Tories criticised after revelation racist comment row did not halt donations from Frank Hester – UK politics live

Richard Holden, the Conservative party chair, has been selected as the party’s candidate in Basildon and Billericay, which in normal circumstances would be described as a safe Tory seat, after the association was invited to pick from a shortlist with only his name on it. His previous seat, North West Durham, has been abolished.

Last night, in an interview with Paul McNamara from Channel 4 News, Holden was asked if this was a stitch-up in his favour. He replied: “No.”

He also said that, under Tory rules, if a candidate has not been selected 72 hours before nominations close, only one name is put forward to the association. He said it had agreed to have him as the candidate unanimously.

At the last election the Conservatives had a majority of 20,412 in Basildon and Billericay, where Holden is now the candidate. Boundary changes increase the notional majority there by about 300 votes.

According to the latest YouGov MRP poll, the Tories are still on course to beat Labour there, but only by 36% to 34%.

Rishi Sunak has been criticised for missing the major international ceremony to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day, PA Media reports. PA says:

The prime minister has attended events in Normandy including speaking at the major British ceremony, but has not been present alongside leaders including France’s Emmanuel Macron and US President Joe Biden at the international gathering this afternoon. Keir Starmer is mingling with world leaders at the Omaha Beach event.

With election campaign in full swing, the Tory leader is heading back to the UK.

A Tory source played down the diplomatic impact of the prime minster’s absence, pointing out he will see Macron, Biden, German chancellor Olaf Scholz and other key leaders at the G7 summit in Italy next week.

But Nigel Farage, whose announcement this week that he is standing in the election came as a blow to Sunak, criticised the move.

The Reform UK leader tweeted: “The prime minister has ducked out of the international D-Day event to fly back to the UK to campaign. I am here in Normandy in a personal capacity because I think it matters. Does he?”

The Green party has called for a wealth tax, and other radical tax reforms, to allow spending on health and social care to rise by more than £50bn a year by the end of the decade.

Announcing the party’s plans, Adrian Ramsay, the Green co-leader, said the Greens were the only party being honest about the scale of the problem, and the tax increases that would be needed to address it.

Our NHS is at breaking point following 14 years of underfunding. Patients are stuck in hospital corridors, people can’t see their GP or NHS dentist when they need to and staff are severely overstretched.

Greens believe passionately in the NHS and we are the only party to be honest with the public that it’s going to cost money to nurse the NHS back to health after 14 years of Conservative damage.

Not just by shifting a small pot around, but by asking the very richest in our society to pay a modest amount more in tax to fund the investment we need to nurse the NHS back to health.

Our plans are credible, deliverable and fully funded.

The Greens say their plans would deliver an extra £30bn a year for the NHS in England by 2030. This would fund measures including a “fair wage” pay rise for health workers, giving everyone access to an NHS dentist, and ensuring that people in urgent need can get a same-day GP appointment.

There would also be an extra £20bn a year for social care in England by the end of the decade, intended to provide people with free personal care, as is already available in Scotland.

In an interview with the BBC, Ramsay said full details of how the plan would be funded would be set out in the party’s manifesto next week.

But he said the party published a document at the time of the budget saying how it would raise an extra £50bn a year. He said there were three main measures:

1) A wealth tax, set at 1% on assets over £10m, and 2% on assets over £1bn. This would raise at least £16bn, Ramsay said.

2) Reforming capital gains tax, so that it is levied at the same rate as income tax.

3) Increasing the scope of the windfall tax on oil and gas companies.

According to the document published in March, the Greens would also reform national insurance, applying it to investment income as well as employment income, and removing the upper earnings limit so that high earners pay more.

Rishi Sunak will reportedly pledge an overhaul of homicide laws, introducing US-style classifications for murder and increasing sentences, as part of the Conservative manifesto, Hayden Vernon reports.

With John Swinney in France for the D-Day commemorations, Kate Forbes, Scotland’s deputy first minister, stood in at FMQs at Holyrood today – but she didn’t offer any further clarity on the SNP’s energy policy.

At the STV election debate on Monday Swinney repeatedly failed to answer a direct question about whether he supports new licences. Swinney said he was “in favour of working with the oil and gas sector” and that there would be a “climate of compatibility test on every single decision we take on the oil and gas sector”.

Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader, pressed Forbes on the SNP position. She said she was “very clear” while continuing not to be clear, telling MSPs:

Our position is clear, we will back the north east, back workers and intend to achieve our climate change aims.

Forbes also managed to wrap in a dig about David Duguid, telling Ross he had “betrayed … a candidate who is currently recovering from ill health”. (See 9.53am.)

“Vote Tory because we’ve got a good record on LGBT+ rights.” That is not a slogan anyone at CCHQ seems to have proposed, and instead ministers have been happy to antagonise the LGBT+ lobby with announcements that suggests they are willing to curtail trans rights as a culture war issue.

But, perhaps surprisingly, YouGov polling out this morning suggests that, of 21 issues included in the survery, gay, lesbian and bisexual rights is the area where people think things have most improved since 2020. And it is also the only area where people think there has been clear improvement.

The finding partly reflects that fact that the coalition government passed a law in 2013 to allow same-sex marriage. It was controversial at the time, but now there is no one in mainstream politics calling for its repeal. But it is also indicative of how social attitudes have changed enormously on gay rights over the past decade.

The full findings are dire for the Conservatives. They suggest 73% of Britons think things in the UK are worse than when the Conservatives came to power in 2010, and almost half (46%) think thinks are much worse.

The SNP has said the Scottish Conservative party’s decision to block former Scotland Office minister David Duguid at the last minute from standing as a candidate (see 9.53am) shows “the nasty party just got nastier”.

Stewart Hosie, the SNP’s campaign chief, said:

This is a day of shame for the Tories, with three-jobs Douglas Ross taking a seat from David Duguid to keep his third salary at Westminster.

The way the Tories have treated Mr Duguid is indefensible. The nasty party just got nastier.

People in Aberdeenshire North and Moray East deserve a dedicated, full time MP and local champion. That’s what SNP candidate Seamus Logan will be.

Hosie was referring to the fact that Ross is MSP for Highlands and Islands, was (until parliament dissolved) MP for Moray, and also works as a football linesman.

UPDATE: I have amended the final sentence to say the third job Hosie was referring to was Ross’s work as a football linesman, not his being party leader.

Rachel Reeves is under pressure from Labour shadow ministers to raise capital gains tax as part of an autumn budget at which the shadow chancellor is considering up to a dozen new revenue-raising measures. Anna Isaac and Kiran Stacey have the story.

Anneliese Dodds, the Labour party chair, has said the revelation that the Tories are still taking money from Frank Hester shows Rishi Sunak has “no integrity”. In a statement she said:

Rishi Sunak has proven he is a man with no integrity.

He is too weak to return the money donated by a man who has made violent, misogynist, and racist remarks which belong nowhere near our politics.

If Rishi Sunak had a backbone he’d have cut ties with Frank Hester months ago, returned the money and apologised properly to Diane Abbott.

These are from Michael Crick, the broadcaster and writer, on Douglas Ross standing as the Tory candidate in Aberdeenshire North and Moray East. (See 9.53am.) Crick runs an X account, Tomorrow’sMPs, that covers candidate selection decisions.

ABERDEENSHIRE NORTH etc: a Scots Tory says: “At approx 21:20 Scot Tory approved candidates were informed that DD was unable to stand. CVs are to be submitted by 11am today & to be available in person in the constituency tonight. Disgraceful behaviour by leader and our party.”

After the extraordinary and almost unprecedented behaviour of the Labour NEC, Richard Holden and now Douglas Ross, perhaps 2024 should go down as the “Grab a Late Safe Seat Election”

Mel Stride, the work and pensions secretary, was the duty Tory on the airwaves this morning. Asked about the latest revelations about the party taking donations from Frank Hester, he replied:

Any racist comment is utterly, utterly unacceptable. I believe that Mr Hester has shown considerable remorse since making those remarks, which were utterly unacceptable.

I have taken great personal pride in the fact that I’ve sat around a cabinet table that is the most diverse in our history, with a British-Asian prime minister at its head that I supported during his leadership campaign, and supported very strongly to be our prime minister.

So that is the very clear position that I have and that the Conservative party has on those kinds of issues.

Asked if the party should return the donations from Hester, Stride said: “I’m not going to get drawn in those kind of issues.”

The opposition parties have denounced the Tories for taking money from Frank Hester this year. The party accepted more than £5m from him in the first quarter of this year, including £150,000 after it was reported that Hester made comments about Diane Abbott condemned as racist and misogynistic.

Labour said the latest figures showed Hester was responsible for more than two thirds of total donations to the Tories in the first quarter of this year. A spokesperson asked: “Are Tory parliamentary candidates comfortable with delivering leaflets paid for by Frank Hester during this election campaign?”

For the SNP, Kirsten Oswald, a parliamentary candidate, said the Tories for once should “put morals before money” and give the donation to charity. She said:

The Conservatives must donate every last penny of Frank Hester’s money to an anti-racism charity – and do so without delay.

All forms of racism and discrimination are abhorrent and have no place in our society – so what does it say if a political party looking to form the next government are happy to accept donations from a disgraced racist donor.

And Daisy Cooper, the Lib Dem deputy leader, said:

How low can Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives go? If the Conservatives spend this money they will be proudly funded by a man who made the most appalling racist and sexist comments.

Ultimately the buck stops with Rishi Sunak. Sunak must personally intervene and make sure not a penny of this money is spent.

No amount of tainted funding will stop the threat the Liberal Democrats pose to the Conservatives in many seats across the country.

Diane Abbott, the Labour candidate and former shadow home secretary who was the subject of racist abuse in comments made by Tory donor Frank Hester to staff at his healthcare company, has said the news (see 10.02am) that the Tories received a further £5m from him in January was an insult to her and all black women.

Rishi Sunak belatedly admitted Frank Hester’s remarks that “I made him hate all black woman and should be shot” were racist. Now it turns out Sunak accepted a further £5 million from him. An insult to me and all black women

The latest donation has been disclosed today by the Electoral Commission, but was made to the Tories in January. That was before the Guardian revealed in March what Hester had said about Abbott. But the Electoral Commission has also revealed that the Tories accepted a further donation from Hester, of £150,000, three days after the story broke.

Hester donated to the party via his company, Phoenix Partnership. He apologised for being rude about Abbott but did not accept that what he said about her was racist.

Labour has withdrawn a costly lawsuit against five former staffers accused of leaking an internal report on antisemitism and “conspiring” against Keir Starmer, Aletha Adu reports.

Rishi Sunak has paid tribute to D-Day veterans at a commemorative event in Normandy this morning. Addressing his remarks in particular to veterans attending the ceremony, Sunak said:

You risked everything. And we owe you everything.

We cannot possibly hope to repay that debt.

But we can – and we must – pledge never to forget.

After the war, many of you dedicated your lives to telling the story of what happened here.

You sold poppies and raised millions for charity.

You taught generations of young people about the horrors of war.

You lived lives of quiet dignity and dedication in your homes, workplaces, communities.

Yet with each passing year, it falls now to those of us who listened in awe to your stories to pass them on to our own children and grandchildren.

Because only by remembering can we make certain that the cause you fought for and that so many of your friends and colleagues died for, that great cause of freedom, peace, and democracy, will never be taken for granted.

(This sounded heartfelt and genuine, but the line about veterans dedicating their lives to telling the story of what happened did not sound accurate. One of the most striking things about people who served in the second world war was how, for many years, many of them never spoke about it at all, to the extent that children and grandchildren only learnt about extraordinary acts of bravery many years later.)

Frank Hester, the businessman at the centre of a row about comments condemned as racist and misogynistic, gave the Conservative party a further £5m in January, figures released by the Electoral Commission show. Henry Dyer and Rowena Mason have the story.

Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader, has announced that he will stand as a candidate in the UK election, reversing his earlier commitment to focus on his duties at Holyrood.

Ross said he had decided to “to lead from the front” after former Scotland office minister David Duguid, the anticipated candidate for the new seat of Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, developed “serious health issues”.

Ross, who until the general election was called served both as MP for Moray and an MSP for the Highlands and Islands, confirmed his decision at a hastily arranged press conference in Edinburgh this morning, after Duguid claimed last night that he had been barred from standing by the party due to ill health.

Duguid, the former MP for Banff and Buchan whose constituency was taken in to the new seat for which Ross has put himself forward, revealed on social media that he had not been selected to stand despite being adopted by his local party.

Duguid has been unwell since May and is being cared for by the spinal injury unit in Glasgow’s Queen Elizabeth University Hosptial.

Sepaking this morning, Ross said:

Unfortunately, with real regret, the party management board concluded that David could not proceed as our candidate for the new seat of Aberdeenshire North and Moray East.

I want to personally thank him for the significant role he has played and there will always be a place for him in the Scottish Conservatives.

Explaining that the new seat includes part of his old Moray constituency, which he held since his surprise ousting of SNP veteran Angus Robertson in 2017, and which has been abolished in the boundary review, Ross went on:

I know how to beat the SNP and I know how important it is to local voters that we do so.

”I know how damaging it would be for constituents, including many I’ve already represented as MP for Moray, to have an SNP MP who only focuses on independence at the expense of all the issues that really matter to local people.

Good morning. The government raises more than £1 trillion in tax every year, and more than half of that money comes from just three sources: income tax, national insurance and VAT. The Conservatives and Labour have both promised not to raise the rates of any of those taxes (although, with VAT, Labour was initially reluctant to give a cast-iron pledge, implying Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, wanted, at least a bit, to keep her options open.)

But there are plenty of other taxes available to a chancellor, and it seems the Conservative party now plans to spend the remaining four weeks until polling day challenging Labour to rule out raising any of them. Today Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, has written an article for the Daily Telegraph in which he promises that his party won’t increase stamp duty, that it will continue to ensure main homes are exempt from capital gains tax, and that it won’t hold a council tax revaluation, or increase the number of council tax bands. The final promise is particular significant because the current council tax arrangements for England are egregiously unfair, and mainstream economists argue (eg here and here) the case for reform is overwhelming.

Hunt says:

That is why today we are announcing the family home tax guarantee.

This guarantee is a commitment not to increase the number of council tax bands, undertake an expensive council tax revaluation, or cut council tax discounts. It is a commitment to maintain private residence relief, so that people’s main homes are protected from capital gains tax. And it is a commitment not to increase the rate or level of stamp duty.

I am throwing down the gauntlet to Rachel Reeves and Sir Keir Starmer to join us in this pledge. This isn’t party political point-scoring. I actually want to see the Labour party say they will put families first and higher taxes second.

When politicians declare they are not engaged in “party political point-scoring”, that’s often a clear sign that are and Hunt’s article suggests that the Tories have decided that tax is the strongest card they’ve got to play in the campaign. Normally parties are reluctant to rule out too many tax increases in advance of an election because they want to retain room for manoeuvre if economic circumstances get tricky. But if a party is expecting to lose, it feels less constrained when it comes to making promises.

So far Hunt does not seem to have succeeded in tempting Labour to play his game. Last night a party spokersperson just said:

We will not be raising taxes on working people … These are more desperate claims from Rishi Sunak who lied to the British people before and is lying to them again.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies is in despair at the honesty of the debate about taxation during the campaign. It says both main parties are refusing to be honest about the need for tax rises or deep spending cuts after polling day.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9.30am: Douglas Ross, the Scottish Conservative leader, is holding a press conference.

Morning: Rishi Sunak, Keir Starmer and other leaders are attending the D-Day Commemorations at the British Normandy Memorial, Ver-sur-Mer. Starmer will also be at the afternoon event at Omaha beach.

10am: Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, is campaigning in Wiltshire. In the afternoon he will be campaigning in Oxfordshire.

11am: Adrian Ramsay, the Green party co-leader, and Dr Pallavi Devulapalli, the party’s health spokesperson, hold a press conference on the party’s health plans.

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