October 25th 2022.
The situation in the UK makes me more incredulous by the day. Rishi Sunak was crowned leader of the Conservative party by the MPs. This was caused by there being no other candidate left standing at the deadline of 2 pm on Monday 24th October.
According to the new rules introduced by the 1922 committee, this did not need to go to the membership of the Conservative party for ratification. If there were two candidates left standing at 2 pm then it would have gone to a vote of the membership. As it is, the MPs managed to avoid this and keep the confirmation of Rishi Sunak to themselves. If it had gone to the membership, then Sunak would probably have lost, whoever the other candidate was, as he is not well-liked amongst the rank and file membership.
He lost respect and political capital when he was involved in the engineering of the removal of Boris Johnson. What upset the membership was not the fact that Sunak was involved, but that it was done in a very unconservative manner. Instead of knifing Johnson in the back, Sunak knifed Johnson front on!!
Talking of Johnson, he came storming in from the West, full of wind and bluster, claiming that he had the numbers (minimum 100) to meet the threshold for taking part in the vote. In typical fashion, he kept claiming he had the numbers until the last minute, when “to preserve party unity” he magnanimously withdrew. This whole episode was typical of his career.
Fast forward to today and Sunak presented himself to King Charles and was confirmed as Prime Minister. He then set about building a new cabinet.
He has tried to be inclusive and attempted to see the many factions represented in the cabinet. One exception was Penny Mordant who remained as leader of the house. She could have expected a more senior position.
After Prime Minister’s Question time today, Sunak and his Chancellor, Jeremy Hunt (whom he retained) announced that the financial statement would be deferred for two weeks. This makes sense, as it gives Sunak and the new team time to review the situation so that they will be able to present a fact-based offering to the public and the markets.
The markets seem to have settled down with most of the anticipated reactions already priced into their positions.
The one position to give Sunak issues was that of Defence Secretary. Ben Wallace, who has done an exceptional job regarding Ukraine, had already been promised an uplift in defence spending from 2% of GDP to 3% of GDP under both Johnson and Truss. Sunak, who is looking for budget cuts in all departments met with strenuous push back from Wallace who appears to have won this battle on the grounds of national security. Wallace is unusual in that he didn’t go to Eton or Oxford. He went to Sandhurst, completed officer training and eventually served as a captain in the army. He is perhaps more grounded than other cabinet members from the Eton/Oxbridge bubble and is an invaluable member of the cabinet.
Things seem to be settling down, but the country is in a financial and economic mess. If Sunak can stabilise the economy then he may have a chance of rescuing the Conservatives in the eyes of the public. The next hurdle will be the Bank of England, which meet tomorrow, and the rumours are that the base rate will rise by 1%.
Readers of my letters may have noticed my references to the UK as being like Alice in Wonderland. Well, here are a few quotes from Alice in Wonderland and Alice Through the Looking Glass.
• The Queen said, ” The rule is, jam tomorrow and jam yesterday but never jam today. “
• Alice laughed. “There’s no use trying,” she said: “one can’t believe impossible things.”
“I daresay you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half-an-hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
• “When I use a word,’ Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, ‘it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.”
• “It’s too late to correct it,” said the Red Queen: “when you’ve once said a thing, that fixes it, and you must take the consequences.”
• “When I used to read fairy tales, I fancied that kind of thing never happened, and now here I am in the middle of one!”
• “Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?”
“That depends a good deal on where you want to get to,” said the Cat.
“I don’t much care where—” said Alice.
“Then it doesn’t matter which way you go,” said the Cat.
“—so long as I get somewhere,” Alice added as an explanation.
• “Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “you’d generally get to somewhere else—if you ran very fast for a long time, as we’ve been doing.” “A slow sort of country!” said the Queen, “Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!”
This all seems to apply 100+ years later, the satire is as sharp today as it was then.