Steerpike

Is the master of the dark arts at it again? Sir Gavin Williamson is back in the headlines following a row about an alleged last-minute stitch up in his Staffordshire seat. With Reform riding high in the polls, every Tory MP is fearing for their future, given Richard Tice's pledge to stand candidates across the country. But that won't be a problem for Williamson in his newly-created constituency of Stone, Great Wyrley and Penkridge where the Reform nominee stood down at the very last minute. How convenient eh? Tom Wellings had been confirmed to fight the seat for Reform, having apparently submitted his nomination papers on Wednesday. But with an hour to go before Friday's Electoral Commission 4 p.

Politics took a back seat on Thursday as the great and good of the British establishment marked the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings. Both Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer took a break from election campaigning to head to Normandy, where they joined the King and other world leaders in commemorating the occasion. But when the time came for the official photographs in the afternoon with Joe Biden, Olaf Scholz and Emmanuel Macron, it was Lord Cameron, not Rishi Sunak, who did the honours for Britain. So why was the Foreign Secretary left to pose for pictures with the three heads of government, rather than the Prime Minister? The answer could lie in an interview which Sunak chose to do with ITV shortly after returning from the commemorations on Thursday afternoon.

Oh dear. As the Conservative £2,000 tax claim continues to implode, poor Bim Afolami has been sent out on the airwaves to prop up his party. Only Sky News aren’t taking his defence quite as well as he might have hoped.  ‘How much has tax gone up under the Conservatives over the last parliament term, per household?’ Sky News’s Sophie Ridge quizzed the former Tory politician.  ‘Well it’s difficult to calculate,’ Alofami confessed, before his interviewer stepped in again.  ‘I’ll give you the answer,’ Rigby replied. ‘Since 2019, according to our Economics Data Editor Ed Colway and analysing OBR figures, taxes have gone up £13,000 per household since 2019. £2,000 sounds like a bit of a bargain in comparison, doesn’t it?

Oh dear. It's been another bad day for the Tories. Shortly after Nigel Farage announced his return as leader of Reform, the first YouGov MRP poll of 50,000 voters dropped, showing Sunak's party down to just 140 seats. But for one Conservative, things were about to get even worse. As Sky's Sam Coates discussed the MRP poll on air, his phone rang and his Apple Watch lit up. On it was emblazoned the name of Grant Shapps, the Defence Secretary. At Sophy Ridge's insistence, Coates took the call, as the camera kept on rolling. 'Hello Grant Shapps', he said. 'You’re live on Sky News.' Amid background muttering and laughing from Shapps, Coates told him 'I’m in the studio with Sophy Ridge. Have you seen you’re about to lose your seat, according to the Sky News-YouGov projection?