Does Labour’s £4,800 mortgage claim add up?
On Tuesday, the Labour party claimed that the measures announced in the Conservative manifesto would raise the cost of the average mortgage by £4,800 over the course of the next parliament.
We’ve now dug into this figure, and found it’s speculative and based on several uncertain assumptions. You can read our full analysis here.
Honesty in public debate matters
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Fact checking the Labour party manifesto
It’s manifesto week and today it was Labour’s turn—Sir Keir Starmer launched the party’s 2024 election manifesto from Manchester this morning.
With the help of Full Fact’s AI tools, we’ve been rigorously reading the 136-page document and identifying key checkable claims.
Find out what we’ve been looking into in our round-up here.
Posted on X
Our calls on transparency in politics here: https://buff.ly/45kU2Ab
Sky News – The Battle for Number 10: Live fact check
Missed #BattleForNo10 on @SkyNews last night? We looked at claims on:
👮 Police numbers
🏥 Waiting lists
🪙 Tax
#GeneralElection #GE24
https://buff.ly/45jtJud
Sky News – The Battle for Number 10: Live fact check
Our team will be following the programme live, and scrutinising in real time the claims made by both politicians, highlighting statements that we think are wrong, misleading or need more context.
You can follow our updates on X throughout the programme.
Fact checking the Green Party manifesto
This week a number of political parties have been releasing their election manifestos, and this morning it was the turn of the Green Party.
We’ve been combing through it with the help of Full Fact’s AI tools and working to fact check its key claims. You can see what we’ve been looking into in our round-up here.
Full Fact's call for change
The two main parties are publishing their manifestos this week - the Conservatives today, and Labour on Thursday. And we have plenty of suggestions for the winner of this election.
Our policy calls for the new government and parliament are split into three themes: what happens during the election period, the behaviour of politicians once elected, and our longer-term vision for a society better able to combat misinformation. During the election campaign we will continue to hold politicians to account for what they say and how they say it.
We are calling for the following commitments:
1. Protect democracy during an election period
2. Politicians must lead by example
3. Strengthen society’s resilience to misinformation
- The next government should strengthen online safety legislation to counter harmful misinformation - especially relating to health or when generated by AI.
- Fact checkers are on the frontline in this fight: the next government must ensure that fact checkers have timely access to data from online platforms and search engines about misinformation on their platforms.
Good information really matters in a healthy democracy, and it's never been more important to campaign for honesty and accuracy in politics, and in wider public debate. Full Fact will do that throughout this election campaign, and we encourage our supporters to help get the message to candidates too. Sign up here to find out more about how you can help with this work.
Honesty in public debate matters
You can help us take action – and get our regular free email
Fact checked: Rishi Sunak’s interview on BBC Panorama
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Tonight we’ve been ‘live fact checking’ the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak during the first of BBC Panorama’s interviews with party leaders, and have looked at a number of claims. Mr Sunak said NHS waiting lists “have risen … they are now coming down”. While it’s true that the number of cases on the main NHS England waiting list has fallen from a high of 7.8 million in September 2023, it’s still higher now than when Mr Sunak pledged that waiting lists would “fall” in January 2023. We’ve unpacked the numbers in our explainer on NHS waiting lists. Mr Sunak also claimed that net migration was “down 10% from the levels that I inherited”. This is broadly right—as we’ve previously written, net migration was down 10% in 2023 compared to 2022. But it was still nearly four times higher in 2023 than in 2019, when the Conservatives pledged to bring down “overall numbers”. The interview included a number of questions about taxes and Mr Sunak made several claims we’ve seen before. Firstly, he claimed “taxes are being cut”. It’s true that National Insurance contributions have been reduced, but the nation’s so-called ‘tax burden’ is high and forecast to rise to a near-record level. Mr Sunak was correct to say the effective personal tax rate for the average earner is the lowest for decades, but this doesn’t include all the taxes people pay. He also spoke about a “£900 tax cut this year”. This appears to refer to the combined value of the reductions in National Insurance contributions in January and April 2024—but this figure is specifically for an average earner and doesn’t take account of any other tax changes. The Institute for Fiscal Studies says once the impact of all tax changes since 2021 is factored in, an average earner will save £340 in 2024/25. Mr Sunak repeated a claim we’ve heard a lot in the past week, that families would face a £2,000 tax rise under a future Labour government. As we’ve explained, this figure is unreliable and based on a number of questionable assumptions. Finally, Mr Sunak claimed children in England are “the best readers in the western world”. As we wrote last week, this appears to be based on the results of a 2022 international study. According to another measure from that year, however, pupils in Ireland and the US were better readers. |
Liberal Democrat manifesto fact checked
This morning the Liberal Democrats officially launched their 2024 manifesto, which we’ve spent the day scrutinising.
We’ve published an initial roundup of a number of claims made in the manifesto, including on tax, the asylum backlog and GP numbers, which you can read here.
With several manifestos set to be released this week, we’ll be fact checking the pledges from other major parties in the same way. You can keep up to date with our most recent work on X (formerly Twitter).
Conservative video fails to address concerns over unreliable ‘£2,094 tax rise’ claim
This morning the Prime Minister Rishi Sunak posted a two-and-a-half minute video on X (formerly Twitter) with a much more detailed explanation of a claim we’ve heard lots in the last few days—that under Labour, “every working household” would face a £2,094 tax rise.
The video was trailed in a separate short video put out by the Conservatives last night, with the words: “The proof. 8am.”
But as we wrote last week in our own detailed analysis of the claim, the £2,094 figure is unreliable and based on a number of questionable assumptions—and today’s explanatory video doesn’t address many of the concerns about it.
For example, the video says the figure’s “overwhelmingly based on official costings signed off by the Treasury”, but fails to mention that many such costings rely on assumptions from special advisers, who are political appointees. We wrote about this point in particular on our Election Live blog as well.