The election began with Rishi Sunak in the pouring rain as Labour’s 1997 anthem, Things Can Only Get Better by D:Ream, blared from a nearby speaker. We should have seen it coming, considering that earlier that afternoon the same speaker had blasted out The Imperial March from Star Wars.
It has only got weirder from there. Here are the most surreal moments from the campaign (and yes, Ed Davey features a lot).
‘Wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee’
In the past few weeks, the Liberal Democrats have: gone paddleboarding; played Jenga; careered down a water slide; completed a water assault course; ridden a rubber ring tied to a boat; built sandcastles; raced wheelbarrows; pruned a garden; drummed on a yoga ball; tried Hula Hooping, water aerobics and Zumba; washed an ambulance; played Frisbee; and appeared on a catwalk after getting a makeover on This Morning. By the time we saw Davey bungee jumping live on the news, hardly anyone raised an eyebrow.
That said, this camera angle during a report on Davey attending a first aid course probably did:
What’s Ed Davey up to now? pic.twitter.com/AEoyTqYVxM
— Swed (@Swedleypops) June 26, 2024
Early on in the campaign, I joked that the Lib Dem manifesto was going to be launched at Chessington World of Adventures. In the end, it was unveiled just before a visit to Thorpe Park, with Sam Coates from Sky News providing analysis of the party’s chances while on the rollercoaster Swarm.
Davey was also interviewed by LBC’s Charlotte Lynch about rejoining the single market while spinning on a teacup ride. “We’ve got great policies for the economy, including the cost of LIVVVVVVINNG,” Davey yelled. At one point, the cameras lost sight of Davey spinning and accidentally zoomed in on a random bunch of people instead.
Ed Davey has just done an interview about the UK rejoining the single market whilst on the teacups pic.twitter.com/VEiK86pkkf
— Scott Bryan (@scottygb) June 10, 2024
Lynch and Coates weren’t the only ones who interviewed Davey in surreal locations. Sky News’s political correspondent Matthew Thompson interviewed him on a paddleboard from an adjacent kayak. It soon became evident why interviewing politicians on open water has not taken off as an art form: Thompson narrowly avoided dropping his microphone into the water, before accidentally moving between Davey and the camera because he couldn’t steer and interview at the same time.
It appears interviewing the leader of the Lib Dems whilst in a kayak is rather hard pic.twitter.com/BVwjL9YeIZ
— Scott Bryan (@scottygb) May 28, 2024
Sky News viewers then witnessed serious analysis of that interview by Thompson, back in the battlebus, split-screened with unflattering shots of Davey clambering out of the water in his wetsuit.
‘He just hung up on me’
With Conservative polling going from bad to worse to “how bad?!”, rolling news channels managed to capture Tory chaos in real time.
As Sky News’s Coates and Sophy Ridge reported a poll that suggested senior cabinet members, including Grant Shapps, would lose their seats, Coates received a call on air from Shapps himself.
💀 Grant Shapps phoned Sam Coates live on sky news then hung up after being asked for his response to the MRP poll showing him losing his seat. pic.twitter.com/SxsIDe7adU
— Marcus Carslaw (@marcuscarslaw1) June 3, 2024
The defence secretary had not realised that Coates was on television at the time. “Hello, Grant Shapps, you’re live on Sky News,” said an excitable Coates, holding out his phone as if he were a candidate during a task on The Apprentice. “Have you just seen that you’re about to lose your seat?”
*click*
“He just hung up on me,” Coates followed. This was soon spoofed as a Who Wants To Be a Millionaire? skit, with Coates as the contestant and Shapps the phone-a-friend.
‘Famously … Sky TV’
You can usually sum up an election campaign in a few soundbites. For Sunak, it was leaving D-day commemorations early to tell ITV News that he “famously” went without Sky TV as a child. For Labour, it was the deputy leader, Angela Rayner, excitedly exclaiming on Sky News that she has her own battlebus, adding: “It’s got a fridge.”
.@BethRigby: “You’ve been benched at bit, but you’re back.”@AngelaRayner: “I’m back and I’m powering up the battle bus.”
— Damon Evans (@damocrat) May 30, 2024
“An Angie Rayner battle bus is about to be unleashed?”
“I have got an Angie Rayner battle bus. Yes. You’re gonna love it. It’s got a fridge.”
😂 pic.twitter.com/yZA0cvSFUW
Also, did you know that Keir Starmer’s father was a toolmaker? You didn’t?! It has come up so many times that it was spoofed as a flag at Glastonbury and the audience jeered when he tried to mention it casually on Sky News. Sometimes catchphrases come out wrong, though, such as when Starmer dropped the clanger “the DNA runs through my DNA” on an ITV debate with Sunak.
Other memorable moments? Penny Mordaunt channelling Maddie from The Traitors by pointing at the other candidates one by one and saying “higher taxes, higher taxes, higher taxes”. Or Steve Baker reeling off “Skydiving, motorcycling, fast catamaran sailing”, when asked by Victoria Derbyshire on Newsnight what he would do if he lost the election.
But the weirdest thing said in the run-up to the election came from the foreign secretary, David Cameron, who channelled Gino d’Acampo when asked by Sky News’s Kay Burley what he planned to do if the Conservatives lost. “If my mother had wheels she’d be a bicycle,” he said.
There were also plenty of surreal moments from the political interviewers. Nick Robinson tried to corner the Green party’s co-leader Adrian Ramsay on climate policy by asking whether it was going to increase the cost of burgers, then illustrated the question by taking out a cold burger and wafting it in front of him.
The hero of the internet, however, was Sky News’s political editor, Beth Rigby, who yelled: “CAN YOU WIN IT?” at passing ministers outside No 10 while presenting. We then learned through her podcast that Rigby pronounces Haribo sweets “Ha-REE-bows”. It’s official: that is what we must call them now.
