Five things leaders will fight over in tonight’s debate – and what the numbers really tell us
The Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer will be interrogated by Sky’s political editor Beth Rigby and members of the public tonight.
During The Battle For Number 10, they will talk and be questioned at length about their ambitions, so viewers can understand in detail what their plans are.
Mr Sunak is somewhat on the back foot as he has to defend his party’s 14 years in government, while Labour is yet to publish its manifesto, making it harder to get to the bottom of some of its plans.
But here Sky News picks apart some of the claims – and counter claims – each is likely to make.
Which leader will help with cost of living?
Cost of living and taxes are sure to feature – they consistently rank among voters’ top priorities.
Labour likes to claim families have become £5,883 worse off in total over the last five years.
But fact-checking organisation Full Fact pointed out the figure doesn’t take into account a broad enough basket of goods, or changes in wages or benefits over the same time.
Factoring these in, the decrease in real disposable income is more like £166, the independent Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) has found.
Meanwhile the Tories claim Labour would leave families £2,000 out of pocket. But the calculations behind it are based on assumptions, as Labour has not yet published it manifesto, and the Tories assume Labour’s plans would be funded by taxes rather than possible borrowing.
Mr Sunak defends his record on the basis of the COVID furlough scheme – which he oversaw as chancellor – and the fact inflation has finally fallen to 2.3%, down from a 42-year record high of 11.1% in October 2022.
But external factors worked in the PM’s favour.
The worst price shocks from the war in Ukraine (namely on fuel and food) eased regardless of government policies.
But falling inflation does not mean falling prices, and any amount of inflation still means prices are rising on top of already higher costs.
Wage growth has now overtaken inflation – but there’s still a gap between how much prices have increased vs wages in the long run, according to ONS data.
This, combined with stubbornly high interest rates which increase the cost of mortgage rates and other loans, explains why people are still feeling the pinch.
Can anyone ‘fix’ the NHS?
Are waiting times going up or down? This is a question on which the leaders are likely to disagree.
The number of outstanding appointments for NHS England peaked at 7.8 million last August – and has since inched down to 7.5 million.
But as other parties love to point out, the waiting list is still 300,000 appointments higher than the 7.2 million in January 2023, when Mr Sunak originally pledged to cut it.
Labour say it would get waiting times back down to a maximum of four months – as per the NHS target – by the end of their first term.
They’d do this by adding “40,000 extra appointments and operations every week”, including more on evenings and weekends, and buying more equipment.
Sky News analysis has shown that these measures alone may do little to bridge the gap, however.
It takes five additional NHS appointments to remove one treatment pathway from the waiting list, according thinktank The Heath Foundation.
With this conversion rate, Labour’s 40,000 additional appointments equates to 8,000 removed from the waiting list, shown in the bar in orange in the chart above – still falling far short of tackling demand.
How would they approach migration?
Both leaders are keen to position themselves as tough on migration, saying that the record levels of net migration since Brexit in 2016 – reaching 685,000 last year – are too high.
Mr Sunak claims his plans, which include the controversial Rwanda deportation policy and an unspecified cap on net migration numbers, are the answer.
But, as Sky News analysis has already shown, caps have failed in the past.
Former prime ministers David Cameron and Theresa May both vowed to cap net migration in the “tens of thousands”. Both failed.
Meanwhile, the Rwanda policy addresses only a tiny fraction of overall numbers, despite its hefty price tag.
It is already set to cost £370m before any removals take place, according to government spending watchdog the National Audit Office (NAO), and could reach an estimated £661m.
It is designed to deter small boats crossings, but these make up only a fraction of asylum claims, and asylum seekers accounted for only 81,000 migrants last year, compared with 432,000 workers and 379,000 students.
Labour have confirmed they will scrap the scheme “straight away”, while the Conservatives have a poor track record of implementing the scheme, so it remains to be seen what the final bill will be.
Nearly two thirds (64%) of 229,000 workers visas granted in 2023 were for healthcare roles like nurses and care workers.
The Tories say their Albania deal shows that deterrence works, with numbers down 90%.
Labour has pledged to “reform resettlement routes to stop people being exploited by gangs”.
Are they really that different on climate and net zero?
Climate and environment comes in fifth in the list of voters’ concerns, according to one YouGov poll.
Yet we have heard fairly little about it recently – the Tories in the last year wanting to distance themselves from it.
A key dividing line is whether to pump more oil and gas from the North Sea.
Mr Sunak wants to “max out” what’s left. Labour says it would stop issuing licences for new projects.
But even though it opposes them, if elected Labour would not actually revoke those handed out by the Tories – which environmentalists have criticised.
The Conservative manifesto says more extraction would “provide energy to homes and businesses across the country”.
But it’s somewhat of a storm in a teacup, because there isn’t much oil or gas left in the North Sea anyway.
The red and blue lines in the chart above show how much – or little – extra the UK might get from new licences – so the decision is more symbolic.
The Tories say they will back renewables, but haven’t really lifted an effective ban on onshore wind farms as promised. Labour wants to double onshore wind power to 35GW by 2030.
Labour’s plans to plug the wells in the North Sea are already putting off some oil majors from turning on the taps at existing projects – and could kill off thousands of jobs, the industry lobby group Offshore Energies UK says.
In reality the parties are more aligned than some of their members would have us believe.
Both back some form of windfall tax until 2029, want to decarbonise most or all electricity by 2030, plan to drive up EVs and want to ramp up solar and offshore wind.
How bad was Sunak’s D-Day gaffe?
It seems no one in Sunak’s team thought an early departure from D-Day commemorations in Normandy would matter.
But oh how it did, drawing criticism from his own party, Labour, and the general public alike.
The polls have not been kind either.
A snap YouGov survey showed two thirds (65%) of those surveyed found the behaviour to be completely or somewhat unacceptable. This rose to three quarters (75%) among the 65+ age group.
This was a gift to Labour, and something Starmer will likely want to capitalise on during tonight’s debate.
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UK
Police investigating criminal offence after Daily Telegraph columnist ‘dumbfounded’ by social media post probe
Essex Police say they are investigating an alleged criminal offence of inciting racial hatred, after Daily Telegraph columnist Allison Pearson said she was “dumbfounded and upset” when officers knocked on her door last Sunday.
Ms Pearson revealed she was told she was being investigated over a year-old deleted post online.
She said she wasn’t informed which post had been reported, but suggested it could have been related to the 7 October attacks in Israel or pro-Palestine marches.
She claimed the officers told her she was being investigated for a NCHI (a none crime hate incident) an incident involving an act which is perceived to be motivated by hostility or prejudice towards persons with a particular characteristic, but is not illegal.
NCHI reports have long been controversial, with many citing free speech concerns, and Ms Pearson’s account of the police visit has led to widespread support from Conservatives and online commentators, including Tory leader Kemi Badenoch.
But an Essex Police spokesperson has told Sky News its investigation was never for an NCHI, and that the matter was always being treated as an investigation into an alleged criminal offence of inciting racial hatred.
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Speaking on her Planet Normal podcast on Wednesday, Ms Pearson said she found the visit “chilling”.
“I was dumbfounded, upset, it’s not very nice,” she said. “I was in my dressing gown on the step of the house, these two coppers were there just outside the door.
“There were people gathering for the Remembrance Day parade so there were people watching from the other side of the road.
“Whatever I did or didn’t tweet, if somebody found it offensive, that to me is still not a reason for two policemen to come to my house on a Sunday morning.
“You know, they don’t do that for burglars, do they? We know policing is under-resourced and they are unable to attend often quite serious crimes.
“This was the most extraordinary overreach and state intrusion into my private life and I don’t think I did anything wrong and I think their response was outrageous.”
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In a statement, Essex Police said: “Officers attended an address in Essex and invited a woman to come to a voluntary interview.
“They said it related to an investigation into an alleged offence of inciting racial hatred, linked to a post on social media.
“For clarity: a complaint of a possible criminal offence was made to the police and this is why we called; to arrange an interview.
“Everyone was polite and professional throughout the brief conversation.”
They said an officer told Ms Pearson: “It’s gone down as an incident or offence of potentially inciting racial hatred online. That would be the offence.”
Essex Police say they have complained to the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO) over what they call “false reporting” regarding the ongoing investigation.
In an interview with The Telegraph published yesterday, Kemi Badenoch said police visiting a journalist over a social media post was “absolutely wrong” and that “we need to look at the laws around non-crime hate incidents”.
“There has been a long-running problem with people not taking free speech seriously,” she said.
She challenged the prime minister to review the laws, saying: “Keir Starmer says he is someone who believes in these things. Now he needs to actually show that he does believe it. All we’ve seen from him is the opposite.”
Ms Badenoch added: “We need to stop this behaviour of people wasting police time on trivial incidents because they don’t like something, as if they’re in a nursery.
“It’s like children reporting each other. And I think that in certain cases, the police do it because they’re afraid that if they don’t do it, they will also be accused of not taking these issues seriously.”
Essex Police said the officers went to the address to invite Ms Pearson to attend a voluntary interview as part of their investigation, which was passed to them by another force.
“The report relates to a social media post which was subsequently removed,” the statement read.
“An investigation is now being carried out under Section 17 of the Public Order Act.”
Essex Police also said they made attempts to contact Ms Pearson before the visit.
Other prominent Conservative voices such as Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Chris Philp have also leapt to Ms Pearson’s defence online, as has X owner Elon Musk, who quoted a post about the incident and said: “This needs to stop.”
Police commentator Graham Wettone told Sky News the police are “duty bound to investigate allegations of crime”.
“They’ve had an allegation of crime made there,” he said. “They will investigate it. If at the end of this they decide that no criminal offence has been committed – and we’re not at that stage yet – then it can still be recorded as a none crime hate incident.”
The police, he said, are duty bound to keep a record of none crime hate incidents.
“Parliament said they want the police to do this, to investigate and record incidents like this. So they are doing exactly what parliament and society asked them to do, and they are getting criticism for doing what people want.”
UK
Sir Keir Starmer vows to defend budget decisions ‘all day long’ as farmers slam ‘disrespectful’ PM
Sir Keir Starmer has said he will defend the decisions made in the budget “all day long” amid anger from farmers over inheritance tax changes.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves announced last month in her key speech that from April 2026, farms worth more than £1m will face an inheritance tax rate of 20%, rather than the standard 40% applied to other land and property.
The announcement has sparked anger among farmers who argue this will mean higher food prices, lower food production and having to sell off land to pay for the tax.
Sir Keir defended the budget as he gave his first speech as prime minister at the Welsh Labour conference in Llandudno, North Wales, where farmers have been holding a tractor protest outside.
Sir Keir admitted: “We’ve taken some extremely tough decisions on tax.”
He said: “I will defend facing up to the harsh light of fiscal reality. I will defend the tough decisions that were necessary to stabilise our economy.
“And I will defend protecting the payslips of working people, fixing the foundations of our economy, and investing in the future of Britain and the future of Wales. Finally, turning the page on austerity once and for all.”
He also said the budget allocation for Wales was a “record figure” – some £21bn for next year – an extra £1.7bn through the Barnett Formula, as he hailed a “path of change” with Labour governments in Wales and Westminster.
And he confirmed a £160m investment zone in Wrexham and Flintshire will be going live in 2025.
‘PM should have addressed the protesters’
Among the hundreds of farmers demonstrating was Gareth Wyn Jones, who told Sky News it was “disrespectful” that the prime minister did not mention farmers in his speech.
He said “so many people have come here to air their frustrations. He (Starmer) had an opportunity to address the crowd. Even if he was booed he should have been man enough to come out and talk to the people”.
He said farmers planned to deliver Sir Keir a letter which begins with “don’t bite the hand that feeds you”.
Farmers’ tractor protest outside the Welsh Labour conference in Llandudno, North Wales
Mr Wyn Jones told Sky News the government was “destroying” an industry that was already struggling.
“They’re destroying an industry that’s already on its knees and struggling, absolutely struggling, mentally, emotionally and physically. We need government support not more hindrance so we can produce food to feed the nation.”
He said inheritance tax changes will result in farmers increasing the price of food: “The poorer people in society aren’t going to be able to afford good, healthy, nutritious British food, so we have to push this to government for them to understand that enough is enough, the farmers can’t take any more of what they’re throwing at us.”
Mr Wyn Jones disputed the government’s estimation that only 500 farming estates in the UK will be affected by the inheritance tax changes.
“Look, a lot of farmers in this country are in their 70s and 80s, they haven’t handed their farms down because that’s the way it’s always been, they’ve always known there was never going to be inheritance tax.”
On Friday, Sir Keir addressed farmers’ concerns, saying: “I know some farmers are anxious about the inheritance tax rules that we brought in two weeks ago.
“What I would say about that is, once you add the £1m for the farmland to the £1m that is exempt for your spouse, for most couples with a farm wanting to hand on to their children, it’s £3m before anybody pays a penny in inheritance tax.”
Read more:
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Welsh farmer Gareth Wyn Jones
Ministers said the move will not affect small farms and is aimed at targeting wealthy landowners who buy up farmland to avoid paying inheritance tax.
But analysis this week said a typical family farm would have to put 159% of annual profits into paying the new inheritance tax every year for a decade and could have to sell 20% of their land.
Keep up with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by following Sky News
The Country and Land Business Association (CLA), which represents owners of rural land, property and businesses in England and Wales, found a typical 200-acre farm owned by one person with an expected profit of £27,300 would face a £435,000 inheritance tax bill.
The plan says families can spread the inheritance tax payments over 10 years, but the CLA found this would require an average farm to allocate 159% of its profits each year for a decade.
To pay that, successors could be forced to sell 20% of their land, the analysis found.
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