There was a feeling of drift as the election campaign moved into its fourth week. As if everyone had already said everything they had planned to say and couldn’t quite understand why the election day was still two weeks away. All that was left for the parties was to pray that no one screwed up. Some hope.
The biggest news came from Reform and the SNP, who launched their manifestos a week later than everyone else. Reform held its launch in Merthyr Tydfil, where Nigel Farage appeared to nominate Richard Tice as his shadow chancellor by allowing him to explain the party’s financial costings. Safe to say that numbers aren’t Dicky’s strong point, though, come to think of it, we have yet to learn of anything that Dicky does well apart from making the most of his sunbed. Reform’s promises made Liz Truss look almost sane. Almost.
The SNP launched its manifesto in an anonymous industrial estate near Edinburgh airport. No one quite knew why that location had been chosen. Perhaps it was cheap. Independence was front and centre of John Swinney’s offer. It went like this: if the SNP won more than half of the 57 Scottish seats in Westminster up for grabs then it had a mandate for independence, and if it didn’t then it still had a mandate because it won the most seats in Holyrood in 2021. Win-win. The party also took the unusual path of not presenting any costings for its policies. That was up to whichever party ended up in government. Bold.
Disappearing act of the week
Since launching his manifesto at Silverstone on Tuesday last week, Rishi Sunak has done precisely zero campaign events to which all lobby journalists are invited. Instead, he’s resorted to doing secretive whistlestop tours of what used to be safe Tory seats accompanied by just one TV camera into which he could record a daily 90-second hostage video. One day he visited a farm in Devon and even the sheep gave him the cold shoulder. A new low. Then, maybe it’s not even Rishi at all. Perhaps instead it’s an avatar with fairly basic AI and Sunak has already decamped to California. This would explain a lot. Because it’s hard to believe that a real human could be this consistently bad at being prime minister. By the law of averages you’d expect Rishi to have the odd day when he was slightly less hapless. But so far he’s just got worse and worse. Almost as if all the AI has learned is how to be rubbish.
Hero of the week
It’s tempting to give this award to Ed Davey yet again. He’s the one party leader who knows how to do human and gives the impression that he lives in a world that resembles the rest of ours. Though worryingly I can’t remember him having done any idiotic stunts this week. Which could just be because everyone is now immune to them and the photographers have stopped recording them. But as a change, this week’s award goes to the taxi driver who took me back from Reform’s launch in Merthyr Tydfil to the train station in Cardiff.
The launch itself took place on the rundown Gurnos estate on the edge of the town, where the community hall was in need of urgent rendering and the ceiling tiles were peeling and stained with nicotine and no one had taken a mower to the lawns. The driver professed himself amazed to have got a job that involved a pickup from the Gurnos. Though less so by the police presence. “What the fuck are you doing here?” were his first words, and for the next half-hour he gave us a delightful potted history of the area. That journey has been the highlight of my travels so far.
Debate of the week
The law of diminishing returns has long since kicked in. Back in 2010 the debates were a novelty. For a start, there were only three and there was the feeling that you might actually learn something new about the party leaders. Now it feels like we are getting three a week and you can sense the public has had enough of them. Especially with the Euros being broadcast on the other channels.
I can only imagine that the reason they have proliferated is that it makes the broadcasters feel good about themselves, as if they are playing an important role in shaping the political conversation. When all that really happens is that the same politicians get asked the same questions by different audiences and give the same non-answers.
That said, Thursday’s BBC Question Time debate was notable for the prime minister looking as if he was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Rishi is famously tetchy at the best of times – he hates being challenged – but this time he looked positively furious from the word go. He was a hair’s breadth away from punching someone. It wasn’t a great look. Fair to say that the audience hated him as much as he hated them.
The Hiroo Onoda award
Hiroo Onoda was the Japanese soldier who was unaware that the second world war had ended and only surrendered himself 29 years later. So, step forward Mel Stride, the work and pensions secretary, who is the last person to realise that the Tories are toast.
It’s usual for the government to put up a different cabinet minister every day to take on the morning radio and television shows. To try to explain why losing is the new winning. Only now the Tories can’t find anyone who is prepared to do this. Time was when you couldn’t get Jeremy Hunt, James Cleverly and the rest of the crew off the media, but now you don’t see them for dust. They have joined Rishi in disowning the chaos they have caused.
All apart from Mel, that is. Mel is the Anthem for Doomed Middle-Age. A man happy to go over the top for the Tory cause time and time again because no one has told him the game is up. You can now almost guarantee that he will be the voice of the Tory party for at least three days every week. GB News should sign him up and give him his own show.
Wake of the week
While Rishi Sunak was dying on his feet during the Question Time debate, the great and the good – along with the filthy rich – of the Tory party were at the Hurlingham Club in south-west London for a gala fundraising dinner. A table at the bash would have set you back a staggering £12,000. That’s a lot of money to fork out for a tired chicken supreme.
The main highlight was the auction where people with more dosh than sense could bid for exciting nights out with the male strippers of Magic Mike. Or, failing that, Michael Gove and James Forsyth. Most people would pay not to have to do that. Or maybe you would just like some down time with David Cameron. Perhaps to ask him how he thinks it’s all gone since he was prime minister and whether he holds himself to blame. Probably not as Lord Big Dave doesn’t do self-reflection. Later in the evening a few people danced at their own funeral before skipping off home. Not a great look. Partying while the UK burned.
The do as I say not as I do award
Who else but Michael Gove? This week, Mikey has been busy sounding off that he thinks the Tories can still win the election, that Sunak is a brilliant leader and that pigs might fly. Only, let’s think this one through. Which Tory cabinet minister announced he would be standing down at this election as he was in danger of losing his seat to the Lib Dems and wanted to deprive the nation of a Michael Portillo moment. Let me think. Oh, yes, that would be Gove. So confident of a Tory victory that he ran for the hills. Still, you can’t say he doesn’t stay on brand.
Bet of the week
So many to choose from. It’s probably easier to try to find someone in No 10 who isn’t being investigated over bets on a July election. Not only has Craig Williams, Sunak’s private parliamentary secretary, been found placing suspicious bets but now the prime minister’s campaign director, Tony Lee, and his wife, Laura Saunders, the Tory candidate for Bristol North West, are under investigation by the Gambling Commission.
Let’s face it, bets are about the only thing the Tories are likely to win at this election. But it doesn’t look great for a prime minister who promised to govern with integrity, accountability and professionalism to lead a party facing such a probe. There again, when Sunak says “can you afford to gamble on Labour?”, we should probably take him at his word.
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