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Get your popcorn ready – some nail-biting drama awaits as Sunak and Starmer face off for the first time
Welcome to ‘The Spin Room’ at ITV studios in Salford, where Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer will face off in the first televised debate of the 2024 general election campaign.
We are in Granada TV’s Coronation Street Experience, and for anyone who loves political soap operas, the hour-long showdown between the Conservative and Labour leaders is sure to provide some nail-biting drama.
The match will not have VAR but the referee tasked with maintaining order will be Julie Etchingham, who was a Sky News presenter from 2002 to late 2007 and hosted party leadership debates on ITV during the 2015, 2017 and 2019 elections.
In the press room, top politicians, including senior cabinet ministers and shadow cabinet ministers, will later join party spokesmen to try to convince the media that their candidate has won.
Top-level politicians expected to be nominated include veteran cabinet minister Michael Gove and rising star Victoria Atkins from the Conservative Party, and the witty and shrewd Jonathan Ashworth from the Labour Party.
Earlier, the Prime Minister travelled by train to the northwest, arriving at Manchester Piccadilly station at lunchtime dressed casually and accompanied by a large retinue of Downing Street staff and senior party officials.
Over the past three days he has undergone a rigorous team preparation programme, with Deputy Prime Minister Oliver Dowden playing the role of Labour leader during rehearsals.
Sir Keir, who spent the morning campaigning near Bolton, is also undergoing a rigorous rehearsal programme, with his relatively unknown staffer Tom Webb, renowned for his excellent impersonation of the Conservative prime minister, taking on the role of Mr Sunak.
Of course, as a former director of public prosecutions, the Labour leader is more accustomed to speaking to a judge and jury than to a television audience, but he will no doubt try to deploy the style of forensic questioning he uses in Prime Ministerial Questions in the House of Commons.
Meanwhile Sunak, who is trailing in the opinion polls, will be pressured by his camp to go easy on Sir Keir, calling him a “softie” on crime and immigration, “two-faced” over his opponent’s policy change and a “fearful Starmer” for his unwillingness to take part in more than one televised debate this election.
Grab your popcorn. Let’s get started!
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