9:47pm Monday: It’s a lot closer than the polls had it, but still a very easy win for Liz Truss. She wins over 81,000 votes to over 60,000 for Rishi Sunak. In percentage terms, that’s a 57.4-42.6 margin for Truss.
Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.
The winner of the Conservative leadership contest, and thus Britain’s next PM, will be announced at 9:30pm AEST tonight (12:30pm UK time). In July, Conservative MPs whittled the candidates down to a final two: Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak. The Conservative membership voted by mail between these two, with the postal reception deadline passing Friday.
A YouGov poll of 1,089 Conservative members for Sky News UK that was conducted August 12-17, gave Truss a 66-34 lead over Sunak, down from her 69-31 lead in early August. Among the 57% who had already voted, Truss led by 68-31. Boris Johnson would easily win a three-way race with 46%, to 24% for Truss and 23% Sunak.
In national UK polls, Labour has taken a double digit lead over the Conservatives. A key reason is the massive rise in energy prices, with the price regulator confirming on August 26 that energy prices for the typical household would increase 80% from October compared to now. That means gas and electricity prices this coming northern winter will be about 2.6 times what they were in the 2021-22 winter after a large increase in April.
It’s also plausible that some people voted for Johnson at the 2019 election, rather than for the Conservative party. By ousting Johnson, the Conservatives could alienate these voters. But the next UK general election is not due until late 2024, and the economy may be better then.
US by-elections suggest improved prospects for Democrats at midterms
I wrote for The Conversation last Thursday that before the US Supreme Court’s Roe v Wade ruling on June 24, the average US by-election was recording a two-point gain for Republicans relative to partisan lean. In four by-elections since, it’s been an average of a nine-point gain for Democrats. This analysis does not include the Alaska by-election on August 16, which was resolved Wednesday by preferential voting. Democrat Mary Peltola defeated Republican Sarah Palin to gain this seat.
Polling is also consistent with a lift for the Democrats two months before the November 8 midterm elections, while Liz Cheney suffered a crushing loss in the Wyoming Republican primary.
Brazilian elections: October 2 and 30 (if necessary)
The first round of the Brazilian presidential election will be held October 2, with a runoff October 30 if no candidate wins at least 50%. The contenders are far-right incumbent Jair Bolsonaro and the leftist Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Lula), who was president from 2003 to 2010.
In five polls conducted at least partly since the August 28 first presidential debate, Lula leads Bolsonaro by between four and 13 points. Another left-wing candidate is winning 8-9%, so Lula will probably not win outright in the first round. In the runoff, Lula has a seven to 15 point lead over Bolsonaro.
Italian, Swedish and Israeli elections
There hasn’t been much change in Italian polls ahead of the September 25 election since my detailed write-up three weeks ago. The right-wing coalition is in the high 40s, the left coalition in the high 20s or low 30s, the Five Star Movement has about 12% and a centrist alliance about 7%. With 37% of parliamentary seats to be elected by first past the post, the female leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, is likely to be Italy’s next PM.
The Swedish election is next Sunday, and it uses proportional representation (PR) to elect its 349 MPs. The Social Democrats are well ahead, but only have 29% so would be far short of a majority. They would still need at least one more coalition ally after the Left party and the Greens.
The Israeli election will be held November 1 after the collapse of a coalition formed to keep former PM Benjamin Netanyahu out. The 120 Knesset seats are elected by PR with a 3.25% threshold. Polls currently suggest that Netanyahu’s Likud, with religious and far-right allies, would fall short of the 61 seats needed for a Knesset majority, but are ahead of the current governing parties.
Just put $500 on the Swedish election.
I would be laying more on the Brazilian election but I think is a risk of a coup happening is Lula looks like winning and I don’t know how the bet agencies would treat that.
I am not sure that Europe will cope well with the far Right controlling Italy and it could be a real threat to the stability of the EU.
As for the UK, the GBP fell to 20 year low against the USD about 4pm but it looks like BoE has intervened. The markets don’t seem to have a lot of confidence in Truss.
And why would you? There is basically a lack of talent there, lead by a blunt pencil of a leader with the former leader still hoping to make a comeback. I can’t see Sunak, Gove, or many of the others wanting to be in her cabinet.
AB
Did Sunak say he would serve in Truss cabinet?
The chair of 1922 party gets his moment in the sun.
2 candidates presented
Returning officer. His moment in the sun.
Drum Roll…..
Truss wins with 57.3%
Sunak has to grin and bare it. It was much closer than predicted.
Breaking Liz Truss wins leadership race
It’s official. Liz Truss has won the Conservative Party leadership race.
Tomorrow she will become prime minister when she visits the Queen in Balmoral for an invitation to form her UK government.
“Breaking Liz Truss wins leadership race
It’s official. Liz Truss has won the Conservative Party leadership race.”
The UK is so f*cked. The USA was headed towards implosion on the fast track, but the UK has somehow found an inside run on the rails and is current favorite to implode first.
No excitement on Tories. Andrew Earlwood lesser of the 2 lessers emerges victorious about sums it up.
Italian politics has seriously declined in recent years. Any chance of left getting its act together?
In Liz we Truss!
And increasingly likely Meloni woman will be Italian PM with the help Berlusconi party.
Germany had elections only recently and German Chancellor is already deeply unpopular.
Macron is running a minority government.
Orbin of Hungary is trying to sabotage EU will from within.
Erdogan is making hay while the sun shines. Now nobody is questioning is human rights violations and suppression of opposition.
The less I say about MBS of Saudi Arabia, the better. Biden went begging to him for oil.
Italian elections: According to La Repubblica, 42% of voters will either abstain or are still undecided…. Heaven knows who will be the winner.
Israel seems to be seriously wanting to take over the record for the most politically unstable Western democracy in the Mediterranean basin from Italy… much to the relief of the Italians, I guess.
Good news from the USA and Brazil…. After Trump out of office (and hopefully into jail…. sooner than later), no mid-term Congress come back for the Republicans?…. Followed by the exit of the pathetic Bolsonaro (the Butcher of the Amazon)?… It couldn’t get any better than that!
DisUnited Kingdom: So, the hard Neoliberal Truss won and is now PM…. Starmer celebrated the good news!!!… 🙂 ….. Now nobody in the left of the Labour party can accuse him of being a Neoliberal. Compared with Truss, he will look like a Bolshevik…..
Nice to see the Social Democrats ahead in Sweden….
“h says:
Monday, September 5, 2022 at 9:41 pm
…Tomorrow she will become prime minister when she visits the Queen in Balmoral for an invitation to form her UK government.”
Will Truss be welcomed by a QEII hologram?
At least a Leftish government is likely in the republic of Ireland (although the election is 2.5 years away)
Sunday Independent poll (1200 respondents)
Sinn Féin 36%
Finn Gael 21
Fianna Fáil 16!!
Labor 3
Greens 2
People before Profit 5
Social Democrats 4
Aontú. 3
Independent 11
The current government has 39%
The combined left vote (not counting independents) is 53%
There’s a widespread belief in the UK that Boris Johnson is plotting a comeback. The idea is that all he has to do is wait for Truss to make such a monumental stuff-up that the party begs him to take over again.
The terrifying thing is that, given those polls of the theoretical three-way contest, combined with Truss’s general level of competence (or lack of it), it might just work.
Adrian Beaumont
Genuine question because I never really followed the career of Liz Truss.
Why do people think Lizz Truss is incompetent?
Can someone provide examples of incompetence?
Ven,
Her negotiation of trade deals with Japan, Australia, and New Zealand where she basically just gave the other side whatever they asked for, pop to mind.
”
EightESsays:
Tuesday, September 6, 2022 at 11:12 am
Ven,
Her negotiation of trade deals with Japan, Australia, and New Zealand where she basically just gave the other side whatever they asked for, pop to mind.
”
EightES
She was Foreign Secretary. Trade deals are done by Trade Secretary, whoever he/she is.
Even if Liz Truss did gave away whatever Australia, NZ and Japan asked for, that proves she is nice lady not an incompetent person. 🙂 Afterall Australia, NZ and Japan were duded by UK for a long time.
Hearing Liz Truss’s backstory reminds me of the Groucho Marx line “These are my principles and if you don’t like them I have others”.
Priti Patel Resigns As UK Home Secretary Hours After Liz Truss Wins PM Race
https://www-ndtv-com.cdn.ampproject.org/v/s/www.ndtv.com/world-news/priti-patel-resigns-as-uk-home-secretary-hours-after-liz-truss-wins-pm-race-3318740/amp/1?amp_gsa=1&_js_v=a9&usqp=mq331AQIKAGwASCAAgM%3D#amp_tf=From%20%251%24s&aoh=16624298664823&csi=0&referrer=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com&share=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ndtv.com%2Fworld-news%2Fpriti-patel-resigns-as-uk-home-secretary-hours-after-liz-truss-wins-pm-race-3318740
Truss was Trade Secretary for a couple of years before becoming Foreign Secretary in September last year.
Just as an aside, I wish the Poms would call their ministers ministers. Calling them secretaries leads to confusion between them and civil servants with similar-sounding titles. To me, anyway.
I think that’s a far too neat way to sum up the Swedish election – S-V-C-MP and SD-M-KD-L ‘blocs’ are neck and neck in the polls. The election could easily go to the right with Sweden Democrat confidence and supply.
Liz Truss to appoint a Cabinet of loyalists: (From The Guardian)
Kwasi Kwarteng, Truss’s closest cabinet ally, will become her chancellor, and she is also expected to confirm the appointments of Suella Braverman as home secretary and James Cleverly as foreign secretary. Those appointments will mean that, for the first time, there will be no white men in the four great offices of state.
Her rival, Rishi Sunak, is not expected to be offered a job in her cabinet, a break from the tradition whereby most unsuccessful leadership contenders have been offered posts. The former chancellor told the BBC that the cabinet was “not something I’m thinking about”, and some allies suggested he would prefer to remain on the backbenches in case Truss’s leadership implodes.
Priti Patel and Nadine Dorries both announced that they would quit as home and culture secretaries, and return to the backbenches. Cabinet Office minister Nigel Adams and Tory party co-chair Ben Elliot also announced their resignations.
Ven wrote, “Adrian Beaumont
Genuine question because I never really followed the career of Liz Truss.
Why do people think Lizz Truss is incompetent?
Can someone provide examples of incompetence?”
OMFG, watch the ‘cheese speech.’
Eight ES wrote,”Just as an aside, I wish the Poms would call their ministers ministers. Calling them secretaries leads to confusion between them and civil servants with similar-sounding titles. To me, anyway.”
Why? The Americans do it too.
According to the Commons library briefing, even though Buckingham Palace says Truss “kissed hands” upon her appointment as PM, she probably didn’t. Now it is just a metaphor. The briefing says:
When it is clear an individual can form a government, they are made Prime Minister, to quote Harold Wilson in 1964, “on the spot”. They also become First Lord of the Treasury from that moment, although the Oath of Office (as First Lord) is taken at a later meeting of the Privy Council (meetings can take place virtually). There are no seals of office as Prime Minister.
There is also no kissing of hands, although that phrase is used to describe the process. This used to occur but has fallen into abeyance (Tony Blair, however, recalls tripping on the carpet so he “practically fell upon the Queen’s hands, not so much brushing as enveloping them”). Instead, an incoming male premier will bow and shake hands with the Monarch, and a female premier will curtsy. In recent years this moment has been photographed for the media. There are no other formalities.
Well, can’t say that I thought the eight-party anti-Netanyahu coalition would last long – but I thought it’d last longer than this. 18 months is just pathetic in this day & age. More importantly, it means that “Bibi” is back in with another chance at evading accountability for even the least of his many, many crimes & misdemeanours – witness his successful stonewalling of the indictments for the last several years of his time as PM, after all.
“Just as an aside, I wish the Poms would call their ministers ministers. Calling them secretaries leads to confusion between them and civil servants with similar-sounding titles. To me, anyway.“
It goes back to the history of these posts when the monarch literally had one Secretary and from that their official titles are “Her Britannic Majesty’s Principal Secretary of State for the XXX Department” but would be called Secretary of State and not the full title in day to day use.
The most senior civil servant in a department is the Permanent Under Secretary of State shortened to Permanent Secretary and would always be called by that title. Permanent because they aren’t political appointments and stay in post when their SOS moves on (though of course they do get moved to other departments) or when there is a new government.
This should clear up any confusion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7Xgd7Cjm98