Labour swept the mayoral elections except for Tees Valley where Ben Houchen won (despite some spectacular allegations of corruption that may come back to bite him) by distancing himself from Sunak and the Conservative Party, even “forgetting” to wear his blue rosette on the day. And Houchen still got hit with a nearly 17% swing to Labour, putting a dent in his previous considerable majority.
I’m surprised the turnover of police and crime commissioners from a nearly-all blue wall to ten of them switching from Con to Lab isn’t getting more coverage.
Too late to add: I can’t find a link to the clip (it was on Xitter) but Andrea Leadsom was on Politics Live the other day having a rant about how if all the factions of the Conservative Party just came together they would be able to weather the current threatened annihilation at the General Election. But let me just describe the level of self-delusion involved by saying that I half expected her to order Steiner’s Panzer units to go leaflet the West Midlands.
I suspect it’s because not many care who their PCC is. In my constituency (where the only election was for the PCC), turnout was a dismal 18%. For the first time in my life I deliberately spoiled my ballot paper - I wrote that I didn’t think national politics should come in to local policing and I would have considered voting for an independent candidate had that been an option. Yes I know it will make virtually no difference, but nor does a single vote.
Another week and another rat leaves the ship. Natalie Elphicke has crossed the floor to Labour. She’s another MP that is standing down at the next election, so has little to lose. But with her past stated beliefs and support for her ex-husband, Labour isn’t her obvious political home. Lots of upset people on both sides of the House.
Wondering why she’s even bothering. Things in the Conservative Party must be really toxic for her to take this action, the only obvious benefit of which is to embarrass Sunak and the Government.
It’s mostly a symbolic gesture, but it will rattle Rishi. Losing a centrist to Labour is understandable, but a member of the ERG jumping ship has got to sting.
What’s the Tory majority at, currently? I know when BoJo won, we endlessly heard about their “eighty-seat majority” but I’ve lost track of how many MPs have stepped down or defected. What’s the margin now, pre-election?
Wow…more than halved. Impressive performance. With the U.S. Congress, I know the GOP has gone from “razor thin” to “no, really, razors aren’t even a good enough metaphor any more” but they’re still hanging on. I doubt 39 Tories will jump ship in the next five months, though honestly, nothing would surprise me at this point.
Each MP that loses the Tory whip counts as double when it comes to a majority though. The Tory total goes down by one and the total for the rest goes up by one. So it would only take 20 defecting or being suspended for Rishi to end up leading a minority government. The same thing happened in the final days of the Major government.
Apparently there’s no suggestion of any particular job for her other than advising on housing policy, which was her field as a lawyer. But it does all look very odd.
Looks like Sunak has finally decided that the shit sandwich is big enough: at the beginning of the day we learned that an “attend on pain of death” cabinet had been called for 4.15pm today. Then journos were cued up to expect an announcement from the PM at 5 o’clock.
Lots of fevered speculation and anticipation, mostly fuelled by nothing more than the foregoing. Total lockdown on press interaction. But now we have got all but confirmation from senior lobby correspondents that they have multiple sources telling us that an election will be called at 5pm.
It’ll be on the 4th of July, and yes, we’re all thinking it.