Rishi is on the way out?

[Justkeepswiimming]

Is Rishi on the way out? Could the Tories really be contemplating replacing him at this point in time?

Having watched the obnoxious Kimi Badenoch this morning (and the equally awful Michael Gove on Friday) be careful what you wish for.

Rishi is the most acceptable face of the Tory party currently.....

Why is Kemi Badenoch obnoxious?

I think they have to get rid of him yes and bring someone new in to lead them through the election. And they know it. And it’s wrong to say no one wants it, they do.

Yes they do. It has to be before end of Jan 25. They have more than enough time.

Leaving her generally snotty attitude out of the equation as it's subjective, her support for the Rwanda bill which isn't.

Yet another politician with a wealthy background looking to pull the drawbridge up behind them.

It's a poisoned chalice. People keep speculating about penny mordant. It would be a terrible career move for her. She'd be better off waiting until the torries lose and then be the opposition leader and win in 4 years. Even if she thought she could get more votes it's a massive uphill battle. No one wants to be pm for 5months and then lose a general election.

Rishi supports the Rwanda bill too and is even more wealthy so not sure how he is more acceptable on those grounds. Clearly the party is doomed whoever leads it though.

Because she’s a right-wing Tory. Obnoxiousness is part of the job description.

What is their parliamentary majority now?

I missed her on the media round this morning, was she announcing that she is going to take Truss' bill through parliament on government time. (of which I note there is plenty due to a lack of other legislation).

About 60 I think. Still plenty, but it had been reduced because they have lost a lot of by-elections & suspended a few MPs from the party for various misdemeanours.

@Freakinfraser I think realistically though they need to have a campaigning window that isn’t impacted by Christmas .

There are apparently a couple of backbenchers who haven’t had a go at being pm yet, and they want to get access to the lifelong ex-prime minster pension quick before the Tories lose power.

So they’ve all agreed that everyone left can be pm for two days, in a rota. That should wring a bit more money out of the taxpayers and into their own pockets before the gravy train comes to an end.

I'm not convinced the current Tory party has the organisational abilities to get that sorted.

Fair point!

What do you mean another unelected prime minister? That’s normal. We don’t elect the prime minster in the UK. Never have.

Oh I don’t know, I think she’d be game for the challenge.

Sigh….
If you think voters don’t care about who is the political leader of the party they are voting for you are wrong. Would you vote for a party that said “we are keeping the leader secret until after the election” or “well this chap is leading us for now but we might change that regularly”. No you wouldn’t!
And everyone knows that this current Government are in power because so many people voted for that bloody clown Johnson, it was Corbyn V Johnson. It definitely mattered who the party leaders were! Boris won because he was Boris. The Tories won because of him.

That’s just not how politics work; and never has done.

Its reassuring to know that no one voted in the last election because But Jeremy Corbyn was the leader of one of the parties.

Is there another example of 3 different leaders without an election?

4 Prime Ministers being appointed in a single parliament is certainly unusual , and I can’t think of a previous occasion off the top of my head. Maybe Churchill Eden & MacMillan in the 50s? It is, however, entirely normal for PMs to be appointed between general elections, & always has been.

Jim Callaghan, John Major & Gordon Brown were all appointed during the course of a parliament. Callaghan in 1976 because Harold Wilson resigned. Major in 1990 because Thatcher was deposed & Brown in 2007 because Blair resigned.

I knew some of the stuff I learned during my politics degree would come in useful one day…

Apologies for the typo in my last post, it’s 3 PMs (so far) in the current parliament, of course, not 4. Johnson, Truss & Sunak.

Someone might well want the job where you get £115K annual 'allowance' for life after being in office. They could maybe squeeze in more than one replacement before the GE.

That sounds suspiciously suggesting we can't change things because they've always been that way.

Another way of looking at it is precisely because we can't vote directly for a PM, then we should have a say when they change ? Especially when - as we have seen with Truss and Sunak - they bring in a completely different manifesto to the one the public were allowed to vote on.

No one in the UK has ever voted for Rwanda, for example. We've never been given the chance.