Ed Miliband

Leader of the Opposition

The choices we make will begin to determine whether we have a responsible capitalism or an irresponsible one. The events of the past three weeks have only served to underline how distant and distracted David Cameron, not to mention his divided party, has become from addressing these issues.

Chrissie Hynde

Lead singer of the Pretenders

Force-feeding causes the birds' livers to balloon to up to 10 times their normal size and become diseased with what is known as hepatic steatosis. In addition to being miserably ill with a painful and debilitating disease, the geese can barely breathe because their grotesquely enlarged livers displace their lungs and other internal organs... geese can be seen panting constantly in a vain attempt to suck oxygen into their squashed lungs. Veterinarian Holly Cheever has compared what force-fed birds endure in their final days to being smothered.

Andy Burnham

Shadow Health Secretary

For political reasons, Jeremy Hunt has turned this whole issue into a crisis of primary care. The trouble is he has a real crisis in A&E that isn't going away - and the measures he is proposing won't solve it, as the advice from NHS England makes clear. In fact, by focusing his department's attention on the wrong target, he could make matters even worse.

Alistair Darling

Labour MP for Edinburgh South West, former Chancellor of the Exchequer and leader of the Better Together campaign

Salmond thinks that suggesting a debt free start is good politics, but people understand there are consequences. If you declare yourself bankrupt you don't start anew with a fresh slate, your bad credit history follows you around for the rest of your life. The consequences for borrowing, business and mortgages would be dire.

Nicola Sturgeon

Deputy First Minister of Scotland, SNP MSP for Glasgow

Scotland not only has massive economic strengths - we are financially strong too. This impressive track record in innovation, our wealth of natural resources and skilled workforce means that Scotland has every right to be confident about our economic prospects as an independent country.

Tim Burgess

Solo performer and lead singer with The Charlatans

The van is the mothership and the gigs are like the bits in Star Trek when they beam down to a new planet for a bit - without us losing the bloke who you've never seen before. There's the fun of looking up some record shops and old friends who've moved to the places we're visiting...

Chuka Umunna

Member of Parliament for Streatham and Shadow Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills

On Wednesday, Ed Miliband made a speech at Google - a business that has been making headlines recently for all the wrong reasons. To the outsider, the profitability of its business model looks plain to see. Yet of £3bn of revenue earned in the UK, it has paid only £3m in tax. Google are not alone in this seeming imbalance. The UK tax bill paid by companies from Amazon to Apple to Starbucks has raised deep concerns among businesses and families who pay their fair share. These are all prominent examples of a more general conundrum: the struggles for national governments framing tax rules for global companies.

Mehdi Hasan

Political director of The Huffington Post UK

As a supporter of secularism, I am willing to accept same-sex weddings in a state-sanctioned register office, on grounds of equity. As a believer in Islam, however, I insist that no mosque be forced to hold one against its wishes.

Theo Randall

Chef, restaurant owner

The good thing about this recipe is not just the fact it is so easy to make but the texture and flavour of a few spring vegetables. The pesto really finishes the soup off and with the addition of the cream, all the flavours are combined.

Jody Thompson

Blogs Editor of The Huffington Post UK

Even though I was useless, the adrenalin rush (when Tallulah eventually did break into a canter) was incomparable. Seriously, imagine mastering a sport where it's not *just* your skill, but it's coupled with persuading a wayward quadruped into taking part too. And it's REALLY FAST. Magic.

JD Schramm

Lecturer, Stanford Graduate School of Business

No conversation, no matter how meaningful and powerful, can bring back the millions we've already lost to suicide. The loved ones of these victims also have a thirst for conversation and our efforts to engage with them may very well prevent the next loss to suicide if we can all continue to break the silence and share our journeys.

Tim Goodchild

Formula 1 petrolhead for 21 years - fan of the underdog, supporter of the legend

The tight twisty nature and no room for error characteristics of the Monte Carlo streets means that one error likely means end of race and into the barriers. It's this that sets this race apart from the rest. 78 laps of pure concentration - Ayrton Senna famously likened it to driving through a tunnel for two hours, zoning in on the perfect racing line for all that time.

Douglas Stewart

CEO, Green Energy UK

Walking up to 30 minutes burns up to 130 calories, not to mention helps you relax. Next time you have a stressful day at work, instead of hopping on the bus stick those headphones in and enjoy a brisk walk home, it will even help you work up an appetite for dinner!

Kate Thompson

Lifestyle Writer for Confetti.co.uk

It's so easy to get married, and yet with the divorce rate at an all-time high, it seems not so easy to stay married. There is so much written on the subject of how to have a happy marriage, and most notably by people on their second or third... These are people who have learned some valuable lessons through trial and error.

Paul Joseph

Co-founder of Health and Fitness Travel

What comes with yoga is a whole new healthy lifestyle, you become more in tune with what's important in life. Practising yoga on a regular basis has improved my mental and body awareness, flexibility, concentration levels and complete inner peace.

Mike Judge

Head of Communications at The Christian Institute

There can no longer be any doubt, this Bill wrecks marriage. Labour's amendment, scrawled on a dog-eared scrap of paper and hastily tabled in the Commons at the eleventh hour. The Bill to wreck marriage has social liberals giddy with delight.

Areeb Ullah

Incoming Vice President of Academic Affairs at King's College London Student Union and committee member for the NUS Black Student Campaign

As a Muslim, I appreciated and acknowledged the need for Muslim organisations to rightly condemn the actions that took place this week but disagreed with both organisations reaffirming the need to distance Islam's true teachings from the individual who attacked the soldier.

Marek Doyle

Nutritional Therapist, Personal Trainer, Champion of Common Sense

Never do I see suggestions for the one thing that, over 90 percent of the time, fixes the actual problem within 24 hours. This one thing is Magnesium. A mineral found in low levels in many foods, it is a component of more than 325 different enzymes in the human body.

Dr Raj Persaud and Adrian Furnham

The detrimental effect of age-progressed images is most probably partly a psychological effect: The addition of an age-progressed image somehow changes observers' decision-making strategies, and does so in a profoundly unhelpful way.

Zoe Armstrong

Writer, blogger, solo parent. Forthegirlblog.blogspot.co.uk

Before it was wrong, children often toiled alongside their parents. For their parents. Now we work for them. Like tiny benign overlords they preside over us. Arguably it's better this way. But sometimes, when my toddler rides me like a mule after 12 hours of one-to-one fun, only marginally so.