Was Sunak Hearkening to Britain’s Low Inflation and Other Economic Progress, When He Called a Snap Election for July 4?
The premier announced his decision outside 10 Downing Street during a downpour. Fate, though, has yet to speak.
When Prime Minister Sunak announced Wednesday evening that the UK was soon to have a general election, the only surprise was the setting of the day for July 4 — regards to George III, by the way — ’though as Disraeli stated, “Departures should be sudden.”
The rationale for Mr. Sunak deciding this date for a “snap election” will fuel speculation in the weeks to follow. Whether the United Kingdom will come to rue such rashness, that will be the task for historians.
Many commentators credit the call to the news that inflation is at or below the Holy Grail of 2 percent — 2.3 percent in April from 3.2 percent in March, according to Britain’s Office for National Statistics — as the cause for announcing the dropping of the writ.
This comes on top of reports that GDP has grown in the first quarter of 2024. In addition, the International Monetary Fund announced that the UK is forecast to outperform its EU partners for the next six years.
Your Diarist believes that Conservative Central Office has been watching the performance of the prime minister-in-waiting in recent weeks, and wanted to catch Sir Keir Starmer on the backfoot.
For no less surprising has been the incompetence of Labour’s top team as the Fourth Estate, tired of treading on shopworn Tories, has turned its attention — and its fire — on to what is generally believed the next Labour Government.
The Conservatives, not believing their good luck, may have concluded that, rather than allow Labour to sort itself out, it would be better to catch them flat-footed and go to the polls before they have a chance to right themselves.
There is also speculation that Mr. Sunak may have called the election to head-off a feared leadership review. Rumors are that those who oversee the party’s management, the 1922 Committee, had received close to the requisite number of letters from Conservative MPs expressing no-confidence in their leader.
Given the proximity of the general election that had to be called before the end of January 2025, there is little doubt Mr. Sunak would have won the confidence vote. He would, though, enter the general election as a wounded leader. He may have decided to cast the dice and trust in fortune, instead.
Nor can one rule out whether reported Russian advances in Ukraine and worsening tensions in the Middle East between Israeli actions in Gaza and reactions from her neighbors, had any impact upon the rush to the polls.
No less unresolved is what Nigel Farage decides. He had been signaling that he was going to sit this one out and go to America to help his friend President Trump regain the White House.
That was when the election was expected in late autumn, near the November presidential election. Now with Britons going to the polls this summer, whatever will Mr. Farage do?
Nevertheless, Britons will only know in the early hours of July 5, when paper ballots are being counted and poll results tallied, whether Mr. Sunak has committed a brilliant stroke of electoral legerdemain or an own goal.
Pundits with an eye to the past will inevitably ruminate on the lessons of 1992 and 1997. The year 1992, when John Major led the Tories to victory after having been counted out. And 1997, when Mr. Major led the Conservatives to one of the worst defeats in the party’s history.
Labour’s Sir Keir will also be reminded of these seminal dates. Will he be like Neil Kinnock who blew a certain thing in 1992? Or the triumphant Tony Blair who exceeded all expectations five years later?
Let us, too, not fail to spare a thought in respect of the British voters. It is difficult to see how these souls benefit from an early election. As hamfisted as the Tories have been, their talk of small government and low taxes is what the Brexiteers voted for in the EU Referendum of 2016 and the Boris Johnson administration in 2019.
That the Tories have failed miserably in delivering what they promised doesn’t change the fact that Labour policy favors the sort of government interventions that are inimical to Brexit idealism. For the Brexiteer, optimism may be hard to muster. Other than to admit that if the inevitable is to come, better to have with it so that the healing can begin.
“If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well it were done quickly.” So scratched Shakespeare. That the Premier made his move, outside 10 Downing Street during a downpour, may prove ominous to some. The Fates will declare their verdict on the Conservative Government soon enough.
