With a week to go to the general election, the ruling Conservative party’s comfortable lead over Labour continued to evaporate, as a new poll gave it just a three-point lead, and Prime Minister Theresa May faced the fallout of her decision not to take part in a televised debate on Wednesday night, in which the leaders of all other parties, bar the Scottish National Party, took part.
“The first rule of leadership is to show up,” declared Caroline Lucas, who leads the Green Party, during the heated debate on Wednesday evening, attacking Ms. May on the very point she had sought to distinguish herself from other contenders. Following a series of policy u-turns (and the decision to hold the election itself), the Conservative party’s “strong and stable” catch phrase has come under fire. Home Secretary Amber Rudd, who stood in for the Prime Minister during the debate, faced laughter from the audience (picked by a polling company to be representative of the country politically, as well as demographically) when she asked people to “judge us on our record” and insisted that the poorest in society would be protected.
Ms. Rudd attempted to keep focus on Brexit, insisting that only the Conservatives led by Ms. May had the ability to make the hard choices necessary for the economy, including in EU negotiations, but the debate swiftly moved to other issues from foreign policy, to immigration and poverty in the U.K.
Labour leader Corbyn elicited applause from the audience as he asked Ms. Rudd if she had ever been to a food bank. Food banks are centres which distribute short-term supplies to those who are unable to buy enough to ward off hunger and has seen a sharp rise in usage in recent years. “Have you seen the levels of poverty that exist because of your government’s conscious decisions on benefits?” said Mr. Corbyn who wants to raise corporation tax, and taxes on the wealthiest 5% to fund more spending on social and health care, education and welfare.
“How can you sleep at night,” Ms. Lucas asked Ms. Rudd, over British arms sales to Saudi Arabia, after the Home Secretary insisted that Britain needed a strong arms industry to succeed economically and protect itself.
The Conservatives also struggled to maintain the upper hand on the issue of national security, as opponents criticised cuts to the police forces over the seven years in which the Conservatives had been in power.
The narrow lead for the Conservatives in the polls, is in contrast to April, when a confident Ms. May announced the snap election, to solidify parliamentary support behind her in Brexit negotiations. “The country is coming together but Westminster is not,” she said at the time.
Liberal Democrats’ Tim Farron during the debate: “If you vote Tory you give her a blank cheque.”
While Ms. May has an approval rating of 43% according to the poll, conducted by YouGov for The Times , (Mr. Corbyn has 30%), a movement has also been gathering against her, with a protest song branding her a “liar liar” topped the UK iTunes chart this week (and it is now at No. 2).
The poll movements have impacted the focus of the Conservative campaign, which touted strength and stability in its early days, as well as on “Theresa May’s Team” (rather than the party itself). Instead the party is now warning of a “coalition of chaos” involving Labour, the Greens, Liberal Democrats and Scottish National Party, after a separate analysis by YouGov earlier this week raised the possibility of a hung parliament.
