Nigel Farage announces he will stand in Clacton in general election Nigel Farage has announced that he will stand for the Reform UK party in the general election in Clacton, his eighth attempt to become an MP after seven previous failures while standing for Ukip. He said speaking to people on the street asking why he wasn’t standing made him feel he was letting them down. Farage said: I took the day off yesterday. Had a normal day. Walked the dogs. Did a bit of fishing. Popped into the pub, you know, a normal sort of day, which gave me time to think and reflect. And I began to feel terrible sense of guilt. He will stand in Clacton. More details soon … Summary of the day … Nigel Farage has made a surprise announcement that he is to stand as a Reform UK candidate in the general election in Clacton and take over the leadership of the party from Richard Tice. Farage said the country was in economic, social and moral decline Keir Starmer has offered a “triple lock” guarantee on the UK’s nuclear deterrent, which he said was at the heart of Labour’s defence police. Legal advice on UK arms sales to Israel would be reviewed under a Labour government, he said The Conservatives have said they will reform the 2010 Equality Act to end what they say is “confusion” over biological sex and gender. Rishi Sunak denied the party was trying to stoke culture war issues Diane Abbott will be reselected to fight her seat tomorrow despite having suggested on social media that Keir Starmer was a liar, the Guardian understands The Liberal Democrats, campaigning on their clean water policies, managed to photobomb a publicity appearance by the prime minister in Henley-on-Thames when they went behind him on a boat A Scottish leaders debate will take place on STV tonight at 9pm. Scottish Greens have said it is not too late for the television network to do the right thing and include them A YouGov MRP has said Labour are on course a landslide majority even bigger than that won by Tony Blair in 1997 Around half a million people have been affected by an issue which meant that some child benefit payments did not arrive as scheduled The Post Office Horizon IT inquiry was due to resume today, with Ben Foat, general counsel of the Post Office as witness, but the session was cancelled due to illness in the inquiry counsel team That is it from me for today. Andrew Sparrow will be back with you tomorrow. Have a good evening, and I will no doubt see you somewhere on the Guardian website soon. Take care. Here is that first Conservative political broadcast of the campaign, in which it says that “by sticking to the plan, Rishi Sunak is steadying the ship and making progress.” One of the odder moments of television from the campaign so far – defence secretary Grant Shapps appears to have rung up Sky News’ Sam Coates while he was on air and had just been talking about the possibility of Shapps losing his seat, then hung up when Coates put him on speakerphone live on air. Here is the map from that YouGov MRP, which says, after one week of campaigning, Keir Starmer might be on course for the largest majority for over a century, leading to a sweeping cull of Conservative ministers losing their seats including the chancellor Jeremy Hunt and defence secretary Grant Shapps. Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper has also reacted to today’s developments with Nigel Farage and Reform UK, saying: The Conservative party has already become the mirror image of Nigel Farage’s Reform. Rishi Sunak’s constant pandering to Reform has horrified former lifelong Conservative voters in the centre ground. Sunak must show some backbone and rule out Farage ever joining the Conservative party in future, including if he gets elected to be an MP Conservatives: Farage risks handing Starmer "blank cheque to rejoin the EU" Here is a Conservative spokesperson reaction to Nigel Farage becoming Reform UK leader and standing for election in Clacton. The party said: Nigel Farage risks handing Keir Starmer a blank cheque to rejoin the EU, impose the retirement tax on pensioners and hike taxes on hardworking Brits up and down the UK. Farage knows that Reform won’t win any seats, but he doesn’t seem to care that a vote for Reform only helps Labour. He’s doing exactly what Keir Starmer wants him to do. Just yesterday, EU insiders openly voiced their expectation that Starmer would seek a softer Brexit deal, opening the door to rejoining the EU all together. That would mean uncontrolled immigration and betraying the will of the British people. Is Farage really willing to risk undoing his life’s work by handing Starmer a blank cheque to rejoin the EU? Only a vote for Rishi Sunak and the Conservatives can deliver a clear plan, bold action and a secure future for our country.” My colleague Archie Bland has just published our first Election Edition, which is our campaign catchup email which is coming out every weekday at 5pm. He’s managed to get Nigel Farage and Reform UK into it before pressing send today, and possibly thrown some shade at me for being one of those to mention Nigel Farage’s seven previous election defeats :-) Last week, Nigel Farage said he wouldn’t be running for election for Reform UK because he had decided that the US election was more important, and Donald Trump needed his help. But it’s devastating news for America: this afternoon, after muttering about his “huge regrets” about his decision in recent days and blaming the establishment, Farage changed his mind, in what he rather grandly described as an “emergency general election announcement”. Somebody call the police! Not only is he running, in Clacton: he’s taken over as party leader from the presumably disgruntled Richard Tice, who has loaned the party £1.4m over three years and has now had to enthusiastically introduce the man who’s giving him the boot. (Since Reform is, unusually for a political party, structured as a private company with Farage as the majority owner, he can basically do what he likes.) As well as going on about D-day for quite a long time, Farage said he thought the race needed “gingering up”. And even before he finally broke the suspense, the day has proven one of the iron rules of modern British politics: his unerring ability to make everyone talk about him non-stop, even if it’s only to say that he’s failed to become an MP seven times. This projection from YouGov/Sky News suggests that among those losing their seats would be Jeremy Hunt, Grant Shapps, Penny Mordaunt, Esther McVey, Alex Chalk, Mel Stride, Johnny Mercer and Gillian Keegan. GB News have also just put out a polling press release, in which they say there survey of GB News viewers. It says Labour has almost doubled its lead over the Conservative party in just a month among GB News viewers. It says: Keir Starmer and Nigel Farage were the only positively viewed politicians among GB News viewers. They trusted Labour more on the cost of living, the. NHS and Housing, while they still backed the Conservatives on foreign affairs, woke culture, Brexit, criminal justice, inflation, and migration. On the question of growing the economy, Labour have overtaken the Conservatives since the April poll. JL Partners polled 530 GB News current and recent viewers on 29-31 May 2024. The YouGov/Sky News major polling prediction suggests Keir Starmer is on course for a 194 seat majority, which would be the biggest majority for over 100 years. They project 422 seats for Labour, 140 for the Conservatives, 48 for the Liberal Democrats, 17 for the SNP and 2 for the Greens. Reform UK are projected to win zero seats.