pluk
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UK politics general discussion
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Matt N
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Out of interest, who is everyone rooting for in this contest?
I’m not really sure myself. I was originally hoping Sajid Javid would win, but now he’s withdrawn, I’m not sure.
I now think that Rishi Sunak will almost definitely win, however. He seems to have by far the most momentum and support of any candidate.
I’m not really sure myself. I was originally hoping Sajid Javid would win, but now he’s withdrawn, I’m not sure.
I now think that Rishi Sunak will almost definitely win, however. He seems to have by far the most momentum and support of any candidate.
Alsty
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TLDR News have got a nice video that runs through the candidates, their history, ideologies and what they will do if they become the Prime Minister. Worth a watch if you've got 12 minutes
I think Liz Truss has got the qualities I look for in a Conservative leader... unelectability.
In all seriousness though, I'm not sure there will actually be much change in direction from the government regardless of who's in charge. Changing the bus driver does not change the route.
I think Liz Truss has got the qualities I look for in a Conservative leader... unelectability.
In all seriousness though, I'm not sure there will actually be much change in direction from the government regardless of who's in charge. Changing the bus driver does not change the route.
Thing is Matt that’s probably not the case, Sunak will likely be one of the two names on the ballot that goes to the conservative membership. The membership tends to be very passionate and is mostly filled with Brexit supporting, low tax, right wing tories. This means that if a more right wing candidate gets on the ballot they will almost certainly win.
Alsty
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The Conservative party will be aware of that though, and if the MPs don't want that they are likely to try and vote them out in the earlier stages. It depends what vision they have for the party and (I guess, most crucially) who they think will win a general election.
Yes that’s true, I wonder if any of them are good enough to win a general election, they’ve got loads of candidates there but I don’t think many of them are very well liked amongst the public, Boris had a charm that people liked non of them are going to be able to match.
I think this is true of Boris Johnson in 2019, but probably something he himself would have struggled with had he made it to 2024. We were already seeing heartland seats like Amersham and Tiverton where support was ebbing away, and it's likely any of the leadership hopefuls will be able to stop that flow away to the Lib Dems.
The real question is, which of these candidates is going to maintain the votes captured in Workington, Harlepool, Ashfield etc - i.e. the red wall.
As things stand, we are still heading towards a hung parliament I think.
Jonathan
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I think a hung parliament with Labour as the largest party seems most likely, though it's worth noting that some polls give Labour a 15-point lead as it stands. What will happen when the Tories confirm their new leader may well narrow the gap, but we shall see.
They'll narrow to start off with but that's natural. But I think it will probably widen again depending how Starmer deals with the new PM.
Matt.GC
TS Member
I'm rooting for an end to 12 years of disastrous Tory government. Your question is a bit like choosing between a kick in the balls or a poke in the eye.
I think your prediction is a little bit too early as well. History tells us that Tory leadership races are very unpredictable so it's a little early to be making the statement "Rishi Sunak will almost definitely win". In fact, Penny Mordaunt is the clear favourite at present for a number of reasons and it's where my money would be going if I was a betting man.
If your question is who would I least dislike personally from a competence as PM point of view, I'd go for Penny or Tom Togandhat. In terms of who would Labour have the hardest time defeating, I think it's probably between Penny (again), Rishi and Liz Truss (a remainer who seems to somehow have positioned herself as someone friendly to Brexiteers). If it was a case of who could do the least damage but Labour could defeat (which I would ultimately want) then it could be Rishi if his scandals continue to haunt him.
But I could never "root" for a Tory PM. I don't want any of them. I think it's hard to defend 12 years of economic stagnation, decline of public services and general incompetence. The country is in the worst state I've ever known it and this current administration has also given us the 2 worst Prime Minister's in my lifetime with the extremely incompetent David Cameron and Bungling Criminal Boris Johnson.
The worst prime minister of my lifetime remains Thatcher.
All the division of the last thirty years comes back down to her "Greed is good" mantra, and stuff the poor, business is good mentality.
Cameron and Johnson are Eton crooks, but what they have done to divide society is nothing compared to the witch.
All the division of the last thirty years comes back down to her "Greed is good" mantra, and stuff the poor, business is good mentality.
Cameron and Johnson are Eton crooks, but what they have done to divide society is nothing compared to the witch.
Matt N
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Interesting. Sunak is getting the most votes from MPs at the moment, but it does appear I might have predicted his victory a little prematurely. I read a news article yesterday that suggested he is far less popular among Tory members than he is among MPs; a poll of Tory members suggested that both Penny Mordaunt and Liz Truss would likely beat him if he was up against either of them in the final stage. The bookmakers seem to be placing the highest odds on either him or Mordaunt dependent on what bookies you go to.
Also, I’ve noticed that many of the candidates, particularly Rishi Sunak, seem to absolutely idolise Margaret Thatcher, and I know Sunak has pledged to “run the economy like Thatcher”. Why is this? I thought Thatcher was one of our most hated previous PMs?
jon81uk
TS Member
She was mainly hated by non-tories due to the issues with unions and similar.
Despite her appearing to come from a working-class background she very much support the "greed is good" tory style.
Matt.GC
TS Member
I suppose I was coming from the angle of competence. I 100% agree with you that she was the most wicked of the lot. If I'm talking about the least compassionate and cruel, then Thatcher definitely gets the gold medal from me. Despicable woman.
Cameron was a toff who handed over a colossal legal decision to the British public - and then completely failed to plan for one of the outcomes, opting instead to simply run away. A shocking dereliction of duty as Prime Minister. As for Boris, it's hard to come up with something he actually did well. He seems to be praised for a number of things such as Brexit and his response to Covid but the NI protocol, terrible state of the economy and thousands of Covid bodies piled high suggests otherwise.
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Matt N
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Interesting you should say this. From what I can gather, people praising him for Brexit are praising him for the fact he actually got us out of the EU rather than being overly bothered about the specifics, which he did do, in fairness.
For instance, my grandad was over our house talking about it the other day, and he said he didn’t get the hate for the current government. He’s a very ardent Leave supporter, and he was talking about how they “got all the big calls right”. One of the things he said, along with praising the government’s pandemic response, was that they “got Brexit done”. This leads me to believe that he wasn’t overly bothered about the specifics, but was more happy that Brexit had finally been achieved. I know his view of Boris Johnson as a person is very low indeed (during canvassing for the last election, he had a doorstep rant with Mark Harper, our local MP, where he declared “I’m not voting Tory while that lying g*t Boris is in No 10!”), but as a Leave supporter, he does seem overall satisfied with the government’s approach to policy.
Matt.GC
TS Member
He didn't get Brexit done though did he? He did little more than sit in number 10 and wait out the transition period. The Number 10 cat could've done that. But I know you've expressed before that your grandad voted leave based on a falsehood about population so I suppose he'd probably not be convinced if he was challenged with this point (I mean no disrespect to your family by the way Matt, I know you've been very honest in sharing this with us).
I've asked many people why they seem to parrot the Tory line "he got the big calls right" and no one seems to be able to mention a single TRUTHFUL one, let alone "all".
Brexit? He didn't really do anything other than walk out the room without a deal and let the civil service try and clear up the mess.
Covid Response? Sending infected people back to care homes without testing them was scandalous. Pursuing a strategy of herd immunity (fingers in ears basically) before locking down too hard too late cost thousands of lives and unnecessary economic damage. The UK had a terrible death toll and unless I'm very much mistaken, I thought it was scientists who created the vaccines and the NHS who rolled them out? Maybe Boris came up with the chemical formula in the end and I've missed this? Maybe the NHS wasn't going to bother rolling them out just for a laugh until he intervened?
Again, I don't know if I'm looking at the wrong figures but I thought we currently have inflation running around 10%, higher taxes than we've had in years, economic stagnation with the UK projected to have the lowest growth out of all the G20 next year, spiraling national debt with the biggest budget deficit since the second war world, rising poverty, gas trebling in price, fuel at near £2 per litre, gridlocked passport offices, gridlocked airports, national rail strikes, ambulances averagely taking 50+ mins to arrive to someone suffering a heart attack and now a current government that's barely even functioning. And this is all before we look at the scandals and criminality!
So please can someone enlighten me on all the big calls he got right? Please.
Matt N
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Isn’t a lot of this down to the worldwide geopolitical situation? I know that the UK is having lower growth than other G20 countries, but isn’t a lot of this down to the approach the UK took to dealing with COVID, and the rest of it is caused by COVID, Ukraine etc?
I could be wrong there, though; that was just my thought.