Closing summary
The Guardian’s live coverage of UK politics is coming to an end. Thanks for joining us. Here’s a round-up of the most important talking points from today:
Reform’s newly elected Greater Lincolnshire mayor Andrea Jenkyns has said she would like to cut at least one county council’s workforce in her area by up to 10%. “That’s what I personally like to see, but again there’s variables there, because we haven’t elected a Reform county council leader yet, so there’s got to be discussions,” Jenkyns said.
The health secretary Wes Streeting said that Reform is “definitely a real threat” for Labour and one they are taking seriously in the wake of Reform’s local election success. Streeting said: “I think there’s clearly, on the right of British politics, a realignment taking place. It’s not yet clear at the next general election whether it will be Reform or the Conservatives that are Labour’s main challengers.”
Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said her party are going to “come out fighting” to try to regain public support after their poor showing in this week’s local elections. “We are going to come out with the policies that people want to see, but what we are not going to do is rush out and tell the public things that are not true just so we can win votes,” she said.
Ed Davey claimed the Liberal Democrats are “on track” to overtake the Conservatives at the next general election, saying they were the only party that “stood up” to Reform UK. The Lib Dem leader said: “I think Labour and the Conservatives made a mistake with Reform. The Conservatives have been copying Reform policies, Labour is sounding more and more like Reform.”
A newly elected Reform councillor has said she has been suspended by the party over posts where she hinted she could defect to another party. Donna Edmunds, who was elected in Hodnet, Shropshire, said in a tweet on 28 April: “I’m a Reform candidate. I’m waiting for Rupert (Lowe) and Ben (Habib) to give us a real alternative and then I’ll defect.”
Asked during the BBC’s Sunday with Laura Kuenssberg programme whether she thought people should be having more children, Tory leader Kemi Bademnoch said: “I do, but that’s a personal choice. But we have to look at the demographics of our country. We cannot solve it with immigration.”
Badenoch’s position suggests she could develop policy solutions to encourage women to have more children, writes Rowena Mason. So far, since becoming leader last year, Badenoch has presented barely any policy, but she has said she wants to come up with honest solutions to long-term problems facing the country.
