Jess Phillips
The Conservative Party has been accused of misleading voters again with a video of Labour candidate Jess Phillips.
The edited video, posted by the @CCHQPress Twitter account, shows the parliamentary candidate saying: “You can never, ever deliver all of those things that you are pretending to deliver when you go to the electorate.”
@CCHQPress has dated the video November 21, 2019 — however, the clip has been taken from an old interview, when Ms Phillips appeared on ITV’s Good Morning Britain on October 3 to promote her new book.
The video was retired this morning during an interview with shadow education secretary Angela Rayner.
During the original interview, Ms Phillips was questioned by Susanna Reid about keeping manifesto promises — before the General Election was announced.
Ms Phillips said: “I think there is an argument to be said that you can never, ever deliver all of those things that you are pretending to deliver when you go to the electorate.
“In reality, things change. Globally things change, situations change. Facts change.
“[We can’t deliver it] in all cases. I can’t control the trade war between America and China and I have to, each and every day, and at the moment it is on a day-by-day basis and it is not good, and I have to say, ‘what is the best thing, the best decision I can make today to make sure my constituents are better off?’”
Jess Phillips tweeted: “I understand it’s difficult for the Conservatives to understand a politician being honest, but this is so misleading, I was being asked why I’d changed my views on Brexit, weeks ago.
“Also if they would like an up to date chat I’ll happily go on telly with one of them and listen to them tell me which of their manifesto pledges they have honoured….. it’ll be a short interview….because they delivered naff all…off to try and get a GP appointment!”
The edited video has been criticised on Twitter.
One person said: “You know she’s not just talking about Labour right, but all politicians? She’s speaking truth whereas you only pretend to use facts.”
Another added: “Edited and old. Get a grip.”
It’s not the first time the Tories have been accused of misleading the public with a video.
On November 5, they were accused of unfairly editing a video of Labour’s Sir Keir Starmer, to make him appear unable to answer a question on Brexit. However, the party stood by the edit.
The Tories also purchased the website labourmanifesto.co.uk and paid for Google adverts to make it appear high in genuine searches for the Labour Party manifesto.
The website purports to showcase Labour’s manifesto but instead actually attacks the party’s policies. It accuses the party of promising “higher taxes” with “no plan for Brexit”.
As well as the discredited assertions on spending there is an attack on Labour’s Brexit policy.
The actual Labour manifesto can be found at: Labour.org.uk.
The Conservatives came under fire for rebranding as a “fact-checking service” during Tuesday night’s televised election debate.
Twitter warned that a repeat of the incident would result in “decisive corrective action”.
Facebook has also been forced to suspend Conservative propaganda adverts which featured doctored BBC headlines that falsified BBC news stories about Tory spend on education.
The Party is also in hot water over using taxpayers’ money to spend on Facebook adverts to Tory target swing constituencies with promises of extra spending.
Twitter and the Conservative Party did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the video.
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