Ed Davey first to take questions as leaders appear on BBC Question Time election special – UK politics live | General election 2024
Ed Davey takes questions in Question Time leaders’ special
Fiona Bruce introduces the programme.
She starts by saying the audience reflects the political complexion of the country.
She introduces Ed Davey.
Key events
Davey says the two-child limit on benefits is “just wrong” and has to go.
Q: Are you trying to persuade people you can be PM?
Davey says he is being realistic.
It would be “challenging, given the polls”.
But he does not want to put a limit on his ambition.
Q: So is your manifesto just a wish list?
Referring to the extra GP policy, Davey says this is achieveable. There are people who are trained as GPS, but who cannot get a job because the money is not there to employ them.
Q: Is the manifesto a wish list?
No, says Davey. It is “absolutely a programme for government”.
As a minister in the coalition, he learnt you should not promise what you can’t deliver.
Q: Like cancelling tuition fees?
Indeed, says Davey.
He says he has spent time trying to rebuild trust.
The next question comes from Linda, who says Davey’s antics during the election campaigns (fun photo opportunities, often involving Davey getting wet) haven’t looked prime ministerial.
Davey says he has been trying to grab attention.
But the stunts have had a serious purpose, he says. He says, when he fell in Windermere, it was to highlight the problem with sewage in water.
Davey says he is ‘not proud’ of some of what Lib Dems did during coalition with Tories
A man in the audience says the Lib Dems lost credibility because they broke their promise on tuition fees and they supported austerity.
Davey says he is “not proud” of some of the votes the Lib Dems supported during the coalition.
But he says they stopped George Osborne cutting welfare by £12bn.
The first question is from Alison, who says the Lib Dems will spend five times as much extra as Labour. Won’t you bankrupt the country?
No, says Davey.
He says the Lib Dems have costs their plans. Oil and gas companies could pay more. Big banks could pay more too. The Tories gave them tax cuts; reversing those would raise £4.3bn.
There should be a tax on digitial media giants.
Q: You are promising an extra £28bn.
By the fifth year of the parliament, says Davey.
Bruce says she cannot see who some plans are funded, like compensation for Waspi women.
Davey says the Lib Dems will crack down on tax avoidance and evasion. And their plans are more credible in this area, because they would spend £1bn investing in HMRC.
Alison says the public finances aren’t a bottomless pit.
Of course not, says Davey. But he says the public services need rescuing.
He is worried about children going to school hungry, he says. When the Lib Dems were in coalition, they insisted on the government introducing free school meals for infants. George Osborne was not happy. Now the Lib Dems want to go further, he says.
Ed Davey takes questions in Question Time leaders’ special
Fiona Bruce introduces the programme.
She starts by saying the audience reflects the political complexion of the country.
She introduces Ed Davey.
BBC responds to legal threat over Tory election date betting allegations story, saying publication ‘clearly in public interest’
The BBC has responded to the statement put out earlier tonight by Laura Saunders, the Tory candidate being investigated by the Gambling Commission over an election date betting allegation. She said she was considering suing the BBC over the story, which it broke. In response, a BBC spokesperson said:
We are confident in our journalism. As Laura Saunders is a candidate standing for election, it is clearly in the public interest to report allegations made against her.
At the BBC event in York, Kevin Hollinrake, the business minister, is in the spin room on duty for the Tories. Asked about the Tory election date betting allegations, he said it was “absolutely wrong” if anyone placed bets using insider information, but he said an independent investigation was taking place and that should be allowed to run its course.
Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has arrived for the Question Time leaders’ special. He is first up, at 8pm.
The climate crisis has not featured much during the election campaign, but Chris Skidmore may shift that a bit. As Pippa Crerar reports, Skidmore, a former Tory energy minister who also conducted a net zero review for the government, has announced that he is voting Labour because he thinks Rishi Sunak has been “siding with climate deniers” to politicise the energy transition.
Here is John Swinney, the SNP leader and Scottish first minister, arriving for the BBC Question Time leaders’ special in York. He is on at 8.30pm.
Sunak, Starmer, Swinney and Davey to face audience in BBC Question Time leaders’ special
Good evening. Tonight we are getting the BBC’s Question Time leaders’ special. It starts at 8pm and it will feature the four main party leaders. They will get half an hour each taking questions from the audience in York and they will be appearing in this order: Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader; John Swinney, the SNP leader; Keir Starmer, the Labour leader; and Rishi Sunak, the Conservative leader and PM. Fiona Bruce is in the chair.
This won’t have the drama of a head-to-head debate between Sunak and Starmer. There is just one more of those to go. It is on Wednesday next week, hosted by the BBC, with Mishal Husain presenting and acting as referee.
But Question Time is still a very tough gig, and it is a programme that regularly illustrates how members of the public can often ask questions that are more challenging, more aggressive, and better informed than the ones politicians normally get from journalists. And there is a long history of politicians coming unstuck here at election time. In his London Playbook briefing for Politico this morning, Dan Bloom recalled some examples.
This show has in the past produced some of Britain’s most memorable election moments, as politicians’ rehearsed lines crumble upon impact with public anger. It’s the one where Theresa May told a nurse there was there “isn’t a magic money tree” … Ed Miliband drew gasps for saying Labour didn’t spend too much (then tripped off the stage) … David Cameron refused to say where £10bn in welfare cuts would fall … and Tony Blair, well, he duelled a pipsqueak Richard Tice.
Tonight Sunak may face particular flak over the Tory election date betting allegations. Here is our story about this.
And here are the questions Labour says he must answer about the allegations.
We are not able to open the comments tonight. I’m sorry about that. But if you want to flag something up to me for my attention, do use X; I’ll see something addressed to @AndrewSparrow very quickly.
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