The last Westminster parliament to run for a full five-year term ended in 2015.
After that we had general elections every two years, in 2017 and 2019, followed by the election now expected by January 2025 at the latest, when this full term will expire.
Not that there has been political stability since 2019. Rather than consult the voters, the Conservative party have changed prime ministers twice in that time running through Johnson and Truss to Sunak.
In the past few days, it has felt as if the tectonic plates under Number 10 Downing Street were shifting again. There have been manifest signs of political panic and – obeying the old mantra of “never let a good crisis go to waste” – political opportunism as well.
Observing tell-tale signs that the government was gearing up under duress, I wondered if, just possibly, Rishi Sunak would go the way of Theresa May and Boris Johnson and deploy the prime minister’s ability to bring about a general election as a tactical weapon in campaigning.
Elon Musk has not yet managed to kill Twitter as a channel of constructive conversation, so I Xed a speculative “are we about to be plunged into a snap general election again?”
No, not this October, it turned out. The prime minister stuck to the planned content in the speech which media speculation had bounced him into delivering prematurely.
More on Rishi Sunak
Related Topics:
Image: Keir Starmer leads in the polls
But what we saw from the prime minister should put us on alert. The electorate should stand by to be called to the polls at any moment.
Sunak has shifted into ruthless campaign mode and he will call an election if and when he sees any advantage in doing so.
Advertisement
His U-turn on net zero measures shows that he has made his choice on how he will fight it.
In the past two centuries no British party has won five elections in a row, as the Conservatives are seeking to do.
Sunak’s strategy is to try to present himself as something different, rather than Sir Keir Starmer as the “change candidate” from the past.
Amid the cost of living crisis, high mortgages and inflation, chaos in the NHS and disruption in schools, Sunak knows there would be little point in trying to run on the Conservative’s record in government.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
He claims that he has restored “stability and confidence” in his first year as prime minister, now his new slogan “long-term decisions for a brighter future” attempts to turn the page on all the decisions the Tories have taken over their past 14 years in power.
Symbolically Sunak has torched the accelerated plans to phase out internal combustion cars and gas boilers, which underwrote his predecessor Boris Johnson’s boast that the UK was a “world leader” on net zero. He hopes that this drives a wedge between him and Starmer.
Setting his heffalump trap for Labour,the Conservative leader says it is for people who disagree with him to explain why they want families to pay an extra £5,000, £10,000 or £15,000.
Piling extra challenges for Starmer to overcome, he claimed to have scrapped compulsory extreme measures for a meat tax, seven recycling bins per household, and car sharing.
He and ministers have struggled to identify any examples of politicians advocating such measures, but that won’t stop Tory activists linking them to Labour on the campaigning trail.
Already at PMQs Sunak is happy to smear Starmer with allegations which are unfounded or which Starmer has ruled out on the record.
So while reducing the, allegedly costly, green measures on net zero or sewage versus housebuilding, he simultaneously claims that he is sticking to the UKs environmental ambitions and commitments.
It could work. Nobody likes paying more when times are hard.
Sunak’s claims that he is still “passionately committed” to net zero and that the UK is still on course, provide an alibi for those disinclined to do anything more.
Those queuing up to attack Sunak’s policy shift include the United Nations, Al Gore, One Nation Conservatives and the mainstream media, precisely the supposedly “elitist” coalition which alienated Leave voters in the Brexit referendum and against Labour in old Red Wall constituencies.
Image: The expansion of the ULEZ has been a contentious issue
Although irrelevant to global warming, the Labour Mayor of London’s imposition of ULEZ charges on polluting vehicles certainly helped the Conservatives to hang onto Johnson’s outer London constituency at a by-election. The 7.4% swing against the Tories was much less than in national opinion polls.
If the Conservatives pull off another “hold” in the Mid Bedfordshire by-election on 19 October, it will be taken as vindication of the new “common sense” strategy.
To stay in power, Sunak will need the votes of traditional Conservatives – older, relatively affluent and in the South.
The Conservatives are also generally doing poorly with younger demographics of working age below 50. The red scare of Corbyn pushed enough of them in the Conservatives’ direction.
It will be harder to paint Starmer as a similar threat, but that is unlikely to stop his opponents trying.
That is the Conservative’s best hope of holding together a winning electoral coalition. Initially Sunak’s green moves have fallen flat with Conservative environmentalists from Zac Goldsmith to John Gummer to the Climate Change Committee.
Big businesses are also openly dismayed, especially by the instability of chopping and changing legislated targets and guidelines.
Replies to my snap election ‘X’ were mostly either “bring it on” or “they wouldn’t dare”.
One MP was not so sure: “I point out that I was elected in 2015 when it was the law, we couldn’t have an election for five years… and we had two in three years”.
The prime minister will go for an election if he sees a burst of sunshine breaking through the electoral clouds hanging over the Conservatives.
He could even get a boost just by calling one; polls show that the public is impatient, over half of those questioned want an election by June next year – around 25% want one this year.
For his first year in office the prime minister has been bombarded by events.
He may have been pushed into it but this week was the first time he found the breathing space to launch an initiative.
More long-term ideas from the “real Rishi” are promised in the coming weeks. It is likely that they too will play to the popularist right of the party.
Sunak doesn’t have to appeal to everybody. In their four general election victories the shares of the vote which put the Tories in power were 36.1%, 36.8%, 42.3% and 34.65%.
Electoral Calculus current poll of polls puts Sunak well short of that: Conservatives 27.5% Labour 44.3%. The prime minister will not go quietly.
The Sunak who has shown himself this week will not scruple to do what it takes to shift the dial – short term as well as long term and if he sees the glint of a chance, he’ll take it.
Crypto lobby group the DeFi Education Fund and the Uniswap Foundation have said the Securities and Exchange Commission should be hands-off on regulating decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs).
The May 27 letter to SEC Crypto Task Force lead Hester Peirce argued that the agency should not treat DAOs under the purview of the securities-defining Howey test if they’re “sufficiently decentralized,” as they are not identifiable and are not a coordinated group.
Instead, the pair said DAOs should be treated as individuals or a group of persons unless proved otherwise.
“If a DAO has a dispersed collection of tokenholders who have the opportunity to actively participate in and govern the DAO and the network, it is sufficiently decentralized such that neither the network token for that DAO, nor transactions in which that network token are the object, should be considered a security.” the letter read.
The letter was issued in response to Peirce’s Feb. 21 statement, which invited comments on crypto.
Favorable regulatory environment
The SEC has flipped on its crypto enforcement actions under the Trump administration, which successfully installed the former crypto lobbyist Paul Atkins to lead the agency.
Atkins has stated that blockchain technology could usher in new forms of market activity.
The following week, Atkins said that the regulator would not stifle innovation and lambasted the Biden administration’s approach to crypto.
In a May 20 SEC oversight hearing, Atkins confirmed that the Crypto Task Force’s first report will be released in the next few months, the group is also holding a series of crypto-related roundtable discussions with industry players.
But new analysis from the Institute of Fiscal Studies suggest that his party’s aim of hiking the personal allowance to £20,000 a year could cost between £50bn to £80bn a year.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
4:45
Will PM’s ‘Farage lite’ strategy work?
Visiting manufacturing workers in the North West, Sir Keir will describe Reform’s economic agenda as a “mad experiment”.
He is expected to say: “In opposition we said Liz Truss would crash the economy and leave you to pick up the bill. We were right – and we were elected to fix that mess.
“Now in government, we are once again fighting the same fantasy.”
More on Labour
Related Topics:
Labour is criticising Mr Farage for betting “that you can spend tens of billions on tax cuts without a proper way of paying for it”.
The prime minister will add: “Just like Truss, he is using your family finances, your mortgage, your bills as a gambling chip. The result will be the same. Liz Truss bet the house and lost.”
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
1:26
Angela Rayner ‘hoping’ for winter fuel update
Sir Keir is referring to the former prime minister’s mini-budget in 2022, which had proposed abolishing the top 45% rate of income tax.
But this policy, among others, spooked financial markets and led to economic turmoil in the UK – with a dramatic spike in the cost of government borrowing feeding through into interest rates.
Mr Farage has argued that his measures can be paid for by scrapping net zero commitments and ending the use of hotel accommodation for asylum seekers.
Recent polls have put Labour second behind Reform UK, while the local election results earlier this month saw Mr Farage’s party win a parliamentary by-election, control of 10 councils and two mayoralties, while Labour lost almost 200 seats.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Elon Musk confirmed that he’s quitting as the White House’s government cost-cutting czar after admitting it was an “uphill battle” trying to slash federal jobs and programs.
Musk’s status as a Special Government Employee leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) meant that by law, he could only serve for a maximum of 130 days, which was set to finish on May 30.
Musk confirmed his exit in a May 29 X post, thanking President Donald Trump “for the opportunity to reduce wasteful spending.” Reuters reported that a White House official said his “off-boarding will begin tonight.”
Musk told The Washington Post for a May 27 report that the “federal bureaucracy situation is much worse” than he expected, and it was “an uphill battle trying to improve things in DC, to say the least.”
In separate comments to CBS, Musk criticized the multi-trillion-dollar tax break package that House Republicans approved on May 22, claiming it would increase the budget deficit and undermine the work that DOGE is doing.
DOGE, which is named after the cryptocurrency, claims to have saved taxpayers $175 billion since Trump’s Jan. 20 return to the White House, a figure heavily disputed by multiple news outlets, which report the figures are overstated, have multiple errors and are inaccurate.
The project’s claimed savings are only 8.5% of Musk’s initial ambition to cut $2 trillion from the federal budget, which he later revised down to $150 billion.
According to the Reuters report, DOGE has cut almost 12%, or 260,000, of the 2.3 million federal workforce through layoffs, buyouts and early retirement offers.
Despite the criticisms, Musk said on X that DOGE’s mission will “only strengthen over time as it becomes a way of life throughout the government.”
It comes as a federal judge allowed a lawsuit to proceed that accuses Musk and DOGE of illegally exerting power over government operations.
The lawsuit, filed by 14 states, alleged that Musk and DOGE violated the Constitution by illegally accessing government data systems, terminating federal employees and canceling contracts at federal agencies.
Musk admits he spent too much time in politics
In a May 28 interview with Ars Technica, Musk, the CEO of EV maker Tesla, admitted that he spent “a bit too much time” in politics, which some critics claim has impacted Tesla’s performance.
“I think I probably did spend a bit too much time on politics,” Musk said. However, he added that the time he spent on DOGE wasn’t as significant as many believed, and he blamed media coverage for overrepresenting his involvement.
“It’s not like I left the companies. It was just relative time allocation that probably was a little too high on the government side, and I’ve reduced that significantly in recent weeks.”
When Musk announced in Tesla’s first quarter report that his time spent on DOGE would drop significantly in May, Tesla (TSLA) shares rose over 5% in after-hours trading, despite the company reporting an 80% drop in net income.
As of March 31, Tesla still held 11,509 Bitcoin (BTC), currently valued at about $1.24 billion.
Tesla shares are still down 5.9% year to date, in part due to Musk diverting his attention away from the company and Tesla’s sales falling considerably in the first quarter.
However, the fall is in line with other Big Tech firms, including Apple (AAPL), Nvidia (NVDA), Amazon (AMZN) and Google (GOOG), which are also in the red in 2025.