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Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster email“A teenage Dad’s Army” Keir Starmer scored a laugh when he told a student who asked about policies for young people: “What I won’t be doing is sending you off to some kind of teenage Dad’s Army”, a reference to the prime minister’s National Service plan. “Not transformational but desperate”The audience appeared unimpressed when Rishi Sunak described his National Service scheme as “transformational”. He also attacked the Labour leader saying “all you can do is sneer at it”. But Mr Starmer hit back at the idea, dubbing it “not transformational but desperate”.Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer More

Sunak and Starmer share opening statements for first General Election debateSign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailRishi Sunak has beaten Sir Keir Starmer in a snap poll asking viewers who performed better in tonight’s debate.The YouGov poll delivered narrow results with Sunak gaining 51 per cent of favourable opinion while Starmer garnered 49 per cent of votes.The party leaders were scolded as they repeatedly clashed in Tuesday night’s debate over key issues including taxes, immigration and NHS waiting times.Debate mediator Julie Etchingham told the Labour and Conservative leaders to stop shouting over each other as they went head-to-head.The prime minister will welcome the snap survey results as he was striving to turn his party’s fortunes around in opinion polls.With just four weeks to go until the general election, the debate on ITV represented a last chance for the Tories after a series of polls suggested Sir Keir was on course to win more seats than Tony Blair’s 1997 landslide victory.The Conservatives have been predicted to get less than 100 seats – a historic low – in four of the last five polls. The countdown is now on for Keir Starmer and Sunak to put up their case in front of millions of voters.Show latest update 1717552800Pictures: Briton’s watch first head-to-head( More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailPrime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labour party leader Sir Keir Starmer went head-to-head on Tuesday evening in the first debate of the 2024 general election.Mr Sunak went into the ITV debate as the clear underdog, after a YouGov poll pointed to a Labour landslide bigger than Tony Blair’s in 1997 on July 4.His challenge was to erode Sir Keir’s dominance, while the Labour leader needed to consolidate his lead, project reassurance and advertise his message of “change” after 14 years of Tory “chaos”.Given the polling gulf between the parties, Mr Sunak sought to cut through with pointed attacks on Sir Keir’s record as a barrister including his defence of Islamist group Hizb ut-Tahrir and his work on European human rights cases.We want to know what you made of the ITV debate. Can debates change the course of an election? Will the conversation help change your mind about either party? Who came out on top for you?Share your thoughts by adding them in the comments — we’ll highlight the most insightful ones as they come in.All you have to do is sign up and register your details — then you can take part in the discussion. You can also sign up by clicking ‘log in’ on the top right-hand corner of the screen.Make sure you adhere to our community guidelines, which can be found here. For a full guide on how to comment click here.Join the conversation with other Independent readers below. More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailNigel Farage has announced he will become the new leader of Reform UK and that he will stand for election in Clacton, Essex.But there was one burning question: who had appointed him? The answer was no one, really – or possibly former leader Richard Tice.As an “entrepreneurial political start-up” with Mr Farage as the company’s director and majority shareholder, there was no internal leadership election, like Labour or the Conservative Party.Mr Farage claimed Reform UK would “democratise over time” after he was accused of running a “one-man dictatorship” by broadcasters.With the party set to contest constituencies up and down the country on 4 July, The Independent takes a look at the company’s unusual structure and how it differs to other parties.Nigel Farage during a press conference to announce he will become the new leader of Reform UK and that he will stand as the parliamentary candidate for Clacton, Essex More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailLabour and the Conservatives are “avoiding the reality” that their economic plans will mean they will have to enact “sharp” spending cuts after the general election, a leading economic think tank has warned.In an analysis published on Tuesday, The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) said neither of the main parties appeared “serious about the underlying principle of getting debt falling”.Both main parties are committed to meeting the fiscal rule of getting debt on a downward path between 2028/29 and 2029/30. However the IFS forecasts say that the future chancellor will be “fortunate” to meet this aim.The think-tank criticised the current fiscal rules which are “arbitrary and gameable” and that it was a “poor guide to the health of the public finances”.While Labour is committed to the overall debt rule, the party is proposing to change the “supplementary” fiscal target in the future to focus on the current balance of borrowing and spending, rather than overall borrowing.The IFS said this would mean revenues would cover day-to-day spending, but would allow borrowing to invest.It added: “There are good arguments for treating day-to-day and investment spending differently, and similar targets were in place from 1997 to 2015 under both Conservative and Labour chancellors.”But the overall, currently binding debt rule did not make a distinction between investment and day-to-day spending, meaning Labour’s plan to borrow £23.7 billion to increase investment in supporting the transition to net zero would make it more difficult to stick within the rule.IFS analysis shows that under the March Budget, forecasts suggest Labour could instigate the extra borrowing without missing the debt target.But it is not possible to conclude this will be possible at the time of a post-election autumn fiscal event, which will be accompanied by a new set of forecasts and other “moving parts” and external economic factors, the IFS said.Isabel Stockton, senior research economist at IFS, described the fiscal rule as having “an unfortunate combination of characteristics”.She added: “It is eminently gameable – and has already been gamed almost to irrelevance by the current government; it is the loosest debt rule we have had in the past 30 years; and yet it is currently so constraining that it will either be breached, or will result in policies in practice quite different to those currently being peddled.“It is, to be kind, not a sensible rule, and neither party appears serious about the underlying principle of getting debt falling.“This has led to both parties avoiding the reality that they are effectively signed up to sharp spending cuts, while arguing over smaller changes to taxes and spending.”Commenting on March forecasts suggesting Labour’s plan for net-zero investment could narrowly fall within the fiscal rule, Ms Stockton added: “If that remains the case come the autumn, then whoever is chancellor by then will be able to consider themselves fortunate. Labour, or anyone serious about government, should not rely on getting lucky.” More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailA Labour candidate for a seat in east London has withdrawn from the general election following an allegation of sexual harassment.Councillor Darren Rodwell, the leader of Barking and Dagenham Council, denied any wrongdoing as he said that he would not run in the election, to be held next month.It comes a day after The Independent revealed Labour was investigating the allegations made against the Barking candidate by a party member on Friday to Labour’s complaints unit.Mr Rodwell’s alleged victim said she met him for a coffee while at an event, believing the meeting was set up to discuss a development in Barking. Mr Rodwell has since said he has no recollection or record of such a meeting.In the communication to the party, the complainant said: “After 10 to 15 minutes, he started asking personal questions which I was not happy to answer. He was ordering more drinks for himself. As I was obviously not happy to be present and was looking for a way to leave, he started touching my hands and legs in a sexual way.“He clearly had other ideas about the meeting. He touched my legs and body inappropriately and I’ve made it clear to him that I did not want him to touch me and left the meeting immediately.”The complaint file, seen by The Independent, reads: “The complainant has received confirmation that an investigator will be contacting her in regards to the allegations.”Labour had previously declined to comment on what it called an ongoing disciplinary matter. Darren Rodwell is an influential local government figure in London More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailRishi Sunak could have avoided the expected election catastrophe facing him and the Conservative Party if he had agreed to make a deal with Nigel Farage.The Independent has learnt that Tory Brexiteer MP Andrea Jenkyns and former Leave.EU communications director Andy Wigmore attempted to broker a deal between the Tories and Reform.Sources have suggested that Mr Sunak “was interested” but dissuaded from going ahead by his key advisers.Around six weeks before the prime minister made his rain-sodden announcement of a snap election on the steps of Downing Street, he is understood to have met with Ms Jenkyns who presented him with a plan to save the Tories.Nigel Farage arrives in Clacton More

Sign up for the View from Westminster email for expert analysis straight to your inboxGet our free View from Westminster emailLabour announced its ‘triple-lock’ commitment to Britain’s nuclear deterrent on June 3, with Sir Keir Starmer aiming to prove his defence credentials before the general election next month.The Labour leader said his party would build four new nuclear submarines if elected, and ensure Britain’s nuclear deterrent remains at sea “24 hours a day, 365 days a year.”It is the latest policy offering from Labour ahead of the general election, as both parties continue to give hints of what their final election manifestos may contain.For the latest political updates ahead of the general election, follow The Independent’s live coverageSir Keir Starmer, Angela Rayner and Rachel Reeves (Lucy North/PA) More