Image source, PA Media

On what is the first official day of the general election campaign, it has been far from quiet...

• PM Boris Johnson sees the Queen and officially dissolves Parliament
• Wales Secretary Alun Cairns resigns over claims he knew about a former aide's role in the "sabotage" of a rape trial
• Two government ministers apologise over their comments about the Grenfell Tower fire

• Mr Johnson makes a speech outside No 10 promising to get Brexit "over the line"
• Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn makes his case as "a very different kind of prime minister" who "only seeks power in order to share power"
• Lib Dem leader Jo Swinson says a "Remain alliance" with other parties will see her gain seats
• The Green Party launches its campaign with a promise to invest £100bn a year on climate action

The World at One
BBC Radio 4

Following on from what our Wales political editor just said, former Secretary of State for Wales Stephen Crabb agrees the Alun Cairns story has "cast a heavy shadow over the start of this campaign".

Mr Cairns announced his resignation earlier over claims he knew about a former aide's role in the "sabotage" of a rape trial.

The Tory MP tells BBC Radio 4's World At One: "It’s been a very difficult week since this whole matter really came to public attention.

"A number of us who are fighting very, very tight marginal seats in Wales have felt increasingly anxious... not just from a PR point of view of the story not going away, but the perception that the party itself isn’t addressing the issue in the correct way.”

He says the incident "demands a far better response from the party" and it "shines a light on the party in Wales" that there are no women in senior positions.

Mr Crabb adds: "We’ve never had a female Welsh Conservative member of Parliament and I think that reflects poorly on us in 2019.”

Felicity Evans
BBC Wales political editor

The resignation of Alun Cairns leaves the Conservative campaign in Wales in disarray.

As secretary of state he was supposed to be leading this campaign.

They had high hopes going into this - they are targeting several Leave-voting seats in the north-east of Wales.

The question now is, how much does this impact on their chances of securing those seats?

Read more on this story here.

Tom Edgington
BBC Reality Check

Image source, Getty Images

The Green Party has pledged to invest £100bn a year to fund its climate policy over the next decade.

The bulk (£91.2bn a year) would come from borrowing, with the rest from tax changes.

This would represent a massive increase on current borrowing levels. The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies believes government borrowing will be £55bn this year.

Spending £100bn a year tackling climate change would be about the same amount of money the government currently spends on education.

You can read more analysis here.

Laurence Sleator
BBC political research unit

Welsh Secretary Alun Cairns resigned this morning just hours after campaigning proper got going.

We believe the last minister to resign during a general campaign was Labour's Armed Forces Minister Lord Desmond Brayley on 25 September 1974 ahead of that year's October election.

Lord Brayley resigned over questionable business dealings.

Laura Kuenssberg
BBC political editor

There was nothing massively new in the PM’s statement just now, but it's clear No 10 reckon they have to win the argument about needing to have an election in the first place.

It's also clear they are going to make a lot of the idea that Parliament wasn’t working - the PM said he’d been "chewing his tie in frustration".

The Tories hope Boris Johnson will start to look happier out on the road - like Jeremy Corbyn, he’s comfortable in front of the crowds, with more visibility but also more capacity for gaffes.

Tom Symonds
On the campaign trail with the Lib Dems

The Lib Dems are claiming to have the UK’s first electric coach as one of their two battle buses.

The coach is being used today to transport the leader, Jo Swinson, and a media pack to Golders Green in north London, then Watford, and later a school in Esher, Surrey.

The driver, Charles Gash, says he’s trying to keep the speed down.

His bus has a maximum range of 220 miles and a fifth of the battery had gone by lunchtime.

The party will use a conventional bus for longer legs of its election tour.

Norman Smith
Assistant political editor

It has been a dismal, wretched, ragged 24 hours for the Tory Party.

Pretty much everything that could go wrong did go wrong - culminating with Alun Cairns walking the plank just moments before Boris Johnson had his big podium moment setting out his pitch.

The task for Mr Johnson is to try and get a grip of this campaign and that is what we have seen him doing this lunchtime – trying to change the tone, change the direction and get it back on to Brexit.

Confused by the latest election developments? Got a question about polling or policy? Or is there anything else you'd like us to explain?

Send your questions to BBC News via the form on this page and we'll do our best to give you the answers.

We've answered this one from Richard Allen in Lewannick:

Q - Can a suspended MP stand for re-election in a general election?

A - An MP suspended by the Commons can stand in any by-election or general election.

But this would probably have to be as an independent candidate, because they would almost certainly lose the party whip. However, in theory there is nothing stopping a party choosing them as the candidate.

If the MP has yet to serve the suspension before an election it rolls over to the next parliamentary session, assuming they win the election.

You can read answers to more of your questions here.

Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson is asked about the Welsh secretary's resignation while on the campaign trail in Watford.

She tells reporters: "It is right that he has resigned.

"The allegations that were made were incredibly serious.

"And I think there are real questions to be asked about why it has taken him so long to come to this conclusion."

Iain Watson
Political correspondent

Jeremy Corbyn grew up not far from the now highly marginal Tory-held Telford constituency.

He praised the enthusiasm of local activists and promised them Labour would abolish food banks, tuition fees and in-work poverty if elected to government.

He made no mention of the abolition of fee-paying schools - a recent conference policy - but he told me that "at the very least" these schools would pay tax and lose charitable status.

And he continued to draw deep red dividing lines with the government - he attacked Jacob Rees-Mogg’s comments on Grenfell and sought to portray the Conservatives more widely as out of touch.

He said ‘"common sense" would be not "to put flammable cladding on people’s homes".

And he declared he was not "born to rule". Now some of his own MPs never mind his opponents have been asking a slightly different question - is he fit to be prime minister?

In an apparent recognition that the leadership question needed to be addressed, he pledged to be a different type of leader - one who would share power

I asked if his leadership extended to telling us whether he personally felt that two controversial figures - Chris Williamson and Keith Vaz (the first suspended by Labour, the other by Parliament) - should be official candidates at the election.

His answer - he doesn’t "dictate" - it was up to Labour’s national executive. As he says, a different type of leadership

Mr Johnson attacks Labour's Brexit position, saying it is not clear where Jeremy Corbyn would stand in his planned referendum.

He says voting for Labour will lead to "more dither and delay".

But the PM says voting for him will see him "get Parliament working for you".

Mr Johnson pledges that on "day one" of a new government, he will start pushing his deal through Parliament and "get Brexit done by the end of January".

Repeating his election mantra, he concludes: "Let's make 2020 the year of investment and growth, not the year of two referendums.

"Let's get Brexit done and unleash the potential of the whole United Kingdom."

Mr Johnson makes his pitch to the electorate comparing his policies to those of Jeremy Corbyn's Labour.

The PM says: "Come with us - a government putting billions into education or go with Jeremy Corbyn who wants to ban Ofsted, which stops bullying in the classroom.

"Come with us, who believe in high wages, or go with a left-wing Labour Party that believes in high taxes for everyone.

"Come with us, putting in a points-based immigration system or go with Labour and totally uncontrolled and unlimited immigration."

Mr Johnson says he wants to "chew my own tie" over the way Parliament has acted over Brexit, and calls its attitude "mindboggling".

The PM adds: "If Parliament has it way, we will still not be leaving on 31 January."

He says delay is "bad for the country" and for MPs to "decide they can cancel the result of the referendum" would be "disastrous for trust in politics".

Starting his speech as the election campaign kicks off, Boris Johnson says he doesnt want an early election, but "we have got to the stage where we have no choice".

He adds: "Our Parliament is paralysed and stuck in a rut [as] MPs are just refusing time and again to deliver Brexit and deliver the mandate of the people."

The prime minister has come out of Downing Street and is about to start his speech in front of No 10.