Keir Starmer reacts as Tories withdraw support for Craig Williams & Laura Saunders
Rishi Sunak is facing pressure to suspend Conservative candidates implicated in the General Election betting scandal after a serving minister added his voice to calls for action.
Reacting to the Conservative Party’s decision to withdraw support for its candidates Craig Williams, who was MP for Montgomeryshire, and Laura Saunders, several politicians have commented about the time it has taken for the Conservatives to act.
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said: “Why didn’t that happen a week ago?”
Liberal Democrat deputy leader Daisy Cooper wrote on X, formerly Twitter: “This should have happened immediately when these scandalous revelations emerged, but instead Rishi Sunak has dithered and delayed.
“Sunak must confirm immediately that these candidates will not have the Conservative whip if elected.”
Northern Ireland minister Steve Baker said placing bets on the election date was "disreputable" and he would have suspended anyone who had done so.
Speaking to ITV's Peston on Monday evening, Mr Baker said: "I would call them up and ask them, 'Did you do it?' And if they did it, then they are suspended.
"But the Prime Minister would have to answer why he hasn't done it, I haven't got inside information on why the Prime Minister hasn't done it."
Mr Baker joins other Conservatives such as former defence minister Tobias Ellwood in calling for the suspension of the four Tories alleged to have placed bets on the election date.
They are the Prime Minister's former parliamentary aide Craig Williams, who has admitted to a "huge error of judgment" in placing "a flutter" on the election date, along with the party's chief data officer Nick Mason, director of campaigning Tony Lee, and Laura Saunders, a candidate in Bristol North West and Mr Lee's wife.
Earlier today (Tuesday, June 25): A Conservative Party spokesman said: “As a result of ongoing internal enquiries, we have concluded that we can no longer support Craig Williams or Laura Saunders as Parliamentary Candidates at the forthcoming General Election.
“We have checked with the Gambling Commission that this decision does not compromise the investigation that they are conducting, which is rightly independent and ongoing.”
On Monday, Mr Sunak insisted that it was "proper" to wait for the outcome of investigations by the Gambling Commission, the police and the Conservative Party itself as he struggled to move on from the scandal engulfing his campaign.
Today the Conservatives are due to turn to the issue of immigration in an attempt to make a dent in Labour's persistently large poll lead.
Home Secretary James Cleverly and his Labour opposite number Yvette Cooper are in a head-to-head in a debate on immigration on LBC.
In the run-up to the debate, the pair traded blows in the Daily Telegraph, with Mr Cleverly claiming Labour would turn the UK into the "asylum capital of the world" and offer an "amnesty" to people who crossed the Channel in small boats.
He pointed to reports in the Telegraph claiming some would-be migrants in France were waiting for a Labour government before they made a crossing, something the Prime Minister himself referred to on Monday, saying people were "queuing up in Calais waiting for a Starmer government".
