UK Tories powerless to escape Rishi Sunak’s death march

LONDON — Penned in. That’s how U.K. Conservatives feel as they march inexorably towards what opinion polls, election forecasters and even most of the party’s own MPs agree is likely electoral annihilation.

Having survived one of the most dangerous weeks of his political life, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak appears to have seen off any potential leadership challenges and won a clear run to the general election expected this fall.

But with apparently no aces left to play, few of his MPs believe he can turn their dire fortunes around even as they agree they are stuck with him.

In recent days, Sunak survived his moment of greatest jeopardy, after a series of elections proved disastrous for the Tories — but not quite dire enough to give a green light to would-be challengers.

The Conservatives took a battering at local elections around the country on May 2, losing just short of half the 1,000 council seats they were defending, as well as a by-election in a parliamentary seat they gained in 2019 and all but one of 11 mayoral contests. 

Hanging on to the Tory mayor in Tees Valley and second place in Blackpool South saved Sunak from open insurrection, with even arch-critic Suella Braverman saying that “changing leader now won’t work.”

Now Tory MPs find themselves locked in a death embrace with their leader: they know he’s leading them to defeat, but believe it’s too late to change course.

Despite the drubbing, Sunak immediately signaled he would not switch things up, telling broadcasters in the wake of the results: “I am determined more than ever to show the public that what we’re doing is making a difference.” 

He is now expected to focus on core Tory concerns: his economic promises, pursuing his controversial Rwanda immigration policy, pledging to lift defense spending and a welfare clampdown.

More than bookkeepers

While most of his troops applaud these causes in principle, several told POLITICO they want Sunak to show he has something else to offer — an extra spark — but fear he’ll come up empty-handed. 

The PM has always managed to transmit a deeply sensible “vibe,” making this a large aspect of his pitch to lead in the wake of his two chaotic predecessors, Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.

With the party bruised from the local elections and tanking in the national polls, the Tory MPs marching under his banner are hungry for more than a steady hand on the tiller. 

One moderate Conservative, granted anonymity to speak frankly, urged the prime minister to use the time between now and the election to “create a vision of what a Sunak Conservative government will deliver” because “we need to be more than just good bookkeepers.”

A second MP, also from the moderate wing of the party, said: “All I want is for Rishi to stand up and tell me why he’s in politics. And apparently he doesn’t want to — it’s bizarre.”

The second moderate MP quoted above said that what mattered was not so much policy substance as the need for Sunak to “stop acting like he’s paralyzed and do stuff” as “this is how people remember you’re in government.”

Fighting to win

​​As ever, various competing wings of the party have a different prescription. 

Nadine Dorries, former Cabinet minister and outspoken critic of Sunak from the right, told POLITICO’s Westminster Insider podcast that he needed to “take a step back” and get “big hitters” such as former prime ministers Boris Johnson and David Cameron, who is currently serving as Sunak’s foreign secretary, “up front and center, firing the bullets at Labour.”

A senior MP on the right echoed calls from Braverman and her allies in calling on Sunak to carry out a reshuffle in order to rebalance a Cabinet which they described as “presently center-left and in some respects remarkably weak.”

Notably, none thought it would be plausible to get rid of Sunak this close to an election.

This sentiment was epitomized by a spokesperson for the Conservative Britain Alliance, a shadowy anti-Sunak movement, which announced at lunchtime the day of local election results: “We’re off to the pub,” suggesting that drowning their sorrows would be more worthwhile than plotting in response to the election rout.

Even those urging bold action or displays of passion from the PM seem to know deep down that none will come.

A series of potential moments to shift the dial — including some genuine surprises, such as Cameron’s re-entry at the top of government and Chancellor Jeremy Hunt trumpeting an ambition to abolish national insurance payments — have all come and gone without altering the polls. 

Sunak’s allies seek to portray his determination to stick doggedly to his plan in the face of noise on the back benches as a virtue. 

Harriett Baldwin, Conservative MP and chair of the Treasury select committee, told POLITICO it was time to “stop all this overhyped media speculation, unite behind the prime minister, and continue to deliver.”

William Hague, former Conservative leader and mentor to Sunak, called on the PM to resist kneejerk populist fixes and focus on building a vision for the longer-term future. 

High on No. 10’s list of priorities for that vision are Sunak’s plan to phase out smoking by making it illegal for those born after 2009 to buy cigarettes and his bid to make the U.K. a leader in AI regulation, both widely seen as potential “legacy” issues for his administration. 

A senior Conservative adviser disputed use of the word “legacy,” and its connotations of a career coming to an end, however, insisting that “the attitude of Rishi and his team is of course we’re fighting to win.”

The trouble is, many of his troops now believe that if they do manage to keep their seats at the election, it will be despite, and not because of, his leadership.

Aggie Chambre contributed reporting.