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Later this morning Plaid Cymru's Ieuan Wyn Jones and the SNP's Alex Salmond will sit together in Westminster to brief the media.

They will, I'm sure, want to talk about the Prime Ministerial debates, spell out a case that says it is entirely unfair that they are excluded from three crucial platforms, three crucial programmes that will be broadcast in countries where they are standing in every single seat.

More on that later.

It's hard to imagine they won't be prepared to take answers on other issues too. What about the shopping list, the list of key principles and issues - or let's just call them demands - that they would whip out in the event of a hung parliament. The 'Snips' as Plaid have taken to calling the SNP . Much irritation in Cardiff = a joint briefing this morning?

I have every faith one of my colleagues in Westminster will ask the question posed at the end of this blog entry, the one that asked how the two parties deal with the quite different demands they would make under the banner entitled "fair funding". How does the Celtic bloc operate on the Barnett formula when the two parties know and when the government with which they're bargaining knows that it means two different things in two different countries.

Barnett? Take another quick look at Gerry Holtham's report. Scotland? You lucked out. Wales? We lost out. Where do we go from here?

No surprises, though, that the two parties are planning to stick together.

Dafydd Wigley knows all about striking bargains with governments that need every vote going. And it was Mr Wigley who wrote in Dal Ati, the third volume of his autobiography, in the chapter on hung parliaments:

"Cyn y gellir cadw pwysau ar y Llywodraeth mae angen mwy na thair sedd".
"Before pressure can be brought to bear on a Government, more than three seats is needed".

He should know.

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