Rishi Sunak is failing to hold together the voting coalition that delivered Boris Johnson a decisive victory in the 2019 general election, according to The Voters Panel on Sky News – launched today.
A profound unhappiness with the state of the country and exhaustion at years of Tory chaos means 2019 Tory voters will flock to at least four rival parties or stay at home at the next election.
Some describe themselves as swing voters, while others say they have backed the Tories all their lives, and this is the group Conservative headquarters and campaign chief Isaac Levido believes is key to the next election.
We found just over a fifth of Tory voters will switch directly to Labour and there is a grasp of what Labour stands for among participants in The Voters Panel, the Sky News-YouGov digital community group launched today reveals.
Pic: PA
However, the depth of despair in the governing party means the relationship between the party and many voters has shattered and they are looking for a new home.
For the next two weeks, including through the budget next Wednesday, Sky News will be regularly interrogating The Voters Panel – an online group of at least 33 people from all corners of Great Britain.
Of the 33 submitting answers so far, nine say they will likely stick with the Conservatives, seven will go to Labour, five to Reform, two to the Lib Dems and one to Green.
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Eight say they aren’t sure, although three of these rule out voting Conservative. This echoes the latest polls.
The last YouGov voting poll suggested of those who voted Tory in 2019, 33% would stick with the party, 20% would switch to Reform, 13% to Labour, 3% to Lib Dem and 1% would go to the Green Party.
Some 29% say they don’t know or would not vote. This suggests that The Voters Panel looks very reflective of the national picture and will be used in the coming days to dig much deeper into voters’ views.
Here are the words people used to described Rishi Sunak – the bigger they are, the more commonly used they were
The headlines, drawn from dozens of videos and written exercises by the panel of 2019 Tory voters since Friday, include:
• A despair at the state of public services. Katrin, who will vote anyone but Tory next time, says schools are “struggling”, the NHS is “underfunded” and needs a cash injection and the economy is “failing”.
Helen, who is unsure where to take her vote now, says: “I am quite worried about the state of the country at the moment. It’s not just me that I need to think about, I’ve also got two young children.”
Michael, who will stick with the Tories, says: “The government doesn’t seem willing to back down to the doctors to give them a decent pay rise.”
Michael says the government seems to be unwilling to give doctors a ‘decent pay rise’
• Concern about the cost of living isn’t matched by demands for tax cuts. Several of The Voters Panel have brought up the cost of living, and the pressures this brings, although there is an appreciation this is in part the consequence of COVID and the war in Ukraine – both out of the government’s control. However, this does not translate into spontaneous demands for tax cuts, beyond a tiny number of people already sticking with the Tories.
• There is a desire to punish the Tories. The anger felt towards the political chaos of recent years does not appear to have softened and was brought up spontaneously by a majority of panellists. Snezzana says the party she voted for in the last election is “destroying the country and the economy” and she will switch to Labour.
Snezzana says the Tories are “destroying the country and the economy” and she will switch to Labour.
Paul, who will switch to the Greens, won’t back the Tories again after the “chaos since Boris was in charge”. Jyoti will not vote Tory again “because Brexit and COVID were all disasters” and while more recently unlikely to back Labour, could go to either end of the political spectrum and back Reform or Lib Dem.
• There is uncertainty about Sir Keir Starmer and Labour. Emma, who doesn’t know how to vote next time, says: “Starmer is someone that sits on the fence quite a lot.” Tom – who says he will vote Labour – says Sir Keir has moved Labour to the centre but “is not a 100% sure on what their manifesto will contain”, adding: “Is he a capable leader? I don’t know, we’ll find out.”
• Sir Keir is “indecisive” and “unbelievable”. Mr Sunak “rich” “unelected and “untrustworthy”. The words used to describe the leaders of the two main parties are largely unforgiving by our participants. Mr Sunak is also weak, disconnected; though seen as competent and intelligent. Sir Keir is known to be a lawyer but “hypocrite” looms large.
• Some, but not many, key messages from the parties, are getting through. David, who is switching to Labour, is one of the few to acknowledge Sir Keir “from a not-as-well-off background. He’s had family problems”.
Paul, who is sticking with the Tories, mimicked Mr Sunak’s slogan by saying “My worry is now…. the Labour Party will get in and we’ll be back to square one” and says “we need to stick with them, see this plan through”.
David will switch to Labour
• Not everybody thinks it’s ‘time for a change’. After 14 years, a minority think that it is not time for a change. All three who suggest this are sticking with the Tories.
• Cut-through moments matter. Widely shared moments on social media are shaping perceptions. Paul, who will vote for the Greens, referenced the bet between Mr Sunak and Piers Morgan as evidence of Mr Sunak’s wealth, suggesting it means he is “obviously rich and I think that puts him a bit out of touch with people. The recent interview where he bet the interviewer a thousand pounds, was a bit not nice to see. Makes him out of touch, especially when people are going paycheck to paycheck”.
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The results of this community group – with so few directly switching Tory to Labour – may lead some Tory supporters to conclude that the next election is not lost, arguing Labour has not sealed the deal with the electorate. There are some glimmers of hope for the Tories. However, direct Tory-to-Labour switching may not be the decisive factor in the result.
The 1997 Labour landslide was driven, in part, by Tories staying at home rather than a surge of enthusiasm for Tony Blair.
Here is a similar so-called ‘word cloud’ for Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer
In 1992, John Major got more votes than any leader at any election ever and a big drop in turnout – from 77.7% to 71.3% in 1997 – was a big part of Blair’s 179 majority. Jeremy Corbyn lost almost 3 million votes between 2017 and 2019, and that was instrumental in the Tory majority of 80.
This community group still suggests less than a third of Conservative voters would stick with the Tories in an upcoming election. This remains an existential challenge for the prime minister.
Braden John Karony, the CEO of crypto firm SafeMoon, has cited the US Department of Justice’s directive to no longer pursue some crypto charges in an effort to get the case against him and his firm dismissed.
In an April 9 letter to New York federal court judge Eric Komitee, Karony’s attorney, Nicholas Smith, said the court should consider an April 7 memo from US Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche that disbanded the DOJ’s crypto unit.
“The Department of Justice is not a digital assets regulator,” Blanche said in the memo, which added the DOJ “will no longer pursue litigation or enforcement actions that have the effect of superimposing regulatory frameworks on digital assets.”
Blanche also directed prosecutors not to charge violations of securities and commodities laws when the case would require the DOJ to determine if a digital asset is a security or commodity when charges such as wire fraud are available.
An excerpt of the letter Karony sent to Judge Komitee. Source: PACER
In the footnote of the letter, Karony’s counsel wrote an exemption to the DOJ’s new directive would be if the parties have an interest in defending that a crypto asset is a security, but added that “Karony does not have such an interest.”
The Justice Department and the Securities and Exchange Commission filed simultaneous charges of securities violations, wire fraud, and money laundering against Karony and other SafeMoon executives in November 2023.
The government alleged Karony, SafeMoon creator Kyle Nagy and chief technology officer Thomas Smith withdrew assets worth $200 million from the project and misappropriated investor funds.
Another attempt to nix the case
The letter is Karony’s latest attempt to get the case thrown out. In February, he asked that his trial, scheduled to begin on March 31, be delayed as he argued President Donald Trump’s proposed crypto policies could potentially affect the case.
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Later in February, Smith changed his plea to guilty and said he took part in the alleged $200 million crypto fraud scheme. Nagy is at large and is believed to be in Russia.
SafeMoon filed for bankruptcy in December 2023, a month after it was hit with twin cases from the SEC and DOJ. It was also hacked in March 2023, with the hacker agreeing to return 80% of the funds.
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Ukraine’s financial regulator has proposed taxing certain crypto transactions as personal income at a rate of up to 23% but excluding crypto-to-crypto transactions and stablecoins.
Crypto transactions would be taxed at 18% with a 5% military levy on top as part of the proposed framework, released on April 8 by Ukraine’s National Securities and Stock Market Commission.
NSSMC Chairman Ruslan Magomedov said in an April 8 statement that “the issue of crypto taxes is not a hypothesis, but a reality that is fast approaching.”
He added that the agency created the framework to help lawmakers make an “informed resolution” by considering each suggestion’s advantages and disadvantages because “these aspects can have a critical impact on the market and tax liability.”
Under the NSSMC’s proposed crypto framework, a tax will be applied when crypto is cashed out for fiat currency or exchanged for goods or services.
Crypto-to-crypto transactions wouldn’t be taxed, bringing Ukraine in line with other European countries, including Austria and France, as well as crypto-friendly jurisdictions like Singapore, the NSSMC said.
The regulator says it “makes sense” to exclude stablecoins backed by foreign currencies or only apply a 5% or 9% tax because Ukraine’s tax code already excludes income from transactions in “foreign exchange values.”
A translated excerpt of the NSSMC’s report said stablecoins backed by foreign currencies could be exempt from taxation. Source: NSSMC
Mining, staking, hard forks and airdrops
Other crypto-related activities, such as mining, staking and airdrops, are also addressed in the framework which floated a few options for taxation.
The NSSMC said crypto mining is generally considered a business activity, but there might be a general tax-free limit for certain crypto transactions, including mining.
Under the framework, staking could be considered as “business captive income” or only taxed if the crypto is cashed out for fiat currencies. While hard forks and airdrops could be taxed either as ordinary income or when the tokens are cashed.
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The regulator suggests a tax-free threshold could help “relieve the burden on small investors” and is common in other jurisdictions.
Exemptions for donations, transfers between family members, and holders who keep their crypto for a set amount of time are also flagged as possibilities. However, the NSSMC says the exemption might not apply to non-custodial crypto wallets.
Last December, Daniil Getmantsev, head of the tax committee of Ukraine’s parliament, said a draft bill to legalize cryptocurrencies was under review and expected to be finalized early this year.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy first signed a law establishing a legal framework for the country to operate a regulated crypto market in March 2022.
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Digital asset manager 21Shares has filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission to launch a spot Dogecoin exchange-traded fund, following similar filings from rivals Bitwise and Grayscale.
The 21Shares Dogecoin ETF would seek to track the price of the memecoin Dogecoin (DOGE), according to the firm’s April 9 Form S-1 registration statement. The Dogecoin Foundation’s corporate arm, House of Doge, plans to assist 21Shares with marketing the fund.
21Shares said Coinbase Custody would be the proposed custodian of its Dogecoin ETF but did not specify a fee, ticker or what stock exchange it would list on.
Source: James Seyffart
21Shares must also file a 19b-4 filing with the SEC to kickstart the regulator’s approval process for the fund.
DOGE currently has a $24.2 billion market cap and is the eighth-largest cryptocurrency by value. It was created in 2013 as a joke and is a fork of Lucky Coin, which itself is a fork of Bitcoin.
21Shares’ proposed Dogecoin ETF is the company’s latest effort to expand its spot crypto ETF offerings, which currently includes only a spot Bitcoin (BTC) and Ether (ETH) fund.
The issuer also filed with the SEC in February to launch a spot Polkadot (DOT) ETF and last year, it filed to create a spot XRP (XRP) ETF.
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The recent surge in crypto ETF filings reflects a “spaghetti cannon approach” from issuers testing which products the new SEC leadership might approve, Bloomberg ETF analyst James Seyffart said in February.
“Issuers will try to launch many many different things and see what sticks,” Seyffart said.
Seyffart and fellow Bloomberg ETF analyst Eric Balchunas said in February that there is a 75% chance that the SEC will approve a spot Dogecoin ETF this year, while the betting platform Polymarket currently gives approval odds of 64%.
21Shares and House of Doge partner for DOGE funds in Switzerland
21Shares also said on April 9 that it partnered with House of Doge to launch a fully backed Dogecoin exchange-traded product on Switzerland’s SIX Swiss Exchange.
The 21Shares Dogecoin product will trade under the ticker “DOGE” with a 2.5% fee.
21Shares president Duncan Moir said that Dogecoin “has become more than a cryptocurrency: it represents a cultural and financial movement that continues to drive mainstream adoption, and DOGE offers investors a regulated avenue to be part of this exciting project.”
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