{"id":271182,"date":"2025-11-19T07:00:07","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T07:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/271182\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T07:00:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T07:00:07","slug":"i-thought-the-grownups-were-back-in-charge-john-crace-on-how-labour-shattered-his-expectations-politics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/271182\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I thought the grownups were back in charge!\u2019: John Crace on how Labour shattered his expectations | Politics"},"content":{"rendered":"

I feel I should probably start with an apology. A few days after the 2024 general election, I wrote that it felt as if the grownups were back in charge<\/a>. It wasn\u2019t as if I was carried away by the vision of Keir Starmer or the charisma of Rachel Reeves. More that I felt we had regained a basic level of competence. That politics would become business as usual rather than the breathless psychodrama of the past 10 years. You could go to bed at night relatively confident that the country would be more or less recognisable when you woke up. There would be no more mad people doing mad things as we raced through five or six news cycles in the course of a couple of hours.<\/p>\n

And part of me was a little concerned. Because what is good for economic stability and social justice isn\u2019t necessarily good for a sketch writer. Dull, well-intentioned politicians putting in place dull, well-intentioned policies, and a government that is ticking over more or less OK, do not necessarily make for great entertainment. So what would I write about?<\/p>\n

It turns out that I needn\u2019t have worried.<\/p>\n

Wet, wet, wet \u2026 Rishi Sunak calls for a general election in May 2024. Photograph: Stefan Rousseau\/PA<\/p>\n

For the last year of the Conservative government, it felt as if Westminster was demob happy. There was no real jeopardy. Everyone knew what was coming next. There would be a general election at some point in 2024 and the Tories would lose. Not because there was a great outpouring of love for Starmer\u2019s Labour but because after 14 years of austerity, Brexit, Partygate and Liz Truss, everyone was sick to death of the Conservatives<\/a>. People wanted change. So nothing the Tories did in that final year was of any real consequence. We could all sit back and enjoy the ride while having a laugh.<\/p>\n

It was Rishi Sunak\u2019s bad luck to be prime minister in the dog days of a Tory government that had long since run out of ideas. Most politicians, Sunak included, are control freaks. They like to think they can make a difference, can bend reality to their will. But the one thing they can\u2019t control is their own space-time continuum.<\/p>\n

If a politician is very lucky, he or she might get one shot at Downing Street in their lifetime. But it won\u2019t necessarily be at a time of their choosing. Sunak\u2019s time came when even someone as naturally entitled as he is could see he was bound to fail. And yet he couldn\u2019t turn down the job. Better to have been a rubbish prime minister for two years than not to have been prime minister at all. At least some people might recognise him in 10 years\u2019 time when he joins the ranks of ex-prime ministers at the Cenotaph for the Remembrance Day service. Which is more than anyone could say for Truss.<\/p>\n

Credit to Sunak: he did at least try. Inside a prime minister desperately trying to manage a Tory party lurching ever further to the right, there were the occasional glimpses of a decent person trying to get out. He was, though, the embodiment of Samuel Beckett. Fail. Fail again. Fail better.<\/p>\n

Almost everything he tried fell apart in his hands. There were his five pledges<\/a>. \u201cJudge me on them,\u201d he said. And we did. Only one of them \u2013 to halve inflation \u2013 was delivered. And that one had very little to do with him. The fall in inflation was more a global trend from which he benefited.<\/p>\n

The new wave \u2026 Keir and Victoria Starmer. Photograph: James Manning\/PA<\/p>\n

Nothing defined Sunak more than his exit. Walking out of Downing Street in a torrential downpour to call the election<\/a>. Having forgotten to bring an umbrella. Anyone sensible \u2013 me included \u2013 had remained indoors and watched the announcement on TV. No point in all of us getting drenched. Most people even missed the speech as an anti-Brexit campaigner was playing Things Can Only Get Better through a loudspeaker just outside the Downing Street gates. Things Can Only Get Wetter<\/a> more like.<\/p>\n

Then there were the D-day commemorations in which Sunak left the veterans<\/a> on the beaches. And the No 10 betting scandal<\/a> over the date of the election, in which one of his closest aides was implicated. It was as if the Tories had a death wish and were actively trying to lose the election. Someone should have told them they didn\u2019t need any extra help. Come polling day, Sunak looked dazed and confused, as if he couldn\u2019t wait for it all to be over. The results came as a relief. Gone and almost certainly soon to be forgotten.<\/p>\n

The first inkling that the new Labour government might also be accident-prone came early on with the freebies row<\/a>. Starmer had campaigned on the slogan that Labour would be squeaky clean. No more Tory sleaze. Starmer helping himself to a few suits and extra pairs of glasses and Reeves enjoying corporate hospitality at a Sabrina Carpenter concert<\/a> might not be up there with Partygate or dodgy PPE contracts, but it was not a good look.<\/p>\n

Illustration: Billy B\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

As head of the first Labour<\/a> government for 14 years, Starmer knew he would be under scrutiny from the media. This was Politics 101. And yet he and the chancellor couldn\u2019t resist. When most of the country was still struggling with low growth and a cost of living crisis, they were getting the perks. One rule for them, another for us.<\/p>\n

Ministers who Starmer had thought had been doing a rubbish job were promptly given another one. Failing upwards<\/p>\n

It was a similar story a year or so later when Angela Rayner was found not to have paid the correct stamp duty on a flat in Hove. Now I\u2019m sure the trust arrangements were complicated, but you would expect a deputy prime minister and housing secretary to go the extra mile to make sure everything was correct. That error cost Rayner her jobs<\/a> and took one of the few Labour politicians who can connect with Labour voters out of the frontline. Just when she was needed most.<\/p>\n

Then there were the policy announcements and the budget. A Labour government that didn\u2019t look much like the Labour government that voters had given a landslide majority. There was a lack of confidence in the administration. As if all its energy had been spent on winning an election it was always going to win, and no one had thought of what they would do when they were in office.<\/p>\n

The removal of the winter fuel allowance. The pointless fight with the farmers over inheritance tax. The welfare bill designed to remove payments to hundreds of thousands of vulnerable people. A bill that was then hollowed out because of backbench rebellions while the government tried to pretend that nothing had really changed. The increasingly rightwing rhetoric on immigration. The \u201cisland of strangers\u201d speech<\/a>. The fanfare surrounding the return of one asylum seeker to France only for him to find his way back to the UK within a month. All this rather drowned out what good news \u2013 hospital waiting lists coming down \u2013 there was. It seemed as if Labour was lurching from one crisis to the next. The cabinet reshuffle in which ministers who Starmer had thought had been doing a rubbish job were promptly given another one. Failing upwards.<\/p>\n

The Rachel papers \u2026 the chancellor of the exchequer presents the spring budget in March 2025. Photograph: House of Commons\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Mostly, though, you couldn\u2019t escape the feeling that Starmer just wasn\u2019t very good at politics. That No 10 had no control of the news grid and were waking up each morning just as surprised as we were that the country was falling apart.<\/p>\n

Take next week\u2019s budget. Little more than two weeks ago, Reeves was giving a surprise press conference<\/a> inside Downing Street at 8.10am \u2013 something almost unheard of. \u201cI want to be clear with the country,\u201d she said. Only she was anything but, as she couldn\u2019t bring herself to say the one thing she had come to say. We were supposed to deduce via interpretive dance that she was planning to break a manifesto promise and increase income tax by 2p.<\/p>\n

Only it turns out that was a false start. Scrub the previous 10 days of briefings. Because now Reeves has changed her mind. Right hand, meet left hand. Having said she was going to do what was right for the country and not the party, she has now realised she would rather do things the other way round. Then we had the absurd spectacle of No 10 briefing journalists that everything was going so well that Starmer was going to fight off any leadership challenge from Wes Streeting.<\/p>\n

\u2018Never less than entertaining\u2019 \u2026 Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch. Photograph: House of Commons\/AFP\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

For reasons best known to themselves, Downing Street thought this made them look hard. It was only the following day they realised they had created a totally unnecessary shitshow and tried to deny they had anything to do with it. Starmer promised to come down hard on whoever had done the briefings. In time he will have to sack himself. But for now he is happy to believe it was divine intervention. The worst game of Westminster No-Cluedo<\/a>: Keir Starmer in the Cabinet Office with the career suicidal tendencies. It increasingly feels as if the government is doing all this solely for my benefit. To give me something to write about. I\u2019m not complaining. Though you may well be.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m happy with Badenoch. She\u2019s never less than entertaining. Some of her performances at PMQs have been thrillingly useless<\/p>\n

But never let it be said that the Tories aren\u2019t doing their bit to liven up British politics. Since the election they seem to have positively embraced their own descent into irrelevance. However unpopular Labour are with the public \u2013 current opinion polls have them on less than 20% \u2013 the Conservatives can still go lower. For now, at least, Kemi Badenoch is still their leader \u2013 she has been in post for just over a year \u2013 and looks relatively secure. Not even Robert \u201cHonest Bob\u201d Jenrick is mad enough to want to become leader given the current state of the party. At least, I don\u2019t think he\u2019s quite that mad. Watch this space.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m quite happy with Badenoch. She\u2019s never less than entertaining. Like many politicians, she seems to have no idea that she\u2019s nowhere near as competent as she thinks she is. That reality gap is always fertile territory. Some of her performances at prime minister\u2019s questions have been thrillingly useless. But more than this, she is always in a permanent state of fury and exasperation. It\u2019s almost as though she wakes up in the morning, sees her reflection in the mirror and picks a fight with herself. Just recently she demanded that Reeves resign over her failure to get a licence for her rental property, and then unresign so that she could resign again in a few weeks\u2019 time when she broke a manifesto promise. You can\u2019t make this nonsense up.<\/p>\n

Angela Rayner arrives in Downing Street a few days before resigning. Photograph: Aaron Chown\/PA<\/p>\n

The Tory supporting cast are also good material. Not least Chris Philp. One of the features of the new government is that it is no longer the Labour shadow cabinet you bump into in the corridor. They now go everywhere by ministerial car. Instead it is the Tory shadow ministers. Which can be awkward. I passed the Philpster on the stairs a few months back. He looked me in the eye and said, \u201cHello, John.\u201d Awkward. At that moment I knew that he knew that I had once described him as \u201ca nose in search of a bum<\/a>\u201d. He also told a press gallery lunch he was upset I had called him a \u201cquarter-wit\u201d. He aspires to be a half-wit. Patience, Philp.<\/p>\n

This new parliament has seen the rise and rise of Reform. Nigel Farage is adamant his party adopts a \u201cone in, one out\u201d policy. Which is why he has lost two of his MPs and gained the driven-mad-by-the-sight-of-black-people Sarah Pochin<\/a> and the gullible Danny Kruger. Reform are now more than 10 points ahead and, if the polls remain the same, look set to win the next election.<\/p>\n

Promises, promises \u2026 Nigel Farage. Photograph: Guy Bell\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Just who would make up Farage\u2019s cabinet is anyone\u2019s guess. Presumably either a bunch of MPs who had only just won their seats and had no experience of anything, or he would appoint outsiders to the Lords who would be prevented from being able to appear in the Commons. It seems that Richard Tice is being groomed to be chancellor. Principally because he is in possession of a small fortune. Mainly because he started with a large one. As for Farage, he is currently trying to reposition himself from insurgent to mainstream politician. By ditching all the promises he made in his manifesto at the last election. I am watching him like a hawk.<\/p>\n

Then there is Donald Trump. Currently in the process of suing the BBC. The Beeb is planning to pay any damages from the proceeds of a new channel \u2013 BBC5 \u2013 which will be dedicated to programmes examining programmes about the BBC. Its favourite pastime.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Starmer is on a mission not to do anything that might upset Agent Orange. The recent press conference at Chequers during the president\u2019s state visit was a case in point. I sat there gobsmacked as Trump claimed to have ended eight global conflicts, including one between Albania and Azerbaijan<\/a> \u2013 which will have come as news to both countries, as they didn\u2019t even know they were at war with one another \u2013 and then said he had never heard of or met Peter Mandelson<\/a>. Starmer just stood there and nodded. Either I\u2019m going mad or he is.<\/p>\n

Lucky us to have such politicians in such an uncertain world. It\u2019s hard to think of how things could have gone any better.<\/p>\n

The Bonfire of the Insanities by John Crace (Guardian Faber Publishing, \u00a316.99). To support the Guardian, order your copy at guardianbookshop.com<\/a>. Delivery charges may apply<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I feel I should probably start with an apology. A few days after the 2024 general election, I…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271183,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-271182","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271182","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271182"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271182\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271182"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271182"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271182"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}