Category: News Blog
Labour has parked its tanks on the Tories’ lawn
Who could lead the broken Tories after Sunak?
Why I am persuading activists not to quit
D-Day commemorations remembered the beginning of the end of the Second World War. Now it may also be remembered as the beginning of the end of the Conservative Party’s general election campaign.
Listening to the shocking stories of Labour Party campaigning over the years I would regularly boast to my Labour friends and colleagues that the Conservative Party was a well-oiled, well-funded and well-run organisation. This week it has appeared less so.
In the run up to the 2010 election I saw up close the policy preparations, the media discipline, the announcements grid, the events diary and the complete commitment. All appear to be missing this time round.
Most importantly, 2010 was a team effort. Sunak on the other hand has appeared a lonely figure, often appearing alone at campaign events, rarely flanked by any of the big beasts in Cabinet and rarely represented or defended on the airwaves by known names.
This week he was also an absent figure at the D-Day commemorations in France, leaving early and walking into days of bad headlines.
The D-Day commemorations presented an opportunity for the Prime Minister to appear prime ministerial. To be seen to be leading the country rather than just a party. Visuals of him alongside royalty, world leaders, veterans and armed forces was an opportunity to remind the country of who he was and who he could be. And yet, since Thursday, headlines have been about his lack of leadership, criticism of him putting party and politics above country and accusations of being a Prime Minister who simply did not understand the gravitas of this moment.
One of the main strands of the Conservative Party campaign has been about how the nation’s security would be safe in our hands versus a Labour Party who are weak on defence.
It was the argument that Penny Mordaunt made on the BBC’s seven party debate on Friday evening when she challenged Angela Rayner on her voting record on nuclear deterrent. Mordaunt made much of the insecure world we live in and the need for international leaders who threaten us to know they are dealing with people who are serious and committed to our national defence. Instead, the Prime Minister’s lack of judgement has undermined a key pillar of the Conservative campaign.
It has also emboldened the Reform UK Party – already chasing the heels of the Conservative Party in the polls – and their leader Nigel Farage, who cynically questioned whether Sunak was “patriotic” claiming that he did not understand “our culture”.
It has left candidates furious with one Conservative colleague telling me that No10 are running “a p— take parody election campaign”
Morale is low, many local Conservative associations feel put out at the last-minute imposition of candidates this week as the deadline for nominations closed. A last-minute dash to find safe-ish seats for CCHQ staff, No 10 staffers and special advisors has left a vacuum of trusted and experienced campaigners at the centre.
Many young activists who have done the hard yards for years and have waited patiently on candidates lists to be selected are not even being shortlisted. Some have, through gritted teeth, defended the indefensible, including the Rwanda scheme, and feel they have been used and tossed aside. I have spoken to three young activists in the last 48 hours and urged them not to resign. Female candidates have felt particularly overlooked.
Young activists are avoiding campaign events, not wanting to be tarnished with failure, and now we have rumours of the party putting the brakes on its social media campaign and potentially running out of money. Astonishingly this weekend ministers were having to deny that the PM was on the verge of quitting.
It’s all giving the impression of a party that’s not in control of its campaign, has given up the fight, thrown in the towel and we still have nearly four weeks to go.
This week’s manifesto launch provides a moment to reset, and the PM must grasp that moment.
It seems likely that on 5 July Sunak will not be Prime Minister, it now seems increasingly likely that he will not be leader of the Conservative Party. Sunak is fighting an election, fighting for his own political survival and increasingly, for the survival of a Conservative Party.
10/06/2024