Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has dismissed a claim from the BBC’s political editor, Chris Mason, that his party has been spreading a “falsehood” about its journalism.

The Lib Dems have launched a campaign saying the BBC is giving too much coverage to Reform UK, and as part of that they have accused the corporation of publishing reports that read like “cut and paste” versions of Reform UK press releases.

In an interview with Davey, Mason repeatedly put it to him that this was a “falsehood” and “straightforwardly not true”.

Davey said that the allegation did not refer to any of Mason’s reports. He claimed that it was aimed at reporting on the BBC’s website, which he said did not involve enough “scrutiny” of Nigel Farage’s policy.

Asked if he stood by the “cut and paste” allegation, he said he did. He went on:

I do think we’ve seen some poor practise in parts of the BBC.

We’re seeing some improvements, and long it may continue because the BBC has a really important role.

That’s one of the reasons why Liberal Democrats have championed the BBC and when it’s not performing that role it’s not unreasonable is it for people to call it out.

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has claimed that Reform UK’s immigration plans would lead to higher costs for taxpayers.

In an interview with the BBC, he said:

Yet again, [Nigel Farage] wants more red tape and high cost for taxpayers. Like Brexit, that’s meant higher taxes and more red tape.

This proposal would need more officials. It would be a huge cost in Home Office bureaucracy having to be paid for by taxpayers. So let’s expose him for that.

Let’s also say he’s talking about people who are fully integrated. If you get indefinite leave to remain, you might have been here for years, you might have come from Canada, from Australia, you might have come from India, lots of different places you might have come from and you’ve thought that you and your family … can stay here and work and contribute and Nigel Farage is saying no, let’s have more regulation, let’s have more taxes and let’s uproot people.

The Royal College of Nursing says that thousands of migrant nurses would lose their jobs under Reform UK’s plan to end indefinite leave to remain and that this would be abhorrent. Nicola Ranger, its general secretary and chief executive, said:

Threatening to sack thousands of migrant nursing staff is abhorrent beyond words. These are people who have come to the UK to care for patients and become part of our communities. They deserve so much better than this.

The policy of retrospectively removing people’s rights in this way would be unprecedented, leaving migrant nursing staff unable to work or access welfare, despite having paid tax. It shows neither compassion nor an understanding of the fundamental role our brilliant migrant nursing staff play in health and care. Without them, services would simply cease to function.

As the largest nursing union, we are deeply concerned by the increasingly hostile rhetoric shown towards migrants. We urge all political parties to end this race to the bottom and instead acknowledge and celebrate the contribution of those who come to the UK from overseas.

Here are some more developments from the Lib Dem conference.

• Members have approved Leading the Way, a 45-page policy review paper, including approving amendemnts saying that ending “deep poverty within a decade” and closing regional gaps “in pay, productivity, health and connectivity” should be goals for the party.

• Members have voted for a motion saying the government should do more to protect the rights of Hong Kongers threatened by China, including blocking the application for the Chinese “mega embassy” in London, appointing a Home Office tsar “for the protection of pro-democracy activists” and suspending further ministerial visits to China until bounties aimed at Hong Kongers living in the UK are lifted.

• Members have approved plans to end “fleecehold”. The propsals include “establishing rights for homebuyers, to ensure there is no way for developers or building insurers to avoid accountability for rectifying defects”.

• Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, has told Radio 5 Live that faith is a part of his life. He said:

Faith has always been part of my life, and while it’s been challenged at times – when I lost my mum it was quite challenging for my faith, I’ll be very honest with you, I was disappointed in the support we had from the church – but over time my faith has definitely been part of who I am and it’s certainly a part of who my family is.

And although it doesn’t determine my policy outlook, you won’t be surprised to hear that I go to quite a liberal church.

And as an Anglican, a member of the Church of England, sometimes I do think that when I have difficult personal decisions to make, I do like to pray.

Steven Swinford, political editor of the Times, says he thinks there was some confusing messaging at the Reform UK press conference this morning.

Confused messaging around Nigel Farage migration crackdown

Farage said explicitly that under a Reform government ‘welfare will be for UK citizens only, not foreign nationals’

But Zia Yusuf, Reform UK’s head of policy, subsequently clarified that the policy will not apply to 4.12million EU citizens with settled status, who account for 9.7% of Universal Credit claimants

He said that a Reform government would open negotiations with the EU about welfare claims by those with settled status

As my colleague @Smyth_Chris points out, that means the policy is limited to non-EU migrants with indefinite leave to remain, who account for just 2.7% of Universal Credit claimants

That means there are likely to be significant questions about how much the policy will actually save

In response, Zia Yusuf, the Reform head of policy, insists that the party would be able to stop EU nationals getting benefits.

Respectfully, no confusion at all @Steven_Swinford.

Your own tweet is self contradictory.

Those on EU settled status will not be have it withdrawn, but a Reform government will stop them accessing welfare in this country. That’s what renegotiating means.

British people will no longer fund a food bank for the world.

Also, your savings claim is inaccurate anyway. The 2.7% is the figure now, before the Boriswave are added to the claimant register. Run that calculation for 5 years time if all the Boriswave get ILR!

At the press conference earlier today Yusuf talked about a renegotiation with the EU. (See 11.44am.)

(As Britain discovered post-2016, negotiations with the EU don’t always pan out quite the way Brexiters predict.)

Victoria Collins, the Liberal Democrats’ science spokesperson, has called for smoking-style health warnings on social media apps used by children. She told the conference:

If we are going to take on this multi billion pound industry we need to be brave. We have long recognised that where online content poses a threat to public health, we need to know. That’s why I’m calling today for addictive social media apps to come with mandatory health warnings for under-18s.

Just like cigarettes or alcohol, these addictive products carry well-documented risks, especially for young people. The evidence is clear that excessive use of these apps exposes children to mental health issues, to anxiety, sleep disruption and to real harm to attention spans. Don’t they deserve to know that?

Clear labelling spelling out those health risks wouldn’t stop young people engaging with social media. It wouldn’t stop them engaging with their community, or connecting with friends online. But it would ensure they go into the experience with their eyes open to the risks – and with enough information to make a change.

When we pick up a pack of cigarettes or a bottle of wine, we expect to be told about the harm those products will pose to our health. So why is social media, the key driver of a crisis in young people’s mental health, any different?

She also called for a two-hour limit to be placed on the amount of time people under the age of 18 can be exposed to “TikTok-style video content”. She said:

Peter Kyle, until recently the Science Secretary, has mooted time caps or curfews on addictive social apps - but moves on to another department leaving behind a record of failure.

The government must finally deliver and introduce a doomscroll ban, that caps the amount of time children can spend on these addictive apps.

Yvette Cooper, the foreign secretary, has told the UN that British jets are ready to “confront” Russian planes violating Nato airspace. Jakub Krupa has the full quotes on his Europe live blog.

The SNP has described Reform UK’s plan to scrap indefinite leave to remain as despicable. In a statement, Pete Wishart, the party’s deputy leader at Westminster, said:

Nigel Farage’s latest plan for mass deportations is one more desperate and despicable attempt to blame migrants for the economic state of broken Britain. Farage’s plans would threaten the collapse of our NHS and would crash the economy all over again.

Instead of attacking migrants who staff our NHS, contribute to our economy and strengthen our society - the truth that Westminster politicians refuse to face is that Brexit broke Britain and Farage was the key architect of that disaster.

It is shameful that instead of calling out Farage, the Labour Party and Keir Starmer are determined to follow him. They followed Farage on Brexit and they are now following him on immigration.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has suggested that having a second runway at Gatwick could lead to cheaper holidays.

On a visit there this morning, she told journalists:

Today, this Government are backing a second runway here at Gatwick. That’s in addition to our commitments to a third runway at Heathrow, small modular reactors and a new nuclear power station in Suffolk, backing energy projects and transport projects right around the country.

This extra runway at Gatwick will mean that people going on holiday will have a greater choice of destinations, it will mean lower costs for a family holiday.

And it will also mean more good jobs paying decent wages through this injection of cash into our economy.

Here is our story on the announcement by Nadeem Badshah and Jasper Jolly.

Severin Carrell is the Guardian’s Scotland editor.

The Scottish National party has appointed a former MP and special adviser to Nicola Sturgeon as its new chief executive, after the incumbent quit on health grounds.

Callum McCaig, the former MP for Aberdeen South and a former leader of Aberdeen council, will become its fourth chief executive in three years after the most turbulent period in the party’s history.

The SNP announced on Sunday he had taken over after Carol Beattie, a former Stirling council leader, resigned “due to personal health reasons”. She was appointed in October 2024 after Murray Foote, a former editor of the Daily Record, quit as chief executive in a row over transparency on its membership figures after 14 months in the post.

McCaig faces the significant challenge of preparing the SNP for what is likely to be a bruising Holyrood election contest, with Scottish Labour facing the increasingly difficult task of ending the SNP’s nearly 20-year-long domination of Scottish politics.

After being humiliated by Labour in the 2024 general election, losing 38 of its 48 Westminster seats, in June the SNP was again surprisingly beaten by Labour for the Holyrood seat of the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse in a byelection the polls showed and pundits assumed would be a straightforward win for the SNP.

Alongside the impending trial of Peter Murrell, Nicola Sturgeon’s ex-husband, for alleged embezzlement during his 22-year tenure as SNP chief executive, the party has seen a steep fall in its membership, down from 126,000 at its peak to 56,000, and much dicier finances.

Its 2024 accounts showed a £455,000 deficit, driven largely by election costs, but also falling revenues. General election years are traditionally periods when party coffers swell with donations: in 2024 its total income fell to £4.5m from £4.7m in the previous year.

In the run-up to Murrell’s arrest in April 2023, the party was riven by bitter factional disputes over transparency and financial accountability, with treasurers and members of its finance committee quitting, which in part fueled the police investigation which led to Murrell’s arrest. The SNP’s auditors, Johnson Carmichael, also quit after more than a decade in the role.

Swinney has been credited with restoring stability to the party’s management and governance, but the challenge of preparing for the 2026 Holyrood elections remains significant. The SNP’s once-feared electoral machine now appears out-dated and underpowered.

Peter Walker is a senior Guardian political correspondent.

The Liberal Democrats have called for new measures to stop government ministers lobbying on behalf of foreign powers in yet another attack on Nigel Farage and Reform at the party’s conference in Bournemouth.

It came in a speech by Calum Miller, the party’s foreign affairs spokesperson, who billed as a way of “Trump-proofing” the UK. Attacks on the US president have been another repeated refrain at the gathering.

Miller, who was a senior civil servant before entering politics, cited the example of Whitehall officials pushing golf bosses for the 2028 Open championship to take place at the Trump-owned Turnberry course, saying the claims needed to be investigated.

But he also took aim at Farage, saying:

We must Trump-proof our politics – especially in light of people like Farage, already measuring the curtains in No 10, who care more about what that office could do for them, than what it can do for this country.

The Lib Dems have previously accused Farage of prioritising Trump’s interests over those of the UK, such as an appearance earlier this month before a congressional hearing on censorship at which the Reform UK agreed with Republican members about what he called the “awful authoritarian” situation for free speech in the UK.

The Lib Dems have called Farage a “plastic patriot”, to the extent of producing a Farage-type Lego figure labelled as such as a gift to journalists attending the conference.

Briefings by party officials have repeatedly noted what the party says is an increasing amount of direct competition between the Lib Dems and Reform in council byelections, especially in the north of England, as support for Labour and the Conservatives drops away.

The Conservatives have described Reform UK’s plan to get rid of indefinite leave to remain as a “half-baked and unworkable” version of their own policies in this area.

In a statement, Chris Philp, the shadow home secretary, said:

Reform UK are once again copying Conservative ideas, but in a way that is half-baked and unworkable. They lift our policies but strip away the detail that makes them enforceable. Mass low-skill migration carries real fiscal costs – in housing, welfare, and public services – which is why Britain needs a system that rewards contribution and stops abuse …

The Conservatives have already tabled detailed amendments in parliament to reform indefinite leave to remain.

We will double the residency requirement for indefinite leave to remain to 10 years, make ILR conditional on genuine economic contribution, block ILR for anyone with a criminal record, ensure there is no access to benefits pre-ILR. And we will go further, we will end automatic citizenship routes, impose a hard, legally binding cap on annual legal migration set by parliament, and ensure temporary work visas are not renewed if people are unemployed or in low-paid work.

Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, has claimed the Reform UK immigration plans have “no basis in reality”.

In an interview this morning, asked about Farage’s claims that he could save taxpayers £234bn by abolishing indefinite leave to remain (see 10.52pm), she said:

The numbers that Reform have come out with overnight have already begun to disassemble.

And, look, I want to bring down illegal migration. This government is bringing down migration. We have sent a record number of people who have no right to be in our country home.

We’re reducing the use of hotels for asylum seekers and we’ve made an agreement with France to send people back who come over on small boats.

Those are all steps towards our ambitions to get a grip of this situation that we inherited.

It is a difficult challenge, I think everybody can see that, but simple gimmicks like those put forward by Reform that have no basis in reality and where the numbers just fall apart – that’s not the way to tackle a very serious issue, and this Labour government are getting on and doing that.

At the Downing Street lobby briefing the PM’s press secretary accused Farage of fosterinng division. She said:

Every week Nigel Farage sets out unrealistic, unworkable and unfunded plans.

You’ve heard the prime minister talk about the politics of grievance that Reform thrives on.

They don’t want to tackle the issues facing the country, they want to foster division.

Labour is arguing that Nigel Farage’s policy announcement has fallen apart because the details don’t stack up. (See 10.52am.) That won’t bother the Reform UK leader. As he showed at the press conference, he enthusiastically embraces controversy, and, like Donald Trump, he is quite happy to leverage chaos and outrage as a way maximising the attention grab.

Farage was interesting in landing two big-picture messages: that legal immigration has been bad for the economy of the UK, contrary to mainstream economic thinking; and that Reform will go much further than other parties by getting rid of indefinite leave to remain, requiring “hundreds of thousands” of people to leave or face deportation.

On the first point, here is a chart showing why economists and politicians have for years regarded controlled immigration as an economic benefit. Put simply, native Britons are a drain on the taxpayer until they start working (because they have to be educated etc, while paying no tax), while migrants normally arrive as working-age adults. This chart, from a Migration Observatory report, says that it is only if an average-wage migrant worker lives to be 92 or older that they become a net cost to the taxpayer.

Farage is arguing that this consensus view is wrong. But he is basing this claim on a figuure in a Centre for Policy Studies report that has been withdrawn by the thinktank.

Jonathan Portes, the professor and former government economist, has written a detail critique of the CPS paper and he has posted a link to it on Bluesky.

Portes argues that, if the CPS had properly interpreted the OBR date, they would have concluded that there would be a net fiscal benefit of about £125bn from the migrants due to get indefinite leave to remain in the next few years.

Farage’s second aim was to publicise a policy that would commit a Reform UK government to mass deportatations of a kind never tried by a government in recent times. Reform says that it will not just get rid of indefinite leave to remain for future applicants; it will rescind it for people who currently qualify.

Understandably, there were a lot of questions about the essential unfairness of retrospective legislation of this kind, and whether Farage would be happy to see pensioners, or Ukrainians, deported as a result. Farage relished the row. “You talk to me about a sense of fair play,” he told one reporters. “Yes, you’re quite right, a fair play to British people who’ve been priced out of the market.”

But it remains to be seen whether Farage will remain committed to this aspect of the policy. He has a track record of turning up to events like this and making provocative announcements, only for the more extreme bits to be dropped soon afterwards. Stopping small boats in two weeks? That turned out to mean two weeks after a Reform government passed the legislation (which could be months after a general election). And when the party said at one of these press conferences child asylum seekers would be swiftly deported under its plans, that idea was dropped within 24 hours.

If Farage does row back a bit, he will get more publicity, the chance to sound a tiny bit more reasonable – while still leaving his party with a policy that would jolt British immigration policy in a more extreme direction than anything seen in decades.

During the press conference, Zia Yusuf, Reform UK’s head of policy and head of government efficiency, said that the plan to revoked indefinite leave to remain would not cover EU citizens who are allowed to remain in the UK permanently under the settled status scheme agreed after Brexit.

When asked if they would be covered, Yusuf said:

The answer is no, in terms of EU settled status.

But there is a caveat, There are a lot of EU nationals in this country you who are drawing on universal credit. So you can expect Nigel [Farage’s] government to open negotiations with the European Union specifically about the welfare aspect.

But, as Nigel has said time and again, the big issue we’re talking about here is the non-EU numbers.

Q: [From Aggie Chambre from LBC] If the Boris Johnson government had such a bad record on this, why are you letting ministers in that government who were very close to Johnson, like Jake Berry and Nadine Dorries, join your party?

Farage says Reform has accepted “one or two people that were in that government who understand the error of their ways and have come to us for repentance”

Q: Sadiq Khan, the Labour mayor of London, has attacked your plans. What is your response?

Khan says:

Thousands of Londoners have indefinite leave to remain.

They have legal rights and are our friends, neighbours and colleagues, contributing hugely to our city.

Threatening to deport people living and working here legally is unacceptable.

Farage replies:

What about the ones that aren’t working?

What about the ones that have never worked and never will work?

What about having an honest debate about those we’ve let into this country, many of whom are great people? Fine, we understand that, but too many of whom are not.

Farage says he looks forward to debating this in the local elections in London next year.

Q: Would you retropectively review grants of UK citizenship?

Farage says Reform would “never, ever” try to take back citizenship from people already granted it.

Q: How is it legal to revoke ILR retrospectively?

Yusuf says parliament is sovereign. It can do this.

The fact that questions liked this are “just a function of learned helplessness”, because other parties assumed they could not do things like this, he says.

Farage and Yusuf are now taking questions.

Q: [From the BBC’s Iain Watson] Will you withdraw the £230bn figure, because it has been withdrawn by the thinktank that produced it?

Farage says the real number is probably much bigger.

Q: Isn’t it the case that people are really most concern about illegal migration?

Farage accepts that people are angry about small boats.

But he claims there has not been a national debate about legal migration because all the main parties have agreed it has been a good idea.

What we are attempting to do today is to make people realise that large-scale migration into Britain, where 50% at least of those that come, will never work and live off the British state, is actually making this country substantially poorer.

Q: Doesn’t removing indefinite leave from remain from people who have it go against the British sense of fair play?

Farage claims the current arrangements are not compatible with the sense of fair play.

Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, used his opening statement at his press conference to say that his party was proposing “massive cuts” to welfare spending.

Without that, Britain would go bankrupt, he suggested.

He said that welfare should only be available for UK citizens.

And he repeated the claim that his policies could save £230bn – even though it has been disowned this morning by the thinktank that produced it. (See 10.52am.)

At their conference Liberal Democrat members have passed a motion urging the government to adopt a more ambitious “reset” policy with the EU. In particular, it says minister should “immediately [begin] talks on agreeing a new, bespoke UK–EU customs union, which would cut red tape for businesses across our country and act as an antidote to anaemic economic growth”, and move “rapidly to agree a youth mobility scheme”.

You can read the full text of all motions being debate at the Lib Dem conference here, and the amendments are here.

The Labour party has claimed that Reform UK’s announcement today about getting rid of indefinite leave to remain has already come apart. In a post on social media it says:

Today’s Reform announcement falls apart as the think tank it based its numbers on says they are wrong and “should no longer be used”.

In his Daily Mail article about his plans, Nigel Farage says:

Under Reform, welfare will only be for UK citizens. No foreign nationals will be entitled to any benefits.

Our changes will save British taxpayers at least £234bn over the lifetime of these migrants. That is four times our total defence budget, or double what is spent on education.

This figure came from a report published by the Centre for Policy Studies, a pro-Conservative thinktank. Highlighting the number of migrants who came to the UK between January 2021 and January 2024 and who would be eligible for indefinite leave to remain (ILR) by the end of the decade, it said:

In our central scenario, 801,000 migrants from the post-2020 wave gain ILR, the vast majority by the end of this decade

It is likely that many of these migrants, both workers and dependants, will represent a long-term cost to the taxpayer. Using the Office for Budget Responsibility’s assumptions about migrant earnings, our central estimate of the lifetime net fiscal cost is £234bn – equivalent to a bill of £8,200 for every UK household, spread out over several decades. However, it could be very considerably more.

But today the CPS put out a statement saying it has withdrawn that figures. It says:

As part of announcing a package of policies on Indefinite Leave to Remain, Reform UK have alluded to research published by the Centre for Policy Studies in February of this year. Part of the research calculated a ballpark figure for the financial cost of the hundreds of thousands of migrants who will soon be eligible to apply for Indefinite Leave to Remain (ILR).

After the CPS’ report was published, the Office for Budget Responsibility revised their definitions of some of the fiscal data contained within our report, meaning that the overall cost estimates should no longer be used. The CPS has been in communication with the OBR and other experts for clarity and will be publishing an updated estimate in due course.

The changes do not impact our analysis of the visa data or projections for the numbers likely to gain ILR on different visa routes.

This is why Labour says the plan has fallen apart. As Jessica Elgot reports in her story on this, Labour has saying the “half-baked” Reform proposals are not credible.

The Labour party is very comfortable attacking Reform UK plans on technical, or practical grounds. But it is much rarer to hear Labour attacking what Reform is saying on the grounds of principle, and so far today no one prominent from the party has been doing that.

In part because the government announced its own plans earlier this year to tighten access to indefinite leave to remain.

Severin Carrell is the Guardian’s Scotland editor.

John Swinney has switched an experienced minister, Graeme Dey, back to his previous role as parliamentary business manager after Friday’s resignation by Jamie Hepburn following an altercation at Holyrood.

Dey, who had been minister for higher education and veterans, had previously held the post of business manager, who has lead responsibility for steering the Scottish government’s increasingly busy legislative programme through the devolved parliament.

Hepburn quit after Douglas Ross, the former Scottish Conservative leader, accused him of assault for allegedly grabbing him by the shoulder. Hepburn disputed the assault claim but admitted swearing vigorously at Ross following a row over government inaction over aggressive gulls.

Dey will keep the brief as veterans minister; he has been succeeded as higher education minister by Ben McPherson, a former minister for local government who was passed over by Humza Yousaf, when he succeeded Nicola Sturgeon as first minister in March 2023.

Young and ambitious, McPherson’s brief is one of the toughest: Dundee university is embroiled in a seemingly intractable financial crisis, and has already had several bail-outs. Most others are also shedding staff and the focus of strikes by lecturers.

Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader, did a round of interviews this morning to mark the fact that his party’s conference is taking place this week. He is giving his keynote speech closing the conference at 2.30pm tomorrow.

• Davey claimed that the “two old parties, Labour and the Conservatives” were not capable of seeing off the threat posed by Reform UK. Referring in particular to Nigel Farage’s party, he told the Today programme:

I think the threat to our democracy, to things we hold dear, British values – decency, tolerance, respect for the rule of law – are being challenged in a way that I can’t remember before.

And when I hear some of the leaders of the Conservative party and, particularly, Reform, they seem to be borrowing from Trump’s America and some of the ideas they’re putting forward I think would take our country backwards.

What’s increasingly clear is the voters no longer trust the two old parties, Labour and the Conservatives, and I think the next election could be about the change we want.

And it’s either change to Trump’s America with Reform or change based on really true British values, where we deal with improving the public services properly, we get the cost of living down by reducing people’s energy bills, we make people feel much better and improve our economy and society.

The Liberal Democrats were only formed as a party in 1988. But that was a merger of the SDP and the Liberal party, and the Liberal party, which dominated politics in the second half of the nineteenth century and in the first two decades of the twentieth century, is a lot older than the Labour party. When Davey says his party is not one of the “old parties”, what he really means is that is has not been one of the main parties for the past 100 years.

• He claimed the Lib Dems were the only party beating Reform in council byelections. He told Today:

Since May, I think we’ve had head to head fights with them [Reform, in local council byelections]. We’ve won three quarters of them. We’re the only party who’s not lost a seat to Reform. I’m determined the Lib Democrats are the answer to this threat to our country.

• He repeatedly avoided questions about whether he would be willing to enter a coaltion with Labour after the election to stop Reform forming a government. In response to multiple questions about this on the Today programme, he said:

My moral responsibility as the leader of a party that has particular values is to speak up for those values and champion those values.

And at the moment, we’re the only party championing those values.

I’ve been deeply disappointed by the Labour Government. I think they’ve failed so many people – pensioners, disabled people, small businesses, large businesses, the farmers.

We need a voice that is offering real change and real hope for our country with a proper economic policy, rebuilding our relationship with Europe

Asked whether he would rule out a coalition, he said:

What I want to do is make sure we have as many Liberal Democrat seats and Liberal Democrat votes at the next election.

During the conference proceedings yesterday, when member were asked on a show of hands if they would approve of a Labour-Lib Dem coalition during a Q&A with Davey, only a fraction of those in the audience put their hand up, PA Media says.

• Davey said Elon Musk should be investigated to see if his company, X, has broken UK laws. In an interview yesterday Davey said Musk should be arrested over content he allows on X. In his on Today this morning interview, when asked to repeat that, Davey said Musk should be investigated by Ofcom. He said:

We think there is clear evidence that he and his company have broken the law.

Davey said, if it was shown Musk had broken the law, he should be arrested. Davey said in his view Musk has broken the law. He explained:

When he took it [X] over, he got rid of teams who were there to protect our children, who were there to enforce the rules, and what’s happened on X, and I’m afraid it really is important people understand this, we’re seeing adverts for videos of child sexual abuse.

The slight change of tone may be related to the fact that, as my colleague Pippa Crerar reported yesterday, the Lib Dems are nervous that Davey’s comments yesterday may have gone to far and exposed the Lib Dems to a libel risk.

• Davey claimed that the Lib Dem plans for higher taxes on banks would not lead to their customers paying more in bank charges. When this was put to him, he told Today:

They’ve got record profits. They’ve got profits that they never, ever thought they’d have because of the way that the monetary policy of the Bank (of England) is being reversed.

And lots of academics have looked at this and said absolutely, that’s outrageous that the banks are making such big profits.

So that wouldn’t go on to the banks’ customers.

Good morning. Last month Reform UK unveiled its “Operation Restoring Justice” plan for the mass deportation of people living in Britain without permission to be here. It was aimed at illegal immigrants, but Nigel Farage, the Reform leader, proposed deportation on an unprecedented scale , without being clear as to quite how many people would be affected. Today he is committing Reform (which is currently well ahead of other parties in national opinion polls) to an even more draconian approach. He says Reform would abolish indefinite leave to remain – the immigration status that allows people to remain in the UK for as long as they want, often the first step towards citizenship.

Crucially, this would not just be for new applicants; it would be retrospective, applying to people who already have indefinite leave to remain. Instead, people would have to apply for a five-year visa, with tougher conditions.

In an article for the Daily Mail, Farage says this policy is intended to reverse what he calls “the Boriswave” – the huge increase in legal migration that happened when Boris Johnson was prime minister.

The Johnson government allowed the number of people getting work visas to soar largely to compensate for the fact that EU workers were leaving because of Brexit, which was the policy that Farage arguably did more than anyone else to make happen. But he does not address this point in his article.

Instead, he says:

Today, I can announce that Reform will go even further.

We will abolish indefinite leave to remain (ILR) status, which grants migrants the right to live, work and study in the UK permanently with full access to Britain’s health and benefits system.

This threatens to bankrupt our bloated welfare state.

We will rescind ILR statuses that have already been granted. We will also restore the treasured status of British citizenship.

Why is this so urgent? Starting from January 2026, if nothing is done to stop it, those 3.8 million migrants will become eligible for ILR.

Let’s be clear, these migrants are not doctors, engineers or entrepreneurs. Many of those eligible for ILR never work and never will. Many are young and old dependants who followed family members here. They are now a burden on the welfare state …

Once we abolish ILR, foreign nationals who want to work here will have 180 days to apply for a tough, new five-year renewable visa. They will have no right to benefits or healthcare without insurance. And no right to bring dependants, unless they are high earners who can afford to keep them.

We are giving British business plenty of notice that the era of cheap foreign labour is over.

In a separate article for the Daily Express, Zia Yusuf, Reform’s head of government efficiency, is explicit about how this is intended to ensure hundreds of thousands of people leave the country.

These changes will lead to hundreds of thousands of people having to apply and ultimately losing their settled status in the UK, which will be done on a staggered and orderly basis to allow businesses to train British workers to replace them. Many of those who will lose their leave to remain are entirely dependent on the welfare state and will leave voluntarily upon losing access to benefits. Those that don’t will be subject to immigration enforcement as part of our mass deportation programme – Operation Restoring Justice.

Reform currently only have five MPs but, given what the polls are saying, and the breakdown of support for the traditional parties the prospect of Farage being the next PM is being taken seriously. No British government in the modern era has contemplated a deportation policy on this scale, and what Farage is proposing is close to “remigration”, something that has been taboo in mainstream UK politics since Enoch Powell was sacked from the Tory shadow cabinet after his rivers of blood speech.

The Liberal Democrats are holding their conference this week and in interviews this morning Ed Davey, their leader, said his party was best placed to defeat Reform. Branding Reform a “threat to our democracy, to things we hold dear, British values – decency, tolerance, respect for the rule of law”, he said the Lib Dems were the only party beating them in local elections.

Morning: Liberal Democrats resume their conference debates in Bournemouth. Victoria Collins, the science spokesperson, is speaking at 11.05am, Calum Miller, the foreign affairs spokesperson, at 2.40pm, and at 2.55pm there is a “Reformwatch” session with councillors. There is a fuller agenda here.

Morning: Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, is on a visit to Gatwick to promote the government’s plan to allow the construction of a second runway there.

11am: Nigel Farage, the Reform UK leader, holds a press conference.

11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.

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