MANCHESTER: Britain’s ruling Conservatives opened their annual conference Sunday, with the party’s chairman conceding they were “the underdogs” heading into a general election expected next year amid widespread economic woes.
The gathering in Manchester, northwest England, will be Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s first since he became Tory leader last October, and likely the last before the election due by January 2025 at the latest.
He is seeking to use the event to rejuvenate his beleaguered party — in power since 2010 — and set out a broader, more populist, policy agenda after nearly a year of trying to stabilise the economy.
The former finance minister inherited decades-high inflation and minimal economic growth — which have helped create the worst cost-of-living crisis in a generation — after taking the reins from much-maligned predecessors Liz Truss and Boris Johnson.
The dire situation has allowed the main Labour opposition, which starts its yearly conference in Liverpool next Sunday, to open up double-digit poll leads and ready itself for a return to government.
Conservative party chairman Greg Hands kicked off the four days of political events with an early afternoon main stage address heavy on realism.
This is likely to be a general election where the Conservatives enter as the underdogs,” Hands told the audience.
“And I know in recent years, you will have had difficult conversations with voters. I certainly have,” he added, before attacking Labour’s record in local and regional governance.
Eyes on fringe
Recently appointed Defence Secretary Grant Shapps — back from a midweek visit to Ukraine — and Foreign Secretary James Cleverly also maintained the partisan attacks in speeches, as the looming election increasingly dominates.
Cleverly simultaneously released a slickly-produced video on social media showcasing his various foreign travels — alongside narrated criticism of Labour — under the headline “Britain is back”.
Monday’s headline speakers include finance minister Jeremy Hunt, while Tuesday will feature hardline interior minister Suella Braverman. Sunak will close the conference with his speech Wednesday lunchtime.
Meanwhile ministers, Tory big-hitters, activists, commentators and others will feature in various fringe events.
They include ex-prime minister Truss, whose only conference as Conservative leader last year was overshadowed by her disastrous mini-budget unveiled less than two weeks earlier.
It rattled financial markets and its impact continues to be felt across the economy, as well as in polling about trust in the Conservatives’ handling of it.
Largely unrepentant, Truss will host a “Great British Growth Rally” on Monday, pushing her discredited tax-slashing agenda alongside several other former ministers.
Amid widespread Tory dismay at record post-WWII tax levels, dozens of senior MPs — including Truss — revealed Friday they have signed a pledge not to vote for Hunt’s November mini-budget if it contains any rates increases.
Sunak insisted in a pre-conference BBC interview on Sunday that reducing inflation would be “the best tax cut that I can deliver”.
Published in Dawn, October 2nd, 2023
