John McDonnell has been accused of Googling the deficit figure in a radio interview with Nick Robinson, after he apparently quoted old information contained on Wikipedia rather than the most recent figure.

When asked what the national deficit was, the Shadow Chancellor said it was £70bn, the figure given on Wikipedia.

However, it appears he got it wrong by £18bn; the deficit is in fact around £52bn, and it appeared he was quoting the 2015-16 figure.

He was being questioned on the Radio 4 Today programme ahead of Labour's manifesto launch later today.

Rustling heard during the interview led host Robinson to ask McDonnell if a colleague passed him a note to help him with the question.