Senior Figures Hit Campaign Trail

Welfare spending, job creation and NHS funding will all come under the spotlight on the campaign trail in Scotland today, as party leaders around the UK gear-up for their high-stakes TV debate.

Health Secretary Shona Robison, Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy, former prime minister Gordon Brown and Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie will be getting their messages across to potential voters on the east and west of the country today.

And First Minister Nicola Sturgeon is preparing to take part in a televised leaders' debate alongside David Cameron, Ed Miliband and four other party leaders.

The two-hour ITV debate - which also features Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg, Nigel Farage of Ukip, Leanne Wood of Plaid Cymru, and Natalie Bennett of the Greens - is being screened tonight.

Today marks the fourth day of the official election campaign. In Scotland, Ms Robinson will begin her day in Edinburgh, where she will claim the plans of the Westminster parties to cut benefits for disabled people would be a clear dividing line between the progressive politics'' being advocated by SNP leader Nicola Sturgeon, and theausterity politics'' offered by the Tories, Lib Dems, Labour and UKIP.

Rolling out Personal Independence Payments (PIPs) to replace Disability Living Allowance will see over 100,000 working age disabled people in Scotland lose some or all of their benefit by 2018, she will claim, representing a cut of £300 million a year.

The SNP says it proposes a modest increase'' in public spending in real terms to support halting the roll-out of PIPs to stop thesavage cuts'' to disability benefits.

Mr Murphy will head to Clydebank to argue that Labour's progressive'' tax plans will mean an extra £1 billion for Scotland's NHS over the lifetime of the next parliament.

The party said it will deliver the extra funding from a tax on properties worth over £2 million and closing tax loopholes.

Former prime minister Gordon Brown will later argue that the SNP's spending plans would break the hearts of the poor''.

The former Labour leader will claim that not one pensioner, disabled person or unemployed person would be better off under the nationalists' plans for spending on the welfare state over the five years of the Westminster parliament.

Mr Rennie will visit a farm deli and cafe outside Edinburgh to argue the Liberal Democrats are the only party which stands for local business success and job creation in Scotland - and that veering left or right poses a threat to economic recovery.

He will say: A vote for the Liberal Democrats is a vote to build on that success, with lower taxes, low interest rates, and a commitment to job creation.''

The Scottish Conservatives' Murdo Fraser will take part in an election debate alongside representatives of other parties, hosted by the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland.