Did Rishi Sunak make a mistake by opting for a six-week long election campaign? | Political news

The Prime Minister has chosen a grueling six-week campaign. More time for mistakes? It’s starting to look like this.

The grim news for the Conservatives in the latest Sky News/YouGov poll raises another question about Rishi Sunak’s political judgment. Was a long election campaign a mistake?

The Prime Minister is already under fire from conservative MPs and activists for betting on elections in July rather than waiting for October or November.

The conventional wisdom was that economic news would be better by the fall and that deportation flights to Rwanda would help prevent boats carrying migrants across the Channel.

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But apart from the doubts about a July poll, the sharp drop in support for conservatives since the last Sky News/YouGov poll on June 3, suggests that a six-week long campaign may also have had the opposite effect.

On May 22, the day the Prime Minister made his shock general election announcement, some senior Conservative MPs privately questioned Mr Sunak’s decision to run a lengthy campaign.

“Margaret was campaigning for three or four weeks,” a long-serving Tory MP who resigned told Sky News, referring to the three-time election winner. Mrs Thatcher.

But with the Conservatives lagging far behind Labor in the polls for months, Mr Sunak was clearly hoping a long election campaign would give his party more time to recover and narrow the gap.

However, the opposite seems to have happened. As the campaign continues, with Election Day still two weeks away, opinion polls suggest bigger losses for the Conservatives, not smaller losses.

On June 3, our YouGov poll suggested the Conservatives would win 140 seats. Today, the same pollsters suggest they hold just 108, well below their previous low of 141 in 1906.

The big change of direction was the spectacular return of Nigel Farage at the head of British reform on June 3. In the Sky News/YouGov poll that day, Reform UK was not predicted to win any seats.

It is now five o’clock, Mr Farage in Clacton. The other big winners are the Liberal Democrats, who are expected to win 48 seats on June 3, up from 67 now. The latest poll is good news for small parties in general.

The Labor Party’s seat forecasts are up slightly, from 422 to 425, and their majority, from 194 to 200. But it is the crisis of the Conservatives which constitutes the big change since the first days of the campaign.

So, are those veteran MPs who lamented Mrs Thatcher’s glory days right that previous Tory prime ministers opted for shorter campaigns? This appears to be the case.

If Mr Sunak had waited until January 2025 to call the election – the end of the government’s five-year term – Parliament would have been automatically dissolved 25 working days before polling day, meaning he could have opted to a shorter campaign.

In 1983, when Mrs Thatcher won a landslide majority of 144 seats, she called the election on May 9, Parliament was dissolved on May 13 and polling day was four weeks later on June 9.

A similar story happened in 1987. Mrs Thatcher called the election on May 11 and polling day was a month later on June 11 when she won a second overwhelming majority and a majority of 102 voice.

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In 1992, when Sir John Major scored a surprise victory after months of trailing Neil Kinnock’s Labor Party in opinion polls, the election campaign again lasted only 30 days.

Sir John asked the Queen to dissolve Parliament on March 11 and voters went to the polls on April 9, when the Conservatives won a 21-seat majority over Labor.

Lord Cameron’s campaign in 2015, after five years of Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition, was longer. Parliament was dissolved on March 30 and elections were held on May 7, when it won a conservative majority of 10 votes.

In the last general election, that of Boris Johnson in 2019, Parliament was dissolved on November 6 and the election was held on December 12, with Mr Johnson winning a majority of 80 seats.

This time, Mr Sunak chose a grueling six-week campaign. More time for mistakes? And more time for the Conservatives’ opponents – Labour, the Liberal Democrats and Reform UK – to gain momentum?

It’s starting to look like this. Sometimes since his D-day fiasco, the Prime Minister looked discouraged. Senior Tories are now talking about a Labor “super-majority” and a “blank check” for Mr Keir Starmer.

And there are still two weeks to go in this long six-week campaign. But it was Mr Sunak’s choice.