Only Labour can beat Reform in Gorton and Denton byelection, Starmer claims – UK politics live

Despite Starmer’s claim, Greens believe they also have a chance after Labour blocked Andy Burnham from runningGood morning. Keir Starmer will be landing in China shortly, and he has been speaking to journalists on his flight over. As usual when a PM travels abroad, while they may want to focus on foreign issues, domestic politics never gets forgotten.As Pippa Crerar reports, Starmer was asked about the Gorton and Denton byelection, where yesterday Reform UK named a GB News presenter and hard-right commentator, Matt Goodwin, as its candidate. Starmer claimed only Labour could beat Reform in the constituency. He said:There’s only one party to stop Reform and that’s the Labour party. We can already see what the bybelection is going to be about, which is Labour values which are about delivering on the cost of living with a strong record in that constituency of what we’ve already done versus Reform.You can see from their candidate what politics they’re going to bring to that constituency: the politics of division, of toxic division, of tearing people apart. That’s not what that constituency is about, it’s not what Manchester is about, so this is a straight fight between Labour and Reform. Continue reading...