Why hasn’t the PM called a GE

Oh my - 18%!

Westminster voting Intention.

LAB: 46% (+1)
CON: 18% (-2)
RFM: 13% (+1)

because he doesn't want one.

Freya5

Grantanow

I think Sunak will delay till autumn so his MPs can continue to collect their fat salaries and pensions contributions after which many of them will be collecting a generous loss of office payment! Then it's time to go and paint their duck houses.

Fat salaries, you do realise the Chief Exec of a hospital gets paid more than the PM.
How much would you suggest the PM gets paid. Or should he do it for free.

Hmm….
news.sky.com/story/westminster-accounts-mps-earn-17-1m-on-top-of-their-salaries-since-the-last-election-with-tories-taking-15-4m-12758768

Grantanow

I think Sunak will delay till autumn so his MPs can continue to collect their fat salaries and pensions contributions after which many of them will be collecting a generous loss of office payment! Then it's time to go and paint their duck houses.

Fat salaries, you do realise the Chief Exec of a hospital gets paid more than the PM.
How much would you suggest the PM gets paid. Or should he do it for free.

CoolCoco

I can’t think why anyone with more than half a brain cell would want more of the same with this current government - we have a prime minister who has guided the economy into a recession. Who is prepared to break international law to fly a plane load of refugees to Rwanda. Who has done nothing to stop the NHS from falling apart. Who is now trying to fight a culture war that he has started, plus Liz Lettuce and her nonsense who put up the cost of mortgages by hundreds, not to mention all the disgusting water companies, starving education and childcare, the failing privatised energy companies who wants more of this lot?

I certainly don’t! For all the reasons stated and so much more!

I think Sunak will delay till autumn so his MPs can continue to collect their fat salaries and pensions contributions after which many of them will be collecting a generous loss of office payment! Then it's time to go and paint their duck houses.

Not me Coolcoco, thats for sure!

I can’t think why anyone with more than half a brain cell would want more of the same with this current government - we have a prime minister who has guided the economy into a recession. Who is prepared to break international law to fly a plane load of refugees to Rwanda. Who has done nothing to stop the NHS from falling apart. Who is now trying to fight a culture war that he has started, plus Liz Lettuce and her nonsense who put up the cost of mortgages by hundreds, not to mention all the disgusting water companies, starving education and childcare, the failing privatised energy companies who wants more of this lot?

Doodledog

BevSec

I dont read any articles by the Guardian, its not balanced reading so left wing! Anyway .i will leave it here.

How do you know if you don't read them? If you only read articles you agree with you won't have to think about why you agree. It's interesting to read things from a different perspective. Anyway, IMO the Graun isn't particularly left wing - it's just not rampantly right.

So many insist that the Graun is a Left-Wing paper. In fact, I believe it's more Centre-Left. It is culturally Left, but I think in terms of economics, it's very much in the Centre.

The way some people refer to it... "that Left-Wing rag" you'd be forgiven for thinking they were talking about the Socialist Worker.

I believe its factual reporting is pretty good. The opinion pieces are a separate matter.

BevSec Which papers do you read? Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph.

I read the Daily Mail,^I^, Guardian, Daily Telegraph, Observer, Mail on Sunday. Not all of them every day, but enough to get a broad picture and all of them, at times, have excellent articles, regardless of their political leanings.

I loke to get a good rounded view across all the newspapers.

BevSec

I dont read any articles by the Guardian, its not balanced reading so left wing! Anyway .i will leave it here.

How do you know if you don't read them? If you only read articles you agree with you won't have to think about why you agree. It's interesting to read things from a different perspective. Anyway, IMO the Graun isn't particularly left wing - it's just not rampantly right.

I dont read any articles by the Guardian, its not balanced reading so left wing! Anyway .i will leave it here.

varian

"He got brexit done" - brexit has been an utter disaster for our country.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/dec/08/by-every-measure-brexit-is-harming-britain

"He won an election with a historic lanslide victory" - only because we do not live in a democracy. Our elections are run under the discredited undemocratic system of FPTP. 58% of those who cast a vote in the 2019 general election voted AGAINST Boris Johnson and his utterly corrupt Conservative Party.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_United_Kingdom_general_election

He won an election with a historic lanslide victory" - only because we do not live in a democracy. Our elections are run under the discredited undemocratic system of FPTP. 58% of those who cast a vote in the 2019 general election voted AGAINST Boris Johnson

... this cannot be repeated too often.

As for Boris Johnson, I don't understand how people cannot see that he is driven by self-interest and that his commitment to Brexit (after having previously opposed it by insisting (rightly) that most of our country's problems were home-grown, was simply to gain the coveted position of PM.

As for his private life, I make no comment. As I've said before, only he and those involved really know the dynamics of their relationships with him. And I do believe that politicians should have a private life - unless they are involved in criminal activity. I'm only concerned with him as a representative of a party in government.

The Tories are not losing votes because they've got rid of "Boris", but because the nation is beginning to see the results of their dismal 14 years in power. The pandemic, the war in Ukraine were not of their making, but years of austerity, low wages, unaffordable house prices, and government incompetence cannot be blamed on those events.

My last post was in response to BevSec

"He got brexit done" - brexit has been an utter disaster for our country.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2023/dec/08/by-every-measure-brexit-is-harming-britain

"He won an election with a historic lanslide victory" - only because we do not live in a democracy. Our elections are run under the discredited undemocratic system of FPTP. 58% of those who cast a vote in the 2019 general election voted AGAINST Boris Johnson and his utterly corrupt Conservative Party.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019_United_Kingdom_general_election

Bevsec I shall use a well known Scottish phrase regarding your unfounded belief in Johnston. It implies a negative while using two positives.
Aye. Right. 😂

BevSec

It was your reply to me. .i know everyone is perfectly able to comment without any help from me. How do you know BJ is without scruples in his personal life by the way? Do you know him personally? He got Brexit done, he won an election with an historic landslide victory, he made sure we had vaccines, and yet the amount of toxicity against him on this site is breathtaking.he was elected mayor of London twice. He would win another election for the Tories if they hadnt been intergalactically stupid enough to have got rid of him.

Think we will just have agree to disagree.

I doubt whether his two previous wives and the woman with whom he had a child then denied it would have any problems with providing you with details of his conduct within his personal life.

He won the election on the back of Brexit, he didn’t get Brexit done, he made an almighty mess of it and royally screwed the Irish over! I’m yet to see ANY benefit of Brexit.

He, personally, didn’t make sure we had vaccines, his then chancellor freed up the cash, the scientists produced the vaccines and our NHS plus a whole host of volunteers rolled out the vaccines.

He was such an amazing PM even his own party disowned him! He was subject to investigations over Partygate and he illegally prorogued parliament.

I doubt very much whether he would have won another election, but now we will never know.

You may see my post about him as “spiteful”, many of us will see it as factual!

It was your reply to me. .i know everyone is perfectly able to comment without any help from me. How do you know BJ is without scruples in his personal life by the way? Do you know him personally? He got Brexit done, he won an election with an historic landslide victory, he made sure we had vaccines, and yet the amount of toxicity against him on this site is breathtaking.he was elected mayor of London twice. He would win another election for the Tories if they hadnt been intergalactically stupid enough to have got rid of him.

BevSec

Quite a spiteful post.

Do you mean me? As original poster? What on earth is spiteful about it?

Sorry .doodledog, I meant Cossy, not you! My apologies.

I’d prefer Labour to win big as hung Parliaments never work all that well.

I don’t think we’re going to have a hung parliament, I don’t think Sunak thinks we are either.

Isn’t the Daily Star a kind of comic? I’ve always wondered who buys it.

I know there’s been a pandemic and the war in Ukraine costing money but Conservatives have been in power for 15 years and everything’s got worse really, even things that were in their power to control.
Even former enthusiastic voters could be forgiven for not bothering to vote next time and I predict a very low turn out.
Galloway and his party could dent support for Labour and the Reform party dent support for Conservatives.
Who knows what kind of hung Parliament we’ll end up with.

Romola

Going back to the original question, Sunak has no good options while the Conservatives are at the lowest point ever in the polls.
If he goes for a GE now, it would be a matter of damage limitation. He may feel he shouldn't wait, however, as the core voters, ie pensioners, are dying off daily, while younger voters are not supporting his government.
Most commentators seem to agree that tomorrow's budget will do little to alter the situation.

You'd think they would huddle together and try to work out why the electorate appears to be unhappy. There's only so much mileage they can get our of "illegals" and shipping them off to Rwanda, etc. Voters have other things on their minds as well, like the NHS, public services, pot holes, the high cost of food and fuel.
Surely, these are things that need addressing? Income Tax cuts are all very well, but if you don't earn very much (or are a 'non-productive' voter), they will hardly offset any of the above.
I suppose the dilemma is that if they do anything to deal with any of these matters, there won't be much in it for them and their friends and donors. Tax cuts might however bring back the party-unfaithful in sufficient numbers. Who knows.