General election - live: Nigel Farage faces grilling from Andrew Neil after four Brexit Party MEPs defect to Tories
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Your support makes all the difference.Boris Johnson has promised to cut taxes in a “post-Brexit budget” within weeks of the UK leaving the EU. But the plan – based on an existing pledge to raise the threshold for national insurance contributions – was branded as “pure fantasy” and the PM accused of lying.
It comes as Conservative officials are said to be concerned about evidence of a narrowing poll lead over Labour. Appearing on This Morning, Mr Johnson likened Labour's leaked, NHS-related government trade documents to “UFO photos”.
Sajid Javid has claimed Mr Johnson could secure a complex trade deal with the EU “within months”. EU documents leaked to The Independent show leaders in Brussels will issue an election result-day warning to Mr Johnson about the “limited” time to avoid a no-deal Brexit.
Meanwhile, Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage was grilled by the BBC's Andrew Neil, who issued a challenge to the prime minister, who has dodged appearing on his programme, telling him he has an interview "oven-ready".
PM says he will bring Brexit deal ‘before you cook your turkey’
The prime minister is speaking at a factory in Derbyshire, and claims everyone in the Tory party supports his Withdrawal Agreement Bill.
“There’s a huge spread of opinion in our party – but they all back this deal.”
He gets a laugh for one of his standard lines about Jeremy Corbyn and Nicola Sturgeon. “We all know who’s going to be wearing the tartan trousers in that relationship.”
He also re-heated lines and jokes about the need to “get Brexit done” and said his deal could be brought back to parliament “before you cook your Christmas turkey” if the Tories get a majority.
After someone watching apparently slipped and made a banging sound, Johnson joked it was “an intervention from the Labour party”.
Boris Johnson speaking in Derbyshire (Sky News)
Almost three-quarters of students backing Labour
Not a great surprise, but a new ICM poll shows 72 per cent of students intend on voting for Jeremy Corbyn’s party. Only 8 per cent of students say they will vote for the Tories.
Self-styled ‘anti-extremism’ campaign just spending thousands on anti-Labour attack ads
A self-styled “anti-extremism” and pro-“civility” group is spending thousands of pounds running anti-Labour attack adverts on Facebook focusing on the party’s tax and nationalisation policies.
Mainstream UK describes itself as “a new campaign designed to encourage a return to respectable and responsible politics, and to banish extremism from British politics once and for all”.
But despite the non-partisan branding and mission statement under which it solicits cash donations, the group’s entire advertising output is in actual fact targeted at the opposition Labour Party – the bulk of it on issues like taxation and public ownership.
Electoral Commission shows Tories biggest benefiter of big donations
According to the latest figures, the Conservatives raised over 3.5 million in the third week of the election campaign, compared with £521,000 for Labour and £509,000 for the Liberal Democrats.
Crucially, these figures only account for donations registered above £7,500 so do not give a full picture of the amount each party has received.
Labour, for example, claims its average donation is £26, and raised over £1m in small donations in the first ten days of the campaign.
Asked if he would "absolutely promise" to get a trade deal with the EU by the end of the transition period, Mr Johnson said he thought he could.
He said: "We already have a deal. And we can come out on January 31 in a state of perfect equilibrium and grace with the rest of the EU because we have a zero-tariff, zero-quota position now, and I've absolutely no doubt at all that we'll be able to make sure that the EU protects its own interests and has a deal with us that ensures that continues for the future.
"If you say 'can I absolutely guarantee that we'll get a deal', I think I can and I'll tell you why - look at what we achieved ... in three months with the new deal that I did.
"We did it and it's a great deal and it will take this country forward and I'm very proud of it."
Asked if it was a "cast-iron guarantee", Mr Johnson said: "The possibility you allude to simply will not happen."
'Total rubbish': Sajid Javid rebuked for falsely claiming homelessness is falling under Conservatives
Sajid Javid has been accused of spouting "total rubbish" after claiming homelessness numbers were falling as he sought to shift the blame onto the last Labour government.
In a series of media interviews, the chancellor said homelessness levels had soared in 2008 under Labour and claimed that the numbers of homeless people had fallen by nearly half since the Tories entered government in 2010.
Labour immediately rubbished his figures, while the charity Shelter said any assertion that homelessness was going down was "not true".
Johnson casts doubt on thousands of prospective new homes
Sajid Javid has been accused of spouting "total rubbish" after claiming homelessness numbers were falling as he sought to shift the blame onto the last Labour government.
In a series of media interviews, the chancellor said homelessness levels had soared in 2008 under Labour and claimed that the numbers of homeless people had fallen by nearly half since the Tories entered government in 2010.
Labour immediately rubbished his figures, while the charity Shelter said any assertion that homelessness was going down was "not true".
Boris Johnson says Labour would 'rig' second Brexit referendum to ensure Remain wins
The prime minister alleged that “millions” of additional voters who could be expected to vote against Brexit would be added to the electoral roll for any re-run vote.
He appeared to be referring to suggestions that EU nationals and 16-17 year-olds might be allowed to take part in a Final Say vote.
Labour’s manifesto promises to reduce the voting age to 16 and grant voting rights to all residents of the UK, though it does not make clear whether these changes would be in place in time for the referendum the party plans for June next year.
Worried Tories say they’re fighting on a ‘manifesto for nothing’ - Andrew Grice
To its credit, in this election campaign the Labour Party is clear about the direction it would take the country. Its promise of “real change” is not another meaningless slogan. Its manifesto would redistribute wealth, hike public spending and taxes for the top 5 per cent of earners and result in a big expansion of the state.
In contrast, we know remarkably little about what a Boris Johnson administration would do.
The prime minister talks about “a new government, not a continuity government”, because he knows voters want change. He has distanced himself from the Tories’ record on Brexit and did the same on sentencing after the London Bridge attack – with unseemly haste. On public spending cuts, he told The Spectator that, in 2010, “I thought austerity was just not the right way forward for the UK.” That was news to some cabinet ministers.
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