LONDON: He’s failed to meet key pledges, hit an opinion poll low, and even cramped the style of a popular Adidas shoe: Britain’s beleaguered Conservative leader Rishi Sunak appears destined to lose a looming general election.
Two tax cuts and a slightly improving economy have failed to boost Sunak’s political fortunes, while criticism from ex-prime minister Boris Johnson and speculation over Brexit figurehead Nigel Farage’s intentions are adding to his woes.
Political scientist Rob Ford reckoned Sunak has been left looking “hapless” in the face of seemingly unstoppable political momentum away from his ruling Tories.
“When the herd moves, it moves. There’s not much you can do,” he told AFP.
Sunak, 43, has yet to announce the date of the election. He is expected to call it for October or November but is legally allowed to wait until January at the latest.
Surveys overwhelmingly show that Britons want an end to 14 years of Tory rule, and nothing that Sunak has done since he became PM 18 months ago appears to be changing their minds.
A YouGov poll released this month found that the Conservatives would win just 155 seats in the UK parliament, down from the 365 that they won under Johnson at the last election in December 2019.
Keir Starmer’s opposition Labour Party would win 403 seats, the same survey found, leading to a whopping 154-seat majority.
“Right now, it’s very difficult to see how the Conservatives remain in government after the next election simply because of the scale of shift they need,” said Keiran Pedley, director of politics at polling firm Ipsos.
Sunak succeeded Liz Truss in October 2022 after Tory MPs forced her out following a disastrous 49 days in office, during which her mini-budget spooked financial markets, sank the pound and sent mortgage payments skywards.
She had followed Johnson, who himself had been defenestrated by colleagues following a series of scandals, including over illegal parties in Downing Street during Covid-19 lockdowns.
While the turmoil of the two previous administrations has hamstrung Sunak, political analysts say he has also contributed to his own plight by falling short on promises and failing to connect with voters.
Despite promising to, he has not stopped migrants arriving from France on small boats. National Health Service waiting lists are higher than when he took office. Economic growth is stagnant, although inflation has more than halved.
Sunak has also tried a number of leadership and policy resets that have fallen flat, including watering down carbon net zero commitments in a pitch to motorists and recently talking about extremism.
The rightward tilt comes as the fringe Reform UK party threatens to deprive the Conservatives of key seats, particularly if Farage stands for them as he has teased.
“(Sunak has) been trying to find this magic wand or silver bullet to turn things around but at the moment none of it seems to be moving the dial,” Pedley told AFP.
An Ipsos poll published in March found that 58 percent of voters view the Conservatives unfavorably, the highest percentage this parliament. Only 19 percent view them favorably.
The survey gave Sunak a net favorability rating of minus 38, the lowest of any politician included.
Critics often accuse the wealthy ex-financier of being out of touch with average Britons.
“He is a combination of being rather awkward and nerdy, and then if challenged he always sounds really irritable,” Ford, politics professor at Manchester University, said.
Sunak is striving to revive his party’s fortunes, traversing the country to meet voters as rumors swirl that a disastrous showing in local elections on May 2 could spark a leadership challenge.
He can’t seem to catch a break, though.
This week, Johnson slammed Sunak’s proposed comprehensive smoking ban as “nuts,” while Sunak’s spokesperson had to deny that the PM was preparing to run an AI fund in the event of election defeat.
Sunak even offered a “fulsome apology to the Samba community” after photographs of him wearing the Adidas trainers sparked headlines like: “Eight trainers to wear now that Rishi has killed Sambas.”
“There’s a kind of a doom loop that politicians can get into where they’re unpopular,” explained Ford.
“The media know they’re unpopular so everything they do is reported negatively, which further reinforces their unpopularity.”
Political observers say polls usually narrow as voting day nears and suspect liberal Conservatives might ultimately stick with the party to reduce the size of a Labour win and ensure the Tories are an effective opposition.
“Everything at this point really is becoming about damage limitation,” said Ford.
Unpopular Sunak in ‘doom loop’ as UK PM stares at election defeat
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Unpopular Sunak in ‘doom loop’ as UK PM stares at election defeat
- Surveys overwhelmingly show that Britons want an end to 14 years of Tory rule, and nothing that Sunak has done since he became PM 18 months ago appears to be changing their minds
Indonesian police clash with protesters against parliamentarians’ salaries
- Protesters marched through the streets around the parliament building, calling for a salary cut for parliamentarians
JAKARTA: Police fired tear gas and used a water cannon to push back hundreds of demonstrators trying to break into Indonesia’s parliament building on Monday to protest against what they called excessive pay and perks for legislators, witnesses said.
Some protesters, clad in dark clothing, threw rocks and set off fireworks at riot police in the capital Jakarta.
At least one motorcycle was set ablaze by protesters.
Protesters marched through the streets around the parliament building, calling for a salary cut for parliamentarians, according to a press release by Gejayan Memanggil, one of the groups organizing the protest formed by students in the Yogyakarta province.
This month, local media reported parliamentarians were paid upwards of 100 million rupiah ($6,150) a month, including a substantial housing allowance. While Indonesia is Southeast Asia’s largest economy, that remuneration is far above the average income in the archipelago of 3.1 million rupiah.
Demonstrators also protested against what they termed policies that benefit conglomerates and the military, the press release said.
Some were seen on television footage carrying a flag from the Japanese manga series “One Piece,” which has become a symbol of protest against government policies in the country.
Jakarta police spokesperson Ade Ary Syam Indradi told reporters 1,250 police personnel were deployed to maintain security around the building.
The parliament’s speaker and deputy speakers of parliament, as well as a spokesperson for Prabowo, did not immediately respond to Reuters’ request for comment.
Parliament speaker Puan Maharani told local media she would accommodate all aspirations from the public.
Norway teen suspected of terrorism after social worker murder
- In 2011, right-wing extremist Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people, most of them youths, by setting off a van bomb outside the government offices in Oslo and then opening fire at a Labour Party youth camp on the island of Utoya
- Norwegian media reported the suspect planned to attack a mosque, but the prosecutor did not confirm this
OSLO: An 18-year-old Norwegian is suspected of terrorism after the murder of a social worker in Oslo which may have been racially-motivated, authorities said Monday.
The woman, who worked in a home helping integrate vulnerable young people into society, was killed overnight Saturday to Sunday at her workplace. According to media, she was stabbed to death.
Lawyers representing the family identified the victim as 34-year-old Tamima Nibras Juhar, born in Ethiopia.
The suspect, a resident at the home, was arrested in Oslo after the attack and has admitted to playing a role in the murder, police said.
Police said Monday the preliminary charges against the suspect had been expanded to include terrorism.
“During his interrogation, he also said he planned to hurt several people,” deputy prosecutor Philip Green said.
“At this stage, we believe he planned to spread terror among part of the population and that’s why he is now the subject of a terrorism investigation,” Green said.
According to the prosecutor, the suspect “expressed hostile opinions toward Muslim people.”
Norwegian media reported the suspect planned to attack a mosque, but the prosecutor did not confirm this.
The teen, who is believed to have acted alone, was to appear before a judge before being placed in detention.
Norway has seen several far-right attacks.
In 2011, right-wing extremist Anders Behring Breivik killed 77 people, most of them youths, by setting off a van bomb outside the government offices in Oslo and then opening fire at a Labour Party youth camp on the island of Utoya.
In August 2019, Philip Manshaus opened fire in a mosque on Oslo’s outskirts before being overpowered. No one was seriously hurt, but before the attack he killed his adopted Asian half-sister in a racially-motivated act.
Both men were sentenced to 21-year prison sentences, which can be extended as long as they are considered a risk to society.
Trump suggests Americans ‘like a dictator’
- Republican Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington earlier this month to counter what he alleged was an out-of-control crime problem, also taking federal control of the city’s police department
WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump on Monday suggested Americans would like a dictator as he signed orders to tighten his federal clampdown on the capital Washington and to prosecute flag-burners.
In a rambling 80-minute event in the Oval Office, Trump lambasted critics and the media as he complained that he was not getting credit for his National Guard-backed crackdown on crime and immigration.
“They say ‘we don’t need him. Freedom, freedom. He’s a dictator. He’s a dictator.’ A lot of people are saying: ‘Maybe we like a dictator,’” Trump told reporters.
But he then insisted: “I don’t like a dictator. I’m not a dictator. I’m a man with great common sense and a smart person.”
Trump — who attempted to overturn the results of his 2020 election defeat by Joe Biden at the end of his first term — said before winning a second term in November that he would be a “dictator on day one.”
Republican Trump deployed the National Guard to Washington earlier this month to counter what he alleged was an out-of-control crime problem, also taking federal control of the city’s police department.
Trump said he was considering whether to send in the military to the cities of Chicago and Baltimore as he targets a series of Democratic strongholds. He sent the National Guard to Los Angeles — against the mayor’s and governor’s wishes — in June.
The president was particularly disparaging of Illinois governor and vocal opponent JB Pritzker, who has strongly rejected any move to send in troops to Chicago.
“When I see what’s happening to our cities, and then you send them, and instead of being praised, they’re saying, ‘you’re trying to take over the Republic,’” said Trump.
“These people are sick.”
On Monday, he further tightened his clampdown by signing an executive order to investigate and prosecute people who burn the US flag — despite a 1989 ruling by the Supreme Court saying that the act is protected by freedom of speech laws.
“If you burn a flag you get one year in jail — no early exits, no nothing,” Trump said.
Trump announced new measures tightening his grip on security in Washington, ordering Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to set up a specialized unit within Washington’s National Guard for public order, and ending cashless bail.
He also indicated that he would soon be changing the name of Hegseth’s department.
“World War Two, it was called the Department of War,” Trump told reporters. “Between us, I think we’re going to change the name.”
Democrats have repeatedly accused Trump of pushing presidential power way past its constitutional limits, most recently by deploying the National Guard in the US capital.
Billionaire Trump has also clamped down on everything from the federal bureaucracy and “woke” politics to his political opponents.
But the 79-year-old rejected all the criticisms in his angry and wide-ranging diatribe in the Oval Office, speaking for more than 45 minutes before taking reporters’ questions.
Trump rejected opponents who have called him racist by proclaiming “I love Black People” — before describing a Salvadoran man who is set to be deported to Uganda in an immigration row as an “animal.”
He went on a long detour about what he called a lack of gratitude from Pritzker about measures to tackle an invasive fish species in the Great Lakes.
“We have a very, pretty violent fish that comes from China. China carp, Chinese carp. You see them jumping out — they jump into boats and they jump all over the place,” Trump said.
Trump also called his Democratic predecessor Biden a “moron” and dismissed Russian President Vladimir Putin’s brutal 2022 invasion of Ukraine as being the result of “big personality conflicts.”
US judge temporarily blocks deportation of Salvadoran man in immigration row
- Lawyers for Abrego Garcia immediately filed a lawsuit contesting his deportation and District Judge Paula Xinis temporarily blocked his removal from the country
- Attempt to deport Abrego Garcia to Uganda adds a new twist to a saga that became a test case for Trump’s sprawling crackdown on illegal immigration
BALTIMORE: A federal judge on Monday temporarily blocked the deportation to Uganda of a Salvadoran man at the center of a row over US President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown.
Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who was wrongly deported to El Salvador in March and then sent back to the United States, was arrested in Baltimore on Monday by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said on X.
Abrego Garcia, 30, who was released last week from a jail in Tennessee, where he is facing human smuggling charges, and allowed to go home to Maryland pending trial, “will be processed for removal to Uganda,” the Department of Homeland Security said.
Lawyers for Abrego Garcia immediately filed a lawsuit contesting his deportation and District Judge Paula Xinis temporarily blocked his removal from the country while she holds further hearings on his case.
Abrego Garcia was required to check in with ICE in Baltimore on Monday as one of the conditions of his release.
Simon Sandoval-Moshenberg, one of Abrego Garcia’s lawyers, told a crowd of supporters outside the ICE field office that his client was immediately taken into custody when he turned up for the appointment.
“Shame, shame,” chanted the protesters, who were holding signs reading “Free Kilmar” and “Remove Trump.”
The attempt to deport Abrego Garcia to Uganda adds a new twist to a saga that became a test case for Trump’s sprawling crackdown on illegal immigration — and, critics say, his trampling of the law.
Abrego Garcia had been living in the United States under protected legal status since 2019, when a judge ruled he should not be deported because he could be harmed in his home country.
Then he became one of more than 200 people sent to El Salvador’s CECOT mega-prison in March as part of Trump’s crackdown on undocumented migrants.
But Justice Department lawyers admitted that the Salvadoran had been wrongly deported due to an “administrative error.”
He was returned to US soil only to be detained again in Tennessee on human smuggling charges.
Abrego Garcia denies any wrongdoing, while the Trump administration alleges he is a violent MS-13 gang member involved in smuggling of other undocumented migrants.
On Thursday, when it became clear that Abrego Garcia would be released the following day, government officials made him a plea offer: remain in custody, plead guilty to human smuggling and be deported to Costa Rica.
He declined the offer.
“That they’re holding Costa Rica as a carrot and using Uganda as a stick to try to coerce him to plead guilty to a crime is such clear evidence that they’re weaponizing the immigration system in a manner that is completely unconstitutional,” Sandoval-Moshenberg said.
The case has become emblematic of Trump’s crackdown on illegal migration.
Right-wing supporters praise the Republican president’s toughness, but legal scholars and human rights advocates have blasted what they say is a haphazard rush to deport people without even a court hearing, in violation of basic US law.
UK migrant arrivals on small boats reach new record
- Record 28,076 migrants reach UK in small boats so far in 2025
- Labour government pledges asylum system overhaul by 2029
- Opposition politician Farage proposes mass deportations of migrants
LONDON: A record 28,076 migrants have crossed the Channel to Britain in small boats this year, a 46 percent rise on the same period in 2024, government data showed on Monday, piling pressure on Prime Minister Keir Starmer over his handling of immigration.
The sharp increase comes amid mounting public concern over immigration, which is polling as the public’s top concern, with anti-migrant protests continuing outside hotels housing asylum seekers.
The record was reached on Sunday after 212 migrants arrived in four different boats that day, the data showed.
The Home Office, or interior ministry, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Demonstrations took place across Britain over the weekend following a court ruling last week that ordered the removal of asylum seekers from a hotel in Epping, north-east of London, the latest flashpoint in the immigration debate.
Starmer’s Labour government has pledged to phase out hotel use by 2029 and to overhaul the asylum system. On Sunday it announced reforms to speed up asylum appeals and reduce a backlog of more than 100,000 cases.
Home Secretary Yvette Cooper, the country’s interior minister, said the changes were aimed at restoring “control and order” to a system she described as “in complete chaos.”
Official data last week showed asylum claims were at a record high, with more migrants being housed in hotels compared with a year ago.
Nigel Farage, leader of the right-wing Reform UK party that has topped recent surveys of voting intentions, outlined plans for “mass deportations” of migrants arriving by small boats.
These would include taking Britain out of the European Convention on Human Rights, barring asylum claims, and building detention centers for 24,000 people.
He told The Times newspaper he would strike repatriation deals with countries such as Afghanistan and Eritrea, and arrange daily deportation flights.
