I wonder what the shortest possible time between resignation and absolution of all offences is? Only a matter of time til cabinet members resign every morning just to clear things up for another day's hard ministerial code breaking
the deal Sunak has done with the far right of the party is “If you let me look after the economics, you can have your culture wars”
That overlooks how many of the hard right of the party are just as keen on using the culture wars as a distraction rather than something they truly believe in.
Yvette Cooper is presently at the despatch box reading out the full charge sheet against the irradiated gerbil, and asking about the implications for national security if her re-appointment
It goes without saying she hasn’t bothered to turn up, scarpering as soon as PMQ’s wound up. So much for accountability eh?
That’s pretty naive thinking. I’d imagine Braverman offered her vote to whomever would guarantee her old job back.
Sunak wasnt exactly in need of one vote for one post.
Aside from anything else he could have offered the same deal to anyone else who wasnt currently in disgrace. Admittedly a fairly short list currently with the tories.
I’d imagine Braverman offered her vote to whomever would guarantee her old job back.
I think you are exaggerating the importance of Braverman's vote, Sunak was having no problem in finding sufficient nominations, he was well in advance of his rivals.
Johnson and Mordaunt were never likely to give Braverman her old job back, Sunak was always the most likely to do so, he didn't have to make any promises to her, she would have known it.
It's amazing that he didn't even bother to wait a few months though, I don't think anyone could have predicted that. Especially after the integrity comments in his speech.
It was never about numbers. Braverman has always been a weird frontperson for the ERG, but she’s as hardline as any of them.
I expect that a top job for her, as their representative on earth, was a non-negotiable ERG demand.
As successive administrations have shown though, the ERG are the feral kids smoking at the back of the class and Rishi is just the latest supply teacher. They’ll soon get bored and start making his life a misery too.
They can never be placated. Any demand met is soon simply replaced with another two, invariably even more extreme. I’m sure they’re presently agitating that he dump the NI protocol or they’ll set the fire alarm off then turn all the taps on in the bogs
https://twitter.com/thedailymash/status/1585209864602648578?s=46&t=bkcCemyTHhIhtp6FeUnXIw
I expect that a top job for her, as their representative on earth, was a non-negotiable ERG demand.
The ERG was badly split on who to support and so chose not to.
Sunak has the same nutty fantasies as most of them but just generally has better PR so keeps them at armslength.
How did PMQs go? I forgot to listen…
Lots of soundbites instead of answers. Lots of cheering. Like they do every couple of weeks when they get a new PM
I've only read the text, but it sounds like he got a bit snarky in some of his (non) answers
but it sounds like he got a bit snarky in some of his (non) answers
Johnson clearly was his rolemodel.
Failure to answer the questions mixed with random invented insults against labour.
How did PMQs go? I forgot to listen…
It was as if he had an earpiece in, with Johnson providing him with the answers. Not really what I was expecting but given his unjustifiable position he didn't really have any other option. Starmer tore into him a bit.
Another ****? (With reference to Steve Baker (Brexit hard man)
https://twitter.com/bmay/status/1585166867429105664?s=61&t=s3juWWuROY8qrMeXZF7EGA
To be fair that ^^ interview dates from 2017 and I believe that since then the ERG has provided a list of MPs, including cabinet members, who are members.
They were forced to by the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority because as Guru-Murthy points out they receive public money.
It is nice to see Braverman squirm mind.
It doesn’t really matter when the interview is from.
More the fairly obvious question it raises…
WTF?? And she’s now the Home Secretary?’ Are you *ing shitting me?!!!! *ING SERIOUSLY?!!!
Like a hamster that’s just been put through a spin cycle. I’ve got brighter plants.
Terrifying that our new PM thinks (or has been forced to think) that she’s the perfect person to hold one of the Great Offices of State
Having said that, it’s highly likely that she will be a big part in his downfall, in some form or other.
Give it a few weeks…
From the BBC:
Helen Whately as a minister in the Department for Health and Social Care
We saw during COVID that she was inept. Same old Tory Govt piss take
Ah but Cruella and the other familiar faces are the price Mr Sunnak had to pay to sit on the throne.
I expect the behind the scenes horse trading to secure his position would make an interesting read.
The reality is it’s just the same old infighting cabal fronted by a new lead singer,who also managed to get a fine for attending a party.
He’s made a seriously good comeback thou,considering when this thread was started he was pretty toasted.
Willing to do ANYTHING for their 'agenda' - be afraid.
https://www.hmd.org.uk/resource/first-they-came-by-pastor-martin-niemoller/
TBH whilst we are watching the continuing farce of the 6 year death throes of the tory party, the machinations are still slowly grinding on with the grim EU law bill that removes uk laws by MP's just sitting on their hands.
the machinations are still slowly grinding on with the grim EU law bill that removes uk laws by MP’s just sitting on their hands.
This 100%
I tire of people stating that the tories are crippled with infighting, or during BGJ's tenure crippled by his laziness and ineptness. In reality there has been no slowing down of the legislative agenda they have and are pushing. The only victories for common decency have been forced by the courts, and I expect them to legislate to remove those barriers.
The Tories are in a state of catastrophic crisis. The latest YouGov poll, taken after Rishi Sunak became their latest leader, puts them on 23%, they have never polled less than 30% in any general election in the last 200 years. Labour are on more than double that.
Desperate and hurried changes of leaders does not appear to be helping them. We have just witnessed the shortest premiership in UK history due to the extreme unpopularity of a Tory PM.
Unpopularity based not on personality but on policy. The Tories are, for the first time in over 40 years, no longer in control of the narrative. They are rudderless, disunited, and experiencing such a crisis of ideology that they can't even agree on what thatcherism, the glue that held them together for the last 40 years, means any more.
The current Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer is now pursuing taxation policies which are diametrically opposed to the taxation policies which he himself was espousing 4 months ago, and the previous Tory Chancellor of a couple of weeks ago was determined to implement.
https://twitter.com/oprosuk/status/1585544469339951105
This is no temporary blip. The last 15 national opinion polls have placed Labour support at greater than all the other political parties put together - every single one has had Labour on over 50% of the total vote.
The Tories face wipeout in a general election. Even if they manage to claw back support so that the Labour lead of 30+% is reduced to just half of that they face a catastrophic collapse in their number of MPs due to where their loss of support is concentrated - marginal constitucies and also Tory heartlands like the South East :
https://www.ft.com/content/aee4a311-bb25-444a-8e0b-b6a55720e8d4
That ^^ is well worth a read. If the psephologist is correct, and he certainly sounds plausible, then the Tories are buggered. There is never a time to be complacent but it would be a mistake to believe that everything is pretty much going swimmingly for the Tories.
There is never a time to be complacent but it would be a mistake to believe that everything is pretty much going swimmingly for the Tories.
On the surface it may look like the tories have fixed their Truss problem, but the right wing will soon start whining about all the things they were complaining about before Truss, and they will get louder and more aggressive when Sunak's honeymoon is over. It could even happen very soon if he has to get rid of Braverman, which looks highly likely.
Also agree on the polls. Sunak will have very little good news for voters so I don't expect he'll get much of a bounce. I think finally the penny has dropped in the wider electorate that the tories are not on their side. Starmer's focus on 'being on the side of working people' is cutting through massively now, even if it's not entirely true.
Reinstating Braverman could well be Sunaks undoing. The backlash against her is huge. to me it seems obvious that reinstating her was the ERG loons price for supporting Sunak.
Yup. Either that or he’s desperate to appeal to those party activists and some of the new 2019 voters that put anti-immigration issues first and otherwise might not welcome him as leader for, er, reasons. Either way, her appointment feels like a miss-step if he is genuinely trying to widen the appeal of his party beyond the core support his party has been left with.
Sunak will have very little good news for voters so I don’t expect he’ll get much of a bounce. I think finally the penny has dropped in the wider electorate that the tories are not on their side
Yep, it seems to take them a long time to realise it and then in 10 years time they will have forgotten it again and vote the tories back in.
There are still many people on the vox pops that are expecting the government to do something to help them and don't realise the government is focusing on reducing the deficit and not even looking at helping people who are struggling to live.
I'm not sure they are that screwed. If a gneral election can't be forced by spring (I don't think it can), peopel will start to forget and I imagine the 'labour would have been just as bad' narrative will seep to the front and ratings will go the tories way once again.
Rishi Sunak is as right-wing on immigration as any other right-wing Tory. There is no reason to assume that he is reluctantly pursuing policies which he would rather not any more than other right-wingers such as Patel and Braverman.
These are his policies, there is no evidence that they have been forced on him.
Also agree on the polls. Sunak will have very little good news for voters so I don’t expect he’ll get much of a bounce.
There won't be a bounce - there will be a gradual closing of the gap. May not be enough to save them from defeat, but an election in a year or 18 months time will be closer than the polls show today.
There won’t be a bounce – there will be a gradual closing of the gap.
What do you think Sunak is going to do to change people's minds that the tories are on their side? Right now all he's offering is the fact that he's not Liz Truss. All he has to offer is more pain, more suffering, and probably more incompetence and chaos if Braverman is anything to go by. And this time the tories can't blame it on labour.
All he has to offer is more pain, more suffering, and probably more incompetence and chaos if Braverman is anything to go by.
In a Cabinet of the criminally incompetent, Braverman is up there as unbelievably, catastrophically stupid.
And Sunak can't be that smart, he must have known there'd be a backlash in re-appointing her, especially less than a week after she resigned/was sacked.
And this time the tories can’t blame it on labour.
Oh yes they can.
The party of personal responsibility is very good at blaming others for their failings.
Whether they will succeed in it is a different matter though.
What do you think Sunak is going to do to change people’s minds that the tories are on their side?
Not a lot - just time.
As long as there's no major shit-storms and interest rates don't rocket then give it a year and Boris/Liz will be a distant memory to many.
And Sunak can’t be that smart, he must have known there’d be a backlash in re-appointing her, especially less than a week after she resigned/was sacked.
It was the price he had to pay for being PM.
Without promising to the right he would appoint Braverman, Mordunt would have got enough nominations to take it to the membership and thus would be PM. It was the only was he could get to be PM
As long as there’s no major shit-storms and interest rates don’t rocket then give it a year and Boris/Liz will be a distant memory to many.
Liz will be a distant memory but inflation woudl have to go down and if people have to pay more for their energy from April combined with inflation they are going to be getting worse off than now.
Latest date for next election is over 2 years away though so things could naturally get a bit better by then without the tories doing anything so they may be able to claim what they did has started to fix it.
Could be great timing for Labour though as if they get in they then have 5 years more of natural improvement and can claim they did it.
Without promising to the right.....
Where does this strange belief that he isn't on the Tory right come from?
What evidence is there he is anything else other than a right-wing Tory?
This is a man who in private boasts of not having any working-class friends and redirecting money away from deprived inner city areas and into affluent leafy Tory-voting areas, ffs.
And why doesn't this disbelief in a Tory's right-wingness extend to other Tories? Why is it assumed that Braverman really is right-wing but Sunak isn't, or very reluctantly is?
Is it really all down to expensive tailoring and a slick professionally coached presentation?
The ERG loons etc.
Its not saying he is not right wing to acknowledge that there is a group far further to the right than him and that they are calling the shots including the appointment of Braverman as their price for supporting Sunak
So it's because Sunak has never been a member of the ERG, are you serious?
Kwasi Kwarteng has never been a member of the ERG either, are you also going to suggest that KK isn't as right-wing as Braverman?
Sunak has always been extremely ambitious, his unprecedented meteoric rise through the Tory ranks exceeds even Liz Truss's. He has only been an MP for 7 years and a cabinet minister for 2.
You don't achieve that by hamstringing yourself to a caucus.
The tory right don't like Sunak because they think he is a fake thatcherite. He says all the right things, but when the chips are down he does the opposite, like raising taxes and dishing out handouts to the poor. He'll never be forgiven for his 'socialist' economic policies during covid. In their crazy world the pandemic was a perfect opportunity to bring in US style darwinian capitalism, and Sunak wasted it.
Also on Braverman, I think given all the stuff that's now coming out I can only assume her departure is priced in. They gave her the job to buy off ERG opposition in the full knowledge that they'd probably have to get rid of her soon after. A price worth paying to secure the premiership?
He’ll never be forgiven for his ‘socialist’ economic policies during covid.
Are you sure they were his?
Sunak cited policy differences with Johnson when he resigned as Chancellor.
But the immediate impression of his latest Budget is that Boris Johnson’s name is stamped all over it. While the Chancellor signalled his intention to rebuild the public finances, the Prime Minister has forced him to splash the cash in a way last seen under Blair and Brown.
The biggest evidence of No.10 influence was that Sunak was forced to burst wide open the spending envelope he set only in March. The £150bn increase in departmental spending over the Parliament, 3.8 per cent in real terms, is a big deal with a real rises in overall spending for every single department.
Are you sure they were his?
Probably not but the right wing seem to blame him for them, probably because they can't admit to themselves that their mop haired hero wasn't the rightwing ideologue they assumed he would be.
Well he is not going to the climate conference in Egypt. Just after the UN said time is running/ran out.
Centerist to your face...
Right wing behind closed doors...
Bit like Boris likes to try and make all people happy...
No interest in the Tory Party like Blair with Labour its a convenient vehicle...
His problem is the currently piss poor and getting poorer electorate...
He will do a windfall tax with a get out" allowance" clause..
He will raise pensions and benefits in line with wages...
He will freeze Public sector budgets...
Use the fiscal head room from the Bond Market dropping...
Levelling up will be lip service...
Watch infrastructure projects get stopped...
Some tightrope.
The latest YouGov poll, taken after Rishi Sunak became their latest leader, puts them on 23%, they have never polled less than 30% in any general election in the last 200 years. Labour are on more than double that.
m not sure they are that screwed. If a gneral election can’t be forced by spring (I don’t think it can), peopel will start to forget and I imagine the ‘labour would have been just as bad’ narrative will seep to the front and ratings will go the tories way once again.
Who are these polls done on?
I work in tye construction industry and (apart from me and 1 plumber) I haven't come across anyone who actually wants a labour government in place, all last week every delivery driver wanted to talk about who's the new PM going to be, tgey all wanted Bellend Boris, saying he did "an all rite job didn't he"
" he had all that shit to deal with, covid and brexit and all that "
These people would still vote tory tomorrow. 🤦♂️
Who are these polls done on?
Very carefully selected samples. For pollsters providing results which are as accurate as possible is what their businesses rely on. Totally screwing up really isn't an option for them and the huge unprecedented Labour lead, which they all show, is way beyond their margin of error.
The polls are currently showing the Tories on 20-25% which is a lot, up to a quarter of voters and twice the level of support for the LibDems, so finding a significant amount of Tory supporters shouldn't be that difficult.
The problem for the Tories is that support for Labour is more than double that.
I agree that "Bellend Boris" isn't that unpopular with many voters, the Labour lead was mostly in single figures when he was PM, but the Tories replacing him changed everything.
Truss very effectively trebled or quadrupled the Labour lead, which is why she was gone in just over a month. I doubt that Sunak has the ability to do much better.
I can understand the nostalgia for Johnson after the chaos of Truss and the promise of difficult decisions/hard times during a cost of living crisis under Sunak, but that won't save the Tories when the next general election eventually comes.
The only uncertainty is how big the Tory wipeout will be. IMHO
