Sunak survives first 100 days, but there is little warm glow around leadership | Beth Rigby
The first 100 days of Rishi Sunak’s premiership are done – a yardstick that his predecessor Liz Truss never even reached, while Boris Johnson found himself utterly consumed with firefighting a pandemic.
Mr Sunak can take some comfort in the fact he’s made it this far without a full-blown leadership crisis or an external global event that has blown his plan for government wildly off course.
But it would be hard too for the prime minister, in good faith, to say his first 100 days have been a success.
Politics live: What the polls tell us about Sunak’s performance
These early months in office take on a symbolic significance for political leaders because they act as a benchmark for early successes (or failures).
It is also often a honeymoon period in which a leader enjoys high approval ratings, typically having won an election.
But for Mr Sunak it has been neither of those. There is little warm glow around his leadership, while his approval ratings have gone the wrong way in his first 100 days.
You can see why, writing in The Sun newspaper to mark his 100-day anniversary, the prime minister asked voters not to judge him on his first days in office, but on how he does in the remaining days until a general election (I reckon that puts him on another 500 or 600 days in office, given current Westminster thinking that he’ll call an election in the autumn of 2024).
Because – and even his allies would concede – it has been a bumpy start for the PM and is likely, says one senior minister, to be bumpy for some months yet.
‘Narrow path’ to victory
On the positives, Mr Sunak’s allies argue that he has managed to stabilise the economy and slow the rise in interest rates, helping slow the increase in mortgages and government debt repayments.
“What we have managed to do is stabilise the economy and get that back on track,” said one ministerial ally. “Now we have to have laser focus on delivering on those five priorities.”
Halving inflation, reducing government debt, growing the economy, cutting waiting lists and stopping small boats – this is the Sunak pledge card going into 2024.
And if he can land it all, his supporters see a “very narrow path” to victory in the next general election.
But look at the first 100 days and the scales are very much weighted to things going wrong, rather than things going right.
This is a prime minister who hasn’t been able to resolve the worst strikes in Britain since the 1980s. Kids off schools, nurses and ambulance crews on picket lines, trains that aren’t running, the military deployed to police our borders.
Then there is the very real crisis in the NHS, with record ambulance delays and A&E wait times testing the patience of an increasingly weary public.
All of it is ammunition for the opposition to scream that Britain is broken and it’s time for a change of government.
There are then the scandals around his cabinet that have seen Mr Sunak forced to defend no fewer than four of his ministers in the 11 prime minister’s questions he’s fronted so far.
There’s Suella Braverman, who broke the ministerial code and resigned from the Truss administration only to be reinstated a few days later by the new PM (amid rumours he did a deal with the right of the party to reinstall her in return for leadership votes); Gavin Williamson, who resigned from cabinet over bullying allegations; Nadhim Zahawi, sacked for his conduct related to a tax dispute while he was a cabinet minister; and he is now taking heat for his deputy Dominic Raab, who is the subject of eight separate bullying complaints.
It is not just deeply uncomfortable for the prime minister but threatening too, with Mr Sunak contaminated by the stain of Tory sleaze.
‘Not looking good’
“It’s very dangerous,” one senior minister and ally remarked to me the other day of the Zahawi and Raab affairs.
“It could be it’s gone too far,” they added into musings that the reputational damage was too deep to be undone.
The view settling in Westminster is that Mr Raab’s position is precarious.
“If you’ve got three permanent secretaries [top civil servants] all giving evidence, you have to say it is not looking good for Mr Raab.”
And it is not good for Mr Sunak either.
First, Mr Raab is in his inner circle and is a key political ally on which he relies, so cutting the tie will be difficult and painful for the prime minister’s inner operation.
Second, as I reported this week, the scandal over Mr Raab is getting ever closer to the PM, with claims that Mr Sunak was told about concerns over “unacceptable behaviour” before he put him into cabinet.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Oliver Dowden has told Sky’s Sophy Ridge that the prime minister ‘wasn’t aware of any formal complaints’ against Dominic Raab before appointing him to cabinet
There are some who would prefer Mr Raab to fall on his sword rather than prolong the pain for his boss.
But all the signs are that it will be Mr Sunak who will have to make this call once the independent investigation by Adam Tolley KC concludes.
And the frustrations are feeding through to the polls.
At the end of November 2022, 41% of the public thought Mr Sunak was doing badly, versus 31% who thought he was performing well.
Two months later, towards the end of January, 56% thought the prime minister was doing a bad job, against 26% who thought he was doing a good job – according to YouGov.
Election looms
So, this a prime minister still in the job, but the polls are going the wrong way, which means the pressure is only going to build.
Any government will hope that that gap narrows as the election draws closer, and the PM’s team is relying on falling inflation and economic recovery to help shift sentiment.
What Tory MPs need, says one Treasury figure, is something positive to sell on the doorsteps and, at the moment, Mr Sunak isn’t giving them any of that.
What many MPs want are tax cuts sooner rather than later, but that’s not what they’re likely to get in the March budget.
For this PM, picking up the pieces of the Truss government’s economic debacle meant the first 100 days of his premiership was always going to be tough.
And Mr Sunak is certainly playing this as long as he can – one Treasury source told me an autumn 2024 election is most likely because “people will not feel any better off” by the spring of that year.
At least he can take comfort that he’s survived, but the big unknown – and for many, the real doubt – is whether he can thrive.
Donald Trump has said Volodymyr Zelenskyy will have to approve a proposed peace plan to end the war in Ukraine.
The controversial 28-point proposal – which would hand swathes of land to Russia and limit the size of Kyiv’s military – closely resembles the Kremlin’s demands.
Mr Zelenskyy has warned he has reservations about the plan, telling Ukrainians in a solemn speech: “Now is one of the most difficult days in our history.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Russia-Ukraine peace proposal explained
But Russian President Vladimir Putin has cautiously welcomed the US proposals – and said they “could form the basis for a final peace settlement”.
Speaking to reporters at the White House, Mr Trump appeared to dismiss Mr Zelenskyy’s concerns: “He’ll have to like it… at some point, he’s going to have to accept something.”
The US president went on to reference their now-infamous Oval Office meeting back in February, where he told Ukraine‘s leader “you don’t have the cards”.
Kyiv has been given until Thursday to accept the peace plan – but this deadline could be extended to finalise the terms.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
We face losing major partner or dignity, says Zelenskyy
‘I am highly sceptical it will achieve peace’
Mr Trump has received pushback from members of his own party, with a prominent Republican warning the plan “has real problems”.
Senator Roger Wicker, who chairs the Senate Committee on Armed Services, expressed doubt that the White House proposals would achieve peace.
“Ukraine should not be forced to give up its lands to one of the world’s most flagrant war criminals in Vladimir Putin,” he warned.
Tim Ash from the Chatham House think tank added: “Russia gets everything it wants and Ukraine gets not very much.
“If Zelenskyy accepts this, I anticipate huge political, social and economic instability in Ukraine.”
Analysis: We could all pay if Europe doesn’t step up
The Trump peace plan is nothing of the sort. It takes Russian demands and presents them as peace proposals, in what is effectively a surrender ultimatum for Ukraine.
If accepted, it would reward armed aggression. The principle that even de facto borders cannot be changed by force – sacrosanct since World War Two for very good reasons – will have been trampled on at the behest of the leader of the free world.
According to Reuters, European nations including the UK, France and Germany are now working on a counterproposal with Kyiv.
EU leaders, who were not consulted about the plan, will hold a meeting on the sidelines of the G20 summit in South Africa on Saturday.
Sir Keir Starmer, who spoke to Mr Zelenskyy by phone on Friday, has warned “Russia pretends to be serious about peace, but their actions never live up to their words”.
Ahead of the talks, the prime minister said: “Ukraine has been ready to negotiate for months, while Russia has stalled and continued its murderous rampage. That is why we must all work together, with both the US and Ukraine, to secure a just and lasting peace once and for all. We will continue to coordinate closely with Washington and Kyiv to achieve that.
“However, we cannot simply wait for peace, we must strain every sinew to secure it. We must cut off Putin’s finance flows by ending our reliance on Russian gas. It won’t be easy, but it’s the right thing to do.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Inside the Ukraine peace plan
The EU’s foreign policy chief, Kaja Kallas, said: “We all want this war to end, but how it ends matters. Russia has no legal right whatsoever to any concessions from the country it invaded. This is a very dangerous moment for us all.”
Read more from Sky News:
Starmer refuses to rule out manifesto-breaking tax rises
BBC board member resigns – and criticises ‘governance issues’
‘Ukraine may be facing an extremely difficult decision’
During his address, Mr Zelenskyy said he would not betray Ukraine’s national interest – but warned dilemmas lie ahead.
He added: “Either a loss of dignity or the risk of losing a key partner. Either accepting a complicated list of 28 demands or enduring an extremely harsh winter, the harshest yet, with all the risks that follow.
“A life without freedom, without dignity, without justice. And all while being asked to trust someone who has already attacked us twice.”
Pics: Reuters
Washington has reportedly threatened to cut off intelligence sharing and weapons supplies if Kyiv refuses to accept the deal.
The US-backed proposal would require Ukraine to withdraw from territory it still controls in eastern provinces that Russia claims to have annexed – with Russia giving up smaller amounts of land it holds in other regions.
Ukraine would also be permanently barred from joining NATO, and its armed forces would be capped at 600,000 troops.
Sanctions against Russia would also be gradually lifted, with Moscow invited back into the G8 and frozen assets pooled into an investment fund.
World
Ukraine and Europe cannot reject Trump’s plan – they will play for time and hope he can still be persuaded to desert the Kremlin
“Terrible”, “weird”, “peculiar” and “baffling” – some of the adjectives being levelled by observers at the Donald Trump administration’s peace plan for Ukraine.
The 28-point proposal was cooked up between Trump negotiator Steve Witkoff and Kremlin official Kirill Dmitriev without European and Ukrainian involvement.
It effectively dresses up Russian demands as a peace proposal. Demands first made by Russia at the high watermark of its invasion in 2022, before defeats forced it to retreat from much of Ukraine.
Ukraine war latest: Kyiv receives US peace plan
(l-r) Kirill Dmitriev and special envoy Steve Witkoff in St Petersburg in April 2025. Pic: Kremlin Pool Photo/AP
Its proposals are non-starters for Ukrainians.
It would hand over the rest of Donbas, territory they have spent almost four years and lost tens of thousands of men defending.
Analysts estimate at the current rate of advance, it would take Russia four more years to take the land it is proposing simply to give them instead.
It proposes more than halving the size of the Ukrainian military and depriving them of some of their most effective long-range weapons.
And it would bar any foreign forces acting as peacekeepers in Ukraine after any peace deal is done.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Is Moscow back in Washington’s good books?
The plan comes at an excruciating time for the Ukrainians.
They are being pounded with devastating drone attacks, killing dozens in the last few nights alone.
They are on the verge of losing a key stronghold city, Pokrovsk.
And Volodymyr Zelenskyy is embroiled in the gravest political crisis since the war began, with key officials facing damaging corruption allegations.
Read more from Sky News:
Witkoff’s ‘secret’ plan to end war
Navy could react to laser incident
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Ukrainian support for peace plan ‘very much in doubt’
The suspicion is Mr Witkoff and Mr Dmitriev conspired together to choose this moment to put even more pressure on the Ukrainian president.
Perversely, though, it may help him.
There has been universal condemnation and outrage in Kyiv at the Witkoff-Dmitriev plan. Rivals have little choice but to rally around the wartime Ukrainian leader as he faces such unreasonable demands.
The genesis of this plan is unclear.
Was it born from Donald Trump’s overinflated belief in his peacemaking abilities? His overrated Gaza ceasefire plan attracted lavish praise from world leaders, but now seems mired in deepening difficulty.
The fear is Mr Trump’s team are finding ways to allow him to walk away from this conflict altogether, blaming Ukrainian intransigence for the failure of his diplomacy.
Mr Trump has already ended financial support for Ukraine, acting as an arms dealer instead, selling weapons to Europe to pass on to the invaded democracy.
If he were to take away military intelligence support too, Ukraine would be blind to the kind of attacks that in recent days have killed scores of civilians.
Europe and Ukraine cannot reject the plan entirely and risk alienating Mr Trump.
They will play for time and hope against all the evidence he can still be persuaded to desert the Kremlin and put pressure on Vladimir Putin to end the war, rather than force Ukraine to surrender instead.
The Eurovision Song Contest is changing its voting system, following allegations of “interference” by Israel’s government this year.
Israeli singer Yuval Raphael received the largest number of votes from the public in the contest in May, ultimately finishing as runner-up after the jury votes were counted.
But a number of broadcasters raised concerns about Israel’s result.
After the final, Irish broadcaster RTE requested a breakdown in voting numbers from contest organiser the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), while Spain’s public broadcaster, Radio Television Espanola (RTVE), called for a “complete review” of the voting system to avoid “external interference”.
In September, Dutch public broadcaster AVROTROS said it could no longer justify Israel‘s participation in the contest, due to the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
It went on to say there had been “proven interference by the Israeli government during the last edition of the Song Contest, with the event being used as a political instrument”. The statement did not elaborate on the means of “interference”.
Sky News has contacted the Israeli government for comment.
In early December, the EBU will hold its winter general assembly, with members due to consider the changes, and if not satisfied, vote on Israel’s participation.
Key changes to next year’s competition include:
• Clearer rules around promotion of artists and their songs
• Cap on audience voting halved
• The return of professional juries to semi-finals
• Enhanced security safeguards
Read more: Could Eurovision boycotts over Israel lead to a competition crisis?
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Will Eurovision boycott Israel?
Sanctions threat
The EBU said the tightening of rules around promotion was to “discourage disproportionate promotion campaigns… particularly when undertaken or supported by third parties, including governments or governmental agencies”.
It said that “any attempts to unduly influence the results will lead to sanctions”.
Contest director Martin Green said “no broadcaster or artist may now directly engage with or support campaigns by third parties – including governments or their agencies – that could distort the vote”.
He said the reduction in the number of votes that can be made online, or via SMS or phone call, from 20 to 10 was “designed to encourage more balanced participation”.
He said that “although the number of votes previously allowed did not unduly influence the results of previous contests, there were concerns expressed by participating broadcasters and fans alike”.
Professional juries in semi-finals – and younger jurors
It was also announced that professional juries in the semi-finals would be restored for the first time since 2022, with an expansion to the range of professions from which jurors can be chosen.
The EBU said this will give roughly 50-50 percentage weight between audience and jury votes.
At least two jurors aged 18-25 will be present in every jury, to reflect the appeal of the contest with younger audiences.
Also mentioned were enhanced technical safeguards designed to “protect the contest from suspicious or coordinated voting activity” and strengthen security systems that “monitor, detect and prevent fraudulent patterns”.
Politics making itself heard over Europop lyrics
Mr Green said that the neutrality and integrity of the competition is of “paramount importance” to the EBU, its members, and audiences, adding that the event “should remain a neutral space and must not be instrumentalised”.
Israel’s 2024 representative, Eden Golan. Pic: AP
A vocally apolitical event, world events have dominated Eurovision in recent years.
Russia was banned from the competition in 2022 following its invasion of Ukraine.
Israel has competed in Eurovision for more than 50 years and won four times, but there have been ongoing calls to block their participation over the conduct of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in the Hamas-Israel war.
Israel denies targeting civilians in Gaza and has said it is being unfairly demonised abroad.
In September, Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland, Iceland, and Slovenia threatened to withdraw their participation in Eurovision unless Israel is excluded from the competition.
There were also demonstrations against Israel’s inclusion in Basel, Switzerland, when the 2025 competition took place.
‘Step in right direction’
Responding to the changes, Iceland’s official broadcaster RUV told Sky News they were “a step in the right direction”, and they would be discussing them with their “sister stations in the Nordic countries” ahead of the EBU meeting in December.
Ireland’s official broadcaster RTE told Sky News: “Clearly, events in the Middle East are unfolding day by day. As previously confirmed by the EBU, the issue of participation in the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest has been included on the agenda of the EBU Executive Board’s ordinary Winter General Assembly.”
Sky News has also contacted the official broadcaster for the Netherlands (AVROTROS), Spain (RTVE), Slovenia (RTVSLO), and Israel (Kan) for comment.
The chief executive of Kan, Golan Yochpaz, has previously said the event should not become political and that there is “no reason” why Israel should not be part of it.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Pic: Reuters
Netanyahu praised Israeli entrant
Earlier this year, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told Israel’s 2025 Eurovision entrant Yuval Raphael she had brought the country “a lot of honour” after she finished in second place, adding “you’re the real winner. Statistically, it’s true… You entered the hearts of a huge portion of the public in Europe.”
The year before he told entrant Eden Golan: “I saw that you received almost the highest number of votes from the public and this is the most important thing, not from the judges but from the public, and you held Israel’s head up high in Europe.”
In October, a ceasefire deal was put in place, aimed at bringing an end to the two-year war in the Middle East.
The war began when Hamas stormed into Israel on October 7 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 hostage.
Israel invaded Gaza in retaliation, with airstrikes and ground assaults devastating much of the territory and killing more than 67,000, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
Its figures do not differentiate between civilians and combatants, but it says around half of those killed were women and children.
The world’s largest live music event, next year’s contest will be held in Vienna, Austria, in May and will celebrate 70 years of Eurovision.
-
Sports2 years agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports3 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports2 years agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports3 years agoButton battles heat exhaustion in NASCAR debut
-
Sports3 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment3 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment1 year agoHere are the best electric bikes you can buy at every price level in October 2024