'The Manchester Tory conference is a wake for a dying party'

01 October 2023 , 20:03

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There were hundreds of empty seats at the Conservative Conference in Manchester for the first session (Image: Andy Stenning/Sunday Mirror)

His Cabinet ministers may be banging on the coffin lid and screaming “he’s not dead yet!” but Rishi Sunak has lost their support, never mind the country.

The Tory conference in Manchester is a wake where the mourners are arguing over who inherits the deceased’s tarnished title. He is desperate to show there’s still life in an unpopular premiership, spewing out policies that crumble on contact with reality. They say what might best salvage their own seats or will position them to seize the devalued Tory crown when Sunak is consigned to history.

Watching up close a government disintegrating is like buying a ticket to a zombie movie, with the walking dead stumbling around before the electorate finishes them off. I saw it with John Major before 1997, alas Gordon Brown in 2010, and here now. So helicoptering Rishi declares he is against a war on motorists then suffers an M-way smash when asked to explain himself.

Anyone for a Rishi Sunak cappuccino? (PA)

Brass-necked Michael Gove claims the goal is tax cuts, after backing post-war record highs, while flailing Sunak, yes him again, wants different cuts. Poisonous Suella Braverman is denounced as an attention-seeking crazy by Priti Patel, who is simply relieved somebody is more reviled. Fancying her chances post-Sunak, Kemi Badenoch shouted she wants to stop the world to let Little Britain jump off with Russia and Belarus.

Hundreds of empty seats in a smaller hall for Defence Secretary Grant Shapps’ “big” speech symbolised a dying party. Bumping into a Tory former Minister with the ability to take a step back, he predicted Starmer will soon be our nation’s PM.

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The Conservatives, he concluded, possess no clear message while Labour offers real change, hope, better schools and hospitals, and revived living standards. No, he isn’t poised to defect. And I don’t believe Labour’s current, limited policy offer matches the far brighter rhetoric. This week in Manchester it isn’t only HS2 facing derailment.

Kevin Maguire