British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak went into full damage control mode on Friday as Nigel Farage’s Reform UK party overtook the Conservatives in the general election polls for the first time.
Attempting to downplay the historical significance of the populist Reform party of Nigel Farage overtaking his Conservatives, Prime Minister Sunak said that “the only poll that matters is the one on July 4th”.
Speaking from the G7 meeting in Italy on Friday afternoon, Sunak said per The Telegraph: “I think we’re only halfway through this campaign and the Conservative Party and me are going to fight for every single vote until the last day.
“What you did see this week is the two leading parties put out their manifestos for the future of our country, and there’s a very clear choice.”
“What I would say is if that poll and all these things were replicated on election day, what that would be is handing a blank cheque to Keir Starmer to increase people’s taxes on their home, their car, their job, their pension, their house, that’s what it will do.
“So I’m going to continue fighting very hard to make sure everyone understands the choice that’s ahead of them.”
Mr Sunak was responding to a poll from YouGov which found that the left-wing Labour Party of Sir Keir Starmer maintained its commanding lead with 37 per cent, while the Conservatives fell to 18 per cent, falling behind Nigel Farage-led Reform at 19 per cent for the first time in history.
In an interview with The Telegraph on Friday, former Home Secretary Suella Braverman blamed the election woes for the Tories on the failure to meaningfully reduce immigration, as the party promised the public in multiple election manifestos.
Braverman, who was forced out of her cabinet post by Sunak last year after criticising the extremism seen at anti-Israel demonstrations in London in the wake of the October 7th terror attacks, said: “We shouldn’t have this split on the Right. If we’re a proper Conservative Party that just does what we promised to do, like cut migration and cut taxes, we would not have this division… and we’d have another 15 per cent added on to our polling right now.”
“I do think that had we done better on immigration, I don’t think we’d be dealing with this problem right now. I urged the Prime Minister for years to take some action on illegal immigration… I was blocked.”
Braverman went on to suggest that figures such as Nigel Farage would have supported the Tory Party were it not for failures on key issues such as migration and said that she would have been open to the Brexit boss joining the Conservatives.
Demonstrating the divide within the Tories, Foreign Secretary David Cameron lashed out at Mr Farage on Saturday for being “incredibly divisive”, adding: “I think with these populists what you get is inflammatory language and hopeless policy.”
“I want to be as sure as we can that we get no Reform members of parliament and the Conservative Party can move forward,” the foreign secretary told The Times of London.
Cameron, who stepped down as prime minister in 2016 after opposing the EU referendum led by Nigel Farage, accused the Brexit leader of “trying to destroy the Conservative Party by standing for Reform”. Mr Farage has openly stated that his goal in this election is to supplant the poorly-named Conservatives as the true opposition party following the expected Labour victory.