The stakes are high when you're trying to convince the nation to vote for you
In the great work of a general election campaign, televised debates don't take much time at all. An hour or three, maximum, and candidates only have to speak for part of this time — otherwise they will just have to try and stand still.
And yet, and still. The stakes will be high in Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer's first televised debate on the 2024 election, airing on Tuesday on ITV and moderated by Julie Etchingham.
Follow The Telegraph's live coverage of today's election debate
It may be over in the blink of an eye, but a few unlucky seconds in a televised debate — a modern, US-imported phenomenon — can turn the rest of the campaign into a slog. Likewise, if you succeed, you will feel confident.
«Televised debates have two important qualities. Firstly, it at least forces the parties to talk for a few hours about the same subject […] and therefore the electorate can differentiate between them,» Professor Sir John Curtis, «the doyen of the British election,» told the Today programme on June 3.
«The second reason is that it is reported later, so whether someone has made a gaffe or there has been a dramatic moment, it will be relayed to a much wider audience and it is the secondary report of who has done well and who has done poorly [that matters].»
The idea of televised election debates was first floated in the United Kingdom 60 years ago when Harold Wilson challenged then Prime Minister Alec Douglas-Home to lock horns ahead of the 1964 general election.
Douglas-Home was not inclined to agree. “You get something like a Top of the Pops competition. Then you will get the best actor as the leader of the country, and the actor will be guided by the scriptwriter,” he said. This is a far cry from the era of TikTok politics.
In almost every election since then, one of the two main party leaders has proposed a debate, but it never happened. Too risque, too TV, too American. The first presidential debate in the United States took place in 1960 and instantly became an integral part of the electoral calendar.
“British politicians and parties have always been suspicious of television, period. He has always relied on press coverage, earned airtime, sit-down interviews with print media and billboards. It is only in the last few years that British politicians have come to appreciate the power of television,” says James Frain, a former government department communications director and now a founding partner of public opinion research agency Public First.
In Britain it took until 2010 for the election debate to begin. Since then, although the format has changed, a vague tradition has emerged. Whether leaders like it or not, the debate looks set to continue.
Frayne believes Starmer could be under more pressure because he is relatively unknown to the wider electorate and has such a decisive lead in the polls that it effectively means he has a lot to lose. “He will be a lot more nervous and have to do a lot more preparation. The stakes are high for him,” Frain says.
Part of this preparation could be opening the archives to see what worked and, just as importantly, what didn't in past elections.
“I agree with Nick” — Gordon Brown, 2010 
The chorus was “completely avoidable.” mistake, Kelly writes. Authors: AP
During the first debate in 2010, the first rule was formulated, which can be broadly stated as follows: if you are a Prime Minister under pressure, you are increasingly seen as someone who does not know his own mind and has no plan for the future. It's a brilliant idea to approach a political opponent and repeatedly state that he made a fantastic point.
Gordon Brown did just that, again and again hitching his Labor cart to Nick Clegg's Lib Dem cart with the phrase: «I agree with Nick.» Clegg apparently didn't mind one bit.
But Frayn despairs. “If you are the prime minister of one of the most important countries in the world, you disagree with the leader of the Liberal Democrats. You just don’t do it,” he says. Some mistakes are unfortunate: the camera falls on the candidate at the wrong moment. Others can be avoided entirely. “I agree with Nick,” it’s more the latter.
“Hell yeah, I’m pretty cool” — Ed Miliband, 2015 
Also in the pile of avoidable mistakes is Ed Miliband's worst debate moment. Speaking on the Today programme, Sir John noted that Sunak and Starmer's advisers will need to have «one eye on [their] television and the other on social media». This is partly to prevent their candidate's statements from going viral for all the wrong reasons.
Unfortunately for Miliband, that was the fate that befell him in 2015 after he famously uttered the line «Hell yeah, I'm tough enough» in response to Jeremy Paxman's question about whether he could stand up to Britain's enemies as PM -minister. Frayne believes that if you have to explain that you're «cool enough,» you have a serious perception problem, no matter how you phrase it.
But in this case the wording was also terrible, making the former Labor leader even less convincing. “You can tell who prepared them,” Frain says. “There was a time when people imported rock star American political consultants, and then weird Americanisms crept in. Nobody in England says, «Hell yeah.» It might work in Ohio but not here.”
Theresa May's no-show, 2017 
Labor Party supporters were unimpressed by Theresa May's absence from the 2017 BBC Leader& Debate No. 39. Photo: Getty
Of course, no matter who advises you, it's good to show up. It's generally okay to walk away from a one-on-one debate as long as it depends on your participation at all, but if it's an event where all the major parties are present, your absence will be noticeable. The worst thing is to send someone in your place, as Theresa May did in 2017.
“Especially if the person you send in your place does better than anyone expected you to do.” , says Frain. May sent her Home Secretary Amber Rudd to fight for her, who survived.
May sent the former Home Secretary in her place Amber Rudd. Photo: Pennsylvania
“You seem afraid to argue unless you show up and send someone with different skills. But you also need to be careful that you're giving a great platform to someone you might not want to give it to.»
On that day in 2017, May effectively handed over the lines of attack to Jeremy Corbyn without entering the fray herself. «Where is Theresa May, what happened to her?» — he asked one day. That was all he needed to say.
The eternal phrase of Ronald Reagan, 1984 
The changing formats of these phrases The UK debate — two parties or seven, surrogates sent in to take the place of shy leaders, a Question Time-style town hall set up, advert breaks or no — means we in Britain are always kept on our toes.
Not so in the US, where locations and broadcasters can change and change, but there is a broad structure. Watching the three debates ahead of the US election is like watching the Ashes: you can witness how the candidates adapt, learning each other's preferred lines of attack and defense, allowing them to re-set the field for the next meeting.
Ronald Reagan is a good example. During the first debate of the 1984 presidential election, Reagan was tired and in no hurry to calm down. He was 73 and already the oldest president of all time (he was just a freshman in 2024, but that's handy), so his Democratic opponent Walter Mondale set the stage for attacks on age.
For the second debate, Reagan had a one-liner ready for the moment he was asked about it. “I will not make age an issue in this campaign. “I am not going to use my opponent’s youth and inexperience for political purposes,” he said. It was his own line, and Mondale even laughed at it. Suddenly the narrative turned upside down. Reagan still had it.
George H. W. Bush looks at his watch, 1992. 
'It seemed to the public that he had better places' Photo: Ron Edmonds
Reagan showed how to use debate to your advantage as a sitting president: appear in control, sharper than your opponent; hold the tiller with a charismatic, steady hand. Risk appears, as George H. W. Bush did in 1992.
It was the first town hall-style debate in US history, with candidates asking questions from the public. In any format, it's smart to be as charming and caring as possible, especially since Bush was up against Bill Clinton, a master of creating instant personal connections with voters.
Bush made the mistake of looking at his watch before answering. To the public, it looked like he had a better place to go and he couldn't wait for it all to be over.
“It was really unfair,” says Frain, “because he was just looking at how much time he had left, but it just goes to show that perception is everything. You can be caught on camera doing the smallest thing — wiping your brow, looking a little weird, stifling a yawn — and it ruins your evening.”
Sweat is notorious. Richard Nixon famously gave up studio makeup in 1960 and soon realized why it was useful: he sweated under the spotlight, his stubble visible, while the boyish and handsome John F. Kennedy looked completely unfazed opposite him.
Binders Full of Women, Mitt Romney, 2012 Speaking of Clinton, there is only one modern Democrat more formidable in debate, and that is Barack Obama. «There's a limit to what you can do against a sensational performer like him,» Frayne says. John McCain wasn't having much fun against Obama's tidal wave in 2008, and four years later Mitt Romney snuffed out his hopes with a weird slip of the tongue when he talked about the large number of women in the state while governor of Massachusetts.
“I had the opportunity to assemble a cabinet, and all the candidates seemed to be men. And I—and I went to my employees and said, “Why are all the people in these positions all men?” — he said. «I reached out to a few women's groups and said, 'Can you help us find people?' And they brought us whole folders full of women.”
It was a strange turn of phrase, delivered awkwardly, on a topic on which he had already been attacked, against an opponent who was completely at home on the debate stage. On top of that, the moment went viral on then-nascent social media platforms like Twitter, where it was milked for all sorts of fun.
Fran has some sympathy. “It just goes to show that this whole format is that you put a regular guy in a room with another regular guy, so people are going to misspoke, they're going to make mistakes, and that's because they're human. There is a limit to how much preparation you can do. You just have to pray that these mistakes don't kill you.»
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