Parties urged to resume their campaigning to show defiance

THE General Election campaign was suspended yesterday following the Manchester terror attack.

Labour told candidates they can resume their efforts today but no national events will take place until further notice.

The Tories would not set a date to restart their campaign last night.

However, former MPS called on the parties to restart events today to show terrorists they “haven’t won”.

Jess Phillips, the former Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley, who is hoping to be re-elected on June 8, said: “If you stop everything, they win. It’s right to show respect for those who died for a period, but in Britain we never have had a culture where we allow this to stop us. In London after 7/7, people got back on those trains the next day and carried on working.”

Andrew Mitchell, the Conservative former international development secretary, said: “I think we need to send the message that we don’t allow terrorists to change our way of thinking or alter our values.”