Rishi Sunak says he is ‘incredibly angry’ about betting allegations in BBC Question Time election special – as it happened | General election 2024

• Rishi Sunak has said in a BBC Question Time leaders’ special that he was “incredibly angry” to hear about the Tory election date betting allegations and that Tory colleagues should face “the full force of the law” if they are found to have broken the rules. (See 9.36pm.)

• Keir Starmer has again refused to say if he really believed in 2019 that Jeremy Corbyn would be a great PM when he said he would. But he has said Corbyn would have made a better PM than Boris Johnson. (See 9.12pm.)

And here is a fact check from Ben Quinn from the QT special, which also featured John Swinney and Ed Davey.

Here is the transcript of the exchange between Fiona Bruce and Keir Starmer about Jeremy Corbyn.

FB: You also said in February 2019 that Jeremy Corbyn would make a great prime minister. You said already, you thought you weren’t going to win that election. Putting that to one side, you said he would make a great prime minister. Did you mean it or did you have your fingers crossed behind your back?

KS: I didn’t think we would win that election.

FB: You said that. Irrespective of that, you said he’d make a great prime minister. Did you mean it?

KS: It wasn’t a question that really arose because I didn’t think we were going to win the election.

FB: We all heard you. We all heard you saying he would be a great prime minister. That was your way of telling the people here to vote for him. Did you not mean that?

KS: I was campaigning for the Labour Party. And I’m glad I did.

FB: But you also campaigned for Jeremy Corbyn to be prime minister.

KS: I was campaigning for the Labour party. I was a Labour politician. I wanted to be elected, or reelected, and I wanted good colleagues to be reelected. Some of the people around the shadow cabinet table were people whose seats were saved because we campaigned hard for the Labour party.

FB: Just answer this, yes or no. When you said Jeremy Corbyn would make a good prime minister, did you mean it?

KS: Look, he would be better prime minister … [pause] … look what we got, Boris Johnson, a man who made massive promises, didn’t keep them and then had to leave parliament in disgrace.

FB: Did you think he’d make a great, not even just a good, a great prime minister?

KS: I didn’t think we were in a position to win that election. And the more I looked at the preparation we’ve now down, the more convinced I am about that.

Here is Peter Walker’s story about the Question Time leaders’s special, which leads of on Rishi Sunak indicating that young people might face restrictions on access to finance or driving licences if they refuse to do national service, as he faced a TV quizzing from voters.

Who won? Arguably Ed Davey. It sounded as if the audience was more receptive to what he was actually saying than with Keir Starmer and Rishi Sunak, and he was good at engaging with the questioners. John Swinney generally got a respectful hearing too. But the first hour felt like a warm up for the two interrogations that mattered most.

Of the two, Sunak was really struggling. It is hard to recall a leader facing such a hostile audience at one of these Question Time specials, and overall the exchanges didn’t do anything to imply all these MRP polls are on the wrong track. Sunak started with a statement about how “incredibly angry” he was about the Tory election date betting scandal. (See 9.36pm.) On paper, the words were strong, and passionate. But if he was really so “incredibly angry”, why did he adopt a very different tone when the story first emerged in the Guardian last week? (Answer: it was not leading the BBC news all day.) And then, when faced with a follow-up question, Sunak resorted to saying the same thing all over again – his standard modus operandi in pooled media clips. He was also lucky not to be asked why he is waiting for the outcome of a Gambling Commission inquiry when, if the allegations are correct, he could very quickly get to the bottom of what happened himself with a phone call.

As the hostile questions continued, Sunak did push back. He argued with Fiona Bruce on various points, and he seeemed happy to have a row with people in the audience over immigration, and the European convention on human rights. Perhaps some Tories will like the combative approach. But he sounded increasingly short-fused and unsympathetic, and when he tried to link Starmer with Liz Truss, that was bizarre and desperate too. It was all a bit unedifying.

Starmer’s most difficult moment in the campaign, until tonight, came when Beth Rigby asked him if he lied about admiring Jeremy Corbyn, and it was understandable why Bruce came back for another go at this. (See 9.12pm.) Starmer was still evasive, but less so than he was last week, and it felt as though this is not a topic that can harm him any more than it has already. After that, he was on stronger ground, and overall it was a solid performance.

The final question comes from a student who asks what Sunak will do for young people.

Sunak says he will cut their taxes sothat, when they get a job, they can keep more of their money.

And that’s it.

As the credits roll, there is some shouting from the audience that sounds like “Shame on you.” It is a reference to Sunak’s answer on the ECHR.

Q: Russian and Belarus are the only two countries that don’t subscribe to the ECHR.

Sunak says the UK does not need a foreign court to tell the UK what to do.

It’s not a foreign court, he says.

He repeats the point about putting national security first.

Q: Why are you considering leaving the European convention on human rights. That’s inhumane?

Sunak says 15 EU countries have now backed removing asylum seekers to safe third countries. He says, faced with a choice between national security and a foreign court, he will choose national security every time.

Bruce asks why he is calling it a foreign court, when the UK helped to set it up.

It’s in Strasbourg, he says.

Sunak says Keir Starmer has spent the last three days not saying what he will do about council tax. It will go up. Sunak will fight that, he says.

Bruce points out that the tax take has gone up under the Tories.

A woman says the UK needs foreign workers because “our lazy lot” won’t do these jobs. She asks why the UK can’t be stricter on illegal immigration.

Sunak says he agrees. He says the government is copying something they did in Australia. If he stays as PM, he will deliver the Rwanda deportations. But Keir Starmer won’t, he says.

Q: Why did you call the election early?

Sunak says his number one job was delivering stability. Once he had got inflation under control, he wanted to give people a choice.

Q: Are you glad you called the election when you did?

It was the right thing to do, he says.

When he was in a leadership contest against Liz Truss, he said she was wrong. He kept going until the end and was proved right. He goes on:

And that’s why you can trust me now when I say that what Keir Starmer is promising you is the same fantasy that Liz Truss did, and it’s just going to mean your taxes are going to go up.

Sunak says of course migrants can make a contribution, like his grandparents.

But the level is too high, he says.

He says, if he wins the election, there will be a legal migration cap.

Q: But, if you want the right kind of workers, they need to be able to bring family members.

Sunak says the government is saying, if people bring family members, they need to be able to support them.

Q: What happens if people cannot afford to do that?

Sunak says there are fantastic people willing to come to the UK without dependants.

Expecting people to support their families is fair to everyone, and that is why he thinks it is the right thing to do, he says.

Sunak says the NHS is doing more operations, treatements and referrals than at any time in its history.

But during Covid 6m operations were missed, so that is a lot to catch up on, he says.

Q: NHS waiting lists have more than doubled under your government. What message do you have for people on those waiting lists?

Sunak says he comes from an NHS family. The NHS matters to him. But he is putting record investment in, he says.

He says inflation hit 2% yesterday. When he became PM it was 11%. That shows what can happen when you stick to a plan, he says.

Q: Brexit has denied young people a future.

Sunak says we had these debates a few years ago. He is not going to relitigate them.

You don’t have to go far from here to see the benefits, he claims. He says the Teesside freeport is attracting thousands of good jobs as a result of Brexit.

Bruce says you could have freeports without Brexit.

Not in the same way, says Sunak.

He says he is focused on the future.

Sunak is now being asked about his national service plan.

Asked how he will make it compulsory, various options are available. He mentions access to finance.

Q: Will you take people’s bank cards away?

Sunak says there are various ways of having incentives and sanctions.

And finally Rishi Sunak gets his go.

Q: We have had five PMs in the last seven years, and one of them lasted just seven weeks. We are a laughing stock. Are you embarrassed to be here as Tory leader?

Sunak says this was a problem he acknowledged when he became PM.

Q: Aren’t the latest gambling allegations an example of the lack of integrity we have had to put up with from Tories for years and years?

Sunak says he was “incredibly angry, incredibly angry” to learn of these allegations.

I was incredibly angry, incredibly angry, to learn of these allegations. It’s a really serious matter. It’s right that they’re being investigated properly by the relevant law enforcement authorities, including a criminal investigation by the police.

And I want to be crystal clear that if anyone has broken the rules, they should face the full force of the law. That’s what those investigations are there to do. And I hope that they do their work as quickly and as thoroughly as possible.

Q: You are happy for them to go into the election?

Sunak says these investigatons are ongoing.

They are serious investigations. They must be done seriously. The integrity of the process must be respected.

If anyone has broken the law, he will make sure they are booted out of the Tory party.

Asked about housing, Starmer repeats the pledge made earlier today about banning landlords from getting renters to engage in a bidding war.

Q: Would landlords have to take the first offer?

Starmer says there would be a scheme in place to stop this.

UPDATE: Dan Bloom from Politico has the full answer.