Category Archives: tory leadership race

Most Brits Do Not Care Who The Next Tory Leader Is, Brutal New Poll Finds

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Most Brits do not actually care who the next Conservative leader is, according to a new poll.

In yet another humiliating twist for the Tories – just a month after their worst ever electoral defeat, Ipsos UK has found 62% of Brits surveyed were not interested in following who would replace Rishi Sunak.

To make matters worse, that includes 36% of Conservative voters.

The pollsters found none of the candidates are very well known among the British public, despite all of them holding ministerial roles at some point.

Just 45% of the 1,091 adults surveyed said they know a great deal or a fair amount about former home secretary Priti Patel, followed by 26% for shadow home secretary James Cleverly, and 24% for shadow housing secretary Kemi Badenoch.

The polling, which took place between August 2 and 5, also found 34% of the public said they do not favour any of the current candidates.

There was a narrow preference for Cleverly among those surveyed, with 18% suggesting he would do a good job, followed by Patel (17%) and shadow security minister Tom Tugendhat (17%).

Badenoch is slightly behind on 14%, putting her on par with former migration minister Robert Jenrick.

Meanwhile, 9% thought shadow pensions secretary Mel Stride would do a good job leading the opposition – which, unfortunately, is the same percentage of respondents who backed a candidate called “Stuart Lewis”, a fake politician added to the poll by Ipsos.

But, it’s not all doom and gloom for Stride.

While a whopping 44% of respondents said they thought Patel would do a bad job, (and 22% thought the same of Badenoch, 20% of Cleverly, 15% of Jenrick, 11% of Tugendhat), just 9% said thought Stride would also perform poorly.

Trinh Tu, UK managing director, public affairs, said: “This new poll suggests high level of public apathy about the Conservative leadership race.”

She added that Patel seems to be most divisive figure at the moment, but for the most part, “Britons are unfamiliar with the main candidates and say they do not care very much about who will emerge at the winner”.

Meanwhile, 65% said a backing from ex-PM Liz Truss would give that candidate the worst chance of winning.

Far fewer (46%) said Reform leader and MP Nigel Farage would have a negative effect on a candidate’s hopes of victory, and 44% said the same for ex-PM Boris Johnson.

Only former PM and Rishi Sunak’s foreign secretary David Cameron was seen as the one who could have a positive impact overall – 31% said it would worsen a candidate’s chances with an endorsement, compared to 32% who said it would improve.

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Rishi Sunak’s Latest Plan To Punish Those Who ‘Vilify’ UK Is Being Completely Torn Apart

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Rishi Sunak has unveiled another new policy as part of his bid to become the next prime minister, but it has almost definitely backfired already.

The former chancellor, who has fallen behind his rival Liz Truss in the polls, says he intends to widen the definition of extremism to include those who “vilify” the UK.

These people, including those who have an “extreme hatred of Britain” will then be referred to the government’s de-radicalisation Prevent programme, according to Sunak, although this is a voluntary scheme.

This could include law-abiding citizens who criticise Britain, but Sunak’s campaign claim it would not include government criticism and was not legally binding.

He said these proposals would “refocus” Prevent on Islamic extremism, rather than right-wing militants, claiming: “We must never let those who seek to undermine and destroy our way of life to succeed.”

Sources also told The Telegraph that Sunak believed extremists wanted to attack the UK’s existence, not just its values.

Sunak said: “There is no more important duty for a prime minister than keeping our country and our people safe. Whether redoubling our efforts to tackle Islamist extremism or rooting out those who are vocal in their hatred of our country, I will do whatever it takes to fulfil that duty.

“Britain is a beacon of freedom, tolerance and diversity.”

Unfortunately, not everyone seemed to agree that this new policy echoed that.

Some people thought it was indicative of how the campaign was actually going for him – he is 34 points behind Truss according to the latest YouGov poll of Tory Party members.

Others pointed out that the policy announcement overlooked some key elements of the Prevent programme itself:

Then there were the people who just feared the idea altogether.

And it wasn’t long until the jokes started to get out of hand…

Truss’ camp also criticised the announcement for being “thin”, adding: “Mostly it’s a restatement of government policy. The few new proposals are superficial and unfunded with a risk of letting serious terrorists slip through the net by creating arbitrary targets.”

It comes the day after Truss’ huge U-turn on her proposed policy to cut public sector pay for workers outside of London. She has since claimed that her campaign was “misrepresented” when she said that.

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Theresa May Stages Silent Protest Against Boris Johnson As He Leaves His Final PMQs

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Theresa May suggested there was no love lost between her and Boris Johnson on Wednesday when she refused to clap him while he left the Commons.

While almost every Tory MP stood, clapped and cheered as Johnson left the despatch box for his final time as PM, one among them stood out.

Footage from ITV’s Shehab Khan showed that May stayed sitting, even looking the other way as Johnson departed.

After a few seconds, she did stand, and stared after Johnson. Once the benches around her started whistling, she folded her arms and looked on after the prime minister.

May was actually forced out of Downing Street by her own party, much like Johnson, but the two have come to blows in the past.

She appointed him as her foreign secretary back in 2018, although they clashed over Brexit as Johnson repeatedly tried to make her take a more hardline approach with the EU.

May wasn’t the only person who held back from applauding Johnson upon his exit – Labour refused to clap at all.

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