This election is a chance for Rishi Sunak to grab the nation’s ear. But he’ll have to say something more compelling than he’s managed so far to keep Britain’s attention.
The best that can be said for Rishi Sunak’s speech outside 10 Downing Street yesterday is that unlike his predecessor but two, Theresa May, the stage didn’t fall down. Standing sodden in the rain, looking every bit the wally without a brolly, he looked a man who knew he was facing the fight of his life – and who didn’t feel as if the gods were on his side.
In truth, he had to take the plunge at some point, though perhaps he could have done so inside. There was a quite compelling working theory that the Tories were content to hang around for a while longer, hoping that something might turn up.
With tax cuts effectively wiped out as an option by borrowing figures and a warning from the IMF that an autumn fiscal event could sent the markets into a Trussian frenzy again, the best they could do was some not-quite-brilliant inflation numbers. May as well, eh.
Yet for all of the well-founded frustrations with the Conservative party, they do still have a real shot in this election. No matter how tired the country might be, the election gives you a hearing. Will Rishi Sunak have something to say?
There is a sense, sometimes, that we still don’t really know who the Prime Minister is. Instinctively, he doesn’t seem like a man who enjoyed lockdown; nor a man who is wholly comfortable with the Rwanda scheme, or some of the more culture war tactics his party have employed in recent years.
He looks more comfortable talking about tech, about a twenty-first century Britain that’s on the front foot. Can that optimism turn around his poll ratings? An election is a moment for sunlit uplands. We aren’t convinced, but then, the negativity certainly won’t.
For Keir Starmer, the challenge is different: hold on. Stay solid. Show the country that there’s a leader as well as a technocrat, a Prime Minister not just a critic.
There will be days when the polls narrow, and widen. There will be over-reactions. There will be days that feel important that aren’t and days that are important that don’t feel it. Let battle commence.