as leader of the country. The Media Guardian has more.
• Labour releases powerful film on Conservative crime choices
  Labour today renewed its call for voters to look again at Conservative policy, releasing a powerful critique of their crime choices. The professionally produced film controversially spends much of its 2 minute and twenty seconds focused on a man AGREEING with Tory crime policy. But Labour's not going soft on Cameron, far from it, this is a very strong film which packs a punch. Launching the film, Alan Johnson, Labour's Home Secretary, said: "I am urging people today to take a long hard look at the Tories' policies on crime and particularly the fact that they would make it harder for the police to use DNA to catch criminals. Our hard hitting short film exposes how weak the Tories are when it comes to fighting crime." Watch the film on YouTube.
• David Cameron’s claim to have changed the Tories is exposed as hot air
  David Cameron's attempt to portray the Conservatives as moderates has rightly taken a battering in the last week. The row over Lord Ashcroft's failure to live up to his promise to pay full UK tax finally exploded, leaving egg all over the Tory frontbench and galvanising the will to fightback with Labour supporters in the very marginals Ashcroft hopes to "buy". Further indications that the Tory's change is only cosmetic came after The Guardian revealed that leading Conservatives, including Lord Ashcroft's boss, had given their support to an extremist group which, among other nutty policies, considers the NHS a waste of money. The group provides a clear link between the Conservative frontbench and right wingers such as Dan Hannan MEP, who Cameron previously claimed doesn't represent Tory values. Having endured over two years of attacks by the media, the Tories have responded to a week of increased scrutiny with official obfuscation and bluster. But a leading Conservative campaigner let the cat out of the bag in an email attacking Cameron's crew, calling the Tory campaign "shambolic".
• Banned councillor still supported by London Mayor despite police probe
  The Evening Standard yesterday reported that: "Boris Johnson's administration was today at the centre of new sleaze allegations after a top fire authority chief spent £900 in donations on two ball gowns while serving as Mayor of Brent." Over many weeks Boris Johnson has repeatedly failed to act over Bertha Joseph - who he has appointed to the fire authority - including at last week's Mayor's Question Time when he was pressed on the matter by Len Duvall AM. The Evening Standard reports: The Met is investigating whether Bertha Joseph committed a crime. After her mayoral role she was made the Tory deputy chairman of the London fire authority — under City Hall's control — despite having been suspended for six months for bringing her council into disrepute. Today the Standard can reveal that Ms Joseph, whom Mr Johnson has refused to sack despite repeated demands, has been reported to the police after losing an appeal last month against her council suspension. A judge said there was "more than a possibility" that she had deprived two children's charities, the Down's Syndrome Association and Shooting Star, of extra income by spending the donations of £400 and £500 on dresses. A Brent council investigation found that Ms Joseph encouraged two businesses — a butcher and a car dealer — to sponsor the dresses she wore to two mayoral charity balls. The judge added that Ms Joseph had shown a "repeated lack of credibility" and that it would be wrong to expect her to serve as a borough mayor again "given the disrepute that she has caused to the office". He ordered her to serve the remainder of her six-month suspension immediately. Read the full article.
• Cameron’s Conservatives drop NHS as “our top priority” as poll gap shrinks
  As their poll lead crumbles - and the latest poll shows Labour just 2 points behind - Cameron's Conservatives seem to have decided to downgrade claims to back the NHS. A couple of weeks ago the Conservatives released a leaflet explaining what their top priorities were, declaring that the NHS is "our top priority". More recently however, in another Tory leaflet [pdf], Conservative Central Office downgrades the NHS to just 4th place. A Labour insider said: "The public can see a con job when they see it. To drop your top priority from first to fourth place in a fortnight, just because the polls are narrowing, says all you need to know about Cameron's lot. "It's simply not credible for the Tories to claim to be the NHS's friend after they starved it of investment, nurses and doctors in the 1980s and 1990s. This is just confirmation that their love of the NHS is only skin deep."
• Boris’s broken promise “a huge blow to the Tories’ plans for elected police commissioners”
  Today is the London Assembly confirmation hearing for Kit Malthouse as chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority. Labour will be pressing its concerns over the direction of policing. Former policing minister Tony McNulty MP told Labour Matters: "Boris Johnson's appointment of Kit Malthouse is both a broken promise on his key pledge to take this role himself and a huge blow to the Tories' plans for elected police commissioners. "Under Johnson and Malthouse police numbers are being cut and the signs are that safer neighbourhood teams as we currently know them will be eroded. Only this week the resignation of a key member of the race and faith inquiry brought Kit Malthouse's role into question. "Londoners have the right to ask what Boris Johnson is really delivering and what happened to his promises for London."

Twitter updates