The debate ahead of the July 4 general election is a reminder that the 2024 election campaign is two races at once: the Conservatives need to thwart a surge from the left-wing Labour Party while also facing a formidable upset from Nigel Farage’s Reform Party on the right.
On Tuesday night, Mr. Sunak underscored the risks of a shift to a center-left government. Mr. Starmer would be forced to raise taxes by an average of 2,000 pounds ($2,550) per household (by one disputed calculation), making pensioners pay taxes for the first time in British history. Not coincidentally, the over-65s are the only demographic in which the Conservatives hold a slight lead over their opponents.
Starmer was slow to counter his opponent’s biased calculations, instead highlighting the promise of stable Labour leadership instead of a “chaos” in the Conservatives. Instant polls showed Sunak, accustomed to a tough TV format, narrowly won the debate, but such a frustrating fight is unlikely to change many people’s minds.
Voters seem to simply want the Conservatives gone, and Labour is the vehicle to achieve that, but viewers of the debate were given no indication of what Starmer will be doing at No. 10 Downing Street. Sunak’s best line was “You can’t say anything about the future, all you can do is talk about the past” (a wise line from Starmer given the recent instability of Conservative governments).
Britain’s tight finances mean plans to build a so-called British “New Jerusalem” at any speed are not possible: without the cushion of the dollar as a reserve currency, Labour cannot borrow to fund an ambitious green investment plan on the scale included in Biden’s Inflation-Breaking Bill.
One person Sunak is unlikely to attend the debate is Farage, Donald Trump’s best friend in the UK. Farage returned to British politics this week to become the official leader of the populist Reform Party, following his historic role in pushing for Brexit. He is also standing for election in the House of Commons. Farage is one of the most influential politicians in decades, beloved by fans as a media star and a dangerous bombast, though he is sometimes entertainingly biting. If his party, which currently has around 12% support, does well, it could turn the Conservative defeat into a bloodbath.
In the 2015 general election, Farage’s last campaign group, the UK Independence Party, won nearly four million votes, or 12.6% of the total vote, and came in second with 120 seats. This performance prompted Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron to follow through on his promise to hold a referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union. Farage’s passionate appeal to anti-immigration voters in that campaign helped secure Brexit. Five years ago, he defeated Johnson’s candidate in 317 seats, helping the Conservatives secure an 80-seat majority.
The latest YouGov poll already puts Labour on track to win 422 seats, compared with 140 for the Conservatives – more than the majority Tony Blair won in 1997. Twelve ministers, including Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt, are expected to lose their seats. Whatever the outcome, in numbers and casualties, the Conservatives know that Farage’s intervention could hit them hard – not just in this election, but in the bitter aftermath of any defeat.
This is crucial to Farage’s goal of reshaping the British right. “I have no faith or love whatsoever for the Conservative party,” he said recently about the party. “I want to reshape the centre-right, whatever that means.”
This is obvious The threat of weakening the Conservative Party and making it submissive after the election. Thus, the Reform Party’s ambition is not only to win seats, but also to help the Conservative Party lose them. Farage’s inspiration is the destruction of the Canadian Conservative Party in 1993, also due to the intervention of a rebel party called “Reform”. In that election, Kim Campbell’s Progressive Conservative Party was left with only two MPs and was then forced to unite with another right-wing group in a long bid to win the election.
Mr. Sunak is now appealing to wavering Conservative voters: A vote for Mr. Farage is a vote for Mr. Starmer. The prime minister is targeting eurosceptic voters who revere reform but worry that Mr. Starmer, if he wins by a landslide, might start to reintegrate Britain into the European Union. How that calculation will play out is varied enough that pollsters are divided.
It could turn out like many “traditional” elections in the UK, with centre-right forces heavily defeated by centre-left forces, languishing for a while before fighting again. But it could also turn out to be more dramatic, offering a Trump-inspired disruptor with a powerful personal following the opportunity to pulverise what remains of defeated British conservatism and remake it in a different form. Here’s a playbook for that: MAGA, with a British accent and a bit of politeness.
