Gove says he apologised to Johnson ‘a long time ago’ for leadership knifing – live

Rishi Sunak refused to commit to tax cuts before the next election, claiming “halving inflation is the best tax cut I can deliver”, Archie Mitchell reports.

The prime minister defied calls from backbench MPs and his levelling up secretary Michael Gove, who this morning called for tax cuts in the next year.

Mr Sunak told the BBC: “I am a Conservative, of course I want to cut taxes.”

But the PM did not say taxes would be lowered before a general election expected next year.

Mr Sunak added: “The best tax cut that I can deliver for the British people right now is to halve inflation.

“Inflation is a tax that impacts the poorest people the most. That is why I set it out as a first priority.”

Poling guru John Curtice tallies up the party’s successes and failures in the eyes of the voters – and the outlook is grim for Rishi Sunak

The party finds itself on average 18 points behind Labour in the polls, little better than its position 12 months ago after Liz Truss was displaced as prime minister by Rishi Sunak. Meanwhile, YouGov’s data suggests that Mr Sunak’s initial personal popularity has largely disappeared, leaving him barely any more popular than his party.

Read Curtice’s full take here:

Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen has said he would not bet on the Conservatives winning the next election.

Lord Houchen, who received a peerage in former prime minister Boris Johnson’s resignation honours list, told an event on the fringe of the Conservative Party Conference that the party “can” win the general election, but still had more to do.

Asked whether he would bet on a Tory victory, he said: “Not at the moment, because we need to do more to give those people (who voted Conservative in 2019) the excuse.

“Just look back. This is not complex, politics is not complex. We’ve had three prime ministers in 12, 15 months. It doesn’t matter whether you like the Conservative Party or not, people are not going to get behind a party that has gone through the last 12 or 15 months.”

The cyclist, who is the Government’s active travel commissioner, argued on Sunday that promoting more car driving could backfire to make driving more “miserable” by creating more traffic.

Head of the Government agency Active Travel England, Mr Boardman also raised concerns about the “language” being deployed around the plans to make driving easier.

He said it is essential that local consent is not ignored over 20mph zones and low traffic neighbourhoods (LTNs) ahead of the full plans being unveiled.

Mr Boardman said he was awaiting “the detail“ of policy being billed as restricting such measures.

James Cleverly, speaking at the Onward fringe event, suggested that “activist judges” whether in the UK or in Strasbourg could always frustrate Government policy.

The Foreign Secretary said: “I get the frustration with sometimes activist judges. I would purely make the observation that just as France makes fantastic wine, but increasingly now we make some brilliant wine, so a lot of things that are wonderful overseas, we are able to produce here in the UK.

“And left-wing activist judges, we’ve got quite a few of those in the UK. And so one of the points I make is that as a government you have to deal with the judicial system and, were it not the ECHR, I’m sure we would have domestic judges that were trying to prevent us discharging our duty to British people. We have to deal with that.”

He added: “A lot of the institution, a lot of the agreements, that were put in place in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War are in many instances now 70-plus years old, and we need to make sure that they remain relevant to the modern world.”

He said that the UK could deal with people smugglers and “break the model without necessarily needing to leave the ECHR”.

Rishi Sunak has insisted the UK is not a “laughing stock” as he failed to announce a decision on whether HS2 will ever reach Manchester as he visited the city for the Tory party conference.

The Prime Minister on Sunday “completely” rejected the allegation from critics, which include leaders across the North as well as predecessors at the top of the Conservatives.

Theresa May is the latest former premier to urge Mr Sunak not to ditch the Birmingham to Manchester leg of the high-speed rail project that was designed to link the North and London.

A drastic cost-cutting exercise could also see it end at Old Oak Common in the capital’s western suburbs rather than reach its centre.

But the Prime Minister has refused to make clear what his plans are, instead relying on his get-out of not commenting on “speculation”.

Oak Common instead of Euston London would leave HS2 as a “white elephant”.

One said their ex-party leader should back the prime minister or “shut up”, adding she had “zero credibility”.

Ms Truss will speak at a “growth rally” at the conference, aimed at pushing Mr Sunak on tax cuts. Dubbed the Great British Growth Rally, organisers are already planning for a large turnout.

Cabinet ministers Michael Gove and Kemi Badenoch have backed keeping open the option of leaving the European Convention on Human Rights as they struggle to curb unauthorised Channel crossings.

But there were signs of Cabinet divisions on Sunday as security minister Tom Tugendhat questioned that such a move could create problems for the Good Friday Agreement (GFA).

Mr Gove, the Levelling Up Secretary, also called for pre-election tax cuts amid speculation that leading figures were jostling for the support of the Tory right in case of a future leadership contest.

Home Secretary Suella Braverman has made threats about the ECHR as her Rwanda asylum policy remains stalled in the courts following legal challenges.

Ms Badenoch, the Business Secretary, told the Sunday Times that leaving the ECHR is “definitely something that needs to be on the table”.

Mr Gove, who supported Ms Badenoch in the Tory leadership contest to replace Boris Johnson, said they should “keep every option open” when asked at the Conservative conference in Manchester.

He declined to go further and say whether he actually supported leaving the convention when pressed at the event for the Onward think tank.

On the same panel, Mr Tugendhat said he is “always happy to listen to ideas” but added “I like to have the solutions that go along with them” particularly raising concerns about the Northern Ireland peace treaty, which incorporates the ECHR.

“What is the alternative for the GFA, for the devolved assemblies and administrations, what does it mean for the various different agreements we’ve struck already that are underpinned by it?” the security minister asked.