British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak addresses the House of Commons in London on May 10, 2023. JESSICA TAYLOR/UK PARLIAMENT VIA AP
After a long period of festivities beginning with the coronation of King Charles III. and the subsequent holding of the Eurovision Song Contest in Liverpool, UK politics has come back into focus and with it the nervousness within the Conservative Party.
Elected officials took note of the disastrous result of the May 4 local elections in which the Tories lost more than 1,000 local councils to Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens. Pressure is mounting for Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to change gears to avoid a crushing defeat in the next general election in 2024.
In recent days, the Prime Minister has come under attack from the party’s right wing for his frustration with a leader who, despite voting to leave the European Union (EU) in 2016, was deemed not conservative enough or not Brexit enough Referendum. On Saturday May 13, a few hundred Tory activists gathered in Bournemouth, a seaside resort in southern England, at the call of the Conservative Democratic Organisation, a supporter’s club of Boris Johnson. The latter was absent, but his supporters continued to talk about him and regretted his departure in the summer of 2022, when a spate of scandals had pushed the former prime minister out of office.
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They also called for “truly” conservative policies and tax cuts, as Rishi Sunak refused to back down from an early 2023 corporate tax hike to stabilize public finances, rocked by Liz’s disastrous tenure. Truss, who had briefly replaced Mr Johnson in the autumn of 2022.
The most direct attack came from Priti Patel, Boris Johnson’s former home secretary, who accused Rishi Sunak of merely managing “the decline” of the Conservative Party and suggested he spend more time with Tory activists “to get more outreach.” to have the people and … “our conservative values”.
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Boris Johnson poses no immediate threat to Rishi Sunak: his political career depends on the conclusions of the Parliamentary Inquiry into ‘Partygate’ – parties in Downing Street during the Covid-19 pandemic – which could be returned in June. The Commission must determine whether the former Prime Minister lied to MPs about the existence of these public holidays. However, the fact that his constituency is excited is raising concerns for Downing Street, which is looking to close the long chaotic bracket of the Johnson and Truss era for good.
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