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ZI had a good drink of this man. Better yet, give him a day pass to Michael Gove’s favorite lair. Anything to erase the memories of the last few hours. About the only consolation Mel Stride can derive from his appearances on the Trevor Phillips and Laura Kuensberg Shows is his almost complete anonymity. Even close friends don’t always recognize him on the street. Even fewer would be able to tell you that he is the Work and Pensions Secretary.
But what makes Mel tick is his loyalty to a lost cause. That has to count for something. And he’s pretty good-natured about it. He’s the kind of guy you’d enjoy spending a day at the cricket with. Just an average guy doing an average job. Which means he ranks pretty high in the current Tory hierarchy. Rishi Sunak i can’t buy that level of mediocrity right now. So when they got the call that Number 10 was looking for an autumn boy for the Sunday shows, Mel was quick to volunteer. And this will pass.
Three days later and still the shortest prime minister’s day in France dominates the headlines. Even the Tory media are unanimous that Rishi Sunak’s decision to divert the international leaders’ event and take the first helicopter from Normandy was an epic failure. Phillips quickly hit the bruise. What was so important that Sunak had to return to London? Apart from giving a pre-election interview to ITV.
Mel squirmed. That was going to be a very long 15 minutes. Hmm… He hadn’t actually discussed this with Rish! Hmm. That made sense. He knew he would be asked about it and had made no effort to get any clarification from Number 10 as to what the hell the Prime Minister and his team were thinking. More likely, the truth is even worse than just looking stupid. Reports suggest that Sunak cannot welcome the celebration of European solidarity. Not everyone can feel foggy about the EU. Also, Sunak gets PTSD every time someone plays Ode to Joy.
At this point, Phillips began to take pity on Stride. “That’s not fair to you,” he said. I am sent so unprepared. But that wouldn’t stop him from shooting the messenger. Did the prime minister not know that thousands of Americans, French, Canadians and Germans also died during the Normandy campaign. Or he just wasn’t that bothered.
“Rishi had some very important commitments in his diary before the election was called,” Mel said. Digging deeper, when every instinct suggested he had no idea if anyone in Number 10 had a functioning brain cell. “He apologized and that’s good. He cares deeply. He didn’t run away.” Except he did just that. He cared so much that he couldn’t bring himself to stay.
Eventually, Phillips relented. “I don’t want to make you feel any more uncomfortable,” he said. How about we just agree that Sunak is the wrong prime minister at the wrong time? What was Mel thinking of replacing him? Absolutely not. It was crucial that Rish! stayed put. He wanted the Tories to suffer a historic defeat. The country wanted this.
Things didn’t get much better when the conversation turned to taxes. Mel insisted they were down significantly, while Trevor showed a graph showing they were at their highest levels in 70 years. Er… yes, but they could have been even higher if we hadn’t cut National Insurance. So the trajectory now goes down at the same time as it goes up. Schrödinger’s Taxes.
Stride was also confused about welfare cuts and the suggestion that families with three children got what they deserved. He also said the fight against tax evasion would bring in at least another £6 billion. So why didn’t the Tories do this sooner? You guys were 14 years old. After all, he smiled nervously. Look on the bright side, Mel. This may be the last time you have to do this.
In Kuensberg’s show, Nigel Farage was making what has now become an almost daily occurrence. The BBC can’t get enough of him. Anything to shake off the boredom of the election campaign. Hopefully Nige doesn’t disappoint by omitting to say something unpleasant or controversial. Laura began by asking why he seemed so happy to help put Labor in power.
Nige quite sensibly noted that the Tories had already done this work but refused to join the dots. The Conservatives winning the election makes his life much easier as after the election he can claim to be the official opposition and if all goes well he can do a reverse takeover of the Tory party.
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Then we moved on to the specifics of the policy. Never Farage’s forte. It would be nice to be reminded of the damage his Brexit has done to the country, but I guess you can’t have everything. After all, Nige doesn’t have the best track record of making things work. He is happiest as a voice of protest. On the other hand, Brexit is ancient history for our current crop of memory-challenged politicians. Maybe it was just a bad dream. It never happened. The 4% hit to GDP is just the result of an altered state of mind. Something none of the major parties want to mention.
“You want to make £50bn of spending cuts,” Laura said. Yes, Nige said confidently. And don’t forget we’ll be raising the income tax threshold to £20k and reducing inheritance tax. Unintentionally adding to necessary spending cuts. But where would the cuts come from? That was easy, Farage replied. We can stop all diversity training in the NHS. Hey! Who knew it was worth £50 billion?
It quickly became clear to everyone that Nige was even worse at economics and maths than Jeremy Hunt. Terrifying. Let him run the country with Dickie Tice as chancellor and we’ll be calling for Liz Truss to come back. None of his figures make sense. They are all just unrated soundbites designed to appeal to disaffected voters. He claims to be saving the country in its hour of need, but deep down he’s just not that serious. He can talk but he can’t walk.
Nige ended up digging in Sunak. “He doesn’t understand our culture,” he said Friday. On Sunday he tried to cover his tracks by saying he was talking about class and privilege – Farage should know all about that – but the racist slur was implicit. Laura picked it up, but the damage was done.
On Sky, the last word was from Paul Johnson of the Institute for Fiscal Studies. He condemned the main parties for covering up the impact of the spending cuts. You’re making a bad situation worse, he said, so stop shutting things down. They won’t, of course. No one has ever won an election by telling voters the truth.
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