Who knew that 24 hours would produce such a flurry of British political news about both Labour and Conservatives?

As yesterday’s post looked at Labour’s centenary of their first Prime Minister, let’s start with them.

Welsh Labour spend £13m on paracetamol

On Tuesday, January 23, 2024, Guido Fawkes revealed that Welsh Labour spent £13m on paracetamol tablets over the last five years in its free prescriptions programme (red emphases his):

Welsh Labour is dealing with a fiscal headache. It has now been revealed that their free prescriptions policy cost £14.5 million in the last year alone. In the last five years pharmacists’ dispensation of free Paracetamol tablets has picked up a price tag of a whopping £13,469,802. A bitter pill to swallow…

Meanwhile, among outgoing First Minister Mark Drakeford’s lasting achievements is a £900 million budget shortfall that has accumulated while Senedd politicians spaff cash on woke jobs and 20 mph speed limits …

One of Guido’s commenters put this into perspective:

If you go to Poundland you can get three boxes of paracetamol, that’s 48 tablets, for a pound. £13,469,802, the amount the Welsh government spent on the stuff, will therefore buy you 646,550,496 paracetamol tablets. The population of Wales is 3,107,500 (2021 census). That works out at 208 paracetamol tablets per man, woman and child in Wales per year. How is it humanly possible for the Welsh government to waste so much money on bloody paracetamol, which costs 2p per tablet, i.e. essentially nothing.

Labour’s Mark Drakeford announced at the end of 2023 that he would be standing down as First Minister, his replacement yet to be announced.

However, as another of Guido’s commenters pointed out, he is leaving behind more wasteful spending for the future:

Drakeford’s upping the number of assembly members to 92 at the next assembly election costing an increase of £121 million pounds. Also he’s proposed to pay each asylum seeker in Wales £1600 per month to help fight deportation … and last year he gave £150 million back to the treasury due to an underspend. England, Scotland you’ve got this type of government to come in a few months’ time.

Yes, that’s because, last year, Sir Keir Starmer said that Wales was the template he wanted to use for governing the UK as a whole.

Dear, oh dear.

This is the reality of Wales under Labour, says another commenter:

Anyone thinking of voting for Labour should look at Wales, which, under Labour control, enjoys:

The worst NHS in the UK

The lowest educational results in the UK.

The lowest economic output/head in the UK. (not aided by Senedd actions to destroy the tourist sector [the tourist tax])

Higher unemployment.

Still, one win, Wales has the highest level of absenteeism. Yay.

And let’s not forget the new 20 mph speed limit that covers most of the Principality! Another of Guido’s commenters wrote:

The 20mph fiasco might have given a few of the ‘always voted Labour cos my da did…..’ brigade pause for thought. The petition against it shows 468,462 signatures so far – that’s way more than voted Labour last time around. Question will be whether that can be translated into votes elsewhere.

Spotlight on Starmer

Allison Pearson had a piercing column on Sir Keir in Tuesday’s Telegraph, ‘Keir Starmer has some nerve — it was the Left that started the culture wars’.

Accompanying it was this photo of him with deputy Labour leader Angela Rayner MP from June 2020 over a subject that has nothing to do with Britons:

Pearson reminds us of the context and her criticism of the Conservative government (purple emphases mine):

Far from fighting the culture wars, an embarrassed government has been far too eager not to offend “progressives”. Scared of looking like “the Nasty Party”, it has seldom taken steps to defend our birthright against forces which loathe the United Kingdom. That capitulation was never clearer than in June 2020 when the statue of Winston Churchill in Parliament Square was sprayed with graffiti saying, “Churchill was a racist” during a Black Lives Matter protest following the murder of George Floyd by police in Minneapolis. The BLM demonstration was illegal under coronavirus regulations. Instead of arresting lawbreakers, however, several Metropolitan Police officers dropped to one knee in a nauseating display of contrition for sins they hadn’t committed while a colleague made of sterner stuff chose to remain standing. That officer, according to an official report “was then subjected to sustained abuse by the protesters until he followed suit”. Bullied, in other words, by all those lovely, “Be Kind” anti-racists.

As the prime minister at the time, Boris Johnson should have metaphorically thrown his arms around Churchill, I thought. Instead, he laid low in Downing Street while righteous hordes rampaged through Whitehall and our great wartime leader was boarded up for his own protection. A cringeworthy moment of cowardice by the state as it ceded key terrain to the social justice thugs.

By far the worst offender was Keir Starmer. On the day of George Floyd’s funeral, he and Deputy Ange took the knee in solidarity with “all those opposing anti-black racism”. If there is a more embarrassing photograph of a leader of the Opposition, I have yet to see it. With BLM now imploding with scandals, the Labour leader’s act of obeisance to a cult led by American, anti-white troublemakers looks ever more craven and ill-advised. The Conservatives should run the picture on billboards during the general election campaign with the caption: “Whose side is Keir on? Not Yours!”

She has more of Starmer’s diatribes against the Government and concludes:

Starmer’s comments about Conservatives being to blame for sabotaging civil society are an unwelcome preview of what we can expect when Labour wins the general election. Teachers will be given free rein to tell pupils their country is racist and despicable. Museums and galleries will withdraw “problematic” – ie anything the Left doesn’t agree with – works of art. Girls will have to use gender-neutral toilets at school because the trans-allies at Stonewall couldn’t care less if they get urinary infections because they’re too scared to go to the loo …

It’s a frightening prospect. The Conservative government should stop sucking up to progressives and spend its final months in office opposing Labour vandals who lie about its destruction of British values. Keir Starmer accuses the Right of waging a culture war, well, let him have one.

With that, let’s move on to the Conservatives.

Conservative MP aims to oust Rishi

Since 2019, we have had four Conservative Prime Ministers: Theresa May, Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak, the present incumbent.

On Tuesday, January 23, Sir Simon Clarke, one of Rishi’s backbenchers and Cabinet member under both Boris and Liz, wrote an editorial for the Telegraph, ‘Replace Sunak as PM or face decade of decline under Starmer’.

Admittedly, in terms of leadership skills, Rishi is at departmental manager level: nothing to write home about. As far as championing traditional Conservative values, he leaves us in doubt.

Back in October 2022, Sir Simon was a Rishi supporter:

In just a little over a year, he has changed his tune:

There has been much debate among Conservative MPs in Westminster over which election 2024 will most resemble: is this 1992, John Major’s improbable comeback, or 1997, his calamitous defeat?

To those willing to look at the polls, the answer is devastatingly obvious. 

In January, the Telegraph’s YouGov MRP poll showed that were an election to be held, the Conservatives would fall from our current 350 MPs to 169, just four more seats than Sir John held in 1997.

And as several experts have pointed out, that is, if anything, optimistic. The poll assumes the gap between Labour and Tories will narrow. And takes little account of tactical voting.

Nevertheless, while bending over backwards to be fair, the poll still shows more Tory seats being lost than in 1997, the Red Wall being wiped out completely and shocking defeats in historic Tory constituencies like Chichester, Horsham and Banbury.

The unvarnished truth is that Rishi Sunak is leading the Conservatives into an election where we will be massacred.

The Times says that Sir Simon Clarke is not acting alone. Lord Frost, our Brexit negotiator, released the results of that YouGov poll timed to coincide with Clarke’s piece for the Telegraph:

Clarke’s intervention appears to be part of a co-ordinated attempt to oust the prime minister started by Lord Frost, the former Brexit secretary. He released a poll last week suggesting that the Tories were heading for a 1997-style electoral wipeout before the critical vote on the government Rwanda scheme.

Further details of that poll, released on Tuesday night to coincide with Clarke’s call, suggest that the Tories could limit their losses under an alternative leader.

It asked people who they would ­prefer as prime minister — Sir Keir Starmer or a new unnamed, tax-cutting Tory leader with a tougher approach to legal and illegal migration. Those behind the poll claimed that voters in 322 constituencies in England and Wales preferred a new Tory leader, while Starmer came out on top in 164 seats.

Here is an illustration of the poll results of over 13,000 participants in England and Wales (click here to enlarge):

Clarke says:

Our country, with all the challenges we face, is on the brink of being run by Keir Starmer’s Labour for a decade or more. 

If Nigel Farage returns to the fray, as looks increasingly likely, extinction is a very real possibility for our party.

And it is now beyond doubt that whilst the Prime Minister is far from solely responsible for our present predicament, his uninspiring leadership is the main obstacle to our recovery.

Rishi Sunak has sadly gone from asset to anchor. He lags Keir Starmer — himself no Tony Blair — by double digits on the “Best Prime Minister” metric. 

He leads Keir in just 139 seats across Great Britain; he is behind in 493. His personal approval ratings have collapsed, particularly amongst the key voters we need to win back, and are now lower than Boris Johnson and even Jeremy Corbyn’s were when they resigned.

Remarkably, the Conservative party, hardly known for having a strong brand right now, outpolls Sunak in 88 per cent of constituencies — and in 98 per cent of the key seats we hold but are set to lose.

Rishi has great strengths. He is decent to his core, fiercely intelligent and works formidably hard.

I saw these strengths up close whilst chief secretary to the Treasury when he was chancellor.

But these strengths cannot compensate for two fundamental problems. He does not get what Britain needs. And he is not listening to what the British people want.

Clarke says that now is the time to act. Furthermore, that action will be straightforward — and will include Conservative Party members, unlike Rishi’s election which was restricted to Conservative MPs:

I know many MPs are afraid another change of leader would look ridiculous. But what could be more ridiculous than meekly sleepwalking towards an avoidable annihilation because we were not willing to listen to what the public are telling us so clearly?

A change of leadership would not have to be a protracted affair. As was planned in October 2022, the contest need only take a week.

Two days of MPs voting, a few more days before an online members’ vote. Which is worse: a week of chaotic headlines in Westminster, or a decade of decline under Keir?

I know I will be attacked for saying this. Perhaps even accused of positioning myself or on behalf of another — emphatically neither of which I am doing. I am speaking out because the stakes for our country and my party are too high at this moment to stay silent.

Every Conservative MP will need to live with the decision they make in the coming days for the rest of their lives. Failing to act would itself represent a decision.

We have a clear choice. Stick with Rishi Sunak, take the inevitable electoral consequences, and give the Left a blank cheque to change Britain as they see fit.

Or we can change leader, and give our country and party a fighting chance.

I completely understand his point. Yes, it will look ridiculous now, but it might be seen as a stroke of genius in future. And it would respond to what voters want: a properly Conservative leader.

The problem is finding someone who would fit the bill. We need someone with Boris’s bombast and bluster on the campaign trail.

A number of Conservative MPs were critical of Clarke’s call. We shall see how this unfolds in the weeks ahead. So far, Guido Fawkes says it is not looking good for Clarke.

Lee Anderson wants Deputy Chairman job back

After resigning the Conservative deputy co-chairmanship (the other being Brendan Clarke-Smith, who also resigned) over the Safety of Rwanda bill several days ago, Lee Anderson says he would like the position back were Rishi to offer it to him. He abstained from the vote.

On January 24, the former Labour councillor and ex-miner told the Telegraph that he wasn’t exactly put off from voting No, even though he claimed to be at the time:

… when he went to vote against the legislation, “the Labour lot were giggling and laughing and taking the mick and I couldn’t do it”.

But reflecting on the moment he changed his mind, he insisted “it wasn’t anything to do with running away or being scared”.

“I’m the last person to be scared of stuff like that,” he said.

“It was a reminder that actually I was letting my colleagues down and I’m not going to give you the satisfaction, that sort of stuff.”

At the time, Mr Anderson said he quit alongside Brendan Clarke-Smith, a fellow deputy chairman, because he was unable to vote for something he did not “believe in”.

But asked if he would return to his old role if approached by Mr Sunak, he said: “Yeah, of course I would.”

He added: “I did wrong. Well, I say I did wrong, I acted on a point of principle. I had to resign. I had no choice. I bear no malice or anything, it’s just I know the rules.”

Mr Anderson said both Mr Sunak and Simon Hart, the chief whip, have “been fine with me” since the Rwanda vote, but they have only spoken “in passing”.

Lee Anderson continues presenting his hourly television programme on GB News every Friday from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m.

As for a new Conservative Party leader, Anderson:

urged colleagues moving against Mr Sunak to “stop being silly” and get behind their leader, as “our only chance to win the next election is by keeping Rishi in No 10” …

He also played down reports of disgruntled Tory colleagues submitting letters of no confidence in the Prime Minister, insisting there was “no chance” of Mr Sunak being removed before the next election.

“Read my lips: no chance,” he said.

Mr Anderson added: “He’s got a plan, we’ve got to stick to the plan, haven’t we? Rishi’s got a plan. I mean, Rishi’s working with inflation, he’s working with the debt. It looks like we’ve got some tax cuts coming in March. You know, if we start putting money back in people’s pockets, their attitudes can change very, very quickly.”

In closing, let’s move to the world stage.

WHO chief says global pandemic treaty under threat

This is great news.

Dr Tedros says that his master plan for the world’s nations to surrender their sovereignty to the WHO is under threat from misinformation.

The plan was to finalise everything at the 2024 World Health Assembly on May 27, but momentum has slowed down, partly by ‘entrenched positions’ and also by ‘a torrent of fake news, lies and conspiracy theories’ (click here for an enlarged version):

Well done, everyone!