Nadeem Badshah (now) and Andrew Sparrow (earlier) 

Sunak defends decision not to take immediate action against Tories in betting scandal – as it happened

Prime minister faces claim Tories are ‘stealing the candlesticks’ on the way out of government
  
  


A summary of today's developments

  • Rishi Sunak has defended not taking immediate action against the people accused of suspect bets around the date of the election. Sunak told The Sun he was incredibly angry and the party is doing their own inquiry. He added: “If anyone has broken the rules, they should face not just the full consequences of the law, but they will be booted out of the Conservative party.” Earlier, Keir Starmer said the data betting allegations were a “total failure of leadership”.

  • The Conservatives are rerouting resources to defend at least three seats held by cabinet ministers with majorities of more than 20,000 as the party retreats to safer ground. Tory activists and candidates in nearby areas have been diverted to campaign for James Cleverly, the home secretary, Oliver Dowden, the deputy prime minister, and Steve Barclay, the environment secretary.

  • James Cracknell, the former Olympic rower standing to be a Conservative MP, has called the Tories a “shower of shit”, in a video he posted on Facebook.

  • Keir Starmer said he would meet with JK Rowling after the author said at the weekend that Labour had “abandoned” her and others campaigning for women’s rights.

  • Nigel Farage has accused Boris Johnson of betrayal as the Reform UK leader vented his anger at the former Tory leader for describing his comments about Vladimir Putin as repugnant. Farage mounted an unrepentant defence of his claims that Russia has been provoked into invading Ukraine as he addressed a couple of hundred Reform supporters from the top of a double decker bus.

  • The number of migrants arriving in the UK after crossing the Channel has hit a new record for the first six months of a calendar year. Home Office figures show 257 people made the journey in four boats on Sunday, taking the provisional total for the year so far to 12,901. The previous record for arrivals in the six months from January to June was 12,747 in 2022. In the first half of 2023, arrivals stood at 11,433.

Rishi Sunak said he understands voters’ hesitation to support the Tories, but urged them not to “sleepwalk” into a Labour government.

Speaking at a campaign event in Chelsea, London, the PM said: “We can’t let Britain sleepwalk into this. It is our job, it is our duty over the next 10 days to wake people up to this danger.

“So I say to all of you, I say to every Conservative, don’t surrender to Labour, fight for every vote, fight for our values, fight for our vision of Britain.”

He added: “I understand people’s hesitation with giving us their support again.

“I’m not blind to their frustrations with me, with our party, the last few years have not been easy for anyone with Covid, with Ukraine, we have not got everything right, we haven’t made as much progress as we would have liked in some areas.

“But this election is not a byelection, it is not a referendum on me, or our party, it is a choice about the future of our country and the government you want to lead for five years.”

Updated

And that brings the interview to a conclusion.

Next up on is the leader of the Liberal Democrats, Sir Ed Davey, on Friday night.

Ramsay adds: “I’m not going to get into talking about individual candidates, because if there are questions raised about candidates, then there is a process for them to be investigated, and there may well still be current investigations ongoing.”

Robinson says the Greens dropped a candidate who “tweeted his hunch that Israel had paid Hamas to carry out the atrocities on October the 7th.” He added the party has candidates on ballot papers next to the words “the Green Party,” one liked a tweet that said, “Israel must be eliminated,” another likened Israel supporters to Nazis. Another claimed “the victims of the holocaust had turned into the predators, and finally, one likened Hamas to the resistance in France, in the Second World War.”

Ramsay responds: “None of those comments you’ve quoted are one that I would make or in any way condone. And as you say, the Green Party has had situations where there were candidates who were originally selected, questions have been made about comments that they have made themselves or they’ve liked on social media, and in four cases, the party has taken action to – which has resulted in those candidates no longer going forward.”

Robinson says the Greens’ manifesto mentions creating a legally regulated market for drugs. Does that mean legalising all drugs, and then regulating them?

Ramsay says: “It says that we would introduce an independent commission on drugs, to address the fact that the war on drugs has failed, we have growing numbers of people who are addicted to drugs, often harmful substances, we have a huge amount of power in the hands of criminal gangs that are profiting from that, and we need to see drug addiction as a medical issue, not as a criminal issue, to support individuals who are addicted to regulate those drugs, which, as I say, are in the hands of criminal gangs. And let’s look through this independent commission at how other countries around the world have introduced more enlightened policies, that do actually support people who are addicted.”

Ram say adds “And my second point I would make is that this whole discussion, as so many people have said, has become highly toxic, in a way that ignores the fact that we have very high levels of violence against women and girls, we have a gender pay gap in this country, we have…growing rates of hate crime against trans people.”

Robinson says the Greens in Scotland launched a fight to change the law, so that men could declare themselves to be women without involving a doctor, so called gender ID. He asks have you learnt from the decision to send a rapist called Adam to a woman’s prison after he changed his name and changed his gender and asked to be called Isla.

Ramsay says “First of all, to answer your question specifically, yes, I think there has to be learning for all of society on the way these changes are made, and ensuring that all spaces, whether they be prisons or any other public spaces, are run in a way that is safe for everybody involved, preserves people’s dignity, is absolutely paramount, and the government has been clear, male bodied people should not be put in female prisons…”

Robinson said the IFS compared the Greens with Nigel Farage’s Reform Party because their ideas are “wholly unattainable”.

Ramsay says: “I’ve quoted to you what other experts have said, welcoming our proposals, other economists, financial experts, who’ve said the Green Party is bringing in a different way of thinking, that by European standards is actually fairly normal, and

we can’t expect to have the level of health services, the quality of education system that other countries have, if we don’t put the investment in that’s needed.”

Robinson says 12 European countries introduced wealth tax. Nine of them, including

France got rid of it.

Ramsay replies: “There was a particular problem with the way France introduced it, which was that it set the starting point too low. We’re proposing a wealth tax starting at 10 million, so if someone has 10 million in wealth and assets, we’d ask them to pay 1%, just 1%, of that wealth and assets back into society.”

On a proposal for more tax on the rich where £50 to £70 billion the Greens say could be raised, Ramsay says “Well, we’ve been working closely with academics and experts around a range of models for how a wealth tax could work, and we’ve been fairly cautious in the model and in the assumptions that we’ve chosen around that, and on the day our manifesto was released.”

Ramsay adds: “So, the share of the economy that goes into tax at the moment is near the bottom of the European league table. What we’re proposing would move us up, but we would still be below where France and other countries are, so actually, it’s Labour and Conservatives that are way out of step with what other countries are doing.

“The IFS, Institute for Fiscal Studies, has been very clear that the next government is either going to have to cut public services, or increase taxes, and so the Green Party is the only party being honest in this election, that says, actually, by European standards, we can make fairly modest changes to the tax system, asking those with the broadest shoulders to pay modestly more.”

Robinson says the total cost of the Greens’ policies would be £145 billion a year on day to day spending. Labour say they’d spend £5 billion. This is what the Conservatives say they’d spend on tax cuts and they would spent £17 bn.

Ramsay says: “Why is there such a difference? Because we have an NHS at breaking point that requires substantial investment and the Nuffield Trust has been clear that the Labour and Conservative proposals that you’ve outlined here would leave the NHS worse off than it was under David Cameron’s austerity. We need the transition to the green economy in a way that tackles the cost of living crisis. We need to invest in our schools that are crumbling and where teachers don’t have the money to spend on the things they need to provide our children with a good education.”

Robinson continues to grill Ramsay about a carbon tax being a tax on meat, cars, deliveries which could raised £90 billion. The IFS thinktank said it would be impossible to raise that sort of money without the effect being felt by everyone.

Ramsay replies: “What we‘re proposing in the carbon tax, is a tax that hits the big polluting companies that are causing the climate emergency, that has a huge impact on people on poorer incomes. So, a tax for example, on high polluting imports of goods, that undermine British manufacturing, we want to support low carbon British

manufacturing. We also want to have a carbon tax on those big polluting companies, and actually, ordinary people are suffering from the fact that this government is not acting on these issues. We have escalating energy bills, escalating food bills, extortionate train prices.”

Robinson cites the party’s manifesto mentioning a carbon tax so what would be the cost of that?

Ramsay says “Our carbon tax that we’re proposing for this five years in this manifesto, doesn’t include farming and that’s because we are putting positive incentives to support farmers to transition to support - producing more food locally, more nature friendly farming.

“That’s what farmers in the NFU and local farmers that I speak to in Suffolk tell me all the time. More and more people are choosing to have a greater proportion of plant based foods in their diet. That’s something that’s happening anyway. But we are talking about how we can make the farming system overall more resilient and one of

the big points there is about what proportion of our food is actually produced in the UK.”

We move onto meat consumption. Robinson asks are you saying to save the climate, we’ve got to ban the burger, or we’ve got to make burgers a lot more expensive?

Ramsay replies “Neither of those proposals are in our manifesto. What is in our manifesto is supporting our farmers to produce far more food within the UK.”

Robinson said the BBC asked the AA about the Greens’ policy for 30 million cars to be scrapped and they estimated it would cost £86 billion and “described the policy as an impossible dream”.

Ramsay says “We do need to put money behind supporting people with that green transition in all sorts of ways, and we’ve shown in our manifesto exactly how we would fund that green transition and we need to think about the economic benefits of doing so.

“Huge job creation opportunities, whether that’s in renewable energy, which is the cheapest way to produce electricity and can bring our bills down, whether it’s in public transport, because a transition like this can only be done and should only be done if we at the same time put the investment into for example, our rail network, which is one of the most expensive in Europe.”

Robinson says the Greens’ manifesto is scrap every petrol and diesel car within a decade which is about 30 million vehicles. He asks is your message to people if you’ve bought a new petrol or diesel car, the Greens are going to take it away?

Ramsay responds: “No, that’s not our message at all and in fact, it would be 2035 before we were looking at getting to that point, and in the meantime, the popularity of electric vehicles is growing and that needs more investment and support to bring the price down, and indeed if we say from 2027, that new cars need to be electric cars, then that means there is going to be lots of second hand petrol and diesel cars for some time.”

Robinson asks in order to have gain for the planet, do we all have to share a little bit of pain?

Ramsay replies: “Well, quite the opposite Nick because we’re suffering pain at the moment, aren’t we? We have extortionate train fares in the UK, far higher than other countries. So, if we were to invest in our rail network, we could be bringing down the cost of people’s train journeys and making the greener option the cheaper and greener option.

“Same with our food supply. The shocks we’ve seen in the economy in international affairs, have exposed the fact that we’re too reliant on international imports for our food and if we were to support our farmers to produce far more of our food locally as farmers want to do.

“So, whether it’s about energy, where renewable energy is the cheapest energy to produce, if we can put that money in, whether it’s about insulating people’s homes to bring bills down, it’s really about helping tackle the cost, the root causes of the cost of living crisis.”

The first question from Robinson is who are the Greens?

Ramsay replies: “The Green Party is a party that wants to think about what really matters in life. How do we measure success for society? And for me, that’s about having a society which is more equal, and where people can access the public services that they need. The big issue that people raised with me on the doorstep in East Anglia and across the country is that our NHS is severely overstretched.

“People can’t get access to a doctor or NHS dentist when they need one. We need to tackle the scandal of sewage in our rivers, we need to protect our natural environment, and we need to rethink how we run society, so that we are supporting people who are the worst off, who have really suffered under the cost of living crisis, as we all have done, and we need to invest in that transition to a green economy with all the benefits that that will bring.”

We will be liveblogging Nick Robinson’s BBC interview with Adrian Ramsay, co leader of the Green party, which kicks off at 7pm.

Starmer sidesteps question about whether he is likely to become 'progressively more radical' in office

Cole says the recent Starmer biography quotes an aide saying Starmer is the sort of person who might become more radical over time.

Starmer says he has a big job. He is looking forward. He dodges the question about the extent of his potential radicalism.

And that is it.

Cole was referring to this quote from Tom Baldwin’s biography of Starmer.

As one former adviser puts it, political leaders more usually define themselves by a ‘radical vision’ which they are then forced to cut and trim down through compromise. Starmer begins the other way round; he exhausts conventional options before, if necessary, becoming progressively more radical.

That is all from me. Nadeem Badshah is now taking over.

Q: Are you ready for winning with a supermajority?

Starmer says this is a change election. But he is taking nothing for granted. Change will only happen if people vote for it.

Q: Why do people like JK Rowling think Labour is wrong on women-only spaces.

Starmer says he respects what Rowling has said. She has made some really important points, he says.

He says it is important that people discuss these issues with respect for each other.

Starmer defends saying he would not go private if he or family member were on NHS waiting list

A woman in the audience says Starmer said he would rather have a family member die than have them use private healthcare.

Starmer says he never said that.

He says he was asked (in the first TV debate) if he or a family member would pay to jump the queue if he were on a waiting list.

He says the waiting list is almost 8m. He suggests the idea of someone wanting to be PM, and charged with bringing waiting lists down, skipping the queue would not be right.

If a family member was in an acute, life-threatening situation, he would want them in the NHS, because NHS hospitals are best for acute care, he says.

He says he experienced times when his mother was in hospital and her life was at risk. He speaks from experience, he says.

Cole says there is a 65% success rate for asylum applications. So the odds of being able to stay are good.

Starmer says, under the government’s policy, the chance of staying is 100%. That is because applications are not being processed. If claims are not processed, people cannot be returned.

He says the current situation is not a disincentive. Rishi Sunak says passing the Rwanda legislation would be a disincentive. But the number of people coming is going up, he says.

Starmer says, from his time running the CPS, he is confident that he can smash the gangs behind the small boat crossings.

And he says he would put more staff in the returns unit so that people whose applications for asylum are turned down can be returned.

A person in the audience says people destroy their documents. So where are you going to return them to?

Starmer says you can return people. The number of returns has fallen by 44%, he says.

He says he knows what it is like to share intelligence with other countries. “I’ve been in the room when we’ve done this,” he says. With other countries, the UK agreed a strategy, and an arrest strategy, so people can arrested in the same time. He has seen that done with terrorist cases. He thinks it can be done with people smuggling cases too, he says.

Starmer says he will not take the UK back into the EU.

He does not want to return to what was a “pretty awful period” for the UK politically.

Starmer says he thinks he was right to serve under Corbyn, and push for change in Labour from within

A member of the audience says, if Starmer said he thought Corbyn would be a great PM, that meant he was willing to lie. How do they know he is not lying now?

Starmer says he helped changed the police service in Northern Ireland. He did that with the Crown Prosecution Service too. And he has done that with Labour.

He says he now wants the chance to take the country, which he says he thinks has been broken, and change it.

Cole asks the person in the audience if he is convinced.

The man who asked the question says he hopes Starmer was not being wholehearted in his endorsement of Corbyn.

Cole says other Labour MPs did not serve under Corbyn.

Starmer says he did not vote for Corbyn. But the party chose him twice. People had to make a decision. But he thought deciding Labour’s policy would be important for the future. And he wanted to be able to challenge on issues like antisemitism from the inside.

Q: But you failed to change the party.

It is fundamentally different now, Starmer says.

Q: But you did not change it when Corbyn was leader.

Starmer says, even when Corbyn was leader, he never let him take Labour away from Nato.

Q: But you did not speak out against Corbyn.

Starmer says he did on issue like antisemitism.

He says he knew there would be a day after Corbyn when they would have to rebuild the party. He implies he is glad about his decision to fight for that change from inside.

Q: Do you stand by exactly how you behaved during the Corbyn years?

Starmer says he has reflected on this. He thinks it was right to fight from within.

Cole says Starmer said last week that Jeremy Corbyn would have been a better PM than Boris Johnson. How would he have been better on Ukraine?

Starmer says he is going to do something he does not often do – praise Johnson. He says he supported Johnson’s line on Ukraine. And he supported Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss on Ukraine policy too, he says.

Q: Would it have helped or hindered our response to the war in the Middle East if we had had a PM who described Hamas as friends?

Starmer says the choice at the last election was a bad one. He never expected Labour to win. He says he has changed Labour, and Corbyn is now not even a Labour candidate.

Keir Starmer is being interviewed now.

When Harry Cole puts it to him that he is days away from becoming PM, Starmer says he has a lot of work to do and won’t stop until 10pm next Thursday.

Sunak says people 'queuing up in Calais' waiting to come to UK because Labour planning to ditch Rwanda policy

Sunak says taxes will go up under Labour. “It’s as simple as that.”

People have to ask themselves if they can afford £2,000 more in taxes that he says they will have to pay under Labour, he says.

(Labour does not accept that figure.)

Sunak accepts there were some things the government should have done differently.

But the election is about the future, he says.

Q: Do you regret calling the election now?

No, says Sunak. He says after he got inflation down, this was the moment for the country to decide its future.

Under Labour, every pensioner will be paying a retirement tax, he says. But that won’t happen under the Tories, he says, because the party will raise the income tax threshold for pensioners in line with the state pension.

And the Rwanda policy will be abandoned, he says.

Those illegal migrants will not be on planes to Rwanda. They will be out on our streets putting pressure on public services and, by the way, I can tell you now they are queuing up in Calais waiting for a Starmer government so they can come here and stay here.

And that’s it. The Sunak Q&A is over.

Updated

Sunak says people can trust what he says about Labour because he was right about what would happen under Liz Truss

Q: Do you feel any responsibility for inflicting Liz Truss on voters?

Sunak says he spent a summer trying to persuade the Tory party that what she was saying was wrong.

He was right in what he said about Truss.

And that is why people can trust what he says about Labour, he says.

UPDATE: Sunak said:

I was right then when I warned about Liz Truss and that’s why all of you can trust me now when I also warn about the damage that Keir Starmer would do to our economy.

In that election, everyone said I was going to lose, I was saying something that no-one wanted to hear, but I was saying it because I believed it, and I’m telling you again now, it all seems a bit familiar, if Keir Starmer’s your prime minister the economy is going to suffer and all of you are going to suffer.

I don’t want to see that happen. That’s why I’m carrying on going every day at this election, I believe in what I’m saying and I want to stop those tax rises happening for all of you.

Updated

Q: How do you feel about the pressure people are under due to interest rates?

Sunak says bringing down inflation was his priority.

Q: But what about people who have lost their homes?

Sunak says everything he is doing is about giving people more security.

Under Labour, everyone will face higher taxes, he claims.

Q: Are you happy with people having to live at home until their 40s because it is so hard to buy a house?

No, says Sunak, “of course not”. He wants people to be able to buy their home.

He says the Help to Buy scheme, and abolishing stamp duty for first time buyers, will make things easier for people like the questioner.

From the Guardian’s John Crace

ten minutes into the Sunak Sun interview and the tetchometer is rocketing

Cole says the Sun gets many stories like this. Who’s responsibility is this?

Sunak says he is in charge. The buck stops with him.

But 6m treatments were cancelled because of Covid, he says.

It is obviously a challenge working to get through that backlog, he says.

The next question comes from a Sun reader who says she thinks the NHS is broken. Her dad died six weeks ago. The family was let down, because he had to wait too long for a diagnosis.

Sunak says he is so sorry to hear this story. He offers to take the woman’s details, and look into what happened. He says he comes from an NHS family, and he says the government is spending more on cancer services. But what happened to her father was unacceptable, he says.

Q: Why did you not act to bring down legal immigration earlier?

Sunak says he has only been PM for 18 months. Legal immigration is coming down, and net migration will be halved within 12 months, he says.

Q: But why didn’t you do it 18 months ago?

Sunak says he has acted.

Q: But the numbers were soaring last year.

Sunak challenges Cole to name another year when the numbers fell by 30%.

The numbers were too high. He got the job, and the numbers came down.

Sunak refuses to deny threat of legal cases blocking July Rwanda flights part of reason for surprise summer election

Cole says he has been told that, just before Sunak called the July election, he was told legal action was likely to block the Rwanda flights planned for July. Was that one reason why he called the surprise election?

Sunak says, every time someone tried to bock the Rwanda plan, he kept going. He says he has a plan, and Labour does not.

That was not an answer to Cole’s question.

Sunak defends not taking immediate action against Tories accused of suspect bets, saying inquiries must take their course

Rishi Sunak is going first.

Q: When you resigned as chancellor, you said government should be conducted competently. How has it turned out?

Sunak says his first task was to bring down inflation. He has done that.

Q: Your closest aid, your bodyguard, your campaign manager and your data chief are all being investigated for insider trading. Is that proper?

Sunak says he was incredibly angry.

The Gambling Commission is investigating.

But the Tories are doing their own inquiry, he says. He says he won’t hestitate to act on that.

Q: But that should not take long. You just ask everyone.

Sunak seems to imply Cole is not taking it seriously. These are very serious matter.

There are mutiple investigations. He cannot compromise the integrity of them, he says.

He goes on:

If anyone has broken the rules, they should face not just the full consequences of the law, but they will be booted out of the Conservative party.

Cole says it looks like Tories were “stealing the candlesticks” on the way out of government.

Sunak repeats the point about being incredibly angry. And if anyone has broken the rules, they will be kicked out.

Q: Whoever they are?

Whoever they are, Sunak confirms.

UPDATE: Sunak said:

I’m incredibly angry about this and the right thing to do, and again you talked about that letter, to do things properly, is to get to the bottom of what happened, to investigate things thoroughly.

Now we have to do that separately to the Gambling Commission, who don’t report to me. I don’t have the details of their investigation. We have to do that sensitively and carefully so that we don’t compromise the integrity of a police and other investigations.

But let me be clear, if we come across findings or information that warrants it, we will not hesitate to act, I have been crystal clear that I will hold people to account, whoever they are.

Updated

The Sun’s “election showdown” is starting.

Harry Cole, the Sun’s political editor, says the UK faces huge challenges, and nothing seems to work.

It is not exactly the BBC …

Another polling company has come out with an MRP poll suggesting Labour are on course for a humongous majority. It is from Focaldata, and it has Keir Starmer set for a majority of 250.

Liz Saville Roberts, the Plaid Cymru leader at Westminster and the party’s candidate in Dwyfor Meirionnydd, says the Institute for Fiscal Studies analysis of the main parties’ manifestos (see 11.37am) confirms what her party has been saying. She said:

The IFS confirms what Plaid Cymru has been saying all along – both Labour and the Conservatives’ manifestos clearly shows that a vote for either party is a vote for more of the same: austerity. Neither party are being honest with voters about the dire state of the economy, and the spending gap in both manifestos will mean that Wales’ could lose out on a billion or more.

Plaid Cymru knows this isn’t as good as it gets for Wales. This election, we’re offering real change for Wales. We are the only party calling for fair funding for Wales to create economic and social fairness and build a fairer, more ambitious nation.

Sunak and Starmer take part in Q&A with Sun readers

The Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer Q&A with Sun readers is due to start at 5.30pm. There is a live feed here. Harry Cole, the paper’s political editor, is chairing. Starmer is due to go first.

Tories in election retreat as resources diverted to defend ministers’ seats

The Conservatives are rerouting resources to defend at least three seats held by cabinet ministers with majorities of more than 20,000 as the party retreats to safer ground, Eleni Courea reports.

This post on X from JK Rowling is probably a good indication as to how she would respond to what Rachel Reeves has been saying today. (See 3.36pm.)

Rowling is recommending a thread by the Observer columnist Sonia Sodha starting here.

Thread on why Labour’s existing position on gender and sex (“the Equality Act is clear on protections for single-sex spaces” - it isn’t - and “we’re going to make it easier for men to qualify for protections normally reserved for women”) waters down those protections for women.

According to Sam Blewett at Politico, Green party campaigners in Bristol Central, where the party’s co-leader Carla Denyer is very hopeful of defeating Labour’s Thangam Debbonaire have been telling voters they meet who admire Debbonaire that, if she loses, Keir Starmer will put her in the House of Lords anyway. Blewett says Debbonaire is furious about the claim, and that she says “of course” that idea has not been discussed.

Tories are a ‘shower of shit’, says Conservative candidate James Cracknell

James Cracknell, who is standing to be a Conservative MP, has called the Tories a “shower of shit”, in a video he posted on Facebook, Simon Hattenstone and Jessica Elgot report.

Reeves says Labour willing to meet JK Rowling to discuss her concerns about its policy on trans rights

Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, has said Labour would be willing meet JK Rowling to discuss her concerns about the party’s policy on gender recognition certificates. (See 9.54am.)

Speaking while campaigning in Scotland, Reeves said:

We’re not going to be changing anything around biological sex. So the Equality Act stands and the protection of single sex spaces, based on biological sex will absolutely stay. Labour introduced the Equality Act it is very important to us and that protection for single sex spaces.

Asked about Rowling, who said in a Times article on Saturday that she would find it hard to vote for Labour while the party was “dismissive and often offensive towards women fighting to retain the rights their foremothers thought were won for all time”, Reeves said:

We’re really happy to talk to JK Rowling to give her assurances about [same-sex spaces].

For me those protections whether it is about prisons, refuges, changing spaces, that is really important to me, it is really important to the Labour Party that those single sex spaces based on biological sex are protected.

And nothing in our plans goes contrary to that, nothing at all.

UPDATE: In response, Rowling posted this on X.

I’ll be happy to meet after @NoXYinXXprisons, @LesbianLabour, @WomensRightsNet, @Womans_Place_UK and @AllianceLGB have been given in person meetings with the Labour leadership. I’d also like to know whether @AngelaRayner still considers the last two organisations hate groups - asking on behalf of female survivors of domestic violence and gay people who don’t subscribe to gender identity ideology.

Updated

The Green party has pledged to end “dental deserts” in the UK and restore full access to NHS dentistry, PA Media reports. PA says:

Green party co-leader Adrian Ramsay said it was a “national outrage” that children were being admitted to hospital for tooth decay, as thousands struggle to access dental care.

There have also been reports of people removing their own teeth at home, due to the difficulty in seeing a dentist on the NHS.

The party has said their MPs will push for a new contract for NHS dentists backed by an additional £3bn for the dentistry budget by 2030.

Ramsay said: “In many parts of the country it is now impossible to register with an NHS dentist, and many dentists are de-registering NHS patients to avoid treating them at a loss. Too many of us are feeling the consequences: dropping from regular preventative dental visits to only going when we have a problem that needs treatment.”

Badenoch says time to talk about Tory 'leadership things' will be after election, hinting she's planning new campaign

Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, has declined to rule out standing for Conservative party leader after the election.

According to the bookmakers, Badenoch has been favourite to be the next Tory leader for a while, and last week the Daily Telegraph said she could walk into the job almost without a contest – because one poll suggested she could be the only senior figure in the party left in parliament after a catastrophic defeat.

In a Bloomberg debate today with her Labour opposite number Jonathan Reynolds, Badenoch played down the idea of standing for leader, but did not rule it out.

She claimed there was “no better job” than being business secretary, saying it was “a lot easier and a lot less pressured than being prime minister”.

She went on:

The fact of the matter is, I stood and I lost. And what terrifies me now is not becoming leader, it is seeing Labour come in …

This is one of the things that I’ve found most difficult doing this job, that people tend not to know what it is, because I’m always asked the leadership question. We’re so interested in the personalities, in the gossip and so on …

We need to focus on this election. The choice is going to be between us or between them. Be afraid if it is them, is all I would say. And we will talk about leadership things after an election, but not before.

The Institute for Government thinktank has said the next government should pass a short bill containing measures to improve integrity in public life. It has written an open letter saying so also signed by various other thinktanks and campaign groups, as well as by a long list of distinguished former civil servants, experts and parliamentarians. It’s an A-grade establishment cast list, and so naturally the letter is in today’s Times.

Here is an extract.

Essential progress can be quickly achieved by providing for independent enforcement of a new ministerial code; establishing new systems for managing conflicts of interest and lobbying; improving regulation of post-government employment; ensuring appointments to the Lords are only made on merit and other public appointments are rigorous and transparent; and strengthening the independence of the honours system, including by ending prime ministerial patronage.

Legislation is not necessary for most of these changes, but a short bill would create the necessary powers and embed the independence of the ethics and integrity system. This election is a rare opportunity to reverse the spiral of declining trust in government – and it is an opportunity that would be dangerous to miss.

Many of these measures are also being proposed by Labour.

Starmer says Tory inquiry into betting allegations designed to 'knock this in long grass' until after election

Keir Starmer has dismissed the news that the Conservative party is conducting its own inquiry into the election date betting allegations. (See 12.35pm.) Speaking at a Labour rally at Northampton Town football club, Starmer said was a “total failure of leadership”. He explained:

[Rishi Sunak has] announced an investigation, an investigation designed for one purpose, which is to knock this in the long grass to the other side of the election.

The Tories should have carried out an inquiry already, he said:

It would take half an hour. Who knew? Did you place a bet? That’s it.

The desperation over this betting story that’s going around – it goes to the heart of what the Tories have become when their first instinct in relation to a general election is not how to serve the country, how do I get the message out, it’s how quickly can I get to the bookies and make some money.

Sunak claims Labour would undermine women's rights with plans to reform gender recognition certificates

Speaking to reporters after the Scottish Conservative manifesto launch, Rishi Sunak said that Labour’s plans to reform the gender recognition system (see 9.54am) would “undo all the progress that we’ve made on this issue, undermine the protections that we’ve put in place for women’s rights, safety and security, and create loopholes that will be exploited by bad faith actors”.

He added:

Fundamentally, I don’t think that Labour have ever properly cared or understood this issue, and that’s crystal clear from his track record.

Sunak also insisted that he remained “energised” with ten days to go before the election and that he would fight just as hard as he had in the leadership contest against Liz Truss, when he was likewise the underdog. He said:

I will fight very hard till the last day and someone mentioned Liz Truss earlier, when I was in that campaign, I fought very hard until the last day and when you’re fighting for something you believe in, actually, it’s quite easy. That’s why I’m as energised as I am.

The Liberal Democrats have written to Sir Laurie Magnus, the independent adviser on ministerial interests (aka the PM’s “ethics adviser), to ask for an urgent inquiry into whether any ministers placed bets on a July election. “We urgently need an inquiry by the government’s ethics adviser to look into whether any Conservative ministers were involved in placing bets on the election date. If they were, this could amount to a very serious breach of the ministerial code,” Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader said.

There is no evidence that any ministers did place bets of this kind. This morning Rishi Sunak said he was only aware of two candidates under investigation for suspect bets, and neither of them are ministers. (See 12.35pm.)

Nigel Farage denounces Boris Johnson as 'liar' and 'worst PM of modern times' as he defends Putin comments

Nigel Farage has accused Boris Johnson of betrayal as the Reform UK leader vented his anger at the former Tory leader for describing his comments about Vladimir Putin as repugnant.

Farage mounted an unrepentant defence of his claims that Russia has been provoked into invading Ukraine as he addressed a couple of hundred Reform supporters from the top of a double decker bus.

Speaking at a rally outside Maidstone, Farage said:

Our leaders have no knowledge of history, no knowledge of Russian psychology.

The fact that I was more far sighted than the rest of our political leaders is not something that I am going to apologise for yet this has been turned into ‘Farage makes outrageous statement. Farage defends Putin.’

Farage said that he had been on the same page as the pope when it came to called for a peaceful route out of the conflict.

However, he reserved his greatest fury for Johnson, who hit out at Farage’s position on Putin at the weekend, describing Farage’s comments as “morally repugnant” and accusing him of “parroting Putin’s lies” about Ukraine.

To cheers, Farage said:

This man will go down as the worst prime minister of modern times, a man who betrayed an 80 seat majority. Who opened the door to mass immigration? Who betrayed the will of Brexit voters? It was Boris Johnson.

He appeared with a blown-up cover of a newspaper report of past comments by Johnson which led to the former Tory leader being branded as an apologist for Putin’s invasion. “If you want an example of EU policymaking on the hoof and EU pretensions to running defence policy that have caused real trouble, then look at what has happened in the Ukraine,’’ Johnson had said in a speech.

Here is a version Farage posted on X this morning.

Starmer says he is not in favour of 'ideology' being taught in schools on gender

In an interview yesterday Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, refused to confirm that a Labour government would implement the guidance on trans issues for schools in England published by the government at the end of last year. The guidance was controversial partly because it said pupils should not be taught what it described as “gender identity ideology”.

Asked about the issue today, Keir Starmer said Labour wanted the consultation on the guidance to continue. He said:

I think we need to complete the consultation process and make sure that there is guidance that is age appropriate. That is helpful for teachers and has at its heart the safeguarding of children.

But asked if he would rip up the ban on teaching children and young people about “gender ideology” at school, he replied:

No, I’m not in favour of ideology being taught in our schools on gender.

Sunak rejects IFS claim Tory manifesto ignoring some of big challenges facing UK

Rishi Sunak has rejected the Institute for Fiscal Studies’ claim that the Tory manifesto, like Labour’s, is ignoring some of the big challenges facing the UK. (See 11.37am.)

Asked if he accepted the IFS analysis, Sunak told reporters:

No, I don’t agree with that. We have a fully costed manifesto which can deliver tax cuts for people at every stage in their lives and that is largely funded by making sure that we can find some savings in the growth of the welfare budget, because it’s been growing at unsustainable levels since the pandemic.

We’ve set out a very clear plan to reform that, to support people into work. And in fact the IFS acknowledge that, last time around, they said that that wasn’t possible, that it was actually delivered, and that’s something that the IFS themselves have said.

Labour, in contrast, don’t think you can save a single penny from the welfare bill, which is already where we’re spending more than on transport, schools, law enforcement. I don’t think that’s right. I want to deliver tax cuts for people and constraining the increase in the welfare budget is the right way to do that to support people in work.

Sunak urges Scottish voters to use election to end SNP's 'constitutional monomania'

The strongest message to emerge from the Scottish Conservatives’ manifesto launch in Edinburgh was about beating the SNP and putting an end to “constitutional monomania”.

Rishi Sunak seemed to relieved to be turning his attention to a weakened opponent. He attacked the SNP for turning Scotland into “the high tax capital of the UK” and selling out farmers.

Of course, he also warned that pensions and the oil and gas industry “aren’t safe with Labour”, but this event was firmly focused on using the same campaigning strategy that has proved successful for the Tories in Scotland since 2014 – targeting the pro-union vote. He said:

This weekend we must send the nationalists the strongest message possible that the country wants to move on from their independence obsession …

Scotland wants politicians who concentrate on the priorities of the Scottish people and not constitutional monomania.

He warned that voting Reform UK in Scotland was “letting the nationalists off the hook. Don’t let your frustration allow the SNP to keep the constitutional debate going”. He went on:

If you want to beat the SNP and stand up for the UK then you have to vote Scottish Conservative.

Scottish leader Douglas Ross reiterated previous calls for what is essentially tactical voting, pointing out that in key target seats across Scotland a vote for any party other than the Tories would let the SNP win.

Ross said:

If the SNP do not just lose this election in Scotland but have a terrible result and are defeated right across the country – then we will have put the nationalists’ political obsession to rest for a generation.

Updated

Sunak says Tories doing own inquiry into betting allegations, and he's not aware of more candidates under suspicion

The Conservative party is conducting its own investigation into allegations that candidates and officials bet on the date of the general election using inside information, Rishi Sunak said today.

Speaking to journalists, and responding to claims from the opposition, and from some of his own candidates (see 8.57am), that he should have responded more robustly to the allegations, Sunak said:

The Gambling Commission is independent of government – it’s independent of me.

I don’t have the details of their investigation, right? They don’t report to me, I don’t have the details, but what I can tell you is, in parallel we’ve been conducting our own internal inquiries and of course will act on any relevant findings or information from that and pass it on to the Gambling Commission.

The commission is reportedly investigating two candidates, Craig Williams and Laura Saunders, as well as Saunders’ husband Tony Lee, the Conservative party’s campaigns director, and Nick Mason, the party’s chief data officer, who has denied wrongdoing.

Sunak told journalists today that he was not aware of any other candidates being under investigation – although he also said that the commission did not talk about the people it was investigating.

Asked whether he had ever bet on politics himself while an MP, Sunak replied: “No.”

Updated

Keir Starmer said this morning it was “nonsense” for the Tories to suggest Labour is placing undue pressure on the Gambling Commission over the election date betting scandal. (See 10.10am.) Asked about the claim, Starmer told reporters:

That’s nonsense. The Gambling Commission is obviously looking at these cases and what we need is leadership from the prime minister – he should have suspended those candidates.

He hasn’t done it because he’s not showing leadership.

DUP not worried Labour government would be pro-nationalist, says Gavin Robinson at manifesto launch

Gavin Robinson, the DUP leader, has urged against voting for smaller parties “who can’t win” as he launched his party’s manifesto, PA Media reports. PA says:

Robinson said his party is “campaigning for every vote” in the general election which will see some close races across Northern Ireland’s 18 constituencies.

He said that voting for smaller parties “risks helping to elect MPs who will take us in the wrong direction and who don’t believe in Northern Ireland”.

In recent history the DUP developed a strong working relationship with the Conservative government, brokering a confidence and supply deal in 2017.

However, Robinson dismissed speculation his party may have less influence in the event of a Labour government.

“We work with every government. We have worked and we will continue to work in the best interests of Northern Ireland,” he said.

“There are many who sometimes casually suggest that Labour is in some way pro-Irish nationalism … that is not true of this Labour party today that is standing across Great Britain on a pro-union ticket.

“The messages that you’ve heard from Hilary Benn as shadow secretary of state and Keir Starmer himself, who knows Northern Ireland, is not to upset the delicate balance that we have.

“I don’t have any strong concerns on that, but the DUP will love many, trust few, and always paddle our own canoe.”

The almost 50-page manifesto, titled Speaking Up For Northern Ireland, was launched at the Harland and Wolff Welders Football Club in the East Belfast constituency, where Robinson is a candidate.

The DUP is running 16 candidates for 18 available seats on the green benches in this general election. They returned eight MPs at the last election in 2019.

In his opening speech, Robinson said he wants his party to send “the strongest team to Westminster”.

UK faces choice between 'higher taxes or worse public services', and main parties won't admit it, says IFS

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has repeatedly argued that the main parties are refusing to face up to the hard choices that the next government will have to make, particularly the fact that existing long-term government spending plans (which Labour and the Tories are both accepting as their baseline) imply serious cuts for services in unprotected areas. But Paul Johnson’s opening presentation at the IFS event this morning was particularly withering.

Democrats argue that election campaigns should provide an opportunity for a country to have a serious debate about the choices it faces for the future. But that is not happening, the IFS is saying. It suggests Britain is being cheated.

  • Johnson, director of the IFS, said the next government would have to choose between “higher taxes or worse public services” and the two main parties were not admitting this. He said:

Public services are visibly struggling. Despite these high tax levels, spending on many public services will likely need to be cut over the next five years if government debt is not to ratchet ever upwards or unless taxes are increased further.

How can that be? A £50bn a year increase in debt interest spending relative to forecasts and a growing welfare budget bear much of the responsibility. Then we have rising health spending, a defence budget which for the first time in decades will likely grow rather than shrink, and the reality of demographic change and the need to transition to net zero. Add in low growth and the after-effects of the pandemic and energy price crisis and you have a toxic mix indeed when it comes to the public finances.

These raw facts are largely ignored by the two main parties in their manifestos. That huge decisions over the size and shape of the state will need to be taken, that those decisions will, in all likelihood, mean either higher taxes or worse public services, you would not guess from reading their prospectuses or listening to their promises. They have singularly failed even to acknowledge some of the most important issues and choices to have faced us for a very 1 long time.

  • He said the manifesto plans from the Tories and Labour on tax, spending and benefits were very modest and “certainly don’t answer the big questions facing us over a five-year parliament”.

  • He said it was a mistake for the Conservatives and Labour to rule out many future tax increases. He said:

The manifestos told us much more about what they wouldn’t do than what they would. Tax locks - pledges not to increase specific taxes or tax rates - aren’t new. But this time, the parties have really gone to town. We’ve seen something of a tax lock arms race. Both have tied their hands on income tax, NICs, VAT and corporation tax. The Conservatives have a long list of other tax rises, and reforms, that they wouldn’t do. Labour have ruled out more tax options since the publication of the manifestos …

These tax locks are a mistake. They will constrain policy if a future government decides that it does in fact want to raise more money to fund public services. They also put serious constraints on tax reform – something which the Conservatives seem to have all but ruled out, and which is notable in the Labour manifesto by its absence.

  • He says Labour’s promise not to raise tax for “working people” was too vague to be meaningful. He said:

Taken at face value, Labour’s promise of “no tax increases on working people” rules out essentially all tax rises. There is no tax paid exclusively by those who don’t work. Who knows what this pledge is really supposed to mean.

  • He said the Lib Dem manifesto contained “some good ideas”, but that the party wrongly implied its tax rises would hit ordinary people.

  • He claimed the Reform UK and Green party manifestos, which contained plans to dramatically slash and increase respectively the level of state spending, were poisioning the political debate in the UK because they were raising unrealistic expectations. He said:

The way [Reform UK and the Greens] suggest that they have radical ideas which can realistically make a positive difference, when in fact what they propose is wholly unattainable, helps to poison the entire political debate.

Take Reform. They propose £90bn of specific tax cuts and £50bn of spending increases, “paid for” by a £150bn package of measures that includes substantial, unspecified cuts in welfare and government waste. If they want a smaller state – a perfectly reasonable ambition – they should tell us how they will achieve it. We saw the consequences of massive tax cuts with no detail on how they would be paid for in September 2022.

In any case, the claim that they could eliminate NHS waiting lists at a cost of £17bn a year is demonstrably wrong, while the vast tax cuts would cost even more than stated, by a margin of tens of billions of pounds per year.

On the other side, the Green party set out a vision for a much larger state …A large part is an additional £80bn a year of borrowing, to be constrained only by its effect on inflation. A massive increase in borrowing when the economy is capacity-constrained, and the debt interest burden is already just that, a huge burden, would have unpleasant consequences.

  • He said the two main parties were refusing to say who they would react if their economic plans did not work out as expected. He explained:

A key question to ask of those seeking our votes on 4 July is how would they respond to such bad economic news. Put taxes up by more? Deepen those cuts to spending? Or push back the date at which debt is forecast to fall? We have not been told. And a clear lesson of the last parliament is that bad shocks do happen. Is it so unreasonable for us to be given a hint of how they would prioritise before polling day?

Sunak claims Farage threat to national security because of his 'appeasement' of Putin

After a passage in his speech attack Labour on familiar grounds, Rishi Sunak also hit out at Reform UK.

[Reform UK] are not on the side of who you think they are.

Reform are standing candidates here in Scotland that are pro independence and anti monarchy.

And you all heard what Nigel Farage said about Ukraine. That plays into Putin’s hands. That kind of appeasement is dangerous for Britain’s security, the security of our allies that rely on us and will only embolden Putin.

This echoes what Sunak was saying at the weekend, after the BBC broadcast Nick Robinson’s interview with Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, in which he said the eastward expansion of the EU and Nato provoked Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Rishi Sunak is speaking at the start of the Scottish Conservatives’ manifesto launch in Edinburgh.

He started by saying that if Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader, had not “held the line” in 2021, at the last Holyrood elections, Nicola Sturgeon and the SNP would have got a majority, and the history of the UK would have been “very different”.

He seemed to be conceding that Sturgeon would have been entitled to hold an independence referendum which she would have won. That is not something the Conservative government at Westminster ever conceded at the time.

Sunak also said a vote for the Tories at this election would settle the matter for a generation. This is from Sky’s Rob Powell.

As Libby Brooks points out, the manifesto makes beating the SNP a priority.

Updated

Keir Starmer and Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, have been doing a Q&A with pupils at a school in Kettering. In his opening remarks, Starmer defended Labour’s plans to give the vote to 16 and 17-year-olds for all elections. They can already vote in devolved elections in Scotland and Wales, but they can’t vote in any English elections, or in any general elections.

Small boat arrivals reach record high for first six months of year, up 17% on total for same period in 2023

The number of migrants arriving in the UK after crossing the Channel has hit a new record for the first six months of a calendar year, PA Media reports. PA says:

Home Office figures show 257 people made the journey in four boats on Sunday, taking the provisional total for the year so far to 12,901.

The previous record for arrivals in the six months from January to June was 12,747 in 2022. In the first half of 2023, arrivals stood at 11,433.

The 2024 total to date is 17% higher than the number of arrivals recorded this time last year (11,058) and up 8% on the same period in 2022 (11,975).

Last year a total of 29,437 migrants arrived in the UK after crossing the Channel, down 36% on a record 45,774 in 2022.

More than 3,000 arrivals have now been recorded since the general election was called on 22 May (3,019), with immigration a key campaign battleground.

Labour and Tories ‘ducking hard choices’ on tax and spending, says IFS

The hard choices on tax and spending that will face Britain’s next government are being ducked by Labour and the Conservatives, leaving voters operating in a knowledge vacuum. the Institute for Fiscal Studies has said. Paul Johnson, director of the IFS, is speaking at an event now presening an IFS analysis of the various manifestos, but Larry Elliott has the story based on a text of his opening remarks sent out earlier under embargo. It’s here.

Tories and Labour accuse each other of trying to exploit Gambling Commission for political advantage

Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, accused Labour this morning of trying to pressurise the Gambling Commission for party political advantage.

Referring to the open letter sent by Pat McFadden, Labour’s national campaign coordinator, to the commission saying it should name the people it is investigating, Heaton-Harris said:

The leader of Labour’s campaign Pat McFadden wrote to try and put some undue influence on the Gambling Commission over the weekend. I think that is actually pretty concerning in itself, Labour trying to lean on yet another independent body like it lent on the speaker of the House of Commons not to have a vote on Gaza.

But Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary who was doing media interviews for Labour this morning, accused the Tories of using the commission to provide political cover from the ongoing election date betting scandal.

He complained about “the audacity of the Conservative party to hide behind the Gambling Commission” and went on:

I think people should greet with enormous suspicion, the fact that the Conservatives are trying to cover up in the middle of an election campaign, which of their candidates is under investigation for serious wrongdoing.

The Conservative party has declined to answer detailed questions about the allegations, such as how many of its candidates and officials are under investigation, what bets they placed and when they knew about the timing of the election, arguing it is not allowed to comment because the commission is carrying out its own investigation.

Updated

Wes Streeting says Labour should 'engage seriously' with concerns JK Rowling raises about trans policy

This morning the Times has splashed on a story about Labour’s plan to make it easier for trans people to get a gender recognition certificate (GRC), giving legal confirmation that they have changed gender. In her story Geraldine Scott says:

[Under current rules people wanting a GRC] are required to submit proof that they have changed genders, which can include official documents such as utility bills or passports, or even library cards or supermarket loyalty cards.

Officials insist on two years’ worth of documentation to ensure the person is prepared for a permanent change. However, The Times has learnt that Labour will ditch the requirement in an attempt to “remove indignities for trans people who deserve recognition and acceptance”.

Instead, transgender people will be required to undergo an effective cooling-off period for two years after their application for a GRC is submitted. A single doctor specialising in gender issues will be able to provide a medical report supporting the change to their new gender.

It has long been known that Labour plans to simplify the GRC process, but the issue is contentious because the Conservatives have attacked Labour relentless over its trans policy and at the weekend the author JK Rowling, a gender critical campaigner, said in an article in the Times that she would struggle to vote Labour because she thought Keir Starmer and others in the party were dismisive of women’s rights.

In an interview with Times Radio this morning Wes Streeting, the shadow health secretary, said that he felt “pretty depressed” reading Rowling’s article because it showed the party had more to do on this issue to rebuild trust with feminists. He also said the party should “engage seriously” with her arguments.

I have a lot of respect for JK Rowling both in terms of what she’s done for children and literacy but also the work that she’s done campaigning for women and in particular violence against women and girls.

I think that we’ve clearly got more work to do to rebuild trust with people that we’ve lost on this issue.

Streeting said that at times biological women felt excluded. He explained:

I think at times in pursuit of inclusion we’ve ended up in a position where women have felt excluded, biological women have felt excluded. And there are practical examples of this in terms of things like NHS language and documentation.

He added:

I think we can find a way through that both treats trans people with the dignity and respect that they deserve, and also treats women with the respect that they deserve, particularly protecting women’s spaces, women’s voices, and right to speak up.

So, when women like JK Rowling do speak up, I think it’s important we engage seriously with the arguments that she’s making, with the concerns that she has.

And also we listen to what trans people are saying about the everyday injustices and indignities that they’re experiencing too, whether that’s hate crime or poor provision in public services.

Stella Creasy ‘not intimidated’ after attack on her London office

The Labour candidate Stella Creasy has said she will not be intimidated after a window and door of her office in north-east London was smashed by an attacker, Peter Walker reports.

The election date betting scandal first became public when it was reported that Craig Williams, who was Rishi Sunak’s parliamentary private secretary in the last parliament was being investigated over a bet he placed on a July election three days before the election was announced. He told the BBC that was a “huge error of judgment”.

In an interview this morning Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, claimed the party did not know if Williams was acting on the basis of inside knowledge. He told LBC:

It needs to be determined whether or not [Williams] had prior knowledge …

He said he made a bet and that was a mistake. We don’t know and I don’t believe anybody does know, maybe the Gambling Commission do … but we don’t know whether he did that with prior knowledge or whether that was just a hunch or whatever.

Updated

Tory former minister says public wants ‘robust action’ from government on betting scandal

Good morning. We’re at the start of the last full week of the general election campaign, and Rishi Sunak’s campaign, which has been calamity-struck since he announced it soaking wet in a downpour, is still embroiled in the election date betting scandal. Here is our overnight story by Eleni Courea and Matthew Weaver.

This morning Tobias Ellwood, the Tory former minister and candidate in Bournemouth East, said Sunak should be doing more to limit the damage to the party caused by the controversy. Asked if he thought Sunak should have suspended the two candidates who are being investigated by the Gambling Commission over alleged suspect bets, Ellwood replied:

Given the scale of this, as we see now, and the potential for the story to continue to eclipse, to overshadow, the election. I would now agree.

I’m not sure anyone, including the prime minister, could have predicted the number of people involved when the story first broke. The public wants to see clearer, robust action.

Ellwood acknowledged the party faced a problem. He said it was not clear if those people being investigated were “in the room when the [election date] decision was made”, in which case the party could take immediate action. But if they were just responding to Westminster rumours, then it was for the Gambling Commission to decide if they were in the wrong, he said.

But Ellwood said the government could go further to reassure the public. He went on:

Let’s introduce clear rules, as you have in the City in connection to the purchase of stocks and shares for example, let’s prevent any current politician or party professional from placing any bets in the future. That will send a clear message to the public that this sad incident is being taken seriously and it won’t happen again.

Ellwood also said the thought the scandal would cost the Conservative party seats. “I have no doubt about it,” he said.

In a subsequent interview on the Today programme, Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary who is standing down as an MP, was asked if he thought Sunak should have suspended the two candidates being investigated. He replied:

I think what you’re trying to suggest is that someone is guilty until they’re proven innocent and that is not how this works.

Here is the agenda for the day.

Morning: Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, is on a visit in south London.

9.20am: Keir Starmer and Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, are visiting a school in the East Midlands where they will be taking part in a Q&A

10am: Gavin Robinson launches the DUP’s manifesto in Belfast.

10am: The Institute for Fiscal Studies holds a briefing on the parties’ election manifestos.

Morning: Rishi Sunak launches the Scottish Conservatives election in Edinburgh with Douglas Ross, the Scottish Tory leader.

Lunchtime: Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, holds a rally in Maidstone.

12.30pm: Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, takes part in a debate with Jonathan Reynolds, her Labour shadow, on Bloomberg TV.

5.30pm: Starmer and Sunak are interviewed back to back by Harry Cole, the paper’s political editor, and an audience of readers on Sun TV.

If you want to contact me, please post a message below the line (BTL) or message me on X (Twitter). I can’t read all the messages BTL, but if you put “Andrew” in a message aimed at me, I am more likely to see it because I search for posts containing that word. If you want to flag something up urgently, it is best to use X; I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly. I find it very helpful when readers point out mistakes, even minor typos (no error is too small to correct). And I find your questions very interesting too. I can’t promise to reply to them all, but I will try to reply to as many as I can, either BTL or sometimes in the blog.

Updated

 

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