RISHI Sunak met the Pope yesterday — as the desertion of Tory voters to Reform left him needing an electoral miracle.
The PM, who was at the G7 summit in Italy where His Holiness addressed the leaders, spent much the day in a war of words with Nigel Farage.
GettyRishi Sunak warned Labour would romp the election if voters switched from him to Reform[/caption]
ReutersNigel Farage mocked the PM and said that with Reform ahead of the Tories 19 points to 18 in a poll he was ‘new leader of the opposition’[/caption]
PAThe PM said Sir Keir Starmer, armed with a ‘blank cheque’, would hike taxes[/caption]
APMr Sunak met the Pope yesterday — as the desertion of Tory voters to Reform left him needing an electoral miracle[/caption]
The Tory boss warned Labour would romp the election if voters switched from him to Reform and Sir Keir Starmer, armed with a “blank cheque”, would hike taxes.
But back home in the UK, Mr Farage mocked the PM and said that with Reform ahead of the Tories 19 points to 18 in a poll he was “new leader of the opposition”.
Mr Farage went on to demand a seat at the upcoming leaders’ debates after leapfrogging the Conservatives in the YouGov survey.
Setting his sights on six million votes, he vowed to “fight” the BBC for a spot in their scheduled final head-to-head of the campaign.
Mr Farage’s march up the polls upended Mr Sunak’s G7 summit and had him scrambling to lure back tempted Reform supporters.
Yet challenged by The Sun that he was “3-0 down with 20 minutes to go”, the Tory leader refused to change tactics and vowed to continue fighting the election on taxes.
He insisted: “We are only half way through, right? So I am fighting very hard for every vote.”
Quizzed over the YouGov survey, he said: “If this poll was replicated it would hand a blank cheque to Labour. It would be handing Labour a blank cheque to tax everyone . . . to tax their home, their pension, their car, their family and I’ll be fighting very hard to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
He added: “Ultimately a vote for anyone who is not a Conservative candidate makes it more likely that Keir Starmer is in No10.”
Attempting to turn the blow on his right flank into an attack on Labour, he went on: “When people are thinking about the substance of what they want to see in a future government . . . if you want to see control over borders? You’re going to get that from us.
“You’re not going to get that from Labour. They are going to cancel the Rwanda scheme. They’re not going to put in a cap in place on legal migration.
“If you want a sensible approach to Net Zero, I’ve already announced that. Labour will reverse it.”
Mr Farage, meanwhile, said he was on course to hoover up millions of votes. Experts believe many will be 2019 Tory voters.
He said just winning one seat in Clacton in Essex, where he is standing in his eighth bid to become an MP, was not enough.
The Brexit champion told The Sun: “We are not going to get four million votes. We are not going to get five million votes.
“We are going to get a very, very substantial number of votes.
“I genuinely think we can get over six million votes. I don’t know where the ceiling is.”
Six million would be streets above the 3.9million his former party, Ukip, won in 2015 when it secured 12.6 per cent of the vote.
The firebrand is determined to get on the next few TV debates to shore up his voter base.
He said: “Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer are taking part in a BBC debate on 26th June. As we are now ahead of the Conservatives in the polls, I demand that Reform UK is a part of this debate.
“If the BBC want a fight with me on this, they can have one.”
He also insisted on being part of the four-way leaders’ event next week that also includes the Lib Dems and the SNP.
‘Deliver change that the country needs’
The BBC said Mr Farage and Reform UK had “received coverage across BBC outlets”.
It pointed out that Mr Farage was on Question Time and the Today programme, the BBC’s seven-way debate and Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg.
He had also appeared on BBC Breakfast, the Nicky Campbell phone-in on BBC 5 Live and BBC News channel, it said.
The Beeb said its editorial guidelines and Ofcom guidance state that “due weight” should be given to “past and current electoral support” when determining coverage for political parties.
It said Ofcom put greater emphasis “on the actual performance of a political party in elections over opinion poll data” given the “uncertainty associated with support in opinion polls”.
Mr Farage, meanwhile, blasted the Conservatives as “completely and utterly beyond belief” after they tried to attack Reform on tax.
Chief Secretary Laura Trott insisted the insurgents’ plan to raise tax thresholds was not funded to which he pointed out the Tories had increased the tax burden to its highest level since 1948.
Labour’s Wes Streeting, meanwhile, said his party would act just as radically whether they won a so-called “super-majority” or just scraped into No10.
He told our Never Mind The Ballots show: “I can tell you that whether our majority was a working majority or a majority that was more like Tony Blair’s, we will deliver the plan in our manifesto.
“We will deliver the change that the country needs, but also the change that country can afford.
“We’re being very upfront with people about the hard choices that we face.”
Analysis shows the tax burden will rise under both the Tories and Labour due to threshold freezes, with Sir Keir also pledging £8billion in other raids.
No rule out on tax assets
By Jack Elsom and Thomas Godfrey
LABOUR last night ruled out whacking family homes with capital gains tax — but did not deny a raid on other assets.
Tories had hit out at the “disastrous policy for families” after Angela Rayner did not reject a plot to impose the levy on primary residences in Thursday’s TV debate.
But a spokesman said last night: “Labour will not introduce capital gains taxes on primary residences.”
The statement did not rule out hikes to capital gains tax on valuable assets such as shares.
Shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting all-but pledged fuel duty would remain frozen if Labour win.
On our Never Mind The Ballots show, Mr Streeting said: “One thing I can predict with absolute certainty — Rachel Reeves has got a pretty good track record of backing The Sun’s Keep It Down campaign.”
Our crusade to freeze fuel duty has helped 37million drivers save £16 on every tank in the last year.