Fewer voters have made up their mind on how to vote than in the past
Whilst most voters think the debates will influence the way the vote
Ipsos Mori have done some polling which asks how many voters have made up their mind on how to vote, and what will influence the way they will vote. The fieldwork for the polling was early to mid February, so well before the recent contretemps over the debates. So David Cameron’s non appearance in the debates could fundamentally damage the Tories as we can see from the above chart, the debates appear key to influencing how voters will vote.
If the  debates don’t happen, then the Newspapers become more influential, something which theoretically should be damaging for Labour as I expect most of the national newspapers to back the Tories, and those that might back Labour generally have the fewest numbers of readers.
With the current polling neck and neck, and 50% of voters indicating the might change their mind, there’s scope for one party over the next 53 days to pull away and get a decent lead.
The full data tables are available here.