How The Sun saw last week's spat between Osborne and Fox © Andy Davey

Trident replacement is looking less likely today after Chancellor George Osborne told media that the Treasury weren’t willing to stump up for the project out of central funds.

Speaking in New Delhi, where he is accompanying David Cameron on his visit to India, Mr Osborne told the Bloomberg newswire: "All budgets have pressure. I don't think there's anything particularly unique about the Ministry of Defence. I have made it very clear that Trident renewal costs must be taken as part of the defence budget."

HMS Vanguard, Britain's first Trident submarine

No one has been more insistent that Britain must commit to replacing Trident than new defence secretary Liam Fox. Despite the lack of credible targets and the exorbitant cost, Dr Fox has fought doggedly for a new generation of nuclear weapons to protect Britain from "nuclear blackmail" by other states - apparently North Korea (possibly four missiles at most) and Iran (none at all) give him palpitations and sleepless nights.

But now, in a deliciously ironic twist, Dr Fox is being asked to put his department's money where his mouth is. Traditionally the Treasury pays for the capital investment in nuclear weapons, but such is the pressure to cut-back on government spending across the board that the Chancellor is now keen that the MoD should foot the bill instead.

A YouGov poll released today reaffirms what we already knew: a clear majority people simply don't support government plans to build a 'like for like' replacement for the Trident nuclear deterrent.

The poll, undertaken on behalf of think tank Chatham House, found that only 29 per cent of the public backed the government's Trident plans. Amongst opinion formers the level of support fell to a paltry 22 per cent.

While George Osborne was busy launching the most swingeing budget cuts in a generation yesterday, he went out of his way to stress that he was being "tough but fair" – and that the pain of his austerity measures would be shared by everyone.

But hey - apparently companies involved in nuclear arms building wont be sharing the pain. This was made clear by new Defence Secretary Liam Fox when he presented his plans for a Strategic Security and Defence Review (SDSR) to parliament.

Over the last six weeks Greenpeace campaigners and active supporters have been energetically campaigning to raise the level of debate about proposals to spend £97bn on new nuclear weapons.

Together we’ve been lobbying candidates, writing to newspapers, polling people on the streets and doing much, much more behind the scenes - helping to make nuclear weapons an election issue for the first time in decades.

The TUC's Frances O'Grady on the gaping hole at the heart of Britain's finances

Tonight sees the final leaders’ debate of election 2010, and with the polls still close and Gordon Brown facing up to the public after his 'bigot' gaffe, it should be a lively one.

The subject of the debate is the real issue of the day – the economy and how we are going to deal with our massive national deficit.

What interesting times we're living in. The unexpected Lib-Dem surge has made this election impossible to call, and at the same time forced both Labour and the Tories to debate questions which they'd far rather ignore. How do they intend to pay down our frighteningly large national debt, for example?

Nick Clegg put the spotlight squarely on Trident in last week's leaders' debate, arguing that £100bn to replace a Cold War relic that has no military value makes little sense at the best of times, let alone when we're facing financial meltdown.

In the latest addition to our Cut Trident video wall, comedian and impressionist extraordinaire Alistair McGowan muses on alternative ways to spend the £97bn that the government is currently planning to blow on new nuclear weapons.