General election 2024 live: Farage claims Tories ‘about to implode’ as Reform overtakes party in poll

Voting for the Conservatives would “enable” a Labour government, Nigel Farage has claimed, after Reform UK overtook the Tories for the first time in a major poll of public opinion during the election campaign.

A YouGov survey commissioned by the Times newspaper had Reform at 19% to the Conservatives 18% of voting intention, in a crossover moment which is the latest blow to Tory hopes of returning to Government.

Mr Farage lauded the poll and presented his party as now being the “opposition to Labour” for voters, as he and other leading political figures took part in a seven-way ITV debate.

In a flip of Conservative campaign rhetoric, he also claimed that voting for the Tories over Reform would enable a Labour government.

Labour sits in the lead at 37% of voting intention, according to YouGov, with the Liberal Democrats at 14%, the Greens at 7%, the SNP at 3%, Plaid Cymru at 1% and others at 2%.

Bim Afolami has dismissed the suggestion that Reform overtaking the Tories in an opinion poll is what the Conservative party “feared”.

The economic secretary to the Treasury told Times Radio: “No. Polls are polls. There is pretty much a poll every single day in this campaign. There will be more. This is one poll out of literally hundreds.

“What it does show is that there is significant difficulty of Keir Starmer having unchecked power to do all the things like tax your home, your job, your car and your pension if people vote Reform.

“A vote for Reform is a vote for Keir Starmer.”

Here’s what we can expect from today:

• Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is attending the G7 leaders’ summit in Italy.
• Chief Secretary to the Treasury Laura Trott will give press conference in London giving Conservative response to Labour manifesto.
• Rachel Reeves and Jonathan Reynolds will join business leaders in central London to discuss the Labour manifesto.
• Labour’s Wes Streeting expected to visit a men’s mental health charity in Wakefield to discuss the party’s plan to tackle mental illness crisis.
• Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper is on a visit to south west Hertfordshire.
• The SNPis holding a campaign event in Broxburn where deputy leader Keith Brown will appear with Livingston candidate Hannah Bardell.

Nigel Farage has claimed the Conservative Party are “about to implode” as his Reform UK Party overtook the Tories in the latest YouGov poll.

In his closing speech of the seven-way ITV debate on Thursday night, the Reform leader said: “Britain is broken, everyone knows it and Britain needs Reform.

“Rishi Sunak won’t do it, he’ll probably be in California by then anyway. And the Tory Party is split down the middle and about to implode in this election.”

Under-18s already vote in Scotland and Wales, but extending the franchise could soon be policy across the United Kingdom, as Sean O’Grady explains:

ITV’s audience laughed when Penny Mordaunt described the UK’s education system as “world class”.

Conservative Ms 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 per cent of our schools are good or outstanding and we have undertaken an enormous refurbishment programme.”

A bomb squad was called to the West Sussex office of Sir Jeremy Quin, a former defence minister and Conservative candidate for Horsham, after he received a suspicious package.

Sussex Police and bomb disposal experts investigated and confirmed the package was safe by 9pm on Thursday, though an investigation is ongoing to determine if an offence was committed.

In a statement Sussex police said: “After an assessment it has been confirmed that the package was safe and there was no risk to the public.

“Officers are reviewing whether there has been an offence committed in the sending of the package and this investigation is ongoing.”

Mr Quin said: “After the receipt of a suspicious parcel at my Horsham office earlier today the police decided that the incident should be escalated and specialists were called in.

“It is still under investigation but there is no cause for alarm and the incident is being thoroughly and professionally addressed.

“It’s a huge privilege to engage in public service but sadly in the world in which we live incidents of this nature always have to be taken seriously.”

The Tories were pushed into third in the survey, by pollsters YouGov.

Sir Keir Starmer rolled up his sleeves on Thursday and declared that Labour is “no longer the party of tax and spend” but instead is the “party of wealth creation”.

The declaration came as Sir Keir unveiled Labour’s manifesto at the Co-op headquarters in Manchester in a noticeably polished and confident performance.

The event had the presidential style Labour has settled on for its campaign, with Sir Keir front and centre in a manifesto titled: “My plan for change.”

In a deliberate move to reassure Tory voters and take control of the centre ground, the Labour leader pivoted from the socialism he supported in 2019 under Jeremy Corbyn to the “changed” Labour promising to bring stability and end “Tory chaos”.