Election latest: Most people support NHS funding increase - even with tax rises, poll suggests (2024)

Our live poll tracker collates the results of opinion surveys carried out by all the main polling organisations - and allows you to see how the political parties are performing in the run-up to the general election.

So far, only one poll has shown Reform ahead of the Conservatives - the Tories are currently an average of 7 points ahead of Nigel Farage's party.

Read more about the tracker here.

Rosie Duffield, who is Labour's candidate for the Canterbury seat in Kent, has pulled out of a hustings saying she does not feel safe.

Ms Duffield has campaigned in support of women's rights and female-only spaces, and has also clashed with the Labour leadership on various occasions.

It was previously reported that she spent £2,000 on bodyguards while campaigning.

Writing on social media on Friday, Ms Duffield said: "The constant trolling, spite and misrepresentation from certain people, having built up over a number of years and being pursued with a new vigour during this election, is now affecting my sense of security and wellbeing.

"The result is now that I feel unable to be focused on giving a clear presentation of the Labour Party's manifesto commitments."

A Labour Party spokesperson described the right to campaign as a "vital" aspect of British democracy.

"It is vital to our democracy that prospective parliamentary candidates are able to campaign freely," the spokesperson said.

"We completely condemn any intimidation tactics towards candidates of any party."

The full list of candidates in Canterbury is:

• Luke Buchanan-Hodgman, Social Democratic Party;
• Rosie Duffield, Labour Party;
• Louise Harvey-Quirke, Conservative and Unionist Party;
• Bridget Porter, Reform UK;
• Henry Stanton, Green Party;
• Russ Timpson, Liberal Democrats.

Liz Kendall, the shadow work and pension secretary, is speaking to Sky News this morning.

She is asked about how much Labour plans to invest in the NHS.

Ms Kendall refuses to give an exact figure, and instead talks about the health service needing "reform".

She does say that there are "clear" plans for how Labour wants to fund 40,000 extra appointments - through scrapping tax "loopholes" like the non-dom status.

The Labour frontbencher says the kind of reform Labour is targeting is an increase in scanners and using private capacity to reduce waiting lists.

But again she cannot say how much this would cost.

Asked about a poll suggesting most people back tax rises to increase NHS funding, Ms Kendall says her party will not increase income tax, national insurance or VAT.

Asked directly if taxes will be raised to fund the NHS, Ms Kendall only rules out tax rises for "working people".

On other policies, Ms Kendall says her party cannot promise to remove the two-child benefit cap because they cannot find the money for it.

And she seems to turn down Sir Keir Starmer debating Nigel Farage one-on-one - as the Reform UK chief wants.

Instead, Ms Kendall says Sir Keir "wants to debate the man he's up against" - i.e. Rishi Sunak.

New polling from Ipsos suggests 61% of people want NHS funding to increase - even if it means taxes have to go up.

Taxation rates have been a central plank of the election, with the Conservatives saying they will cut levies with taxes at their highest levels in decades.

They have also attacked Labour for not ruling out various tax rises.

According to Ipsos, some 61% of people backed NHS spending going up regardless of if this meant taxes going up - with 16% opposing it and 15% backing neither option.

The next highest policy area was education, with 44% backing a spending increase regardless of tax rises, 22% opposing and 24% backing neither option.

In total, 40% of people supported government spending in general going up even if it meant taxes rising - with 27% opposing and 24% backing neither option.

In total, 1,131 adults were asked for their views between 7 and 10 June for their survey.

Gideon Skinner, senior UK director of Politics at Ipsos, said: "Our research has shown the high levels of public concern over the state of public services, reflected in this polling suggesting some public appetite for increased spending, even if it means higher personal taxes.

"This is particularly high among Labour and Lib Dem voters, and among older people – although younger generations are less keen on increasing their personal tax bill.

"No matter who ends up in Number 11 Downing Street on 5 July, there is also a clear majority for increasing spending on the NHS – an issue which consistently ranks among the top issues that Britons say matter to them the most.

"With rising waiting lists and declining public satisfaction, party pledges on the NHS are likely to be a critical factor for many voters."

Veterans minister Johnny Mercer is speaking to Sky News this morning.

Asked about his party lagging an average of 20 points in the polls, he says the election this year was "always going to be tough after 14 years in power".

He says the campaign has "been up and down" - but that he hasn't heard the polls reflected on the doorstep.

Mr Mercer attacks Labour over their record on education - saying that the number of children in good or outstanding schools "halved" in his area of Plymouth when there were Labour MPs in the area.

The Conservative candidate is also asked about some of his campaign literature, which appears to avoid too much explicit Conservative branding (read more here).

Mr Mercer responds that "it's blue, it's got me on it, I am talking about my record in government.

"So, which part of it is not clear that I'm in the Conservative Party?"

He says more scrutiny should be put on Labour's campaign - claiming they are not being challenged on their prospective tax and spend policies.

Overnight, Labour went on the attack against the Conservatives over the state of the NHS.

They claim that, if the Tories stay in government for the next five years, waiting lists could rise to around 10 million appointments.

The overall NHS waiting list climbed to an estimated 7.57 million treatments at the end of April, affecting 6.33 million patients, according to NHS England figures released on Thursday.

But there are doubts over the veracity of Labour's claims - which are reached by extrapolating the growth in appointments under various periods while the Conservatives have been in power.

They do not use the data from the pandemic.

In May, Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) economist Max Warner said the 10 million figure was "highly unlikely".

Mr Warner said Labour's commitment to eliminating elective waiting times above 18 weeks by the end of the next parliament "would represent a major improvement, undoing nearly a decade of worsening in NHS waiting times in just five years".

He said: "Delivering on all these promises would be expensive: it would almost certainly require real-terms funding growth upwards of 3% per year.

"Beyond some small amounts of 'additional' funding, the Labour manifesto provides no detail about the overall funding the NHS will receive in the next parliament."

Shadow health secretary Wes Streeting said: "If the Conservatives are given another five years in charge, waiting lists will hit 10 million, and more and more patients will be forced to pay to go private to get treated on time.

"That's the choice for patients under the Tories: pain or private? Patients face double taxation on health: they pay their taxes, and then pay the Tory health tax if they want to be treated on time."

By Professor Will Jennings, Sky News elections analyst

Even a poll-obsessive like me would have to admit that during election campaigns we often spend too much time focusing on the election 'horse race' - who is up and who is down in the polls - on an almost hourly basis.

Even in this election, where Labour has been well ahead of the Conservatives from the outset, the focus has been on how much.

Figures for the Labour lead span a huge range from 16 to 25 points. And now there's talk of "crossover".

Has Nigel Farage led Reform past the Tories into second place for the first time in a general election campaign?

There's a 10-point difference between pollsters in the figures reported for Reform UK starting at nine points and reaching 19.

The unprecedented nature of what the top end of these results suggest means we could be heading for a seismic reordering of the political landscape on 4 July. Alternatively, many pollsters could end up with egg on their faces.

What lessons can we learn from polling at previous British general elections?

Perhaps the most fundamental thing is that polls become more informative about the result as election day nears.

Read the full analysis below:

Welcome back to another day on the campaign trail.

Today is set to be a bit quieter than a weekday - and the prime minister is still away on international duty.

After attending the G7 over the past few days in Italy, he is heading to a Ukraine Peace conference in Switzerland.

He is attending Trooping the Colour in London in between, however.

Meanwhile, Labour will be campaigning on health - and has claimed NHS waiting lists could hit 10 million.

Deputy leader Angela Rayner will be campaigning on working conditions in Scotland.

Coming up this morning on Sky News:

• 7.15am: Veterans minister Johnny Mercer;
• 8.15am: Shadow work and pensions secretary Liz Kendall.

Thanks for joining us on another packed day in the election campaign.

Nigel Farage said he could be the official "voice of opposition" to Labour after a poll showed Reform UK pulling slightly ahead of the Conservatives - and said his party could get more than six million votes.

He also demandedto be involved in a leaders' general election event next week.

At the G7 summit in Italy, Rishi Sunak brushed off the YouGov poll result and said a vote for Reform would "give a blank cheque to Labour".

Elsewhere, the parliamentary watchdog said it was "satisfied" that Scottish Conservatives leader Douglas Ross didn't break expenses rules after "reviewing" media reports that he claimed for journeys to his job as a football assistant referee.

And our political editor Beth Rigbylifted the lid on what it was like to prepare, execute (and almost miss) Sky News' big leaders event on Wednesday night.

We are are now pausing coverage for the evening. Join us on the campaign trail again in the morning. Goodnight!

Asked if he'll be voting Tory on 4 July, former justice secretary David Gauke says he is "considering his options".

He says it wouldn't benefit the country to have a "massive" Labour majority.

He adds that he'd be "minded" to vote Conservative if the candidate near him was "someone who would stand up to Nigel Farage" and stop the Tories from becoming a "fully fledged obvious party of the right".

"But... I think there is going to be a big battle in the Conservative Party at the end of this process, as to whether they open the door to Nigel Farage," he says.