Election latest: Farage on defensive after supporters caught on camera making racist, murderous and hom*ophobic remarks (2024)

By Gurpreet Narwan, political correspondent

Britain could soon have its most diverse parliament ever but how will voters from ethnically diverse communities behave at the ballot box?

The voting trends of such groups are incredibly complex and varied. There is no single narrative but several themes stick out from YouGov's exclusive polling for Sky News.

Most notably, the handling of the conflict in the Middle East has damaged the two major parties in the eyes of British Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities. This is something the Labour Party, in particular, is very sensitive too.

Labour have historically fared well with these voters and 53% of ethnic minority voters we polled said they would vote for the party - that's a greater lead than polls we've done with the general population.

However, the Tories fare worse among ethnic minority voters on the whole - in this poll they are neck and neck with the Green Party at 14%.

But, if we drill into the detail, 32% of British Indians said they would vote Conservative - 12% higher than the general population. This is a good reminder that there is a huge variation in voting trends among communities.

Reform UK polled much worse with ethnically diverse communities than the population at large - they're on 7% - but they're still one point above the Lib Dems.

Read Gurpreet's full piece here:

That concludes tonight's edition of Politics Hub With Ali Fortescue - scroll down to read through tonight's interviews and analysis.

Our next guest on Politics Hub With Ali FortescueisClaire Ainsley, Director of the Project on Center-Left Renewal at the Progressive Policy Institute, and former adviser to Sir Keir Starmer.

We discuss what the US-UK relationship could look like under a potential Labour government and a possible Trump presidency.

She replies that the shadow foreign secretary, David Lammy, has been "at pains" to build relationships across the Atlantic, and "all of the shadow foreign affairs team have really been out and present, not just in obviously a North America, but around the world".

He says: "I think there's definitely a readiness, on the part of other governments, to be able to have somewhat of a reset [with] the UK.

"So I think in the end, the US-UK relationship is going to be extremely important. And actually it's about common interests and the primarily that will be in the first instance about backing for NATO and obviously for Ukraine."

We bring in our panel, and former Labour cabinet minister Ben Bradshaw says: "I don't think it's any secret that probably most Labour people - actually most members of the current government - would rather work with a Democrat president than with a Trump [presidency].

"But you deal with whoever the American people deliver as president."

Should Sir Keir Starmer win the election, he will have a steep learning curve, with multiple international summits scheduled for immediately after polling day.

But Ms Ainsley says he is "ready".

"You can just see in Keir Starmer that he is ready to be prime minister if that's what the voters decide next week.

Next, we ask Labour's Sarah Jones for her reaction tothe debate between presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden last night.

She replies: "Well, obviously it was a difficult watch for lots of different reasons.

"And it will be for the American people to decide who they want to run their country.

"And it will be for whoever forms the next government to have a stronger relationship with the US as we can."

Asked if she has any concerns about Joe Biden's performance in particular, she replies: "No, it's not for me to question his ability or his performance or anything like that."

Finally, we ask Ms Jones if it will be a problem, should Donald Trump win the election, that the likely future foreign secretary, David Lammy, has said some extremely critical things about him in the past.

She replies that "the role of a Labour government, as you would expect any government to be, is to do what's right for our country and what's right for the world".

She says the Conservative government has "not played the role on the world stage that we could have done", and a Labour government would want to "build those strong relationships" and "come together" with allies to "find solutions" to the issues we face.

Next on Politics Hub With Ali Fortescue, we are hearing from Labour's shadow minister for industry and decarbonisation, Sarah Jones.

We ask first for her reaction to the racist and hom*ophobic comments made by Reform UK activists, captured on camera, and she says it's "really grim for our politics in the middle of an election to hear such awful things".

She says Nigel Farage, the party leader, should question "what kind of party" he is running, and if such sentiments are widespread within Reform UK.

"But the fact that these comments were made openly and without anybody thinking that they would be challenged is quite extraordinary. And there's no room for those kinds of views in politics.

"And I hope that Nigel Farage looks very carefully at the party that he's leading and the leadership he's providing, that he's enabling people to feel it's okay for them to say those kinds of horrible things."

Asked what exactly she thinks Mr Farage should do, Ms Jones replies: "If he is serious, which it doesn't appear that he is actually because he's flip-flopping between saying, well, these comments were wrong and then saying, well, it was implying it was some kind of set up.

"He needs to own what's happened. Take responsibility for it, and stamp anything like that out within his party.

"And I think the scrutiny that he's now under is good. It's quite right that we're looking at him and understanding what he thinks about the world and about, about all these issues."

Finally, we ask Tory candidate and former defence secretary Sir Liam Fox what he made of the debate between presidents Donald Trump and Joe Biden last night.

He says he "did not find it an encouraging spectacle".

"It did not look as though Biden was properly focussed on the subjects that he was being asked about. And Donald Trump wasn't exactly sticking to the issues either."

More broadly, he notes that countries like Iran, Russia, and China will have been watching, and "they will be taking from that debate that President Biden didn't appear to be properly focussed".

"His team have said that he was perhaps unwell. Perhaps he had a cold. But if I were a Democrat in the United States today, I would be taking a long, hard look at whether there was a potential other candidate."

As election day approaches, conversations are starting to happen about who could become a caretaker Tory leader in the event the Tories lose and Rishi Sunak subsequently quits.

Former cabinet minister and current Tory candidate Sir Liam Fox has been mooted as a potential interim leader, and we ask him next if he would consider the role.

He tells Politics Hub With Ali Fortescue: "I've always thought, as a doctor, it's a very good idea not to have a post-mortem while the patient's still alive.

"So let the voters make their own judgements next Thursday. And we'll deal with the circ*mstances we have afterwards."

Pushed on if it is something he would be hypothetically comfortable with, given that his name is being bandied around, he replies: "Well, it's very flattering, but, as I say, we have to wait and let the voters make the decisions."

The first guest on tonight's edition of Politics Hub With Ali FortescueisSir Liam Fox, Conservative candidate and former defence secretary.

We ask first for his reaction to the racist and hom*ophobic comments made by Reform UK activists, captured on camera, and he describes them as "horrible" and "disgraceful".

He also notes that party leader Nigel Farage claimed earlier in the campaign that Rishi Sunak "doesn't understand our culture".

"When you have that sort of dog whistle politics, you shouldn't be surprised if occasionally the dog bites you."

Asked if he thinks there is a wider problem within the Reform Party, he says he is "not really qualified" to make that judgement, but "that sort of way of speaking about other people has no place in our politics".

"I think that we've now seen Reform exposed," he adds, and points to Mr Farage's previous comments saying the west "provoked" Putin into invading Ukraine.

He says Reform is "an unsuitable party to be represented in the House of Commons".

Pushed on if the problem goes deeper in the party, Sir Liam says: "Well, it does seem to be a broader problem because we've seen it from a number of candidates, some of the things that we put out on social media."

"It does strike me that this is a group that is actually appealing to some of the most unpleasant and base instincts of parts of the country. And I hope that voters totally reject them.

"I think that their view of Britain is a distorted one, just as their view of the world is a distorted one."

Asked if he would say Reform UK is institutionally racist, he says it's "a deeply unpleasant party" with "deeply unpleasant individuals" and a "really quite dangerous" would view.

With just days until the general election, I think today was the most raw and angry we have seen the prime minister.

He talked about his daughters and about protecting his family as he responded to a recording of an activist from Reform, calling him, as Sunak himself put it, a "P***".

Nigel Farage said the comments caught on an undercover camera were very wrong but went on to claim it was part of a "set up".

But the Reform leader, so often on the attack, is on the defence.

The question being asked now: does the Reform party have a deeper problem?

Our daily politics showPolitics Hubis live now on Sky News with ourpolitical correspondentAli Fortescuehosting this evening.

The fast-paced programme dissects the inner workings of Westminster, with interviews, insights, and analysis - bringing you, the audience, into the corridors of power.

Joining Ali tonight:

• Sir Liam Fox, Conservative candidate and former defence secretary;
• Sarah Jones, Labour shadow minister for industry;
• Claire Ainsley, former adviser to Sir Keir Starmer.

And on her panel are:

• Mercy Muroki, former adviser to Kemi Badenoch;
  
• Ben Bradshaw, former Labour MP for Exeter and cabinet minister.
  

Watch live on Sky News, in the stream at the top of this page, and follow live updates here in the Politics Hub.

WatchPolitics Hubfrom 7pm every night during the election campaign on Sky channel 501, Virgin channel 602, Freeview channel 233, on theSky News websiteandappor onYouTube.

With less than a week to go until election day, Rishi Sunak has a mountain to climb, with a new MRP poll putting his party on course to win just 85 seats.

Labour are forecast to win a whopping 470 seats and become the largest party in Scotland for the first time in over a decade, the new poll by Survation says.

Here are the full results from the survey:

• Labour: 470 seats
• Conservatives: 85 seats
• Liberal Democrats: 56 seats
• SNP: 12 seats
• Reform UK: 4 seats
• Plaid Cymru: 3 seats
• Green Party: 2 seats

Theanalysis is based on 23,364 interviews conducted between 15 and 27 June 2024.

In Scotland, Labour is predicted to win 37 seats, while the SNP will crash down to 12.