Andrew Marr was clearly out to egg Kenneth Clarke on during his interview with the Business Shadow this morning. Clarke didn’t need any encouragement.

Following George Osborne’s from-the-hip News of the World interview today, Tory Big Beast Kenneth Clarke gave his colleague both direct and indirect support for his stance. Key extracts from the interview included:

“With so much scepticism about politicians, we need to win an enormous number of seats. So we must come across as a Government with the willpower to tackle financial calamity…we must tackle the enormous debt to save us from a serious crisis, Gordon Brown is minimising the problem and this is entirely wrong…the fiscal deficit needs to be tackled right away…I’ve always said that living on a sea of debt is folly…debt management will dominate our Government and this is a very severe fiscal problem, the State is now over 50% of GDP and there has been a monumental increase in government payroll”.

Asked how he thought the Tories could get above what he called the ‘glass ceiling’ of 38%, Clarke answered, “We need more liberals coming over to us…many of the simply aren’t social democrats…Nick Clegg, I like Nick Clegg, but he’s a Conservative really. He’s in a terrible dilemma, and I think a lot of his true liberal supporters recognise this.”

This came across as a clear appeal to those who are confused about the need for fiscal action – as did Osborne’s interview with four NoW staffers. Much of the phrasing is similar.

It looks like an attempt by this Tory money-duo to drag Cameron kicking and screaming out of Steve Hilton’s ivory tower. The Slogger has no confirmations or leaks as yet. Stay tuned.