Would You like a feature Interview?
All Interviews are 100% FREE of Charge
Nigel Farage wanted ITV’s seven-way debate to be all about Nigel Farage, but Penny Mordaunt and Angela Rayner had other ideas.
During the 90-minute special, the Reform UK leader told primetime viewers that his party had overtaken the Conservatives in the opinion polls for the first time.
For viewers who hadn’t been closely following the latest developments in the extraordinary 2024 election campaign, it was a red wine-spill moment.
Mr Farage tried to provoke the Speaker on multiple occasions during the debate, but Mr Mordaunt pretended he was not there and continued his attacks on the Labour deputy leader.
The two women clashed over the NHS, tax and private schools, with Mordaunt again bringing up the Conservative claim that Labour was planning a £2,000 tax increase on households, which Rayner denied.
Mr Mordaunt repeated the words of Grant Shapps, who urged voters not to give Labour a “blank cheque”.
The Conservatives and her party will have been shaken by Reform UK coming one point ahead of the Conservatives in a YouGov poll just days after Rishi Sunak unveiled his £17bn tax cut pledge to voters, but she made little shift to the left on her ITV platform.
An hour and 15 minutes into the debate, when moderator Julie Etchingham asked participants to ask each other questions, Mordaunt was forced to turn his attention to the Reform UK leader who was making life so miserable for Conservative members.
Mr Farage asked why the Conservatives had failed to reduce net immigration after 14 years in power, with Mr Mordaunt claiming “Nigel is helping the Labour party”.
All questions from other politicians, apart from Mr Farage and the Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper, were directed at Mr Rayner – unsurprising given his large lead in the opinion polls and his apparent certainty of victory in England, Scotland and Wales.
But Labour’s deputy leader remained calm amid the criticism, highlighting Labour’s key messages of wealth creation, change, reducing NHS waiting lists and getting more teachers.
Farage told his audience that his party could be a real opposition to the Labour government, and concluded by telling them: “Join the rebellion!”
Wouldn’t it have been better for the Conservative party if Ms Mordaunt had gone head-to-head with the Reform UK leader over a 90-minute debate? Did she make a mistake?
She and her aides had clearly decided on a strategy for the debates which Mr Farage would not take part in.
Unfortunately, the Conservatives cannot do that in a real election campaign.