Election

Read the latest General Election news, views and analysis.

Thursday

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Watch: Sunak slammed for Partygate during campaign trip

Oh dear. It was only a matter of time before the issue of Partygate came up on the campaign trail and today the Prime Minister was forced to face up to it. On his trip to Buckinghamshire, the first question asked of Rishi Sunak centred on the pandemic, the government-enforced lockdown and the rule-breaking in No. 10. Hardly the best start… Pointing to the PM’s use of the word ‘trust’, a frustrated voter spoke out: It’s good that you mentioned trust. My mum died in 2020, the height of the pandemic, my brothers couldn’t be with us in hospital, I couldn’t be there. You probably remember, that was the month

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Rayner backs Abbott staying on as Labour MP

Another day, another confusing twist in Labour’s stance on Diane Abbott. The ongoing saga has created significant disquiet over the last 48 hours, with Labour’s confusing messaging on the whole thing proving a rather effective distraction from Sir Keir Starmer’s party policies. It’s hardly the best way to kick off your election campaign… First we heard that Labour would bar the long-standing MP from representing the party at the next election. Then, just hours after the story broke, Abbott was reinstated with the Labour whip, which some speculated was to allow her to retire with dignity. Then Starmer himself denied that Abbott had been ‘banned’ from standing at around the

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Can Sunak really take credit for future interest rate cuts?

When the Bank of England finally delivers an interest rate cut, can the Tory party take credit for it? Rishi Sunak thinks so. ‘We are the party who has committed to bringing down inflation, which is a necessary condition for bringing down interest rates,’ he told the Times in an interview published today. ‘And I think people can see we have delivered that.’ Of course no politician is in a position to promise or deliver a rate cut. That decision sits firmly with the BoE’s Monetary Policy Committee, who this month voted to hold the base rate 5.25 per cent for the six time in a row. But to be fair to

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SNP’s ‘urgent plea’ to house campaigning Westminster staffers

Oh dear. No one party appears to be enjoying an especially slick campaign at present, but north of the border the SNP seems particularly down on its luck. As Mr S noted on Monday, the Nats are not exactly swimming in cash at the moment — the party is struggling to bring donations in while the police probe into its finances remains ongoing — and separatist candidate have been forced to plead with the public for help with their campaign Crowdfunders. Now the Nats are faced with a fresh problem: where to house the party’s central Westminster team, who are loyally trekking north to help with election efforts. Well, if

Eliot Wilson

Labour’s law and order plans are pure vibes

Most observers would agree that Yvette Cooper, the shadow home secretary, is a serious person. One newspaper profile last year spoke of her ‘steely determination’. Sir Keir Starmer knew what he was doing when he appointed her to the Home Office brief, the toughest and most unforgiving in Westminster. On Wednesday, while the party leadership was mired in accusations of purging its left wing, Cooper went into bat for Labour’s law and order credentials, promising to ‘take back our town centres from thugs and thieves.’ Efficiency savings are notorious in Whitehall. All too often, they are a triumph of hope over experience This is an important policy area: crime may not top

Isabel Hardman Isabel Hardman

Starmer’s safety-first campaign is backfiring

The problem with spending an election campaign saying as little new as possible is that it does leave a big gap that can easily be filled with rows over process and mistakes. Labour has a safety-first approach to its campaign, wanting to reassure voters that it has changed rather than being too exciting, but this makes the row over Diane Abbott all the more pronounced because there is little else to talk about. Yesterday, the party wanted to talk about its pledges on the NHS, but none of them were particularly new or striking. Instead, its frontbenchers were all asked repeatedly about the way the party has handled Abbott’s case.

Patrick O’Flynn Patrick O'Flynn

How does Sunak solve a problem like Farage?

In the classic comedy Blackadder II the late, great Rik Mayall was responsible for one of the most memorable cameo appearances in television history. As the swashbuckling adventurer Lord Flasheart, he gatecrashed Blackadder’s wedding, declaring himself ‘flash by name and flash by nature’. Leaving female guests giddy and male ones open-mouthed in admiration, he then eloped with the spellbound bride. This left Rowan Atkinson’s Sir Edmund to contemplate the horror of a substitute marriage to the bridesmaid, Baldrick. A week into this election, I found myself scouring YouTube for the relevant footage after observing Nigel Farage’s performances to date. When Rishi Sunak took the Westminster village by surprise with his

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Paul Waugh to fight Rochdale seat for Labour

If at first you don’t succeed, try, try, try again. That appears to be Paul Waugh’s guiding mantra anyway, after the former chief political commentator for the i newspaper put himself forward for the Rochdale candidacy for a second time this year. He has now been successful and will stand as Labour’s candidate for the seat in the looming general election. All’s well that ends well, eh? Waugh announced at the start of the year that he was stepping down from his top newspaper job to try to be selected for Rochdale after the death of veteran MP Tony Lloyd on 17 January — but the hack was unsuccessful after

Katy Balls Katy Balls

Starmer purges the Corbynites

One of the first thing Keir Starmer and his team decided to focus on after winning the Labour leadership was candidate selection. The Labour leader’s senior aide Morgan McSweeney takes the view that a Labour rosette needs to mean something – and in recent years that has appeared to be in doubt. In the 2017 and 2019 snap elections a series of Labour candidates were picked with little vetting, or with factional reasons winning the day. This included Jared O’Mara who was selected for Sheffield Hallam for Labour when Jeremy Corbyn was leader and elected in 2017. In 2023, he was jailed over a £52,000 fraud. So, Starmer’s team have

Andrew Tettenborn

Fewer kids should go to university

Rishi Sunak said on Tuesday what many of us have quietly suspected for some time. As a nation, we have too few apprentices and too many university students. Why not, he said, look hard at the higher education courses we provide at public expense, and where we see high drop-out rates, or poor employment and earnings prospects, be prepared to axe them and use the money to support apprenticeships? Predictably, the call for a cut in the number of university students has led to yelps of dissent, both from Labour with an election to win, and also from the higher education establishment with sales to safeguard. For all that, however,

Wednesday

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Now Labour blocks Lloyd Russell-Moyle from standing

It is a bad time to be a member of the Socialist Campaign Group. Hours after Mr S revealed that Labour activists in Poplar are urging the party to intervene against Apsana Begum, tonight Lloyd Russell-Moyle has confirmed that he will be blocked from standing again in Brighton Kemptown. The left-winger, a former frontbencher under Jeremy Corbyn and Keir Starmer, told activists tonight that ‘yesterday, out of the blue, I received an administrative suspension letter.’ According to Russell-Moyle, an unknown person has made ‘what I believe to be a vexatious and politically motivated complaint about my behaviour eight years ago. This is a false allegation that I dispute totally.’ He

Jawad Iqbal

Labour can’t avoid questions about Diane Abbott forever

The Labour leadership has only itself to blame for becoming embroiled in a bitter and divisive row over the future of Dianne Abbott, the MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington. She was suspended from the party in April last year after writing a letter to the Observer that appeared to play down racism against Jewish people. The party is now facing growing questions about how the disciplinary process around Abbott unfolded. Abbott apologised for her remarks, but was placed under a months-long investigation and lost the Labour whip. She finally confirmed this morning that she would not be allowed to stand again as a Labour candidate, even though the

Brendan O’Neill Brendan O’Neill

The tragedy of Diane Abbott

Here’s the tragedy of Diane Abbott. She entered British politics as a trailblazer for black Britons and now she leaves public life on the sour note of insulting Jewish Britons. She started out as a warrior against racism but ended up seeming to minimise racism. She devoted her political career to standing up for beleaguered minorities and then made the grave moral error of playing down the beleaguering of Britain’s Jewish minority. The moral fall of Diane Abbott tells a broader story about the moral decay of the left How did this happen? How did our first black female MP end up in the eye of a racism storm? How

Callum Hunter

Could the election be closer than you think?

Yesterday, the firm I work for, J.L. Partners, released a poll showing a 12-point lead for Labour over the Conservatives. This gap between the parties is much narrower than other polling companies are predicting – with several other polls showing a 20 point plus lead for Labour. Our poll still shows that Labour is heading for victory, but it has already been seized on by the Conservatives as a sign that they are still in contention in this election campaign. What explains the difference in these polls? And could the election in fact be closer than many think? To understand how we have arrived at this result, you also have to understand the

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Iain Dale quits LBC to run as Tory candidate

It’s the end of an era for over 70 Tory MPs who will quit their seats at the next election – but one media veteran is making a rather interesting move in the opposite direction. Iain Dale, who has worked at LBC since 2010 and has presented a number of shows including Cross Question and All Talk, told listeners on Tuesday night that the show would be his last as he wants to stand for the Tory candidacy in Tunbridge Wells. After an extremely successful broadcast career, it’s quite the decision… The seat is currently held by Greg Clark MP, who announced last week that he will be joining the

Tuesday

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Diane Abbott banned from standing for Labour

The drama in Westminster never seems to end – and tonight is certainly no exception to that rule. In one of the biggest developments of the week, it transpires that Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour party will not allow veteran MP Diane Abbott to represent the party at the upcoming general election. However, Abbott has reportedly been given the Labour whip back as a middle way. The Hackney North & Stoke Newington MP was the first black woman elected to parliament, serving continually since 1987 and achieving a majority of over 33,000 in 2019 – but Labour’s decision this evening is likely to bring her 37-year political career to end. The

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BBC presenter grovels after Farage jibe

It seems these days that the BBC is doing a better job of creating the news than presenting it. Today’s row is about one of the broadcaster’s stars entering into a spat with Reform’s Nigel Farage — and losing rather spectacularly… The I’m a Celeb finalist was out today helping promote Richard Tice’s party in Dover as he made his first big speech of the election campaign. At a gathering of party supporters and journalists, Farage spoke of immigration problems seen in Europe. Quoting remarks made by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, the Reform founder pointed to ‘the wave of — and I’m using his words not mine — “aggressive, young males” that

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Watch: Ed Davey struggles to stay afloat during campaign tour

It’s a gaffe a day in British politics, as poorly-planned campaign visits are fast turning party leaders into laughing stocks. The latest victim is none other than Sir Ed Davey, who is currently on a UK tour to spread the word that the Liberal Democrats are putting the issue of sewage dumping at the top of their manifesto. This morning, Davey joined local MP Tim Farron on a constituency visit to Windermere in the Lake District to campaign on water cleanliness. For that reason alone — never mind the fact that the Lib Dem leader is not exactly an, um, experienced paddleboarder — it’s certainly rather brave of Sir Ed

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Did Rachel Reeves just rule out more tax hikes?

Speaking to business leaders in the East Midlands this morning, Rachel Reeves delivered a fairly uncontroversial speech. In her first major address since the election was called last week, the shadow chancellor insisted that Labour is the ‘natural party of British business’ (a point bolstered by today’s letter signed by over 100 business chiefs endorsing Labour). She said she wanted ‘to lead the most pro-growth, pro-business Treasury our country has ever seen’ – who could argue with that? She then went on to restate her commitment to fiscal discipline and a promise to make the numbers add up. While the dig at free markets won’t have been everyone’s cup of tea, it was

Iain Macwhirter

The SNP has finally given up on Greta Thunberg

It is less than three years since Nicola Sturgeon was taking selfies with Greta Thunberg at the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow. Now in this election the climate, if you’ll excuse the pun, has changed beyond all recognition. Gone is the moral posturing and climate alarmism of recent years as the Scottish parties desperately roll back on their climate rhetoric in the face of huge job losses in Scotland’s energy sector. Black is the new green. Oil and gas companies are no longer climate pariahs. It was of course Nicola Sturgeon back in 2021 who made Scotland the first country in the world  to declare a ‘climate emergency’. We cannot