Tonight Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer will face off in their first television debate of the general election campaign.
With the Conservatives still around 20 points behind in the polls, Mr Sunak will see the TV debates as an opportunity to put himself in front of voters and try and change minds before the vote on July 4.
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Sir Keir is likely to portray himself as the answer to ending what he describes as the “chaos” under the Conservatives, while Mr Sunak will accuse the Labour leader of having no plan for the country.
But what are the issues that the pair are likely to spar over? Here are five things to watch out for in tonight’s debate.
Economy
Sir Keir and Mr Sunak are battling to claim their party is the one to be trusted on matters of the economy.
Both parties in recent weeks have claimed to have revealed black holes in each other’s spending plans.
The Tories dedicated their first campaign poster to warning voters to “start saving” in case of a Labour government, with Mr Sunak and Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor, repeatedly claiming that Labour would put up taxes “as sure as night follows day”.
Sir Keir is likely however to present Liz Truss’s ill-fated mini-Budget of September 2022 as evidence that the Tories cannot be trusted with the nation’s finances, and cite the high tax burden.
The Prime Minister will likely mount the defence that the current economic situation is down to the unprecedented Covid pandemic and the war in Ukraine, and point to the two cuts in National Insurance that he has enacted since entering office.
Migration
The Conservatives’ and Labour’s plans to tackle illegal migration, and how to curb overall net migration, are a key dividing line between the two parties.
Mr Sunak has put the Rwanda scheme at the centre of his plan to stop the boats, having finally passed the legislation through the Commons.
But Labour have said they would immediately ditch the scheme if they enter government, which the Tories have portrayed as a further sign that the UK would become a “magnet for illegal migrants” under Labour.
Mr Sunak could meanwhile face questions about his stance on the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), amid fears that judges in Strasbourg could thwart his Rwanda plan.
Sir Keir has put his policy for tackling small boat crossings, his border security command, as one of his six “first steps” for government.
Legal migration will also be a likely topic for debate, with both parties in recent days setting out policies for how they will deal with the issue.
Mr Sunak today pledged to introduce a cap on migration, and Labour’s refusal to mirror the move could be used by Mr Sunak as a means to accuse Sir Keir of not being sufficiently tough on the issue.
Defence and national security
The Tories have sought to put defence at the heart of the election, after Mr Sunak earlier this year pledged to raise defence spending to 2.5 per cent of GDP by 2030, a promise that Labour has not matched.
Sir Keir has tried to push Jeremy Corbyn and his stance on nuclear weapons to the back of voters’ minds, as he insists that he would increase defence spending and update the UK’s nuclear arsenal.
It is likely that Mr Sunak tonight will claim Labour would pose a greater risk to the defence of the nation than the Tories, which he will say are a safer pair of hands on national security matters.
Labour have in the past cited the shrinking size of the army – which they say is at its smallest size since the Napoleonic era – as evidence the Conservatives cannot be trusted on defence.
Personal attacks
A key aspect to the first head-to-head debate to watch out for will be how much, if at all, the two leaders resort to personal attacks.
The Tories have repeatedly attacked Sir Keir over his u-turns on policy since becoming the leader of the opposition, calling him “Flip-flop” Starmer.
Mr Sunak has repeatedly brought up Sir Keir previously providing legal advice to Hizb-ut Tahrir, an Islamist organisation, at Prime Ministers’ Questions.
The Prime Minister has been subject to Labour attacks about his personal wealth, as they seek to paint him as out of touch with the electorate.
Lee Cain, the Downing Street director of communications under Boris Johnson, said that the aim of television debates is to “drive a message and frame a choice”, and not to engage in an “on-camera argument”.
It remains to be seen whether the leaders will land personal blows or stick to policy.
The NHS
Sir Keir will want to put Mr Sunak under pressure on the NHS, as Labour has put reform of the health service as one of its key promises to the electorate.
It is likely that the state of current waiting lists, something that Mr Sunak had set he wanted to cut down, will be raised as an issue, as part of a wider portrayal of Tory mismanagement of the NHS.
