After coming out on top in successive rounds of Conservative Party lawmakers, Mr Sunak will be up against Liz Truss, Britain’s foreign secretary, in the party’s rank-and-file votes, with the winner announced on September 5. .
Most Tories appreciate his long-standing pro-Brexit stances, but some suspect him of deliberately starting the chain of events that led to Boris Johnson’s downfall as Prime Minister, by stepping down as Minister of Foreign Affairs. finances in early July.
Other party members are railing against his raising Britain’s tax burden to its highest level in decades, just as Britain – like other economies – heading for a severe crisis in the cost of living, with inflation beginning to accelerate.
On top of that, some Tory lawmakers fear his wealthy background could be an easy target for the centre-left Labor party in an election due in 2024.
Two party lawmakers have said there is a concerted push for ‘anyone but Rishi’ as it is feared a photographed politician clutching a 180-pound ($216) coffee mug will struggle to win over many readers.
Patrick English, associate director of pollster YouGov, said Sunak’s distancing image contributed to his low level of popularity among readers – polls currently suggest he will lose the second round – but his experience in the economic management could help turn the situation around quickly.
“Nobody is coming to the public with a plan. Nobody is saying how they’re going to work things out,” English said. “So if he can do it, his image problem won’t matter.”
The son of an East African-born Indian doctor and pharmacist who migrated to Britain in the 1960s, Sunak traded a lucrative career in finance – which included stints at Goldman Sachs and the TCI hedge fund – for parliament as late as 2015.
In 2020, then 39, Sunak looked like Johnson’s most likely successor as he raced to shield the economy from the impact of the coronavirus shutdown just weeks after becoming chancellor of the country. ‘chess board.
He abandoned the conservative small-state instinct to borrow heavily and avoid an economic depression.
In a photo that encapsulates the sense of emergency unity behind his bailout plans, Mr Sunak posed outside his Downing Bourse office, flanked by the leaders of Britain’s biggest trade union group and a major employers’ group .
THE PRAISE OF THE PANDMIA FADE AWAY
That unity quickly faded as the world’s fifth-largest economy emerged from the crisis with an additional 400 billion pounds ($480 billion) of debt and then descended into a cost-of-living crisis that has led to an increase in demands for public funds.
Sunak insisted that his priority was to fix public finances, and he offered hardly any additional help for the hardest hit households in a budget update in March this year, before bowing to pressure. increasing and to announce additional measures in May.
At the time, Sunak’s popularity was at an all-time low after he was fined for breaking COVID lockdown rules and confirmed he held a US green card while serving in the British government, raising questions as to whether he saw his long-term future in Britain.
Sunak’s personalized tagging on his social media posts during the pandemic, showing the support the government was providing to millions, also angered many lawmakers.
More damaging still, it was revealed that his wife – the daughter of a mega-rich Indian entrepreneur – had non-Britain domiciled tax status, at a time when Sunak was raising his taxes.
But he argues that he alone has the experience to navigate Britain through an impending economic downturn, or even a recession.
Sunak has called promises of immediate tax cuts made by rivals in the Tory leadership race “fairy tales” but says they will be possible once Britain gets inflation under control , which looks set to reach double digits soon.
Craig Watkins, chief executive of Kantar Public UK, said his firm’s opinion polls suggested Conservative readers were not asking for income tax cuts but wanted more targeted measures such as cuts in the value added tax on energy bills and fuel tax.
“It’s about reducing taxes on things that have gone up a lot,” Mr Watkins said. “Income tax cuts are not a priority over these two.”
($1 = 0.8341 pounds)