Rishi Sunak, the former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, addressed the nation for the last time as he left 10 Downing Street. It was a bittersweet moment for Sunak and his wife, who are known to be wealthier than the King. As he prepares to leave his position, Sunak’s phone bill will surely be enormous, as he spent last weekend calling the 175 former Tory MPs who lost their seats in the recent election.
According to a close ally of Sunak, he felt a personal responsibility towards those who lost their seats. These individuals had dedicated their lives to public service and Sunak wanted to make sure they were supported during this difficult time. In his first appearance in the House of Commons as the leader of the opposition, Sunak expressed his remorse for his party’s worst ever election result.
“To those who are no longer sitting behind me, I am sorry,” Sunak said. “We have lost too many diligent, community-spirited representatives whose wisdom and expertise will be missed in the debates and discussions ahead.”
However, Sunak’s words of regret have not been well received by many in the party. They hold him responsible for the disastrous result that saw Keir Starmer’s Labour Party secure a 174-seat landslide majority on July 4th. Some of Sunak’s most vocal critics attended the Popular Conservatism conference in Westminster earlier this week, where they discussed what went wrong for their party.
“It was a terrible result,” said former Tory MEP David Campbell-Bannerman. “I call it a ‘Conservative Chernobyl’, a kind of meltdown for the Conservatives.”
Criticism of Sunak is not limited to the Tory right. A former cabinet minister from the party’s moderate wing believes that Sunak’s decision to call a summer election was a mistake.
“The best time to have it would have been to coincide with the local elections in May,” the MP said. “Tying it in with that campaign would have given us a better chance of saving more MPs and councillors. Calling it when he did made no sense.”
Some Conservatives believe that Sunak would have been better off waiting until the end of the year to call for an election, giving voters more time to feel the benefits of the improving economic situation. However, a Sunak advisor explained that the decision to call for an election in July was based on data that showed a growing number of people struggling with their finances due to rising interest rates.
“All the data we were seeing showed that hundreds of thousands of people were coming off their fixed rate mortgages every month and suddenly seeing their bills go up by hundreds of pounds because interest rates are much higher than they were,” the advisor said. “Even if the Bank of England knocked half a per cent off the base rate, it would have made no difference to them. The longer we waited, more people were becoming poorer and inevitably blaming the government. That’s why he decided to go for July.”
The Tory Party is now in a state of limbo, with no clear leader in sight. It may take until the end of the year for a new leader to be chosen, as the party reflects on what went wrong in the recent election. Sunak has stated that he will stay on until the mechanism for choosing his successor is decided, which may mean an interim leader will have to be appointed to lead the party until a permanent one is elected. However, some believe that Sunak owes it to his party to stay on until his replacement is chosen.
“After leading us to our worst defeat ever, the least he can do is stay on as leader for a few more months to help steady the ship,” said one MP. “All he would really need to do is ask six questions a week at PMQs. Surely that’s not too much to ask.”
At a meeting of the party’s 1922 Committee of Tory backbenchers, Sunak urged his remaining MPs to unite and hold the new Labour government accountable. The meeting was reportedly harmonious, with no one taking the opportunity to criticize Sunak to his face for the disastrous election campaign he ran. However, outside the room, party grandee Sir Edward Leigh, who is now the longest-serving male MP in the House of Commons, was clear about the direction he believes the party should take.
“We have to be a proper Conservative Party,” Leigh said. “We have to stand for something, otherwise we’re going nowhere. Because all these people who voted
