UK general election live: Boris Johnson makes first appearance on ...

With just one sleep to go, here is how party leaders are spending their last day before voting day – and the messages they’ll be trying to drive home:

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will end his campaign trail in the South East. He has used th the word ‘supermajority’ in three tweets in the last hour. As in stop the Labour / tax-raising supermajority.

He has shared his fears of a Labour “supermajority” and said in an overnight statement: “If you are worried about an unchecked, unaccountable Labour government you can stop that by offering us your support so we can stand up for you and be your voice in the next Parliament.”

In a marathon final leg of his tour, Labour leader Keir Starmer will speak to voters in England, Scotland and Wales.

“We’re out in constituencies where we haven’t necessarily won before, because we think that many people are disillusioned with what they’ve seen in the last 14 years,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

“We’re a changed Labour Party and we’re constantly putting our case forward, still smiling, still with a spring in our step that we’re probably the only positive campaign left now.”

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey will hit the road again to round off his stunt-packed campaign.

There is no time to slip into a Dryrobe and warm up after surf lessons on the Cornish coast, because party chiefs have several stops lined up on Sir Ed’s final pre-vote tour of southern England.

Wrapping up his party’s thread on care, which he has spoken about several times on the campaign trail, Davey said: “Throughout this campaign, I’ve been so moved by all the people I’ve spoken to or who have got in touch to discuss their experiences caring for loved ones.”

Reform UK leader Nigel Farage will take another trip to the Essex seaside constituency which he is contesting. Survation pollsters have said Clacton is the only constituency where Reform UK has a confident lead, but they could take 16 seats at an “upper end” estimate.

Scottish First Minister John Swinney has told voters some seats will be won or lost “by only a handful of votes”.

In his final pitch, he said: “Be certain about one thing - your vote will matter. It could make all the difference.”

The Labour-led Welsh government has committed to introduce “globally pioneering” legislation that would in effect make lying in politics there illegal.

Members of the Senedd described it as a historic moment that would combat the “existential threat” that lying in politics poses to democracy.

After a passionate and dramatic debate in the Welsh parliament on Tuesday evening, the government’s counsel general, Mick Antoniw, said the legislation would be introduced before the next Welsh elections in two years’ time.

He said: “The Welsh government will bring forward legislation before 2026 for the disqualification of members and candidates found guilty of deliberate deception through an independent judicial process.”

Antoniw said the practical details of how a law to tackle lying would work would need to be worked out and he called for cross-party cooperation.

With just one sleep to go, here is how party leaders are spending their last day before voting day – and the messages they’ll be trying to drive home:

Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will end his campaign trail in the South East. He has used th the word ‘supermajority’ in three tweets in the last hour. As in stop the Labour / tax-raising supermajority.

He has shared his fears of a Labour “supermajority” and said in an overnight statement: “If you are worried about an unchecked, unaccountable Labour government you can stop that by offering us your support so we can stand up for you and be your voice in the next Parliament.”

In a marathon final leg of his tour, Labour leader Keir Starmer will speak to voters in England, Scotland and Wales.

“We’re out in constituencies where we haven’t necessarily won before, because we think that many people are disillusioned with what they’ve seen in the last 14 years,” he told reporters on Tuesday.

“We’re a changed Labour Party and we’re constantly putting our case forward, still smiling, still with a spring in our step that we’re probably the only positive campaign left now.”

Liberal Democrat leader Sir Ed Davey will hit the road again to round off his stunt-packed campaign.

There is no time to slip into a Dryrobe and warm up after surf lessons on the Cornish coast, because party chiefs have several stops lined up on Sir Ed’s final pre-vote tour of southern England.

Wrapping up his party’s thread on care, which he has spoken about several times on the campaign trail, Davey said: “Throughout this campaign, I’ve been so moved by all the people I’ve spoken to or who have got in touch to discuss their experiences caring for loved ones.”

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Reform UK leader Nigel Farage will take another trip to the Essex seaside constituency which he is contesting. Survation pollsters have said Clacton is the only constituency where Reform UK has a confident lead, but they could take 16 seats at an “upper end” estimate.

Scottish First Minister John Swinney has told voters some seats will be won or lost “by only a handful of votes”.

In his final pitch, he said: “Be certain about one thing - your vote will matter. It could make all the difference.”

It has just gone 7am: let’s look at today’s stop stories. With 24 hours to go until polls open, the Guardian leads with Keir Starmer accusing the Conservatives of desperate tactics amid claims that Tory criticism of his defence of family time was insensitive and had antisemitic undertones.

The Times has Boris Johnson saying a Labour landslide would be “pregnant with horrors”:

The i: Prisons crisis for new government on day one

The Financial Times leads with water groups facing lawsuits, but also carries the interesting headline, “Rich offload assets as concerns mount over Labour’s capital gains tax agenda”.

The Independent: The final poll - Tories brace for wipeout

The Daily Mirror: Is it coming home? 14 years of hurt never stopped us dreaming

The Daily Express: Rishi: Your vote counts, your voice counts… please use it wisely

The Daily Mail: Boris and Rishi unite to stop Starmergeddon

The Daily Record carries a letter from Starmer saying “Let’s send a Labour government to Westminster with Scotland at its beating heart”:

The Yorkshire Post: ‘Part-time’ attacks on Starmer ‘must stop’

Finally, the Daily Star with an endorsement from Kim Wilde for Count Binface:

Keir Starmer has accused the Conservatives of desperate tactics amid claims that Tory criticism of his defence of family time was insensitive and had antisemitic undertones.

Ben Quinn, Peter Walker andKiran Stacey report:

With Rishi Sunak embarking on a marathon day of campaigning, beginning with a pre-dawn visit to a distribution centre and closing with a late-night rally, Tory ministers and aides sought to contrast these efforts with what they termed Starmer’s “part-time” approach.

As an increasingly personal election campaign neared its end, the Conservatives pushed out “final warnings” about what they said a massive Labour majority would mean for taxes, migration and other policy areas.

Downing Street chiefs believe the criticism of Starmer for saying he would maintain his current habit of trying to spend time with his wife and children after 6pm on Fridays “pretty well come what may” has resonated with voters.

However, it has sparked an angry backlash, with senior Jewish figures saying the decision to target such a culturally significant time of the week – Starmer’s wife, Victoria, comes from a Jewish family – was ill-judged and deeply unfair.

“I would have thought to anybody it’s blindingly obvious that a Friday night is quite important in some religions and faiths,” Starmer told reporters during a campaign stopover in Derbyshire.

Calling the attacks “laughably pathetic”, the Labour leader said his comments in a radio interview the day before had simply been to set out how he tried to keep Friday evenings aside for his family and would if elected prime minister, adding: “But I know very well it’s going to be really difficult to do it.”

Starmer said the aim was to create “protected time” for his children, his wife and her father. “Obviously her dad’s side of the family is Jewish, as people will appreciate, and we use that for family prayers – not every Friday, but not infrequently.

“That doesn’t mean I’ve never had to work on a Friday, of course it doesn’t. Plenty of times I haven’t been able to do it, but I try to protect that time, I’d like to try and protect it in the future.”

Zadie Smith has written a long piece for the Guardian this morning on the hope for real change –and a return to the sort of free, functional healthcare and education she once boasted about to Americans – after 14 years of Tory rule:

You should think of yourself (I said to myself) as something like the Ancient Mariner, just repeating over and over your tale of woe, in the hope that the next time the big bright bird of potential equity flies past the ship of state, we might remember what it looks like, and what it can do, and not let any Tories or neoliberals rush up on to the deck to shoot it down.

This Ancient Mariner metaphor stood me in pretty good stead until I settled in the US, around 2010, returning 10 years later to a Britain I barely recognised. At this point, I became Rip Van Winkle. The list of things that have boggled my mind in the past four years is too long to recount here, but the final straw came just a few weeks ago, while I was washing up. The radio was on. A government spokesperson was extolling the virtues of conscription. Where else (asked the spokesperson) can people of different classes and races and genders meet each other on a more or less equal footing and pursue a common goal? Where else in modern-day Britain can community be fostered and encouraged, and people allowed a space in which their human capacities, whatever they may be, can flourish? Where else, I ask you, where else?

I couldn’t work out if this spokesperson was so dense that he truly couldn’t think of an alternative answer to his own query, or if this was one of those very unfunny comedy skits you sometimes find yourself listening to when your hands are otherwise occupied with soap suds. But no: he was 100% serious. The thought that a well-funded state school would provide all of the above had truly never occurred to him. And then I realised: oh Jesus, if things carry on as they are, one day he’ll be right.

Former PM and Labour leader Gordon Brown, in an opinion piece for the Guardian, has urged voters to, “reject the Farage version of Britain and to get our real country back, and to show that greatness comes from standing tall in defence of our principles. To show that greatness comes from standing tall and moving together in defence of your culture, your history and your values.”

Even a small number of votes for Reform UK will see the SNP handed seats in Scotland, according to the Conservatives.

The party has continued its warnings against its traditional voters defecting to Nigel Farage’s party on the eve of polling day.

Opinion polls indicate the SNP and Labour are engaged in a two-way race north of the border, with seat projections suggesting the Tories may hold on to the same number of seats they won in the previous election.

In recent days, the party has urged Scottish voters not to shift to Reform.

Party chairman Craig Hoy said:

Many seats in Scotland are a straight contest between the SNP and Scottish Conservatives. In those key seats, no other party can win. Reform, Labour and the Lib Dems are simply too far behind. Even a small number of votes for Reform could lead to big wins for the SNP.”

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Despite polling suggesting a Labour surge, Hoy appeared to suggest it is his party that can inflict a defeat on the SNP.

“The opportunity is within our grasp to hand the SNP their worst election defeat in more than a decade, but just a few people choosing to vote Reform could put all that at risk,” he added.

“In key seats up and down Scotland, only a vote for the Scottish Conservatives can beat the SNP and get the focus on to the issues that really matter to you.”

As the traders pack up under the striped awnings of the market stalls in the centre of Alford, east Lincolnshire, Matthew Warner is loading balls of wool from his family shop into the back of his car.

Warner, a father of two, is feeling a serious strain on the family finances from fuel prices and childcare, and his wife cannot work full-time hours as a nurse because of the costs. A longtime Tory voter, the 33-year-old is still undecided on who he will vote for on Thursday, but he says he is now attracted by Nigel Farage’s Reform party, who are making significant inroads in seats like this.

Alford is in the heart of one of the safest Tory constituencies, Louth and Horncastle, but the race is a near-perfect encapsulation of the battle for the soul of the Conservative party.

Its MP is Victoria Atkins, the health secretary, a key figure in the party’s moderate wing and a champion of Rishi Sunak. Her Reform opponent, Sean Matthews, is a retired police officer and was previously a local Tory branch chair who quit the party in protest over its removal of Liz Truss and installation of Sunak.

Like many voters in the market towns of this constituency, Warner says he believes it is time for a change after 14 years, having voted Tory at every election. “Nigel is standing out to us more than any other,” he said, though he is dismissive of all the other main parties. However, he says ultimately that he does not trust Reform – or any other party – to make a difference to the struggles of ordinary people.

Boris, burgers and Basingstoke: here are the best pictures from T-2 days on the campaign trail:

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A landslide victory for Keir Starmer in the general election on Thursday could hand Britain a stability premium in global markets, boosting the pound, shares and investment in the UK at a time of mounting political turmoil elsewhere, City investors have said.

In sharp contrast with Conservative party warnings over the dangers of a large Labour majority, analysts in the City of London said the prospect of a resounding mandate for Starmer’s party could secure Britain’s “safe haven” status among investors in an increasingly volatile world.

After failing to close the gap in opinion polls during the election campaign, Rishi Sunak made a last-ditch warning that a Starmer “supermajority” would “bankrupt people in every generation”.

However, City analysts said a Labour landslide could pave the way for global investment in Britain after years of political and economic uncertainty since the 2016 Brexit referendum under the Tories, which had clouded the prospects for international investors.

Boris Johnson made his only appearance on the general election campaign on Tuesday night, less than 48 hours before voters head to the polls, and did not appear with or praise Rishi Sunak.

The former prime minister made a surprise appearance at a Tory rally in Chelsea, accusing Keir Starmer of trying to “usher in the most leftwing Labour government since the war” and claiming he would increase taxes and fail to stand up to Vladimir Putin.

Johnson thanked those at the National Army Museum for attending the late event, claiming that it was “way past Keir Starmer’s bedtime”. He thanked the prime minister for asking him to come, but that was the only mention of Sunak in his speech.

Hello and welcome to the Guardian’s live coverage of the general election. With less than 48 hours to go until voting stations open, former PM Boris Johnson has made a surprise first appearance on the campaign. Johnson appeared on Tuesday night at a Tory rally in Chelsea and did not share a stage with or praise Rishi Sunak, the Guardian’s Aletha Adu reports.

Instead, he said Starmer would try to “usher in the most left-wing Labour government since the war”. Making a reference to “other parties” allegedly “full of Kremlin crawlers”, Johnson said: “Don’t let the Putinistas deliver the Corbynistas. Don’t let Putin’s pet parrots give this entire country psittacosis - which is a disease you get by the way from cosying up to pet parrots.”

With just over 24 hours to go now until voting opens, here is what is coming up today:

• Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey is also campaigning in south-east England

• Labour Party leader Keir Starmer is campaigning in Wales, Lanarkshire and Dudley.

• Tory leader Rishi Sunak is campaigning in south-east England today.

• Reform UK leader Nigel Farage is campaigning in Clacton.

• SNP leader John Swinney is campaigning in Cumbernauld, Glasgow and Livingston.

• Scottish Green co-leader Patrick Harvie will join the candidate for Mid Dunbartonshire, Carolynn Scrimegour in Milngavie.

• Scotland’s deputy first minister Kate Forbes is on the campaign trail with the SNP candidate for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, Seamus Logan.