‘Not unnatural’ for high-profile MPs to step down before election, says minister
The treasury minister Bim Afolami insists it is “not unnatural” for high-profile Tory MPs such as Gove to be standing down at an election. The MP for Hitchen and Harpenden, where the Conservatives have seen their majority diminish in recent elections, has told Times Radio:
Look, it’s not unnatural if you’ve got people who served for 20, sometimes 30 or 35 years in parliament in their 50s or 60s coming to retirement or indeed retiring completely, that they choose to bring their political careers to a close. I think that’s fine.
Afolami said he thinks the party has a “good balance” of Tory big beasts, such as the chancellor Hunt, and newer MPs such as him. He denied it had crossed his mind to stand down or being worried about losing his seat, saying the party is “pretty confident here”. He has added:
The Lib Dems are strong but, you know, we’re confident that we’ll hold the seat and we’ll beat them.
Key events
Zoe Williams
It was a disastrous first day of campaigning for Rishi Sunak: his audience of warehouse workers in Derbyshire was discovered to contain undercover Tory councillors, and his small talk in Barry, south Wales, was decried when he asked everyone whether they were looking forward to “all the football”: Wales did not qualify for the Euros.
Sunak is now probably in a helicopter somewhere, self-soothing with the truism that all prime ministers make football gaffes. It’s so common that it’s almost part of the office; that you be inauthentic in your love of the beautiful game. For sure, all prime ministers do mess something up, but every clanger tells its own story, about the man (or woman), the time, the expectation and the choice of team.
Here are some of the highest-profile football gaffes committed by politicians over the decades:
Aditya Chakrabortty
Say this for Keir Starmer: he’s lucky in his enemies. From Rebecca Long-Bailey to Liz Truss to Humza Yousaf, they flop as heavily as solo projects from lesser members of Take That. And then we come to Rishi Sunak.
It shouldn’t be said of a man wealthier than the king, but: poor Rishi. The defining images of this first week of the election campaign will be of a downpour and D:Ream, and the ostensible leader of the country standing drenched on his doorstep as if, Withnail-style, he’d called an election by mistake. For his launch, Starmer kept in the warm and looked prime ministerial. What a contrast.
Or is it? Elections bring out such binaries: incumbent v insurgent, chump v champ. But these two rivals are more alike, personally and politically, than is in either’s interest to let on.
Both non-London southerners, they come from well-paid jobs outside Westminster, Sunak in finance and Starmer in law. SW1 is stuffed with lifers, yet these two only became MPs in 2015, gifted ultra-safe seats and swift promotion to the frontbench.
Conservative donors have poured more than £2.5m into key election battlegrounds to shore up support for MPs, such as Liam Fox and Penny Mordaunt, who are in danger of losing their seats.
Rowena Mason, Henry Dyer and Aletha Adu write that the 2024 election will be the highest-spending UK contest, after the government raised national election limits to £34m per party – leaving the Conservatives and Labour in an arms race to raise cash.
Tory candidates and their associations in some of the most closely contested seats have been bringing in £50,000–£100,000 from donors over the last year, as tight local spending limits kick in only during the last five weeks of the campaign.
A last-minute splurge by candidates is expected next week before the campaign deadline of 30 May. MPs and activists across the parties said they were rushing out mailshots before the regulated period for spending kicks in, and tens of thousands of pounds were being spent on targeted letters and surveys.
A briefing pack for Conservative candidates, shared with the Guardian, urges them:
Spend as much as possible between now and 30 May getting targeted social media adverts and campaign material out. This is important, as whatever you can deliver and post between now and 30 May will not count towards candidate election expenses.
Experts warned that the parties were increasingly getting their funds from a small number of big donors with the power to influence results in marginal seats – despite Labour’s commanding lead in the national polls.
The prime minister has made light of his disastrous general election announcement; during which he became increasingly drenched by rain as he was also drowned out by the strains of the anthem to Labour’s victorious 1997 general election campaign.
Sunak said he avoided catching pneumonia while speaking outside 10 Downing Street, but admitted he was not sure what state his suit was in. The prime minister was meeting local ex-servicemen at one of their regular Saturday breakfast meetings in Northallerton in North Yorkshire, in his Richmond constituency.
The prime minister met the group of eight veterans and sat in the Buck Inn, a Wetherspoons pub on the High Street, where the group were sipping tea and eating breakfast.
Vicky Rudd, sat next to her husband Doug, from Richmond British Legion, asked Sunak about his health, concerned he might have caught pneumonia “after seeing that picture” of the election announcement speech. The prime minister said:
It was wet. The number of people who have given me an umbrella over the last couple of days…
He reflected it was still right to make the announcement in the rain, saying:
When the moments happen, that’s what you do. That’s our tradition, the prime minister, in the big moments, they call the election and they go out there. I thought, come rain or shine, it’s the right thing to do. But no pneumonia yet, my suit on the other hand… I’m not quite sure what state it will be in when I get back down to London.
The Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar will visit Wishaw in North Lanarkshire following the official launch of the party’s campaign on Friday. He says:
This chaotic and dysfunctional Tory government has let down Scots and put their own party interest ahead of the national interest – but the same is true of the SNP.
This is a pivotal moment for Scotland and a chance to reject the division and decline of both the Tories and the SNP.
The next six weeks will decide Scotland’s future and I know what path I want us to take. This election is an opportunity for change that we cannot afford to miss.
The Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross was joined by Stephen Kerr, the party’s candidate for Angus and Perthshire Glens, as he visited a railway station in Brechin. Ross said:
Our campaign to beat the SNP and end their obsession with independence is going full steam ahead. John Swinney’s shameless defence of Michael Matheson is turning more and more local people away from the SNP.
We’re asking voters to come together and take the opportunity to remove the SNP from every seat possible. We have a big chance in this election, but we need to seize it.
The Scottish Lib Dem leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said it was time to “tear down the acid yellow wall of the SNP” as he campaigned in Mid Dunbartonshire, which he claimed would be the tightest-fought seat in Scotland.
The Scottish first minister will lead a “day of action” for the SNP as the first weekend of general election campaigning begins. John Swinney will be travelling around Scotland as he and other party leaders make their case.
He is expected to discuss the SNP’s end to tuition fees, the doubling of NHS funding, the Scottish child payment, free bus travel for young, and disabled and elderly people, and baby boxes. Swinney says:
I am proud to stand on the SNP’s record in government, and to contrast it with the record of the Westminster parties.
We have managed to achieve so much in the face of 14 years of Westminster austerity because we are the only party that will always put Scotland first – and which is focused on people’s priorities.
But just imagine how much more we could achieve if all decisions about Scotland were made in Scotland, rather than by Westminster parties for whom Scotland will always be an afterthought and who are both doubling down on austerity and cuts.
This general election is the opportunity to put Scotland first and unite behind an alternative to austerity and the SNP’s message of hope – protecting the NHS, tackling the cost-of-living crisis and eradicating child poverty.
Tories claim Sunak is not taking ‘day off’
Bim Afolami is seeking to counter the narrative that Sunak’s plan to spend Saturday in discussion with his advisers amounts to a “day off”.
Three sources have told the Guardian the prime minister is taking the unusual step of a day away from public events on the first Saturday of the campaign, spending the day at home in his constituency and in London.
Afolami tells Sky News Sunak is not “taking the day off” from campaigning, with the broadcaster saying it understands he plans to meet a group of veterans in the morning. The City minister says it’s “not right” to say Sunak is taking the day off campaigning, claiming: “He’s going to be campaigning in Yorkshire.”
But, asked what campaign events Sunak has planned, he admits he does not know.
‘Not unnatural’ for high-profile MPs to step down before election, says minister
The treasury minister Bim Afolami insists it is “not unnatural” for high-profile Tory MPs such as Gove to be standing down at an election. The MP for Hitchen and Harpenden, where the Conservatives have seen their majority diminish in recent elections, has told Times Radio:
Look, it’s not unnatural if you’ve got people who served for 20, sometimes 30 or 35 years in parliament in their 50s or 60s coming to retirement or indeed retiring completely, that they choose to bring their political careers to a close. I think that’s fine.
Afolami said he thinks the party has a “good balance” of Tory big beasts, such as the chancellor Hunt, and newer MPs such as him. He denied it had crossed his mind to stand down or being worried about losing his seat, saying the party is “pretty confident here”. He has added:
The Lib Dems are strong but, you know, we’re confident that we’ll hold the seat and we’ll beat them.
The Liberal Democrats, who are targeting so-called blue wall seats in southern England, claim that, in standing down as an MP, Michael Gove is “running scared” from the prospect of an electoral drubbing.
Ed Davey’s party continues its trail across the south-eastern England on Saturday, with the leader hitting two marginal constituencies to highlight sewage-dumping as a key electoral battleground in areas near the coast.
The Lib Dems say party analysis shows water company bosses have pocketed some £54m in bonuses since 2019 as the party announces plans for a new, strengthened water industry regulator to replace Ofwat.
It is time to get rid of this toothless and weak regulator that is sitting idly by while water firms destroy our rivers and beaches with filthy sewage.
This is a national scandal which has got far worse under the Conservatives’ watch. Their record is one of rising sewage levels and water firms stuffing their pockets with cash.
The Liberal Democrats have led the campaign against sewage, with our plans for a new regulator, an end to disgraceful bonuses and profits, and a focus on protecting our previous environment.
Saturday’s campaigning is expected to centre on the economy, with Keir Starmer focusing on the cost-of-living crisis and Jeremy Hunt signalling support for tax breaks for high earners.
The chancellor indicated the Conservatives would seek to end the impact of tapering of personal allowances on larger incomes, were they to be reelected, while his opposite number Rachel Reeves vowed to deliver financial stability with a Thatcher-style commitment to “sound money”.
Workers lose £1 of their tax-free personal allowance for every £2 their earnings rise above £100,000, and anyone on more than £125,140 gets no allowance.
Hunt used an interview with the Daily Telegraph to dangle the prospect of a change to the current system.
If you look at the distortions in the tax system between £50,000 and £125,000, they are bad economically because they disincentivise people from doing what we need, which is to work, work harder. And we are the party of hard work.
He explicitly confirmed a Tory government would aim to correct these “distortions” within five years.
Hunt also branded inheritance tax “profoundly anti-Conservative”, but refused to be drawn on whether cuts to death duties would feature in the party manifesto.
Rachel Reeves will meet with supermarket workers in London to talk about the cost-of-living crisis; seeking to attack the Conservative record on the economy as she pitches Labour as the party of “stability and tough spending.” In an article on the front page of the Daily Mail, Reeves said:
Back in the 1980s, Margaret Thatcher proclaimed that the Conservatives were the party of sound money. But three decades on from when she left office, it was the Conservatives who crashed the economy, put pensions in peril and sent the average monthly mortgage repayments up by £240 a month.
I will never play fast and loose with your money… I believe in sound money and public spending that is kept under control.
Reeves appeared to hint she may eventually be able to cut taxes “for working people” under a Labour government, saying saying she supports reductions when there is “a plan to pay for it”.
Michael Gove and Andrea Leadsom to stand down at general election
Peter Walker
Michael Gove and Andrea Leadsom have joined the now record-breaking exodus of Conservative MPs from the Commons, with the former saying it was time for a “new generation” to lead the party.
Gove’s announcement in a letter tweeted on Friday evening had been anticipated by some given the strong Liberal Democrat challenge he faces in his Surrey Heath constituency, but adds to the sense of Tories fleeing in the face of a likely general election loss.
Leadsom released her own letter shortly after, writing to Sunak: “After careful reflection, I have decided not to stand as a candidate in the forthcoming election.”
It puts the total number of sitting Tories saying they will not stand again at 78, beating the previous record of 72 from 1997.
An MP since 2005, Gove has been central to Tory fortunes ever since. The levelling up secretary had previously served as education secretary, justice secretary, environment secretary and chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster.
In his letter, Gove wrote that he knew “the toll office can take, as do those closest to me … No one in politics is a conscript. We are volunteers who willingly choose our fate. And the chance to serve is wonderful. But there comes a moment when you know that it is time to leave. That a new generation should lead.
Leadsom reached the final two of the 2016 Conservative leadership contest to replace David Cameron, but withdrew, putting Theresa May in No 10.
Kiran Stacey
Conservative jitters about the campaign were distilled on Friday afternoon in a searing article by Fraser Nelson, the editor of the right-leaning magazine the Spectator, in which he argued Sunak was making a mistake by trying to make himself the sole focus of the campaign.
“A popular leader may run a personal campaign, but Sunak’s approval ratings are worse than almost any prime minister in postwar history,” Nelson wrote in the Telegraph.
A Conservative source called the idea that Sunak was hoping to reset his campaign “ridiculous”. But another campaign operative added: “Prime ministers don’t normally spend the first weekend of the campaign at home talking to their advisers.”
A Conservative spokesperson did not respond to a request to comment.
Sunak retreats from campaign trail after hapless start
Kiran Stacey
Rishi Sunak will retreat from the campaign trail today, spending the day at home in his constituency and in London after a difficult first few days of the general election campaign.
Three sources have said the prime minister is taking the unusual step of a day away from public events on the first Saturday of the campaign and instead will spend it in discussion with his closest advisers.
Conservatives aides said the move was not part of an attempt to reset his campaign after a first week plagued by missteps and high-level resignation announcements.
Keir Starmer, the Labour leader, is in contrast planning to use the day at public events designed to focus on his argument that the Conservatives have damaged the economy and raised living costs. He is understood not to be planning any days off the campaign trail for the next six weeks before polling day.
Sunak’s decision to take a day away from public campaigning comes after an error-strewn start to the campaign for the prime minister.
He began by announcing the election in the pouring rain to the booming sounds of the 1997 Labour anthem Things Can Only Get Better, played by a nearby protester.
He then attended a public question-and-answer session at a factory at which it was revealed that two of the questioners were Tory councillors, before asking workers in Wales whether they were looking forward to the Euro 2024 football tournament, for which Wales has not qualified.
On Friday, the prime minister travelled to Belfast where he visited the Titanic Quarter and was asked by a journalist whether he was captaining a sinking ship.
Good morning
Just three days after kickstarting a six-week general election campaign, Rishi Siunak is taking a day off.
Three sources have told the Guardian the prime minister is taking the unusual step of a day away from public events and instead will spend it in discussion with his closest advisers.
The news comes as Michael Gove and Andrea Leadsom joined the now record-breaking exodus of Conservative MPs from the Commons, with the former saying it was time for a “new generation” to lead the party.
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