The American writer Joe Klein once described elective politics as “the art of competitive storytelling”. We know the story that Rishi Sunak wants to sell to the public. The scion of an upwardly mobile family of Indian ancestry who has reached the apex of power thanks to talent, hard work and the opportunities provided by Britain. A safe pair of hands who will fix the ghastly mess left by his predecessors. A fresh leader who will restore, as he put it in his sales pitch outside Number 10, “integrity, professionalism and accountability” to government after an appalling period when these qualities have been shockingly absent.
If he can make this tale persuasive with the country, then maybe the Tories can rebuild public trust from the smoking wreckage of the Johnson and Truss premierships. Labour’s senior team is alert to this. At the most recent meeting of the shadow cabinet, Sir Keir Starmer warned his colleagues to expect a significant Tory bounce in the polls. That does not make the Labour leader a super-forecaster. Given the extinction-level ratings the Tories collapsed to over the autumn, there is really only one way for the Conservative poll level to go and that is up. Which means a deflation of the stratospheric leads Labour has been enjoying. “None of us thought that the 30-, 20-point leads were real,” says one senior Labour frontbencher. “I think we’ll get back to where we were four or five months ago.” If she’s correct, Tory morale ought to improve and some Labour people will get windy.
