“When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.” Rishi Sunak prefers Jillie Cooper to William Shakespeare. But last week’s travails will have left the Prime Minister recognizing a little of how own plight in Claudius’s words. 20 points behind in the polls, hemmed in by apathetic ministers and mutinous backbenchers, he finds something rotten in the state of his government.
After last week’s fruitless Budget, Monday’s double whammy of Lee Anderson hotfooting to Reform UK and the uncovering of Frank Hester’s appalling comments about Diane Abbott raised fundamental questions about the Prime Minister’s good sense. Anderson absconding was hardly unexpected. But it doesn’t help as Tory and Reform UK poll ratings nudge ever closer together.
Yet MPs cross at Number 10 for Anderson’s suspension won’t have been Sunak fans in the first place. Hence why the Hester row was so damning. However sweetly his millions sit in CCHQ’s coffers, it was absurd to send Mel Stride out to suggest Hester’s comments that Abbott “should be shot” for making you “want to hate all black women” were not “gender-based or raced-based”.
Number 10 should have immediately said Hester’s comments were racist to move the story on. Taking until Tuesday evening – and only after Kemi Badenoch’s intervention – allowed the vacuum to be filled with the left’s righteous indignation. Even Sunak-sympathetic MPs were left shaking their heads at his naivete. Questions have been raised about his Downing Street operation.
Even so, as damnable as dragging one’s feet in condemning Hester was, it isn’t the most fundamental of the Prime Minister’s problems. Currently, the Conservatives are polling under 25 per cent. The public hate the Tories, want Sunak gone, and are set to give Labour a landslide. This reality appears to be dawning on even the most well-insulated Tory MPs. What can be done?
For the Sunak-skeptical amongst them, there are three major options. They can hand in their notice, to hop to the front of the queue for lobbying gigs. They could join Anderson in the charge of the right brigade. Or they can once again give in to a deep and desperate reflex: smashing the glass marked leadership challenge. Blood will have blood, if one allows me to switch plays.
Reports abound of dark mutterings amongst ministers and backbenchers. But a wise head once told me not to trust what one reads in the weekend papers. Only Simon Clarke and Andrea Jenkyns have gone public; Mandy Rice-Davies rules apply to both. But the temperature has been rising for months. Mysterious opinion polls, anonymous briefings, drag pubs in Trafalgar Square: same old.
The obvious flashpoint for a challenge would be in May’s local elections. A worst-case scenario: councils lost across the Red and Blue Walls, Ben Houchen and Andy Street’s hard work unrewarded, Susan Hall roundly trounced in London. Psephologists would soon be using the figures to predict a general election wipeout. MPs would know by how much they are going to lose their seats.
The herd might move en masse (as is its wont). But the problems are obvious. Despite the evidence of the last five years, removing a Conservative leader is supposed to be difficult. 15 per cent of Tory MPs are required for a confidence vote – 53 letters, on current numbers. Do the rebels have that? Over Windsor and Rwanda, Sunak successfully called his critics’ bluff. Third time unlucky?
Even if sufficient letters could be convinced to land on Graham Brady’s doormat, Sunak’s opponents would have to win a confidence vote against him. Both Theresa May and Boris Johnson survived them. Both were gone within months. But Sunak can call a general election whenever he likes. Why give unhappy Tory MPs the satisfaction of doing the voters’ job for them? Give them their P45s.
Could Sunak be convinced to resign? The May example presents itself. She resigned a day after the Conservatives came fifth in the 2019 European Parliament elections on only 8.8 per cent of the vote. However bad the local elections are, no pollster is expecting that. Sunak hasn’t been exhausted by the Brexit wars. Even if he is California Dreamin’, he quite likes being Prime Minister.
Even if these not-insignificant hurdles were overcome, a leadership election would be no cakewalk for Sunak sceptics. As Peter Franklin points out, three options present for selecting a replacement: a full leadership contest, as with Liz Truss and Boris Johnson; an MPs-only ballot with one of the final two dropping out, as with May; and a coronation, as with Sunak. Each is very flawed.
His critics on the right – so far loud in demanding tax cuts and a stiffer approach to Rwanda – would have to confront the fact that the bulk of MPs on the Tory benches are out of sympathy with their ambitions, even if they did agree that Sunak should go. The One Nation group cannot be wished away. Why remove Sunak only to see him replaced by Jeremy Hunt? Stranger things…
Of course, a quick glance at our Cabinet League Table would suggest that the Chancellor is not what one would call a frontrunner. The two ministers currently topping our list are Penny Mordaunt and Kemi Badenoch. Both have been at the top of our table; both stood in 2022; both formed our panel’s perspective final two in that benighted contest. Both are ladies not unblessed with ambition.
Leaving aside their other qualities, the two face very different prospects at the next election. Electoral Calculus has Badenoch clinging on in Saffron Walden, but Mordaunt losing Portsmouth North by a margin of more than 10 per cent. If they are the frontrunners, if Badenoch waits, she is on track to be the next Leader of the Opposition. Mordaunt will be unemployed.
So, it runs, if she wants to be Prime Minister, she has more of an incentive to act as soon as possible. Her role as the Leader of the Commons provides plenty of opportunities to meet with and fraternize with her fellow MPs (Sunak should have sent her to Transport). Whatever her previous foibles, her Coronation antics provided a public platform her colleagues can only dream of.
Could the lady who once carried the Sword of State pull another from a stone? “You could not have another contest and the only possible candidate I can see people uniting behind is Penny,” one source has told the Daily Mail. Reports now suggest a group of “right-wing MPs” have told Mordaunt’s allies they would settle for her. Polls suggest she is Britain’s most popular Conservative.
In the land of the blind, the one-eyed man is king (or queen). Whatever Mordaunt makes of these reports, the idea of her swooping to the rescue like Johnson after May’s resignation is for the birds. Do MPs not remember her previous leadership punts went? How they unravelled after poor debate performances, awkward press conferences, and someone struggled through her book?
Whatever one makes of Mordaunt’s recent public notoriety – primarily predicated on carrying a sword, naval vibes, and taking the mick of recalcitrant Scots – the idea of her being the new face of the Tory right seems to be quite bizarre. The few views she is known to have been on the distinctly liberal end of the spectrum. Her shifting views on transgender issues still dog her.
Hence why – the same week the party’s right is supposedly sounding her out – some are briefing about her as the last great hope of One Nation Toryism. The truth is that Mordaunt – blessed with obvious confidence – has become a useful focus for desperate MPs still railing against the inevitable. Sunak-sceptics should be careful what they wish for. Things can always get worse. O Canada…
Number 10’s plans are plain: finally get flights to Rwanda, cross their fingers as the economy recovers, and have another Budget in September to finally pass tax cuts big enough for voters to pay the slightest bit of notice. None of this looks any different from what has come before. But it is the best Conservatives can hope for. Vote Leave is not coming to their rescue again.
The plan is not working. Sunak has ducked every opportunity for a radical change of approach. His re-sets are lost between bad luck and self-indulgence. But he is honourable, doing his best with a vile inheritance. A Labour government holds few charms. But Sunak’s critics should focus on re-building after the election, not briefing their idle fantasies. Every way you look at it you lose.
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Author: William Atkinson
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