Minister: Farage Must Not Join Tories

According to a minister, Nigel Farage cannot be permitted to join the Conservative Party.

If he maintains his marginal seat, Steve Baker is gearing up for a leadership run, and he told Sky News that "someone who has intentionally set out to destroy the Conservative Party cannot subsequently be welcomed into it."

That was his goal in dealing with Richard Tice. Regretfully, his party has drawn a number of members that I would never permit to join the Conservative Party.

“I’m afraid Nigel can’t have it both ways. If he wants to be a Conservative he should shut down his party and join us.”

James Cleverly, the Home Secretary, and Kemi Badenoch, the business secretary, have both said Mr Farage should not be allowed to join the Tory party.

Mr Baker later told Sophy Ridge’s Politics Hub programme that he “wouldn’t mind” becoming the next Tory leader.

“I would not rule it out,” he said. “The reality is that my colleagues have sent for me before the referendum, after the referendum, during Covid and over net zero.

“And on all four occasions, I’ve led actual MPs to a great degree of success – and I wouldn’t mind the chance to do it again.”

Labour’s Jonathan Ashworth later attacked Mr Baker for firing the starting gun on his campaign with just 72 hours until polls close on July 4.

“It is incredible that less than 60 hours until polling booths open, Tory ministers are undermining the Prime Minister by boldly flaunting their leadership ambitions on national television,” the shadow paymaster general said.

Elsewhere, Sir Keir Starmer said transgender women have no right to use women-only spaces following Mr Ashworth’s failure to say which lavatory trans women should use earlier on Monday.

Ed Miliband, the shadow energy secretary, dismissed environmental protest groups like Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion are “deeply counter-productive”.

In Leicestershire, Rishi Sunak warned that tax rises were in Labour’s DNA as he addressed a campaign rally.

“It’s what they always do,” he said. “It’s in their DNA.”

10:00 PM BST

That’s all for today

Thank you for following The Telegraph’s live coverage of the general election campaign. My colleague Dominic Penna will be with you tomorrow morning to guide you through all the latest developments.

09:52 PM BST

Just Stop Oil ‘deeply counter-productive, says Miliband

Environmental protest groups like Just Stop Oil and Extinction Rebellion are “deeply counter-productive, Ed Miliband has said.

Labour’s shadow environment secretary told The Guardian that the activists hindered the drive to net zero by making it less popular with the public.

 “I think all the evidence is that it turns people off the cause,” he said.

09:43 PM BST

Labour has a problem with racism among its supporters, says Cleverly

Labour has a problem with racism among its supporters, the Home Secretary has said.

In an interview with The Telegraph, James Cleverly said that his most recent experience of racism had been from the “political Left”, with their anti-patriotic rhetoric telling ethnic minorities they should know their place.

“I get criticism when I say how proud I am of this country, I get criticised by Left-wing voices, and it reminds me that they fundamentally hate this country, and they expect me to echo their opinion, and I don’t, and I won’t,” said Mr Cleverly, whose father is English and mother is from Sierra Leone.

The Home Secretary’s comments follow an election row over racist comments by some Reform UK candidates and supporters, including personal slurs targeting Rishi Sunak’s Asian heritage which left the Prime Minister “hurt” and “angry”.

09:27 PM BST

Labour attacks Baker for Tory leadership ambitions

Labour has attacked Conservative minister Steve Baker for saying that he “wouldn’t mind” becoming the next party leader.

Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow paymaster general, said: “It is incredible that less than 60 hours until polling booths open, Tory ministers are undermining the Prime Minister by boldly flaunting their leadership ambitions on national television.

“From Covid cronyism to trips to the bookies, these Tories always put self-interest and their own ambition ahead of serving their country.

“What this shows is that if the Conservatives are given another five years, the chaos will just continue.”

09:13 PM BST

Trans women have no right to use women-only spaces, says Starmer

Transgender women have no right to use women-only spaces, Sir Keir Starmer has said.

Asked by The Times if trans women with gender recognition certificates have the right to do so, the Labour leader said: “No. They don’t have that right. They shouldn’t. 

“That’s why I’ve always said biological women’s spaces need to be protected.”

Asked whether he would meet JK Rowling, Sir Keir said: “I’ve indicated a willingness. Hopefully we can get that organised.”

Sir Keir’s comments come after Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow paymaster general, refused to say which lavatory transgender women should use. Bridget Phillipson, the shadow education secretary, declined eight times last week to answer the same question.

09:11 PM BST

08:54 PM BST

Tax rises are in Labour’s DNA, Sunak warns

Tax rises are in Labour’s DNA, Rishi Sunak has warned.

Speaking at a campaign event in Leicestershire, the Prime Minister said: “Friends, we have got urgent work to do. We have three days to save Britain from the danger of a Labour government.

“A Labour government that would hike up everyone’s taxes by £2,000, would shunt our politics to the Left, and they would change the rules to entrench themselves in power for a decade.

“We cannot let Britain sleepwalk into this. It is our job, it is our duty, to wake people up to that danger.”

He added: “He added: “Once you’ve given Labour a blank cheque, you won’t be able to get it back.

“And that means that your taxes are going up: your car, your pension, your savings, your work, you name it, they will tax it thousands and thousands of pounds. It’s what they always do. It’s in their DNA.”

08:31 PM BST

Gullis attacks Starmer for wanting to stop work at 6pm on Fridays

Jonathan Gullis has taken a swipe at Sir Keir Starmer after the Labour leader said he wanted to stop working at 6pm on Fridays to spend time with his children, reports Genevieve Holl-Allen.

Speaking to activists in the East Midlands, he said: “The truth and reality is this is a much more dangerous world to have a deputy leader and a Foreign Secretary who aren’t prepared or willing to use a nuclear deterrent.

“To have a leader the Labour Party who’s literally boasting he plans to clock off at 6pm on a daily basis today, so let’s hope Putin doesn’t choose 6.01pm when he wishes to go any further with his illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine.”

08:25 PM BST

Tories need to find ‘inner Bellinghams’, says Gullis

Jonathan Gullis has urged the Conservatives to find their “inner Jude Bellinghams” in the final week of the general election campaign, Genevieve Holl-Allen reports.

At a rally event in the East Midlands, the Tory deputy chairman said: “We’ve got to find our inner Jude Bellinghams.

“We need to find that 95th-minute magic and deliver that extra route of extra leaflets or knock on those extra few doors”.

08:14 PM BST

Journalist’s joke was filthiest thing on Keir Starmer’s farm visit

Starmer’s tour of Tory heartlands took him to rural Oxfordshire, past chocolate box cottages and rolling hills, to somewhere near Chipping Norton: David Cameron country, where he famously locked himself in a shed and wept out a memoir, writes Tim Stanley.

“Surely the socialists can’t win here?” I asked a county councillor who dutifully held up a sign marked “CHANGE”. Oo arr, it be possible alright: Chippy, as they call it, is in fact a former mill town and has been attached to the redrawn Banbury constituency, turning Victoria Prentis’s 17,000 majority into a marginal.

The Labour revolution knows no limits. Give it five years and this farm we were standing in could be collectivised, populated by strapping Soviet boys looking doe-eyed at tractors.

As it is, Heath Farm is the cleanest farm I’ve ever been on. No pigs, no muck; the only hint of the arable was a reporter relieving himself in a bush.

07:55 PM BST

Labour poll lead narrows as election nears

Labour’s lead over the Conservatives has narrowed to its lowest for a month as the election campaign reaches its end, Deputy Political Editor Dan Martin reports.

The Savanta poll for The Daily Telegraph found the Tories on 24 per cent, up three – the highest figure since before Rishi Sunak’s D-Day debacle in early June.

Labour has also increased by one point to 39 per cent, while Reform UK has seen another decline to 13 per cent.

Sir Keir Starmer’s lead of 15 points over that of Mr Sunak is still likely to result in a Labour landslide – but it could save the Conservatives from electoral oblivion.