Christopher Furlong/PA
RIshi Sunak claims to have “made progress” on “all five” of his pledges to voters, as set out at the start of last year.
Two months after replacing Liz Truss, who became the shortest-serving prime minister in UK history after surviving just 44 days in office, Sunak set out five objectives for his administration, which were:
A year on from setting out his stall, the PM has now told voters in Lancashire that he has “made progress” on all of the objectives he set out, even though that is complete tosh.
In fact, only one of the pledges – to halve inflation – can be argued to have definitely been achieved, and he doesn’t even have the levers to control that measure.
As we pointed out here, if he did, why did he allow it to soar to over 11 per cent?
As for the others, he’s either made no progress or made things a lot worse!
Here’s a scorecard The London Economic has compiled to keep track of his progress:
Rishi Sunak proudly declared that “the economy is growing” last month in a video filmed in Downing Street.
Three days later it was shown to be flatlining and now revised figures show that Britain could be heading for a recession.
Gross domestic product (GDP) fell by a revised 0.1 per cent against the zero growth initially estimated, the ONS said.
It also flatlined during the second quarter of the year, after prior estimates showed 0.2 per cent growth, painting a bleaker picture for the economy.
To give credit where it is due, Jeremy Hunt has remained unwavering amidst calls from the Tory right to slash taxes in an era where public spending cuts are having a devastating effect on public services.
Unfortunately, that hasn’t helped the chancellor reduce government debt.
Government borrowing was higher than expected last month amid greater benefits costs and increased interest payments, according to official figures.
However, it was lower than the same month last year after the Government spent significantly less on energy support for households.
But the Government has borrowed over £24 billion more so far this financial year compared with a year ago, which means the chances of election-boosting tax cuts could be fading.
Victoria Atkins has suggested that the Prime Minister’s pledge to cut NHS waiting lists relies on the “threat” of further NHS strikes being “removed”.
Which makes videos like this all the more puzzling.
With NHS waiting list standing at 7.8 million — half a million more than in January – Sunak needs Victoria Atkins fanning the flames on industrial action like a hole in the head.
Regrettably, that is precisely what she has just done.
A planned address from the prime minister on immigration was revealed to have been quietly canned this week by Number 10 amid concerns that the government’s “stop the boats” plan could be in crisis.
Rishi Sunak had been expected to make a statement in December outlining progress on the Rwanda deportation scheme and plans to house asylum seekers in ships such as the Bibby Stockholm and in former barracks, Whitehall sources have told the Guardian.
But the planned speech has been shelved after Conservative party splits over the Rwanda bill, the suspected suicide of an Albanian man on the Bibby Stockholm in Portland, Dorset, and a failure to place asylum seekers in large numbers into surplus MoD accommodation.
