The only poll that counts is the one on election day. That’s been Rishi Sunak’s mantra as survey after survey shows an electorate itching to give the Conservatives not so much a good kicking as a knockout blow. It is increasingly difficult for those around Sunak to maintain this level of detachment given what the psephological crystal ball is telling him and the party. One recent shock came over the Easter weekend: a mega-poll, carried out by Survation and published in the Sunday Times, predicting the Tories’ worst-ever election result. The poll predicted they would win fewer than 100 seats. Sunak’s own constituency in Richmond, North Yorkshire, was at risk. Everyone knows things are bad for the Tories, but it is ...

To lose one minister may be regarded as a misfortune – to lose two in a single week looks like carelessness. Or, more accurately, like inevitability. Hence the news on Tuesday (26 March) that the skills minister Robert Halfon would be joining the armed forces minister James Heappey in quitting his government role and standing down as an MP at the next election was greeted by the Westminster equivalent of a shrug. It was a regretful shrug, to be sure. Heappey and Halfon are both widely liked and respected ministers in their departments, and their resignation announcements prompted a wave of appreciative cross-party tributes. These are not troublemakers flouncing out of Rishi Sunak’s government in protest at his leadership in the ...

Lee Anderson’s recent defection to Reform UK was perceived by many Conservatives as symbolic of the fracture between their party and the voters it won for the first time in 2019. For some, the views represented by Anderson have become synonymous with working-class voters. But this mistaken characterisation of today’s working class is one of the many reasons that Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives look like they will lose the next general election. Writing in the Telegraph, Tory MPs Miriam Cates and Danny Kruger argued that Anderson’s defection is “a sad indictment of the failure of our party to listen to the voters who propelled us to victory four years ago”. This analysis promises to lock in the Tories’ strategy of pushing further and ...

The recent Wellingborough and Kingswood by-elections didn’t see a stunning share of support for Reform UK. It was the dramatic swings to Labour that were the story of the night. But Reform’s double-digit vote shares were, for the first time, in line with polling forecasts. Up to this point, the party had dramatically underperformed then. Myself and others dismissed their polling numbers as more phantom than fact because whenever the ballot boxes came out, Reform’s vote did not. Now, if the polls are to be believed, Reform will win two to three million votes at the next general election, if not more. Any MPs? Unlikely. Such is the reality of first-past-the-post and there is little evidence of concentrated organisation on Reform’s ...

The 25th anniversary celebrations – if that’s the right word – of the Scottish Parliament’s opening are under way.  Thursday saw three of the four living former first ministers appear at Edinburgh’s Assembly Rooms to talk about that quarter century and the events that led up to devolution.  Jack McConnell, Henry McLeish and Alex Salmond have perhaps little in common beyond the high office they held with varying degrees of success – they are certainly not friends. Nicola Sturgeon, the most recent ex-occupant of the post, was not in attendance. It struck me, as I considered the line-up, how Holyrood has failed to produce a cadre of wise old birds who have climbed to the top of the political ladder, either stepped or ...

Their noble lordships inflicted seven defeats on the government over the scheme to send asylum seekers to Rwanda yesterday. “Even if flights take off, we’ll still fight the election on the economy.” That was how one government source described the Conservatives’ strategy to me last month. Nonetheless, they said, the government would press on with the Rwanda plan because it was the only way to stop people crossing the Channel. Last night’s series of defeats in the Lords means the government will not bring the bill back to the Commons until after parliament’s Easter recess, pushing the earliest take-off date to June. This matters because there is a large rump in the Conservative Party that thinks the route to re-election (or simply non-annihilation) ...

With Labour 20 points or more ahead, a general election likely within eight months and seemingly nothing remedying the situation, it would not be a surprise if the Conservative Party was inclined to panic. In terms of pure political survival, this is not necessarily irrational. The Tories panicked in 2019, put Boris Johnson into Downing Street and ended up with an 80-seat majority. In the past ten days, the conversation within the Conservative Party has got a little louder as to whether it should enter panic mode and remove yet another leader. The case for ousting Rishi Sunak is a straightforward one. His critics argue that the Tories are heading for defeat and that Sunak is losing popularity. He shows no ...

Last night in her Mais Lecture, Rachel Reeves gave us the most comprehensive glimpse yet into what she would do as chancellor. But there’s a mismatch at the plan’s heart.  Reeves has set herself an extraordinarily high bar. She wants to build a new economic consensus, reverse national decline and achieve the highest growth in the G7. In her speech, she defined herself not only against recent Tory chaos, but the Thatcherite paradigm that has ruled since 1979. “Ever closer global economic integration” was dismissed as “economically naive and politically reckless”. As George points out, attacks on New Labour were also laid on thick. She criticised its insecure and regionally unequal economic model that pumped the City and then distributed the proceeds to ...