I thought Sunak won last night’s debate on all traditional counts. He was more aggressive, more on the ball and he was fluent in his delivery. His opponent was boring and consistently lost his way half-way through his sentence. Sunak had a new word “surrender” and he used it well, Starmer went on and on about his time in the legal system and reminded us why we don’t care for lawyers.
Despite all this, only one in three people of the 3,000 who voted in the FT poll, agreed with me and even the YouGov post debate poll – where punters are a little closer to the action – put the result as 50-50.
The point is that we are beyond listening to and trusting Rishi Sunak and so he simply can’t win a debate any more. This should be a big lesson to populist politicians, at the end of the campaign, you are judged by actions and not words.
We know our pensions and we know how they get taxed. As LCP and others have commented, the Conservative claim to have lifted us out of pension taxation and their claim that Labour will deliver a “retirement tax” is nonsense.
It is full of hot air like a lot of promises about new hospitals, funding the NHS with a Brexit dividend and the public has decided not to listen to oratory but to mark Sunak as a loser, however he performs.
It is sad that Starmer comes across as such a loser and I applaud the questioner who asked whether these two were the best that Britain could offer us.
But I would rather have Starmer, for all his haplessness, than five more years of the Johnson/Truss/Sunak continuum. And this is what the public sees more of Sunak as. As I have written elsewhere on this blog this morning, you cannot divorce yourself from previous Governments when those Governments were your Governments!
I am looking at a leaflet from a Conservative politician which arrived last night. It is asking me to vote for him to hold a Labour Government to account. That is the authentic voice of the Conservative party and it is why Sunak cannot win a debate, an election – anything,
I agree that starmer is pretty awful in these debates and on television generally. However unlike sunak he understands how to manage his team, and has the skills to do so. Sunak is an individual who has shown he cannot manage. And he lies and misrepresents data . And histeam of cabinet ministers have shown by the outcomes of their actions that they too cannot manage, cannot tell the truth and are incompetent. They lie about labours plans. First they say labour don’t have a plan but then they create out of thin air what labour’s tax plans are. They are corrupt too. Go es PPE fast lane, Jenricks intervention to ensure Desmond s property scheme went through, supporting the proven illegal lobbying of the odious Owen Patterson. They bully and blame the civil servants. May, Johnson, Truss, Sunak, it doesn’t matter which one you choose they are useless leaders. They are morally bankrupt too, look at Johnson refusing to sack the bully Patel when she clearly broke the ministerial code and bullied his team so badly that a great civil servant such as Putnam resigned. The covid parties. The decision to reappoint braverman as home Secretary when she broke the ministerial code giving secret information to Sir John Hayes, her total incompetence and the inherent racism in so much of the tory party’s home office. Sunak can’t lead , shows none of the integrity he professes to have and a good talker who blows hot air and lies has been found out. Starmer is dull and boring but he is twice the human being of all the tory leaders combined. So good riddance to the tech bro liar sunak.
Torsten Bell will make a very good future Labour Prime Minister
There is a rule that “very good future … Prime Ministers” seldom make it.
Ydy ymgeiswyr Llafur yn cael eu gorfodi ar Gymru?
The most telling question to these politiciaans was from an elderly visitor who asked:
‘Are you the best uninspired candidates for being our PM that this great country can offer the public’ or words to that effect!