What to expect tonight
ITV will host a 90-minute seven party debate, which is scheduled to kick off at 8.30pm BST.
Moderated by Julie Etchingham, the debate will include:
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Penny Mordaunt for the Conservative party
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Angela Rayner for the Labour party
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Daisy Cooper for Liberal Democrats
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Stephen Flynn for SNP
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Nigel Farage for Reform
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Carla Denyer for Green party
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Rhun ap Iorwerth for Plaid Cymru
If the last multiparty debate was anything to go by, we can expect clashes (perhaps that £2,000 tax rise claim will come up again?) and hostile exchanges. At the BBC seven party debate, Penny Mordaunt and Angela Rayner sparred over taxes, defence and the cost of living in a series of bad-tempered exchanges.
Another recurring theme of the seven-way debate was representatives of the smaller parties clashing with Nigel Farage, as the Reform UK leader made contentious points on areas including immigration, crime and net zero.
While we don’t know the exact series of topics and questions that will be raised, we can take a good guess that some of biggest general election stories of the past few days will crop up.
Like the previous multiparty debate, lots were drawn to decide the standing positions. Each party’s representative will stand behind podiums on the stage in the order of (L-R) Labour, Liberal Democrats, Conservative, Green party, Reform UK, SNP, Plaid Cymru.
Key events
Deyner says she thinks it’s “shameful when some politicians scapegoat the people who become our neighbours, our friends, our colleagues to distract from their chronic underinvestment in public services”. The solution is investing in communities. She says the Lib Dems will never engage in the scapegoat rhetoric.
Debate moves on to migration
Question: I keep hearing that migration levels are too high and are getting higher … I understand that we as a country need some foreign workers, but what are you going to do?
Rayner says our economy has been over-reliant on overseas workers to fill skill gaps. Labour has an industrial skills strategy that would tackle this, she says. It would “skill up” people in the UK, she says.
Farage says people voted to reduce “the numbers coming in” when they voted for Brexit and the Conservatives in the last general election. He says “one in 30 people walking on the street out there has come in the last two years’alone”. Net migration has to be at zero, he insists.
Farage thinks that putting 20% on private school fees is a “self-defeating policy” as it would then put the burden on state schools. Rayner says we cannot afford to give private schools a tax break.
Lib Dems’ Cooper says party was ‘punished’ over tuition fees
During the discussion about education, and especially universities, Flynn poked fun at the Lib Dems history with tuition fees.
“We were punished for that. That’s democracy,” Cooper replied. She changes subject by bringing up the Conservative’s move of scrapping maintenance grants.
Denyer says it’s time to invest in school buildings, teachers and in making “schools more than exam factories”.
Angela Rayner said she had “never been called timid in my life” when the Greens accused Labour of being too careful with its tax plans.
As the parties debated investment in public services, Green co-leader Carla Denyer told the ITV debate:
I would like to know from Angela: why so timid? Why wait for economic growth when you could introduce a tax that doesn’t affect those on average incomes or lower incomes, it only affects the billionaires and multi-millionaires?
It could raise tens of millions of pounds. Why won’t Labour even consider it?”
Labour deputy leader Rayner replied: “I have never been called timid in my life.”
She pointed to reforms rather than extra tax and spend as the solution, adding:
We gutted our home care services, it costs so much more money now that people are stuck on trolleys in A&E for 40 hours plus.
These are our elderly relatives that are treated really poorly and it costs us more money, so if we put the money in the right place, we can actually make savings.”
Laughter as Mordaunt describes UK education system as ‘world class’
Penny Mordaunt was laughed at by the ITV audience when she described the UK’s education system as “world class”.
Host Julie Etchingham said ITV had received messages from hundreds of teachers saying schools are in crisis while one 12-year-old had written in about his crumbling school building.
“Be honest, do you think our education system is still world class?” the host asked. Mordaunt said: “I think it is world class and we have improved.”
To laughter, she added:
Well, when we took office literacy rates were trailing the world, now they are leading them.
We have 90% of our schools are good or outstanding and we have undertaken an enormous refurbishment programme.”
“Most of the public don’t care what colour the cat is, they just want some mice caught,” the Mordaunt has said in reference to “dogma”, while answering a question about the NHS.
Answering the first question during ITV’s seven-way debate, Mordaunt said:
They [the public] want results and in my experience, listening to people who are actually doing these jobs – police officers who have reduced crime by half over the time we’ve been in office, healthcare professionals who are coming up with amazing initiatives in our hospitals and in our GP surgeries, teachers who are responsible now have 90% of our schools good or outstanding. Listen to the professionals in those services, keep political dogma out of it.”
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper addressed the issue of private involvement in the NHS and said:
To be honest, where there is capacity in the private sector, we could be using some of it in order to bring down waiting lists, but let’s not kid ourselves, there is very limited capacity in the private sector and we shouldn’t be using it if it guts more capacity from the NHS.”
Plaid Cymru’s Rhun ap Iorwerth said: “I have to draw attention to the analogy with the cats and the mice here. What we’ve seen under the Conservatives and 14 years is the fat cats getting rich and getting the cream. I fear that with privatisation of the NHS, we’re going to see the same under Labour.”
SNP’s Flynn blames Brexit for hospital and staffing issues
Farage laughs as Flynn says “we need more people coming in to work in our hospitals and in our social care”. He blames Brexit for staffing issues. Farage says that Labour is right to use the private sector in the NHS.
Rayner rebuts Flynn’s comment. She says that Wes Streeting has said that capacity in the private sector would be used to bring down waiting lists, rather than keep people waiting for years. She says again that Labour will always keep the NHS publicly owned.
Etchingham again asks the seven participants whether the have tangible “big ideas”. Rayner says reform and new technology is needed for the “best possible care”. She presses the point about social care needing to be tackled also.
Flynn says the shadow health secretary has essentially said the door would be open to the private sector. Rayner says that’s not true.
Daisy Cooper says she’s heard versions of this question again and again. She says the Lib Dem’s manifesto is a manifesto to save the NHS and that they would invest £9bn “upstream”. Under the Lib Dems, Cooper says there will be 8,000 more GPs and the dentist crisis would be tackled.
Labour’s Angela Rayner says the “workforce problem” needs to be fixed and investment is needed. She says the NHS will remain a public service under Labour. She says unless you tackle social care along with the NHS “then you won’t fix the problem”.
Carla Denyer for the Green party says on the NHS that the Conservatives plan doesn’t help when they’re refusing to pay health workers properly. She says Labour’s solution of more privatisation isn’t helpful either.
The answer, she says, is investment. For both the NHS and social care, she adds.
Panellists quizzed on plans to help an NHS that is ‘on its knees’
The first question is on the public services with a focus on the NHS.
Q: The NHS was an amazing thing but, unfortunately, now it is on its knees. So many public services are not working as they used to. Do any of you have any ideas that are big enough to make things work again?
The Conservative’s Penny Mordaunt says the “only way” to reduce the NHS waiting lists is to keep the NHS budget strong. She says Labour is the only party on tonight’s platform to cut that and says they have cut the NHS budget three times in Wales. Mordaunt says Conservatives have brought in 70,000 more nurses.
The SNP’s Stephen Flynn says under a future Labour government there would be £18bn worth of public sector cuts.
Rhun ap Iorwerth for Plaid Cymru says at the heart of the future of the NHS is sustainability of the workforce as well as funding. He says it “pains so many people to hear Labour’s Wes Streeting talking about bringing the private sector into the NHS”.
Reform UK’s Nigel Farage says the reason NHS caseloads are up due to an “exploding population”. He says “all of our public services are under pressure because the population has increased by 6 million since the Conservatives came to power”. He says even though people talk about more money for the NHS, we need to look at countries such as France where people pay into an insurance fund. “Let’s think more broadly,” he says.
Etchingham says the format for tonight is simple. Questions will be coming from the audience and Etchingham says she might add in questions from viewers. She says the participants will be able to answer uninterrupted.
Etchingham passes over to the seven participants to introduce themselves to the viewers.
Seven-party ITV debate kicks off
Julie Etchingham, the ITV newsreader and journalist who is chairing tonight’s debate, opens the programme.
Bookmakers told to find all substantial bets placed on July poll after Sunak aide’s ‘flutter’
Bookmakers have been asked by the Gambling Commission to trawl through all substantial bets placed on a July election after one of Rishi Sunak’s closest aides put a wager on the poll date just days before it was announced.
The prime minister said he was “disappointed” with the behaviour of Craig Williams, which was revealed in the Guardian, but neither would be drawn on whether they had discussed the date of the election prior to the bet being placed.
The watchdog has now asked bookmakers to provide information on all substantial bets on the timing of the election after odds shortened on a July poll in the week before the date was announced.
Williams, who is standing for re-election in Montgomeryshire and Glyndŵr, placed a £100 bet with Ladbrokes on a July poll. The Gambling Commission launched an inquiry after the bet was referred to them by the bookmaker.
Williams, Sunak’s parliamentary private secretary and who was MP for Montgomeryshire until parliament was dissolved, would not confirm if he had insider information on the date.
The prime minister refused to be drawn on whether he would disown Williams as a candidate, saying: “It is very disappointing. Craig Williams has said that it’s a huge error of judgment. Now there is an independent inquiry which is confidential and it’s important that that is allowed to continue. It’s not appropriate to say anything while that’s ongoing.”
It understood the watchdog wrote to all licensed bookmakers this week requesting information on anyone who stood to gain more than £199 by betting on a July election in the UK.
You can read the full piece by Matthew Weaver, Jim Waterson and Jessica Elgot here:
