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Rishi Sunak’s hopes of reviving flagging Tory sentiment suffered a blow on Wednesday after a second Conservative MP defected to Labor in as many weeks.
In a dramatic move, Natalie Elphicke, MP for Dover, crossed the floor in the House of Commons just moments before the start of Prime Minister’s Questions, the weekly showdown between Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer.
She criticized the “broken promises of Rishi Sunak’s tired and chaotic government” and cited his record on “housing and the security of our borders” as key factors in her decision.
While Elphicke was seen as to the right of the party on some issues, she presented herself as a centrist and accused the Tories of leaving the center of British politics.
In a coup for Starmer, Elphicke said in a statement: “The modern Labor Party looks to the future – to building a Britain of hope, optimism, opportunity and justice.”
Her departure came less than two weeks after Dan Poulter, Tory MP for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich, said he was joining Labor because he could not “look NHS colleagues and patients in the eye with a clear conscience.” “can.
It also only took a few hours for Sunak and his strategy guru Isaac Levido to brief Conservative MPs in Downing Street about the nationwide general election campaign. Another meeting is scheduled to take place next week.
Ahead of the Number 10 briefing, a minister warned that after the disastrous local election results, MPs Sunak and Levido were likely to give tough feedback on the government’s direction and raise questions about what eye-catching measures would be introduced before voters went to the polls next time Survey.
“Morale is bad and the local election results were even worse, but we have to move on,” the minister said, adding that they wanted to know what Sunak had “up his sleeve” in the run-up to the general election.
The Downing Street briefings begin a day after Tory leader Richard Holden and staff at Conservative campaign headquarters launched a series of regional briefings for Conservative MPs, offering more detailed advice on local news and leaflets.
There was despair across the ruling party after it lost around half the council seats it defended last week in the Blackpool South by-election and mayoral elections, including in the West Midlands.
Sunak’s suggestion over the bank holiday weekend that Britain was heading for a parliamentary stalemate in the general election further angered senior Tories.
His claim was based on an analysis of local election results by Professor Michael Thrasher, which suggested that although the main opposition Labor Party would be the largest party, it would not achieve an overall majority.
However, other pollsters have cast doubt on the analysis, pointing out that they expect Labor to see a repeat of its result in the 2019 Scottish general election, when the party won just one seat.
According to the Financial Times election poll tracker, Labor has a 20-point lead over the Conservatives.