All the news today is about the election results. Who are the winners? Who are the losers? Well I’ll tell you who the biggest losers are - us. The public. The voters.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has got the kind of kicking normally reserved for a drunk man who starts on a nightclub bouncer.
I think it’s fair to say the general impression of Mr Sunak is uninspiring, untrustworthy, devoid of vision and caught between two warring wings of his party - trying to appease both, but pleasing neither.
The Tories could lose around 470 seats, the Mayoral candidates in the West Midlands and Tees Valley sent letters around quoting Boris Johnson saying: Forget about the government’. They won.
Mr Sunak didn’t seem to care about getting rid of Sadiq Khan in London - I haven’t seem him endorse the Tory candidate Susan Hall and the reality is Mayor Khan is gettable.
But what’s he really done to move the dial?
Now on to Labour. This is not 1997.
Keir Starmer has the charisma of wet cardboard and a manifesto to match - he’s u-turned on green policy, on taxation, on Brexit, on nationalising the railways, on tuition fees, on whether or not he’s friends with Jeremy Corbyn, on rent control, on what a woman is, on Gaza, on bankers’ bonuses…now the noise is he could even u-turn on Rwanda.
He’s lost the Muslim Vote, just look at what happened in Oldham. Labour suffered a shock defeat in Oldham, Greater Manchester, last night, losing control of the local council to Independent candidates.
It performed most poorly in wards with large Muslim populations.
But look at what happened in the Blackpool South by-election: Labour’s Chris Webb won with 10,825 votes. In 2019, Labour came second with 12,557 votes. The public do not really want Mr Starmer. I doubt they’re overly keen on hearing the words: Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, Foreign Secretary David Lammy and they shudder at the prospect of Edward Samuel Miliband as the Secretary of State for Energy and Net Zero.
Reform…well Richard Tice’s party performed very well. In Blackpool South they were only about 100 votes behind the Tory candidate. In a whole host of council seats the same people who stopped voting Tory went out and voted for Reform instead. That is undeniable. And Tice is bullish.
But it won’t make a difference at the general election. Talking of a general election, some people are now predicting Labour could fall 32 seats short of an outright majority.
Just look at some of the turnouts - 30%, 29%…and then think about all the massive issues we’re facing in Britain. NHS, cost of living, taxation, illegal immigration, law and order…people are sitting on their hands.
People want a general election, but they don’t want to vote for anyone. Great Britain is full of Great Brits…it’s just a shame not enough of them are in politics.
