(Photo credit: Bing/Creative Commons)
From Leeds to Exeter, Cardiff to Eastbourne, Darlington to Cheltenham, the Tory leadership elections have been played out in a series of hustings all around the UK.
For more than a month, they have been held also in Perth, Belfast and Manchester, culminating in Birmingham, Norwich and London. There’s no escaping the ceaseless, often banal, television and radio interviews.
Tory MPs have reduced the succession to disgraced Prime Minister, Boris Johnson to a continuity choice of the former chancellor, Rishi Sunak or foreign secretary, Liz Truss.
The absurdity of the system, where only the party faithful can participate in hustings and vote for the next PM rendered the hard-pressed British public helpless spectators at the coronation of Johnson’s successor on September 5.
The race to Number 10 quickly evolved into a scramble of extreme pledges, pandering to the Tory gallery. Sunak, once the front-runner, promised fiscal prudence, while Truss, a Johnson loyalist, offered immediate tax cuts as a sop to the right-wing of the party.
The sweeteners to win favour were soon being scattered like confetti. Pledges were made not to repair but to maintain Tory policies which inflicted austerity, reduced public services, and fewer liberties on the public.
As the opulence became more radical, Sunak proposed widening the definition of extremism to include vilification of the country.
As reported on page 9, he announced he would also “refocus” the discredited Prevent counter-extremism program even more towards so-called “Islamists” as supposedly the biggest threat to national security after complaints that it had tilted too much towards tackling the growth of right-wing terrorists.
According to the Jewish Chronicle, the former chancellor also controversially told an audience of Conservative Friends of Israel that there was a “very strong case” for moving the British Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, following the example of former US President, Donald Trump, in breaching the unique status of the holy city.
Sunak seemingly admitted that he could be out of his depth, stating he had never been Foreign Secretary and was not aware of the “sensitivity” of the issue. Not to be outdone, Truss was also said to have made a promise to consider a similar move.
Most people could be forgiven for thinking they are insignificant. As if Brexit was not a total disaster, the Northern Ireland Protocol problem solved, or there was not an energy crisis, record inflation and a rise in the cost of living making things worse for the poor. Buried in the background was that perhaps Johnson had not been booted out by his own party.
How is Tory HQ so oblivious to their party’s shift to the right? All while Labour stands by, unwilling to act as a viable opposition. The current state of British politics is at an all-time low.
