Badenoch to ‘get better’ at media and PMQs, says Stride, as he backs her as leader – UK politics live | Politics

Rachel Keenan is a Guardian reporter.

Candidates in the Holyrood by-election contest for Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse byelection have cast their votes, after a brisk campaign following the death of the sitting MSP Christina McKelvie in March.

The Scottish National party candidate, Katy Loudon, posted a video on Instagram outside a polling station where she says “the stakes couldn’t be higher” due to the rise of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, which is also contesting the seat.

Davy Russell, the Scottish Labour candidate, posted a photograph of himself coming out of a polling station with the caption:

It was an honour to vote in the village I grew up in this morning. Polls are open for the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse by-election, so make your plan to vote and let’s put this community first!

The full list of candidates is:

Collette Bradley, Scottish Socialist party

Andy Brady, Scottish Family party

Ross Lambie, Reform UK

Katy Loudon, SNP

Janice MacKay, Ukip

Ann McGuinness, Scottish Greens

Aisha Mir, Scottish Liberal Democrats

Richard Nelson, Scottish Conservatives

Davy Russell, Scottish Labour

Marc Wilkinson, independent

Government claims latest figures ‘shatter myth’ VAT on fees would lead to many pupils leaving private schools

Richard Adams

Richard Adams is the Guardian’s education editor.

The 2025 school census, published by the Department for Education this morning, has reignited claims and counter-claims about the effects of adding VAT to private school fees and whether children would be moved out by their parents to save money.

The statistics for England were collected by the DfE in January, when 20% VAT was first added to fees, and show that the number of pupils in private schools dropped by 1.9% or 11,000, compared with the same time last year.

But it came as pupil numbers fell nationally by 60,000, because of a long-term fall in the birthrate. And the number of private schools operating in England went up by 35, according to the census.

A government spokesperson was quick to claim that private school rolls hadn’t been greatly affected by the tax.

Today’s figures shatter the myth that charging VAT on private education would trigger an exodus. The data reveals pupil numbers remain firmly within historical patterns seen for over 20 years.

The 1.9% decline in private school pupil numbers reflects the broader demographic trends and changes in the state sector, with almost no change in secondaries and a 1.3% reduction in state-funded primary school pupil numbers.

This manufactured crisis has failed to materialize. Ending tax breaks for private schools will raise £1.bn a year by 2029-30 to help fund public services, including supporting the 94% of children in state schools, to help ensure excellence everywhere for every child.

The Independent Schools Council, which represents over half of the fee-paying schools in England, responded, with Julie Robinson, the council’s chief executive, saying:

These new Department for Education statistics show that the drop in independent school numbers cannot be explained by the fall in overall pupil numbers.

The government’s own figures now show that, in England alone, 8,000 more students have left independent education than politicians had estimated. This outsized exodus should concern anyone who is interested in this tax on education as a revenue raiser.

There are some nice pictures from Keir Starmer’s visit to a school in Essex this morning. The captions don’t fully explain what was going on, but at one point he seems to have engaged in a particularly lively conversation with the young girl sitting next to him, including on the topic of teeth.

Keir Starmer has described the govenment’s decision to extend free school meals for pupils in England as a “statement of intent”, implying it will be followed by changes to the two-child benefit cap.

Speaking to broadcasters on a visit to a school in Essex where he was promoting the free school meals policy, he said:

This is a statement of intent. It’s something that we’ve been wanting to do for a long time. It’s the first time it’s ever been done …

I would see it as part of a wider package, because we’ve already done work on child care, on breakfast clubs, on school uniforms. So it’s about [giving children] the best possible start, but it’s also essentially a cost of living issue for their parents.

In a further answer, he described the policy three times as a “downpayment”. Asked if his use of the word “intent” meant he intended to life the two-child benefit cap, he replied:

I would say this is a downpayment on child poverty. We’ve got a taskforce that will come out with a strategy. I want to get to the root causes of child poverty. One of the greatest things the last Labour government did was to drive down child poverty. I’m determined we will do that.

Today is a downpayment on that, but it goes with breakfast clubs already being rolled out … But yes, it’s a downpayment on what I want to do in relation to child poverty.

Keir Starmer will host Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte in London next week, Downing Street has said.

Speaking at the morning lobby briefing, the PM’s spokesperson said:

The two leaders have spoken a number of times and this will be the second time that Mr Rutte has visited the prime minister at Downing Street.

You can expect the prime minister to raise how we can ensure all allies meet their stated pledges in support of our collective defence, to keep people safe.

It is worth recognising the UK’s track record on spending and indeed our contribution to Nato, both in terms of our spending and our capabilities.

Rutte is pushing for Nato members to commit to spending 3.5% on the military, with a further 1.5% on defence-related measures.

Q: Today the ONS today has apologised for getting inflation figures wrong. How can any chancellor govern without good data.

Stride said it was “thoroughly reprehensible” that the ONS cannot deliver accurate information in, for example, its labour market data. He said the ONS has admitted that its polling approach to getting information does not deliver good detail, beccause fewer people respond, and so sample sizes are lower. He said that was unacceptable, and that he was surprised this had been allowed to continue for as long as it has.

He said if he were still chair of the Treasury select committee, he would require the ONS to explain this.

Q: Do you think the Conservative party should change its leadership election rules to stop the members choosing another Liz Truss?

Stride says he does not want to comment on that process.

But he says Kemi Badenoch is the best person to deliver the thoughtful style of leadership and politics that he has been calling for. (See 11.23am.)

He says:

If you look at the nature of the challenge and the approach to it that I have set out, which is deep thought through through time and thoughfulness, she is the person to lead us.

She will get better through time at the media. She will get better through time at dispatch box though PMQs, just as Margaret Thatcher, when she became leader in ‘75 , was often criticised for everything from her hair to the clothes she wore to the pitch of her voice to heaven knows what else, in the end, she got it together, and Kemi will do absolutely that.

What she is doing behind the scenes is leading a shadow cabinet that is united, and our party has not been united in that way for a very long time.

And she is going to drive through the process with me and others, so that we come to the right conclusions.

Stride was referring to the many criticisms of Badenoch’s performance (which explain why Henry Hill, deputy editor of the ConservativeHome website, said in a recent Guardian article that Tories assume she will face a leadership challenge.)

Stride probably intended these remarks to be helpful. But Badenoch may not view them quite like that.

Stride defends the Conservative party’s opposition to lifting the two-child benefit cap. He says:

I think that in a fair society we should accept that individuals who are not receiving benefits and have to take the hard choices about whether they have a medium-sized family, or whether they have a very large family, they often have to really have a long, hard look at whether they can afford to do that.

And I don’t think it’s right, where people are on benefits, that they should naturally not worry about those considerations that other people, who are taxpayers, are having to [think about].

Q: Do you think there is anything Liz Truss got right?

Stride says Truss was right to say that the status quo was not acceptable.

He says he is in favour of “responsible radicalism”.

Q: Can you get taxes down to pre-pandemic levels?

Stride replies:

Absolutely, we can get taxes down, but we get taxes down in a responsible way that can be paid for, and we do it by addressing a number of deep-seated, deep-rooted issues – the size of the state, whether we’ve got the right skills offer to drive a higher value added economy, that we get energy costs down, and we can control welfare and so on and so forth.

We will only do it if we have a whole plan that all leans in the same direction, but it can be done.

Stride says millionaires should not be getting the winter fuel payments. But the government set the means test so low that most pensioners below the povery line no longer qualified.

Stride is now taking questions from the media.

Q: [From the BBC’s Chris Mason] How do you deal with the fact the public don’t seem to be listening?

Stride says political opinion changes. The Canadian Conservatives seemed a shoo-in to win the election at the start of this year, but their leader lost his seat. And after the 2019 election people assumed Labour would find it very hard to win the next election, he says.

He says things can change “very quickly”. And this government is making mistakes, he says.

Haldane asks Stride about what Liz Truss tweeted about his speeech. (See 10.19am.)

Stride says he does not believe that just cutting taxes is the right approach.

You can never get away from the bond markets, he says. You need a credible fiscal policy.

He says his “overriding message” that the Tories will never repeat the mistakes of the past.

Stride is now being questioned by Andy Haldane, the former Bank of England chief ecconomist who now runs the RSA thinktank.

Q: There seems to be a fatalism at growth. People say we are consigned to the slow lane. Do you agree?

Stride says he does not accept that. He says that countries like the US, Canada, France and Germany have 20% higher productive rates than here. That means their workers can work from January to August and produce as much as a British worker in a year, he claims.

(That would not be true on a 20% higher productivity rate, but Stride may be thinking of another figure.)

He says there is no magic bullet to solve this.

But the tax system is one factor, he says.

Stride said he thought economic policy should be guided by two principles.

First, ensuring economic stability as the prerequisite for protecting the nation’s finances and keeping taxes low …

And, secondly, completely rewiring our economy and the state to jump start economic growth.

(Rachel Reeves would agree with both those points._

But Stride also attacked the Labour government, describing it as “clear and present threat to our economy”. He said Reeves has increased borrowing, and has added £80bn to the debt interest bill over this parliament.

Stride went on to attack Reform UK, describing their policies as “pure populism”.

He said their policies involved a revival of the “magic money tree” approach to spending. The Tories thought they had seen that off with Jeremy Corbyn, he said. But it was back under Reform, he said.