THERE’S an age-old saying about elections that wise folk like to remind us of at the start of every political campaign.
“Oppositions don’t win elections, governments lose elections.”
Never has that adage been more true than for the snap election announced by Rishi Sunak for July 4.
Time and again, voters tell pollsters that they are fed up with the current Tory Government, but they also say they don’t have much faith in Labour to do a better job.
After 14 long years of Conservative rule and plenty of talk about how people want change, there is surprisingly little enthusiasm for a Starmer government.
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Indeed, there is remarkably little enthusiasm for either of the two leaders: Mr Mediocre vs Mr Boring is hardly the big box office draw of the century.
Not-very-merry men
(Frankly, if you’ve made it this far into this column then congratulations — you’ve lasted longer than most of us can stay awake during a Sunak or a Starmer stump speech.)
But we’re going to be hearing a lot about how voters want “change” over the next six weeks.
Whether it’s from Labour or the smaller parties, such as Reform UK, the Lib Dems and the Greens, they’ll be telling us until they are blue in the face that they are offering the country CHANGE.
Rishi Sunak, meanwhile, will lead his Tory band of not-very-merry men in one long chorus of: “Our plan is working, stick with the plan.
Let’s just be grateful for small mercies that we’re getting a snap election and only being forced to endure this stuff for SIX WEEKS instead of six long MONTHS.
In all honesty, there can’t be many people who are thinking, “Yep, this is all going swimmingly well! More of the same, please, Rishi!”.
If there are, don’t worry, the men in white coats will be heading round soon.
Everyone knows our country isn’t working any more. Our economy is in a mess, we don’t control our own borders, crime is out of control, our NHS is creaking under its own weight, our Armed Forces aren’t equipped to defend the realm, too many of our young people don’t want to work while too many of our old people are being left to rot in inadequate social care.
Meanwhile, our schools are crumbling, our roads are full of potholes, our public transport is unreliable, our water is full of sewage, our energy supply is expensive and unreliable and, to add insult to injury, we are also in need of a couple of million more houses for people to live in.
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But, apart from that, everything is just fine.
To adapt Monty Python, we might well ask: What have our politicians ever done for us?
So, yes, the situation is pretty bad and the list of problems is endless.
And, yes, change would be a darned good thing. Plenty of it, and quickly! But what kind of change?
What exactly is on offer from Keir Starmer, who is, after all, the only alternative Prime Minister waiting in the wings?
An economy that is even more dependent on immigrant workers and unreliable green energy than it already is?
Reform of the NHS — but what reform will actually deliver better healthcare and value for taxpayers?
Renationalising our railways is a popular policy but what would it actually achieve in terms of the train service on offer?
A “fairer” immigration system, yes, but fairer to whom?
The Tories may have failed on many major issues in recent years, but there is little evidence that Labour’s plans won’t make things even worse.
After all, Keir Starmer will face exactly the same in-tray as the current PM — as well as all the same economic constraints and global events that continue to rock our nation.
But Mr Flip Flop has shown himself to be as unreliable as he is deathly dull.
Can anyone really trust Starmer on defence or the economy when he happily campaigned TWICE to elect Jeremy Corbyn to be Prime Minister of this country?
Can we trust him to stick to any of his pledges to voters when he worked for years to betray Brexit? Or trust him to tackle law and order when he took the knee to Black Lives Matter?
Oh, and, while we’re at it, has he worked out what a woman is yet?
Labour’s pitch to voters is nothing more than “we can’t be any worse than the current bunch”. But all the evidence points to the contrary.
This is a far cry from 1997, when Tony Blair rode into office on a landslide wave of enthusiasm.
Cat among pigeons
Where’s the inspiration? The vision? The ambition? Instead, Starmer is just offering us a mediocre alternative to Sunak’s managed decline of our once great country.
Is it any wonder that so many voters are looking to other alternatives, such as Reform UK, or planning not to vote at all?
Certainly, Nigel Farage has set the cat among the pigeons by announcing that, while he won’t be standing as an MP himself, he will be leaving his GB News show to campaign for Reform UK, meaning the Tories are now being flanked on the left AND on the right.
With six weeks until polling day, voters are sick and tired of our country being run into the ground by politicians on all sides. We want — and deserve — change.
Tony Blair campaigned in 1997 to the tune of Things Can Only Get Better.
But Keir Starmer has yet to convince many voters that the change he is offering is a change for the better, not the worse.
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