General election 2024: Starmer ‘infuriated’ by secret Diane Abbott briefing as SNP attack ‘chaotic’ Tories

Sir Keir Starmer will pitch Labour as the “party of national security” as he seeks to switch attention to defence matters during the general election campaign.

The Labour leader is expected to meet with forces veterans and a group of his party’s candidates when he campaigns in the North West of England on Monday.

Sir Keir will reaffirm his commitment to a “nuclear deterrent triple lock” as well as his ambition to increase defence spending to 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP), a measure of the size of the economy.

Labour says its nuclear deterrent triple lock involves: a commitment to construct the four new nuclear submarines in Barrow-in-Furness; maintaining Britain’s continuous at-sea deterrent; and the delivery of all future upgrades needed for the submarines to patrol the waters.

The Minister for Women and Equalities said the Conservatives would set out a “clarification in the law”.

She told Sky News this morning: “What we are doing is making sure that people understand what the law says.

“We have seen a lot of problems with people misinterpreting the law.”

The Conservative party has pledged to amend the Equality Act to rewrite the definitions and allow organisations ban transgender women.

The Tories claim a new definition will improve the safety of women and girls from single-sex spaces.

However, the party says the proposed changes would not scrap existing protections against discrimination on the basis of gender reassignment.

The sex of those with a Gender Recognition Certificate will still align with their acquired gender in law outside the Equality Act.

Under the new scheme the Conservatives will also establish in law that gender recognition is a reserved matter, claiming that “this will mean that an individual can only have one sex in the eyes of the law in the United Kingdom”.

Parties are heading out across the nation to convince voters ahead of the big day on July 4.

Here’s what you can expect from today’s campaigning:

• The Tories have unveiled a pledge to over overhaul equality laws to redefine what the term “sex” means in law.

• Rishi Sunak is expected to visit the South East as he sets out “confusions around definitions of sex and gender”.

• Sir Keir Starmer will outline Labour’s defence and naitonal security stance.

• He will visit forces veterans in the North East of England.

• The Liberal Democrats are set to announce a new Blue Flag status for rives to expand marine protected areas.

• SNP, Reform UK, the Green Party and Plaid Cymru candidates will be out speaking to voters.

Over 30 years ago in Canada, a ruling Conservative Party was demolished in an election thanks to a party called ‘Reform’.

But anyone predicting history will repeat itself in Britain this year is set to be sorely disappointed, writes Jabed Ahmed.

Read Jabed’s piece in full here:

Rory Stewart has spoken of never wanting to go back into politics, saying he found being a Conservative minister “very unpleasant” and admitting: “I feel like a fraud all the time, in a whole series of ways.”

Mr Stewart ran to succeed Theresa May as prime minister and Tory leader in 2019 and came to prominence for his amusing and highly personal use of social media.

The Labour leader said last year’s 685,000 figure has “got to come down” as he vowed to “control our borders and make sure British businesses are helped to hire Brits first”.

Seeing the Online Safety Act as a “job done” would be a “disaster”, a bereaved father has said as he called on the next government to commit to updating legislation to tackle harms affecting children.

Ian Russell, whose 14-year-old daughter Molly took her own life, said bold measures are needed to reassure parents of “real change” when it comes to internet safety and their children.

In 2022, a coroner ruled schoolgirl Molly, from Harrow, north-west London, died from “an act of self-harm while suffering from depression and the negative effects of online content” in November 2017.

Mr Russell said while the Act has laid “really important” foundations, a new government will need to work out how to “keep on top” of developments in the fast-changing world of tech.

Mr Russell told the PA news agency it would be “wrong to forget about the Online Safety Act, or to think of it as a piece of legislation that only hit the statute books towards the end of 2023 and so it’s done”.

He added: “It’s not done because it’s so new, it’s not done because it will need revising, it’s not done because tech moves at such a pace that, even if we were to catch up in terms of legislation and regulation, tech would have moved on and we’d have to adapt it to catch up with tech again.

“So this is a constantly evolving thing and it would just be a disaster if the next government starts to regard the Online Safety Act as a job done. This isn’t finished, they need to complete the work and need to work out how to keep on top of it.”

Keir Starmer, the man who seemingly has everything to lose, and Rishi Sunak, the prime minister trailing in his wake, are gearing up for what could be a crucial moment in the election campaign – the first televised showdown. Kate Devlin investigates