The element of surprise and an improving inflation situation could have swayed the Tory leader to confound expectations and call a summer election, North East minds suggest.
LONDON — Rishi Sunak stood outside the famous black door of No. 10 Downing Street in the rain and bet the house.
The prime minister upset the political consensus by announcing on Wednesday that the UK general election would be held on July 4.
An election was legally due by January 2025, but most Westminster insiders expected – given the ruling Conservative Party is about 20 points behind its Labor rival in most opinion polls – that Sunak would hold off on calling a contest until at least autumn.
Josephine Harmonassistant professor of political science at Northeastern University in London, suspects that an element of wanting to catch his rivals, including Labor leader Sir Keir Starmer, played into the prime minister's decision to go early.
“I think he really wanted to capture that element of surprise,” Harmon said, “and maybe he thought that Labor would be in disarray and that it would have a strategic advantage, if you like, by calling the election.
“That's probably right, but I imagine Labor expected an election could be called at any moment – they wouldn't have been completely surprised. But I think it was definitely an element that he was going for.”
Another influence on Sunak's thinking, Harmon said, could be that an election held in the colder winter months, when energy bills could bite again, might have meant a lower turnout among core Tory supporters, who they tend to be older voters.
There might even be a personal element to it, because it's such an amazing move… He might want to get over it and get it over with.''
Josephine Harmonassistant professor of political science
So could a desire to run the election on his own and the Tories' terms rather than waiting in vain for a rise in fortunes, he suggested.
Sunak's call comes despite concerns from his own MPs and ministers – Northern Ireland Secretary Chris Heaton-Harris reportedly told Sunak he would wait longer – about the July 4 date.
Harmon said: “I think another factor is that there might even be a personal element to it, because it's such an amazing move. There's a 20 point lead for Labor at the moment and I think there was an element of him being a bit sick of being lame. He might want to get over it and be done with it.”
Unlike the fixed four-year rolling system for electing a president in the US, British prime ministers have the ability to use political events to their advantage when setting an election date.
A poor set of local election results in May had fueled speculation that Sunak would be playing for time, but a recent drop in consumer inflation appears to have prompted him to opt for a summer date.
As James Carville said after Bill Clinton's successful US presidential election in 1992, it was “the economy, stupid” that can win during campaigns.
Northeastern Global News, in your inbox.
Subscribe to NGN's daily newsletter for news, discoveries and analysis from around the world.
Harmon said polls show the top three issues for the British public are health, immigration and the economy. “The economy can be a driving factor for him if he looks at the inflation numbers and makes a strategic judgment based on that,” he added.
On the same day Sunak set the election date, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) announced that the consumer price index measure of inflation had fell to 2.3% in Aprilfrom 3.2% in the previous month.
Sunak has made reducing inflation one of the top priorities of his prime ministership, and the rate is now close to the Bank of England's target of 2%.
Economist Marianna Kolidirector of social sciences at Northeastern in London, said falling inflation was “good news for everyone”, with the cost of living crisis gripping Britain over the past two years.
However, he points out that voters are unlikely to feel the difference in their pockets before voting in the next six weeks.
“I don't think people will notice much of a difference to their supermarket bill over the next couple of months,” he said.
“Prices don't really go down. What I think they'll still find is that with things like services, there's what economists call “sticky inflation,” so it's likely to go nowhere.
“Inflation in services is still running at around 6%. This includes things like fixing up your home – housing costs are a really big concern, with housing a huge issue in the UK.'
In an attempt to control inflation, the Bank of England's independent Monetary Policy Committee raised interest rates to 5.25%. With the committee meeting on June 20, the Tories will be hoping for a rate cut that they could use to reinforce the key pre-election message that careful handling of the economy is paying off.
But Kohli said she would be surprised if there was a rate cut before Election Day.
“There is a reason why central banks are independent of the government in most countries and that is precisely because if they were controlled by the government, they would [cut the rate],” he said.
“And so the Monetary Policy Committee wants to not think about the political obstacles, but to focus on the economics.
“I would be surprised if they cut interest rates in June. You never know and they will have their reasons, but I think service inflation is still a concern.”
One argument put forward in favor of a November election was that it would potentially allow another round of tax cuts ahead of the country going to the polls, given that the UK traditionally holds two budget events a year, one in the spring and the other in the autumn. .
Kohli stressed that, like the International Monetary Fund's warning that the two cuts made between January and April to national insurance (a form of tax used to pay for pensions and health care) “point in the direction of fiscal irresponsibility”, The tax cuts aren't necessarily going to win over voters who value public sector investment.
“We know there are things the UK government will need to spend on,” he said.
“When we look at the priorities for the election, we obviously have the economy — huge. Another huge one is the National Health System and another big one is water quality, for example.
“So all of these things are of concern to voters, probably more so than rather abstract economic figures. They want to know if they can swim safely at their local beach, for example. So the tax cut approach could core the Tory vote, but probably won't sway swing voters.”
Edmund NealLondon-based associate professor of modern history, said that while a July election was a rare event in Britain, Sunak's decision to opt for a six-week campaign drew parallels with 1997, when former Tory prime minister John Major same long run.
However, Major's decision did little to dampen the public's desire for change, with Tony Blair winning heavily for Labour, marking the start of a 13-year period of opposition for the Conservatives.
“In a sense, they tried this in 1997, but I wonder if the result will probably be the same,” Neill said. “The calculation is the same, that basically the more you see the opposition, the more gold falls.
“But of course it's very ambiguous why you would bet on Suella Braverman [the outspoken former home secretary] holding the message for six weeks? I don't think I would.”
While much has been made of Starmer's efforts to bring Labor back to the center ground in order to try to emulate Blair's 1997 victory, Neill stresses that conditions are very different compared to 2024.
By 1997, the economic outlook had recovered from its dire outlook at the beginning of the decade, and global affairs were calmer than today. Starmer, who was director of public prosecutions for England and Wales before being elected to Parliament in 2015, is also not seen as having the same sensitivity as Blair.
But Neill speculates that the public may be receptive to his leadership style after a period of turmoil that included the COVID-19 pandemic and the cost of living crisis, the same way they welcomed Margaret Thatcher's successor in 1990.
“Maybe now is the time for good, boring government,” he said.
“It could be a bit like the early days of John Major, where everyone breathes a huge sigh of relief and actually quite likes boring, capable people doing relatively unremarkable things, and they'll keep blaming the previous government and hope that this can to be done for as long as possible.”
