Doing what he does best and avoiding his responsibilities, Rishi Sunak managed to be busy on the day of a double by-election contesting two Tory safe seats yesterday. Perhaps he saw the writing on the wall, but the reality is still a shock. Labour managed to achieve the single greatest turnover of a majority in a by-election since 1945 in Mid Bedfordshire, previously held by Nadine ‘Dosser’ Dorries, while in Tamworth a similarly impressive 20,000 vote majority was overturned. The bad news continues for the Tories. I doubt any Tory MP will be particularly confident about keeping their job in next year’s election.
One particularly striking thing with these two results was the collapse in turnout. In Tamworth, turnout was just 35%, nearly half that of the 2019 general election. By-elections generally do see lower numbers of voters hitting the polls as people see their vote is perhaps not that consequential to the wider national picture. But I think this is indicative of a deeper issue and we will see this throughout the country come GE 2024. Rather than vote for another party, staunch Tories will instead elect to stay at home, living the mantra of not my circus, not my monkeys.
With the Prime Minister conveniently out of the country and the rest of the Cabinet seemingly too busy to make an appearance, the Tory Party Chairman made the media rounds this morning. Predictably Greg Hands, the man whose comedic ability rivals that of a tax advisor at a funeral wake, said this result was not necessarily a depiction of Tory failings or Labour’s strength. Apparently people in their droves were telling canvassers on the doorstep in Tamworth and Mid Bedfordshire that Labour and Kier Starmer are not what they want. Unfortunately for Mr Hands, they clearly don’t want the Tories either. Come on Greg, it’s time to think up a strategy a little more comprehensive than just misrepresenting ironic jokes from 13 years ago on social media.
But let’s be honest here, Greg has a tough job on his hands, if you will pardon the pun. The Tories have been in power for thirteen years, in which time we’ve seen inflation adjusted wages stay below their peak in 2008 , we’re dealing with a seemingly unsolvable housing crisis , public infrastructure is crumbling around us , our rivers and beaches are flooded with sewage , the NHS backlog is nearing 8 million people , the asylum backlog is topping 150,000, and the failing justice system means cases are not seeing court until up to four years after the crime. That’s a long list. And I could go on.
But what does Greg have to work with? Well unfortunately for him, Rishi Sunak. Rishi, the man whose grand plan include mandatory maths lessons until 18 but no funding for extra teachers , ideological climate extremism , cancelling infrastructure projects , and sloppy anti-trans dogwhistles . A hard sell, if I’m honest.
People want their lives to improve, or at the very least, not get worse. It’s hard to argue the nation has moved anywhere but backwards under the stewardship of the Tories and it seems the electorate are finally seeing it. These problems take time to manifest themselves. Initially, austerity hit the worst off the hardest, but more than a decade of underinvestment in the country is now rearing its head and becoming more evident by the day, impacting a wider selection of society and voters across the spectrum. Rishi doesn’t give the public the confidence that he will change things. Time and time again, his media appearances seem to expose the fact he is actually just a poorly implemented ChatGPT bot, unable to independently think of something that’s not written on his briefing notes.
It’s clear the Tories are in a death-spiral. It happens periodically with parties in the UK. Remember Labour’s ’longest suicide note in history’ in the Thatcher years, or the sleaze and infighting in the Tory Party before 1997? It’s the natural ebb and flow of a dominant two-party system and first past the post. The wheels are falling off the Rishi Wagon and there’s no one to pick up the pieces and reunite the party now. The saving grace is that Rishi will not have the ability to pass anything overly ambitious or groundbreaking through parliament, he was the party’s second choice and still doesn’t command full support, and it seems their majority is dwindling by the day. It’s very much Rishi’s lame duck era.
He knows he won’t be in the job for much longer despite the claims from himself and his cabinet that they’re in this for the long haul. You have to feel sorry for them, why not end the pain now? Voters may not be entirely won over by Kier Starmer’s rebranded Labour Party, but whether through abstention, or holding their nose and voting for ’the other side’, I see the Tory vote collapsing at the next election. People will be hoping their lives will improve and it’s clear the Tories can’t or won’t deliver that. If putting their trust in the Labour Party doesn’t deliver the changes they’re looking for, there could be some serious implications for politics in the UK in the years to come.