The two Tory PMs both told voters the economy had turned a corner – but there is little comparison now with 27 years ago

With a Labour victory looking increasingly probable, John Major’s pitch to voters in 1997 was simple. Britain had come a long way, the then prime minister said in his foreword to his party’s manifesto. “We must be sure that we do not throw away what we have gained, or lose the opportunities we have earned.”

Sound familiar? It should, because it is exactly the same argument Rishi Sunak is deploying as he seeks to defy the opinion polls and win a fifth successive general election victory for the Conservatives.

The Conservatives and Labour are embroiled in a fight to woo voters with promises to keep rates of tax low

The two main political parties are in a bidding war over which can promise to increase taxes the least. Each accuses the other of harbouring a desire to push up taxes to support a growing list of spending pledges.

The Conservatives say there is a £38.5bn funding gap in Labour’s spending promises over the next five years and that to cover it, “Labour will increase your taxes by £2,094”. Labour claim unfunded Tory spending pledges add up to £71bn, or 2% of GDP.

Jeremy Hunt clashes with BBC presenter over linking increased mortgage rates to Liz Truss mini-budget

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Jeremy Hunt has confirmed the six-year income tax threshold freeze, which drags millions into paying higher rates, will last until 2028.

The chancellor’s comments on what has been Britain’s biggest tax rise on incomes in at least 50 years give space for Labour to follow suit, meaning that taxes are likely to go up no matter who wins the election.

Prime minister announces early summer election with date putting parties on campaign trail for six weeks

• Sunak calls UK general election for 4 July
• Why is Sunak calling an election now?

In an interview with Sky News this morning, Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, was asked if the UK would follow Ireland, Spain and Norway in formally recognising a Palestinian state. No, he replied. He told Sky:

We have a long-standing position on this that we will be prepared to recognise the state of Palestine at the time that it most helps the peace process, and we will continue to keep that under review.

We will continue to keep that under review. But our position is that this is not the right time to do it at the moment.

Dubbed “Sue’s shit list” by one senior Labour official, it has been drawn up by the former civil servant to identify the most immediate problems Labour would face in office if it wins the election expected this year.

Senior Labour officials said that any one of the areas on Gray’s “government risk register” could puncture a honeymoon period for a new administration led by Sir Keir Starmer.

Prime minister says there will be a general election ‘in the second half of the year’ when asked at PMQs

In an interview with Sky News this morning, Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, was asked if the UK would follow Ireland, Spain and Norway in formally recognising a Palestinian state. No, he replied. He told Sky:

We have a long-standing position on this that we will be prepared to recognise the state of Palestine at the time that it most helps the peace process, and we will continue to keep that under review.

We will continue to keep that under review. But our position is that this is not the right time to do it at the moment.

Dubbed “Sue’s shit list” by one senior Labour official, it has been drawn up by the former civil servant to identify the most immediate problems Labour would face in office if it wins the election expected this year.

Senior Labour officials said that any one of the areas on Gray’s “government risk register” could puncture a honeymoon period for a new administration led by Sir Keir Starmer.

Lower inflation won’t help the Tories when everything still feels expensive and public services are on their knees

Rishi Sunak trying to win back public support reminds me of the economist stranded on a desert island with a chemist and physicist. A tin of beans washes ashore and an argument breaks out over how to access the contents. The physicist suggests using spectacles to focus the sun’s rays into a penetrating beam. The chemist suggests using sea salt to corrode the seal. “It’s OK, I’ve got this,” says the economist. “First, we assume a tin opener …”

It’s a joke with many variations but always about the kind of person who has a clever theoretical model to explain how the world would work if only everyone behaved according to the model, which they don’t.

Body says £30bn fiscal gap cannot be filled by higher growth or extra borrowing. So how will No 11 ease pressure on public finances?

A report that tells the UK government it faces a £30bn funding gap that cannot be filled by higher growth or extra borrowing is a blow to both the current chancellor and the next one.

Tuesday’s International Monetary Fund assessment of the UK economy and Whitehall spending argues that betting on the economy revving up over the rest of the decade will not be sufficient to pay for all the likely welfare bills associated with an ageing population.

World body’s latest health check of UK economy says ‘unpopular revenue-raising measures’ may be needed

Jeremy Hunt is preparing a pre-election cut in national insurance despite a warning from the International Monetary Fund of a looming £30bn hole in the public finances, Downing Street has indicated.

Rishi Sunak’s spokesperson said the government rejected the IMF’s argument that there was no room for a third cut in NI in less than a year and that the Treasury should instead be thinking about tax increases or spending cuts.

This cautious programme is too limited to bring about the changes Britain needs – and which would keep Labour in power

• John McDonnell was shadow chancellor from 2015 to 2020

We’re months away from a general election whose outcome has already been determined. Rishi Sunak has repeatedly demonstrated that he is no political Lazarus, and the question is not whether the Conservatives will lose the election but by how much – and how long they will take to recover, or whether their party will survive at all.

So the focus is on Labour’s strategy for entry into government and beyond.

John McDonnell has been the Labour MP for Hayes and Harlington since 1997. He was shadow chancellor from 2015 to 2020

Companies are deserting the FTSE because of a shortage of investment – but there is a solution

Britain had it in its power to be a genuine hi-tech superpower. Instead, the opportunity slipped through our fingers, as we have been “tech-stripped” on a monumental scale. On one estimate, up to half the FTSE 100 could now be populated by vigorous British tech companies but those are all now foreign owned with one exception, Sage. The implications for our industrial, business, services and even defence base are dire – one of the most important condemnations of the last 14 years.

The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, complacently declared last week that this was just how capitalism operated – even as we learned that another 21 companies worth £24.6bn had joined the exodus from the UK’s public markets this year alone. It was a variant of Philip Hammond’s comment in 2016 on Japanese SoftBank taking over yet another of our tech jewels, the chip designer ARM. What was obviously an exercise in technological vandalism was instead proof positive that Britain was “open for business”, a view echoed at the time by that other high priest of wealth generation, Nigel Farage. This reflex mantra of Tory ministers and Brexiters alike is a necessity: to say anything else would reveal the paucity of their world view.

The chancellor will have good news to pass on this week. But he knows the cost of living crisis may not be over yet

Jeremy Hunt knows it. Rachel Reeves knows it too. The Office for National Statistics will come bearing good news on Wednesday when it releases the latest inflation figures. The only real question is just how good the news will be.

In the year to March, annual inflation as measured by the consumer prices index stood at 3.2%. The figure for April will be a lot lower and if Hunt gets lucky it might even fall as low as the government’s 2% target.

As the inquiry publishes its final report, the chancellor is under pressure to find £10bn to put right a longstanding injustice

The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, will come under pressure to stay true to his word and sign off on immediate compensation payments totalling up to £10bn to victims of the contaminated blood scandal when the long-awaited final report on the affair is published on Monday.

The scandal is described as the worst treatment disaster in NHS history, with more than 3,000 people having died as a result of receiving contaminated blood products in the 1970s and 1980s. It is estimated that, even today, a person infected during the scandal dies every four days.

Chancellor seems to cherrypick data as he tries to outline how the Tories have got the country back on its feet

Jeremy Hunt called a press conference on Friday to outline why the electorate should trust the Conservatives with the economy, but some of his claims appear to have used cherrypicked facts and figures. He gave his speech just over a week after the shadow chancellor, Rachel Reeves, accused the Conservatives of “gaslighting” the UK over the state of the economy by presenting too rosy a picture of what is actually going on.

Here are some of Hunt’s statements on the economy, and some context for his claims.

Chancellor also criticised for ‘dodgy dossier’ on Labour plans as he aims to make low tax a key election issue

Jeremy Hunt has been accused of exaggerating the Conservatives’ economic record and presenting a “dodgy dossier” on Labour’s spending plans, as he moved to put low tax at the heart of his party’s offering at the next election.

The chancellor gave a speech in central London on Friday, pitching the Conservatives as having helped the UK recover from economic troubles more quickly than expected. He also signalled a further cut to national insurance in the autumn, having already reduced the tax from 12p in the pound to 8p.