Election latest: 'Big banks and billionaires' to pay for £9bn NHS boost under Lib Dems (2024)

Sky News' deputy political editor Sam Coates and Politico's Jack Blanchard are here with their guide to the election day ahead.

This is day 19 of the campaign. Jack and Sam discuss Rishi Sunak's attempted reset after the D-Day debacle, Labour's plans for childcare, the Lib Dem's manifesto launch, and the reaction to Emmanuel Macron's shock election announcement in France.

Email Jack and Sam:jackandsam@sky.uk

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Question. If a prime minister is heckled at a rally and there's no backdrop scandal to imbue it with meaning, should it still end up on the news?

I ask because so often in election campaigns, individual and often innocuous events get sucked into the black hole of a political narrative and spat out as something very different and much more dangerous.

Exhibit A - the torrid two days Rishi Sunak has had after his early departure from the D-Day commemorations.

Such was the scale of this saga that even a solitary road sign in rural Gloucestershire was transformed into a symbol of the hapless Tory campaign stumbling from one PR disaster to another - simply because it read "Veterans Way" and happened to be next to a school the prime minister was visiting.

A GP with gripes about the widening of access to medical care topped off the party's hell day after she interrupted Mr Sunak at a rally in Wiltshire.

This was inevitably seen as another blow for the embattled campaign, despite the prime minister giving a fairly convincing defence of his policy.

You wonder how such a situation would have been received had it happened to Sir Keir Starmer - the drama potentially diluted by his huge lead in the polls and polished campaign machine.

None of this is to deny the importance of the D-Day story.

As one pollster put it, the debacle seemed almost "laser guided" to inflict the maximum amount of damage on a leader leaking votes to the right and facing frequent accusations of being out of touch.

That was certainly evident in Bishop Auckland on Saturday.

The Tories took this seat for the first time ever in 2019, but metres from a Conservative campaign stop one former candidate for the party told Sky News he could "never vote for that man" after events of the past two days.

"He's leading them off the cliff like rats following the Pied Piper," he said.

So how can Rishi Sunak change the weather?

Read Rob's full analysis below...

Over the weekend, Labour's shadow attorney general Emily Thornberry said "it would be fine if we have to, in the short term, have larger classes" in the state sector.

This was in response to suggestions a VAT imposition on private education could cause independent institutions to close.

Speaking to Sky News this morning, shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said Ms Thornberry was wrong.

"I'm afraid that's not our position," Ms Phillipson tells Kay Burley, saying her colleague misspoke.

Ms Phillipson is also asked about if Labour has any plans to raise any taxes in the wake of the election.

She rules out Labour increasing fuel duty, stamp duty and capital gains tax.

After repeating that taxes won't be raised on "working people", Ms Phillipson says this means people "that go out to work for a living, and have faced huge tax increases under the Conservatives - where they've risen to the highest point in 70 years".

The Liberal Democrats are launching their manifesto later today.

At the heart of the party's policy platform is a £9bn pledge to fix the health and social care - and they will be doing that by "looking to the big banks and to the billionaires".

Asked if £9bn is enough - it works out to about 5% of the health and social care budget - deputy leader Daisy Cooper says it is a "significant investment", and will be used to recruit 8,000 GPs.

It will also be used to "end the access crisis" in NHS dentists.

Ms Cooper says £9bn is a sum of money that can have "a really transformational effect".

Some £4bn will come from reversing a tax cut given to big banks, Ms Cooper says, and the other £5bn will come from reforming capital gains tax.

You can read more about the Lib Dem's manifesto launch below:

We've been hearing from policing minister Chris Philp this morning.

Asked how he felt when he heard the prime minister had left Normandy early, Mr Philp says he was "shocked and disappointed".

But Rishi Sunak has "apologised" since then, Mr Philp says.

He adds the PM has "a good track record" on the military and veterans while in office.

He is asked about the last time he spoke to Mr Sunak - the prime minister and leader of his party.

Mr Philp tells Kay Burley that he has not spoken face to face since parliament dissolved on 30 May - 10 days ago.

"We had a text message exchange a few days ago, but I haven't spoken to him since parliament broke up," Mr Philp says.

It's worth noting that Mr Philp is campaigning to get elected in south London - while Mr Sunak is looking to get elected in North Yorkshire, so their patches are not close together.

He is then asked about Mr Sunak not doing any interviews over the weekend, following the uproar over him leaving D-Day early.

Mr Philp says the PM is going to be out "on the campaign trail today" - where Mr Sunak will be "talking to journalists whenever they want to ask him some questions".

By Matthew Thompson, Sky News correspondent

The Liberal Democrats will launch their manifesto with a £9bn pledge to fix the health and care system.

The policy, which will be revealed by party leader Sir Ed Davey on Monday, includes plans to recruit 8,000 more GPs, boost cancer survival rates and introduce free personal care for the elderly and the disabled.

The total cost would be an extra £9.4bn a year, to be funded in part by reforming capital gains tax. CGT is paid on profits from the sale of assets such as shares or property and is set lower than the rate of income tax.

It is often argued this disparity means wealthy people, who often earn more from assets than from income, are able to pay less tax.

The Lib Dem manifesto will also promise not to increase income tax, VAT or national insurance.

Speaking to Sky News, Sir Ed Davey said: "This is the healthcare election for the Liberal Democrats.

"We've been listening to people around the country, and top of their concerns in so many areas is the health service.

"So we have absolutely made the NHS and care at the heart of our manifesto."

Read more below:

Former home secretary and Conservative candidate Suella Braverman has called for her party to enter into a pact with Reform UK leader Nigel Farage "in the future".

Mr Braverman, who is considered a likely candidate in any future Tory leadership contest, adds she would welcome the former UKIP leader into the Conservative Party.

Speaking to The Times, Ms Braverman says: "We need to, in the future, to find some way to work together because there shouldn't be big differences between us.

"I would welcome Nigel into the Conservative Party. There's not much difference really between him and many of the policies that we stand for.

"We are a broad church, we should be a welcoming party and an inclusive party and if someone is supportive of the party, that's a pre-condition and they want Conservatives to get elected then they should be welcomed."

Mr Farage has ruled out doing a deal with the Conservatives in this election.

In 2019, Reform - then known as the Brexit Party - did not stand in Tory seats.

We're entering another week in the general election campaign - and this week it's manifestos.

Today is the Liberal Democrats' turn, tomorrow is the Conservatives, Wednesday is the Greens and Thursday is Labour.

These documents - upon which any new government bases its legislative agenda - can be dense and hard to understand, but we'll do our best to explain them all.

Stick with us this morning as we get the Lib Dems' policy platform and truffle through it for all the best bits that matter to you.

Meanwhile, coming up on Sky News this morning will be:

• 7.15am: Policing minister, Chris Philp;
• 7.30am: Lib Dem deputy leader Daisy Cooper;
• 7.35am: Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson.

Overnight, Labour pledged to create 100,000 extra nursery places in schools.

The Conservatives promised they would add an extra 8,000 police officers.

You can read about their latest offerings below.

Labour has abandoned plans to bring back the pensions lifetime allowance (LTA), blaming the Tories "botched" handling of the policy.

The LTA put a cap of £1.07m on how much people could save, or benefit from investment growth, in their pensions before tax charges kicked in.

The limit was scrapped by Chancellor Jeremy Hunt last year - in a move branded a "tax cut for the rich" by Labour at the time.

Ms Reeves pledged to reinstate the cap, but has now U-turned on the £800m proposal, with allies telling the Financial Times it would add uncertainty for savers and be complex to reintroduce.

Insiders said the money it was due to raise was never allocated, so "there will be no black hole" as a result.

A Labour source confirmed to Sky News that the cap would not be reintroduced, blaming the Tories for their handling of the policy.

They said: “The Conservatives have botched their policy of abolishing the lifetime allowance, with thousands of people approaching retirement being left in limbo because of errors in legislation. "

The source claimed this had led to "the extraordinary situation where the current government advised some savers to delay retirement until after the election".

"Labour's priority is to bring stability and certainty back to the economy. That is why it will fall to a Labour government, if successful at the election, to sort out this mess and we are determined to do so.”

Sir Keir Starmer said he wants to "change the whole approach" to how students are charged for university, amid speculation he is considering a graduate tax.

The Labour leader has come under pressure to make the system fairer after rowing back on his pledge to abolish tuition fees last year.

Asked about rumours of some sort of graduate tax, the Labour leader told The Guardian: “The way the system works at the moment doesn’t work for students. It doesn’t work for universities.

"I think we should change the whole approach, and obviously we’re working on what that would look like, and there is a range of options.

"We will be looking at a fairer way overall, for students and actually for universities.”

Tuition fees rose to over £9,000 per year under the Conservative and Liberal Democrat coalition government.

Last year Sir Keir dropped his leadership pledge to abolish the fees, blaming the Tories' handling of the economy.

Labour said at the time it would set out another solution "in the near future", with shadow education secretary Bridget Philipson saying she would like to lower monthly loan repayments.

It is not clear if more detailed plans will be unveiled in the party's manifesto, expected to be launched next week.

Reports have previously suggested that members of Sir Keir's shadow cabinet are in favour of a graduate tax.

The general idea behind this is that graduates would pay for their tuition through a special tax on their income, rather than paying back the fees through a loan with high interest rates.