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We are heading towards the finishing line in this marathon election campaign. But, to mix my sporting metaphors, I don’t think there is going to be a late goal to rescue Rishi Sunak and the Conservative Party from the jaws of defeat. Not that I’m sure that Sunak wants rescuing. Yes, he has been out on the campaign trail every day, but with little enthusiasm or vigour. He looks miserable and probably can’t wait for it all to end on Friday.

He is working on the assumption that Labour will win a big majority. We will see the Conservatives double down on their warning of the dangers of a Labour “supermajority” and the shock news that once in power the Labour Party will try to win another term. They are focusing their attention and resources on their heartlands to ensure they secure at least 100 seats and protect the likes of Jeremy Hunt, Gillian Keegan and Penny Mordaunt whose hitherto safe seats are looking vulnerable.

Conservative Strategy

Some of those Conservative big players are being threatened by the Liberal Democrats who will be outright winners of the “how many times can we drench the leader” award of the national campaign, but who have been playing very effective campaigns locally. They have run carefully targeted campaigns in Conservative-held seats in the south and south-west of England, picking up support from Labour voters by being explicit on the need for tactical voting. We should expect them to oust a few major players on Thursday.

Reform UK

Reform UK is also expecting a Labour win and will be using the next few days to woo Conservative voters with the message that the party is a spent force and Reform will be the most effective opposition. While this may appeal to some Conservative waverers, others will be put off by yet more revelations of racism and misogyny among candidates and activists.

Scotland

In Scotland, where boundary changes mean the number of seats in Westminster goes from 59 to 57, the Scottish National Party, which held 43 seats, is also assuming it will lose seats to Labour (which had just two). It is now campaigning on the basis that if wins 29 seats, it would be a mandate for independence. Some might say that losing 14 seats wouldn’t be a mandate for anything, let alone independence.

In fact, the only party not assuming a Labour victory is the Labour Party. Keir Starmer and his team are determinedly not counting any chickens. Many of them will have still be haunted by the memory of 1992 (when Labour under Neil Kinnock unexpectedly lost), but for all of them it is about keeping clear heads and sticking to their plan. It may be a little dull, but it is this approach that has been responsible for the huge change in the party since the time of the last general election when big promises made by a populist leader were not believed by the electorate. So, don’t expect any changes in strategy from Starmer and co.

What we will see is them urging people to vote, not to assume that it is a done deal. Contending with voter apathy has always been an issue across parties, but now with record low levels of public trust in politics, getting its vote out is going to be its biggest challenge over the next few days if Labour is to secure victory.

Labour’s likely ascendency to controlling the UK Government will bring fresh challenges to the devolved administrations. Grayling’s team of experts have been analysing what an incoming Labour administration might mean for the governing parties in each nation and how it may impact future election outcomes.

Scotland: Can Labour rebuild its reputation?

By Ross Laird, Head of Scotland

The expectation of a Labour majority in Westminster will be largely come at the expense of the SNP. Many of the key battlegrounds lie across the Central Belt in what will swiftly become the territorial dispute between the two parties in the Scottish Parliament elections in 2026.

Make no mistake, all of the political parties in Scotland are entering the General Election campaign with an eye towards building momentum for 2026. That means that there will be little love lost between the SNP and Labour. The SNP will be keen to continue to lay the blame for cutbacks and austerity at Westminster’s door and start to rebuild their narrative after the General Election.

Constitutionally, there are likely to be continued disputes between London and Edinburgh. However, with less than two years between now and the 2026 election and the collapse of the deal with the Scottish Green Party, the scope for the kind of legislative disputes we’ve seen in the past (notably the deposit return scheme and gender recognition) are much reduced.

From Labour’s perspective, this will be an opportunity for the Party to rebuild its position as the dominant force in Scottish politics. Douglas Alexander’s expected return will give the sense that Scottish Labour’s big hitters are back and the promised location of Great British Energy in Scotland will be keenly watched. Ultimately, Glasgow remains the largest political prize, both in the 2026 Scottish Parliament elections and the local government elections thereafter, so expect to see a flurry of announcements from Labour that demonstrate their commitment to the city.

Wales: Will Keir Starmer’s win spell the end for Vaughan Gething’s premiership?

By Siân Jones, Head of Wales

Labour’s long Welsh winning streak shows every sign of continuing at this election, but we can expect internal Party debates to continue over the future of the beleaguered Welsh First Minister, Vaughan Gething. Gething has long been considered the preferred candidate of UK Labour, but Starmer will need to consider how tenable the First Minister’s position is as Labour head into the Party Conference season.

Having brought the Co-Operation Agreement between the parties to an early end, Plaid Cymru leader Rhun ap Iorwerth will have his eyes fixed on the 2026 Senedd elections. This leaves Gething, who recently lost a Senedd confidence vote in his leadership, struggling to get his Budget through – a problem amplified by Rhiannon Passmore’s suspension from the Labour Group this week.

With Rachel Reeves’ strict spending plans and lack of firm commitment to reform the Barnett Formula, there’s likely to be little change in funding allocated to Wales in the short term, meaning scant relief for the creaking Welsh NHS. Meanwhile, the pressure to resolve the steel crisis at Port Talbot will be considerable.

There may be some improvement – at least superficially – in functioning intergovernmental relations, with the proposed Council for the Nations and Regions providing a new forum. However, UK Labour are treading carefully on the question of further devolution, particularly over whether control over structural funds will move to the Welsh Government or other Welsh ‘representatives’, as stated in the manifesto.

We can expect a united front from UK and Welsh Labour for now, with a spate of joint announcements and visits in newly won seats – particularly those that showcase their shared commitment to skills, jobs and the green economy. But, over time, conflict may well reemerge over funding – and who determines where it goes.

Northern Ireland: How does Labour keep Northern Ireland’s devolution running?

By Richard Hunter, Northern Ireland analyst

Voters in Northern Ireland will go to the polls with a power-sharing Executive and Assembly in place, for the first time since the Assembly election in May 2016, four Prime Ministers ago. Maintaining those institutions and providing stability will be the key priority for any incoming government but, with the DUP potentially facing losses of Westminster seats and further leadership turmoil, stable leadership within Northern Ireland may be hard to come by.

With an urgent crisis in Northern Ireland’s health service and disputes over a fair fiscal formula for Northern Ireland, demands for funding for frontline services are likely to confront the new Secretary of State for Northern Ireland. With spending tightly constrained at a UK level, we can expect a dispute over the Executive parties’ unwillingness to raise more revenue locally, as well as over the costs of specific projects, including the renovation of Casement Park to host matches at Euro 2028.

The parties are, however, united in their desire for the repeal of the UK Government’s legislation regarding the legacy of the Troubles, which is opposed by all five main NI parties and committed to by Labour. Labour’s policies on closer alignment with the EU on veterinary regulation and carbon pricing also have the potential to remove post-Brexit trade frictions between Northern Ireland and Great Britain, which will be welcomed across the Northern Irish economy.

With Irish elections expected within months, Sinn Féin and the Irish Government will remain on an election footing after the new UK Government takes office, while a new European Commission is yet to be formed for trade negotiations. While there may be a more diverse delegation of Northern Irish MPs in the Commons to hold him to account, there will be no quick and easy answers on Northern Ireland for a Labour Government.

As with any election campaign, a key issue that arises time and again on the doorstep and in TV debates is voters’ trust in politics. Moments like the expenses scandal 15 years ago and Partygate more recently have done untold damage to the public’s faith in our elected representatives, and trust is at a 40-year low.

Conservative Betting Scandal

If voters were beginning to forget past sins, the emergence in the last week of allegations that a number of senior Conservatives, including two candidates and possibly a Cabinet minister, had placed bets on the date of the election have brought sleaze back to the fore at the worst possible time for the Conservatives. Interventions by party bigwigs, including Michael Gove’s comments that the gambling scandal is perpetuating a sense that it’s “one rule for them, one rule for us”, are adding to the feeling that this is a party on the verge of collapse.

Labour’s Trust Challenges

Labour strategists may be delighted that this has fallen into their lap so close to polling day, but a common view heard by colleagues on the doorstep is that “they’re all the same”. While the gambling scandal may have short term benefits for the party hoping to govern, many voters will view these latest indiscretions as simply emblematic of a wider malaise.

Meanwhile, the Labour Party is not immune to questions about its own integrity. Voters have expressed misgivings about how much they could trust Sir Keir Starmer given his support for the then Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, in 2019. Starmer has since disavowed almost all of Corbyn’s policy platform and argues that he was campaigning for Labour with absolute certainty that Corbyn had no chance of winning the election – an awkward defence that in a tighter race may have caused Starmer significant difficulty.

Liberal Democrats’ Haunted Past

Sir Ed Davey will be delighted that his stunt-heavy campaign has given the Liberal Democrats a platform to build a very respectable result, so he may have been somewhat stunned to have the party’s infamous election pledge to abolish tuition fees of 14 years ago thrown at him at Question Time on Thursday evening. Having courted young people during that campaign, that betrayal of voters’ trust was and continues to be keenly felt.

Farage and Reform UK

Nigel Farage, the perennial “outsider”, clearly sees himself as the beneficiary of the decline in voters’ trust, accusing the Conservatives of betraying Brexit by failing to implement it “properly” and arguing that blue and red are indistinguishable. For someone who has never had to compromise in government or even sat in Parliament, this is a simple game to play. What’s more, potential Reform voters don’t seem to be put off by the serious holes found in Reform UK’s manifesto. They know Reform UK won’t form any part in government, so, at least for now, it seems the trust voters place in the party can be repaid simply by Farage continuing to be Farage.

Trust is an essential ingredient for a stable and productive politics with which voters and businesses can constructively engage. With not long to go in this campaign, it’s incumbent on all parties to prevent further damage to faith in politics and policymaking, and each new and returning MP will have their part to play.

To keep up to date with the latest news and views on the UK General Election, head to our Hub for more insights.

It is fair to say that nobody expected FMCG policy to be front-and-centre of an election campaign dominated by economic growth and immigration, but as the UK closes in on polling day, what could be in store for the sector?

With a recent IPSOS poll estimating Labour could win 453 seats, it is as certain as things can be in politics that Keir Starmer will become the next Prime Minister, with the bookies overwhelmingly backing a majority government. With this relative comfort, Starmer opted to last week publish a broad brush ‘fully costed’ manifesto consisting almost entirely of existing pledges.

More stick than carrot for HFSS?

From an FMCG perspective Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, Wes Streeting, has long advocated for tighter HFSS regulation to address preventable health conditions and reduce the burden on the NHS – previously pledging to “use the heavy hand of state regulation” to improve public health.

With that said, perhaps Labour’s manifesto is only the tip of the iceberg. The key headline was a commitment to ban the sale of energy drinks to under-16’s – a pledge dropped by the Tories over fears of reneging to a nanny state, despite many UK retailers already enforcing a voluntary ban. Other policies of note include banning junk food advertising to children, restricting the advertising of vapes, and a continuation of Sunak’s plan to create a smoke-free generation. Little detail on how these would be implemented was included.

An encore for the King of Leon?

There have been whisperings around Westminster that Labour will revive Henry Dimbleby’s National Food Strategy, which would leave Starmer with a fine balancing act between incentivising healthier lifestyle choices and mandating measures which could drive up food inflation. Streeting himself has pledged to ‘steamroller’ the food and drink industry with measures to tackle HFSS and ultra-processed foods (UPFs) – assuming a Labour victory, Streeting will certainly be one for the watchlist for promotion during any reshuffle.

Beer, wine and Number 10 (again)

A promise by Keir Starmer to hold one fiscal event per year will provide light relief for the UK’s beer, wine and spirits industries, who continue to live budget-to-budget on excise duty regimes. This includes a raft of reforms announced in 2023 (coming into force in Feb 2025) to tax all alcohol by ABV which presents significant challenges for the wine industry (mainly SMEs and importers), who face the burden of preparing for 29 new tax bands.

Despite no pledges to freeze duties making their way into the manifesto, both Starmer and Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves have hinted support for a freeze to beer duty as part of the party’s plan to breathe new life back into the UK’s high streets. As we’ve come to expect with Reeves in charge of the coffers, this support doesn’t come without the caveat that anything in a future Finance Bill must be within strict fiscal rules.

Defra – a department in flux?

Perhaps most worryingly for businesses seeking clarity over the direction of travel for recycling reforms – including Deposit Return Schemes (DRS), Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) and Packaging Recovery Notes (PRNs)– is the distinct lack of detail on waste and resource policy. The only nod coming in the form of a generic ambition to reduce waste by moving to a circular economy.

It is no secret that Defra has been struggling to progress its waste and resource reforms, and it seems likely the department is earmarked for its own reforms under a potential Labour Government. While there is a clear opportunity to engage with a party which hasn’t yet formed a concrete position, there is the risk that new impetus in the department could lead to rash decision-making by Labour’s policy team.

As we await the result of July 4^th, businesses across the FMCG sector should use the period to align their strategy and messaging to Labour Party priorities, preparing to engage by providing pragmatic solutions and offering front-line business insights into the impacts of specific policies.

To speak to our FMCG sector specialists about how we can support your business during this year of political change, please contact Michael Broughton (michael.broughton@grayling.com).

The road to Downing Street runs through the Midlands. The region comprises several bellwether constituencies that Sunak and Starmer will need to win if they want the keys to No 10, from cities and market towns, to former industrial heartlands and rural shires. Since the 2005 general election, the Conservatives have increased their vote share at every general election in the Midlands. This looks all-but-certain to change in 2024.

Rebuilding the ‘Red Wall’

The 2019 general election saw the Conservatives sweep aside large Labour majorities in its working class strongholds, winning the support of new Conservative voters who were unhappy with Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the Labour Party and wanted to get Brexit done. This time around, Brexit is done and Sir Keir Starmer is trying to expunge the memory of Corbyn. In traditional bellwether seats such as Nuneaton and Lincoln, the picture is grim for the Conservatives fighting on two fronts against Reform UK and Labour.

The recent local elections saw Labour gain control of several key councils, such as Nuneaton, Redditch, and Tamworth. If these trends play out across the region on 4^th July, Labour is on course to regain not only seats it lost in 2019 but those that fell in 2010 after the party’s 13 years in government. It may even win rural seats that Blair failed to take in 1997.

Meanwhile, the Conservative Party faces a further, potentially existential threat in the form of Nigel Farage’s Reform UK, from which Labour will be the main beneficiary. Driven by unease over rising immigration and the failure to deliver on the promise of ‘levelling up’, polling indicates that a significant portion of the Conservatives’ 2019 voter base in the Midlands will switch to Reform UK. Nowhere is more emblematic of this than the East Midlands seat of Ashfield, whose MP Lee Anderson was elected as a Conservative in 2019 but has since defected to the party.

The Liberal Democrats could also regain a foothold in the region since their wipeout at the 2015 general election, with the party primed for gains in the more affluent Shropshire and Herefordshire counties.

Not all a bed of roses for Labour

Labour also faces its own challenges in the region. The Midlands is home to cities and large towns, some with large Muslim and student populations. Labour has faced significant anger from some Muslim voters over its stance on the conflict in Gaza, with the Labour Muslim Network recently warning that many Muslim Labour voters felt “betrayed”. This played out in the recent West Midlands mayoral election, when an independent candidate who ran on a pro-Palestine ticket almost denied Labour the mayoralty, winning 70,000 votes. Labour also faces dissatisfaction from young progressive voters in Midlands cities, driven by their concerns about a perceived lack of ambition on issues like climate change and public spending.

Although the Greens and independents may benefit, this is unlikely to have a material impact on results given the scale of the likely swing to Labour. However, it could be a problem for a midterm Labour government.

Calling businesses in the Midlands

If current polling trends are replicated on 4^th July, Labour looks set to form the next government off the back of large gains in the Midlands and elsewhere. The region is home to party bigwigs such as Pat McFadden, Jonathan Ashworth and Shabana Mahmood, which presents an important opportunity to Midlands-based businesses to build on their local ties and demonstrate the value they bring to the region.

If you are a Midlands-based business and want advice about how you can navigate a change in government, get in touch with our Head of Public Affairs, Alan Boyd-Hall.

We are now firmly in the second half of this election campaign and the Conservatives seem to have given up any hope that they can win. You can see why. Poll after poll suggests that they will be lucky to get 100 seats, with Labour seemingly on course to win around 450. Rishi Sunak looks increasingly uncomfortable, and people are beginning to feel sorry for him – not a good sign for his campaign team.

Sunak looks south

The Conservative strategy is wholly focused on defending seats in the south of England which for years have provided seats with majorities of more than 10,000 for high flyers, including several Cabinet members. Polling indicates these are anything but safe, so the voters of Surrey and Sussex, Hampshire and Wiltshire, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire have been treated to multiple visits from senior Conservatives attempting to shore up waning support. Retaining seats here is essential for the future of the party, not just to avoid being wiped out but to ensure that there is a reasonably sized pool of MPs from which a new leader can be chosen to pick up the pieces.

The Conservatives have two attack lines that we should expect to dominate the remaining weeks. They continue to assert that Labour will increase taxes (claims repeatedly rebutted by Labour) and that voting Conservative is the only way to avoid giving “former Corbyn supporter” Sir Keir Starmer a “super majority”. It is a strategy to dissuade disgruntled Conservative voters from voting for Reform UK. The reality is that Reform is not likely to win more than two or three seats, but splitting the vote leaves Labour and, in a few notable cases, the Lib Dems, a chance to take seats from the Conservatives. I am not convinced the message is landing.

Labour needs business

For its part, Labour is continuing to pursue a cautious strategy, reassuring voters that is the only choice for change and that it can be trusted with the economy, security and public services. It has deliberately avoided showy stunts and its manifesto was in line with an agenda already well-rehearsed. The most notable element of it was the focus on growth – it is a big gamble to pin plans for investment not on increasing taxes rates but on increasing wealth. The party will be counting on voters sharing its confidence or at least not listening to sceptics.

If last week was all about Starmer and the manifesto, this week will see Shadow Chancellor, Rachel Reeves, take centre stage, with a pledge to “restore economic stability”. We will see this message appearing on billboards and flooding social media. She will also host an “infrastructure day” bringing in business leaders to discuss plans to harness private investment to boost growth.

This wooing of business by Labour will continue well beyond the election. While it has undoubtedly contributed to perceptions that Starmer has delivered on his promise to change the Labour Party, its purpose was always deeper. With the public sector financially constrained, Labour needs business if it is to achieve its vision for growth.

Get in touch with Alan Boyd-Hall for more on how Grayling can help you Navigate Change.

Tanks, lawns

The Conservative Party’s astonishing record of time in government has been down to its ability to adapt, unideologically seeking the centre ground of public opinion and nicking policies from other parties. Conservative governments have, within the space of a few years, gone from advocating austerity to promising lavish spending on left behind communities, from hugging huskies to “cutting the green crap”. There is a reason that the party is one of the most successful electoral forces in the western world.

Labour has been watching. Angela Rayner’s words before the manifesto launch – “you can’t tax your way to growth” – could have been taken directly from a Conservative attack on Ed Miliband in 2015. Labour hasn’t missed an opportunity to call out what it alleges have been 25 tax increases since the 2019 election. Its core pitch, driven home as the first of Labour’s “steps for change”, is that it, not the Conservative Party, is the party of fiscal discipline.

Prudence with a purpose?

This has worked for Labour before. The tagline for Gordon Brown’s 1998 budget, which more or less stuck within Conservative spending plans, was “prudence with a purpose”. This was aimed squarely at reassuring those who perceived Labour as the party of tax, spend and profligacy. The Blair government eased into its spending plans with a great deal of early caution before increasing investment in public services, underpinned by a consistently growing economy.

The economic situation in 2024 is clearly incomparable to 1997: public debt is the highest it’s been since the 1960s, the tax burden is the highest since 1948, and yet public services are not performing. But many Labour members are concerned that the leadership is unnecessarily boxing itself in. They fear that the Labour Party has sacrificed its mission to deliver social justice on the altar of fiscal discipline. By capping corporation tax at 25% and ruling out increases to national insurance, VAT, or any of the income tax bands, Labour is setting itself a genuine challenge to deliver the improvements to public services that voters are desperate for – even with increases to capital gains tax and fuel duty, which haven’t been expressly ruled out in the manifesto.

The growth gamble

Labour’s gamble is that economic growth – mentioned 49 times in the manifesto – will pay for good quality public services as it did in the early 2000s. Rachel Reeves’ diagnosis of the country’s economic weakness, that it is being held back by low productivity caused by supply side weakness, has been welcomed by economists.

One of the solutions, planning reform, gets a good hearing in the manifesto. It confirms that a Labour government will give combined authorities new planning powers, re-introduce mandatory housing targets, reclassify datacentres to avoid being held up in local planning, take a more “strategic approach” to releasing greenbelt land, and create a new super-quango, the National Infrastructure & Service Transformation Authority out of the NIC and IPA.

While all important, there are some that would advocate for a more radical approach to planning and other key initiatives like Great British Energy, which some fear will not be able to compete with the enormous public subsidies being doled out in other markets.

A “no surprises manifesto” is what Sir Keir Starmer promised in the Sky debate last night, and it is what he’s delivered. The approach is one of caution, for now. Labour will be hoping that falling inflation and an expected reduction of the base rate in August will give them a more favourable economic wind – one that eventually carries them into the second term in office that they want and surely need.

With pop sensation Taylor Swift embarking on the UK era of her global tour in Scotland, politicians have been quick to capitalise. From the renaming of Loch Tay to Loch Tay Tay, which was endorsed by First Minister John Swinney, to Scottish Social Justice Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville telling voters to “shake off” the Tories and calling the Labour Leader Sir Keir Starmer a “Blank Space”, it seems Scot’s voters will be in for a Cruel Summer this general election.

Duguid drama as Ross resigns

The Scottish Conservative leader, Douglas Ross, has announced his intention to stand in the general election, despite having previously committed to standing down to focus on the 2026 Holyrood election campaign. The seat, Aberdeenshire North and Moray East, was to be contested by former Scotland Office minister David Duguid. Ross said in interviews that he was brought in to run as a candidate of last resort. However, Duguid took to social media to clarify that he had every intention of fighting a campaign, but that the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Management Board stepped in to deny him the candidacy following a recent medical operation, with no apparent medical consultation.

Following on from this, Ross then announced he would be standing down as leader of the Scottish Conservatives. Ross said he intends to carry on in the role until after the election and will also resign as an MSP if he is re-elected to Westminster. Ross originally said he believed he could serve as an MSP and MP, as well as party leader, but came out on Monday saying, “on reflection, that is not feasible“.

Going Green

The Scottish Greens announced this week that that they will stand a record 44 candidates in the upcoming general election, surpassing the party’s previous record of 31. It had been understood that the Greens deliberately chose not to field many candidates for fear of splitting the left vote. However, following the collapse of the Bute House agreement with the SNP earlier this year, the party now seems to be throwing their full weight into this general election campaign.

Dinnae forget the policy!

Scottish leaders have their own series of televised debates, which are key to establishing which policies and issues are front of mind north of the border. Interestingly, all four main parties are currently sparring on macro-level topics such as austerity, cost of living, Brexit and management of the economy, rather the usual constitutional questions. Compared to previous general election cycles, the conversation around independence has been largely absent. This has been picked up by activists and commentators, prompting the SNP to publicly state this week that page one, line one of the manifesto will be about independence.

Another policy area proving pertinent in Scotland is net zero targeting, and what this could mean for the oil and gas industry. Aberdeen and the surrounding areas will be looking closely as how parties say they will secure the future of these regions, with new extraction licences a key topic of debate. Parties will need to convince the people who rely on the industry that a pivot to renewables will protects their livelihoods in practice.

This week we should see the publication of the SNP manifesto, likely to focus on economy, cost of living, child poverty, rural issues and energy development plans in Scotland. We’d also expect to see a renewed focus on delivery of core services and the reform of education, something as a former Education Secretary, John Swinney, likely feels is unfinished business.

As the campaign continues, those north of the border will be keeping a keen eye on how the parties in Scotland show they’re championing the nation and if they can put Holyrood-led issues aside to make their voices heard down in London.

With the General Election campaign so far plagued by gaffes and missteps, the Conservative manifesto launch saw Rishi Sunak’s last-ditch attempt to shift the polls away from what can only be described as disastrous. Before manifesto week, a Labour victory was nearing inevitable, but recent polling suggests the battle is now on for the Conservatives to even hit that 100 MP mark, and – remarkable though it is to utter these words – cement its chances of being the second largest parliamentary party and official opposition.  

It’s against this backdrop that Rishi Sunak unveiled his manifesto at Silverstone, the home of the British Grand Prix. 

But far from being revved and ready – it appears the Conservative engine hasn’t yet ignited.  And time is running out as the clock ticks down to Polling Day.  

Despite last-minute efforts to cram in as much as possible into the 76-page document (albeit cutting and dicing existing announcements in the most part), it all still feels a little bit safe, and does not offer the clear policy platform needed to secure a seismic shift in the Conservative Party’s fortunes. In short, today’s launch shows there’s very little left in the tank when it comes to new ideas, and an uninspiring recent track record to fall back on.   

Instead of a total reversal in fortunes, the Conservative top team will be hoping for just a modest gear change to save at least some Tory MPs on 4th July, and reduce the size of the Labour majority. A defeatist attitude, yes – but a fitting one, with reports rumbling that a rebel manifesto from the Tory-right could be launched next week, should Rishi Sunak’s own manifesto launch fall flat in the coming days.  

With a raft of Conservative parliamentary candidates on the precipice of losing a job, and future leadership hopefuls smelling blood as they politely clap on the PM from the sidelines at Silverstone, the next three weeks remain a fight for survival for Rishi Sunak. Who could blame him for looking forward to a sunny summer holiday in California…   

But before we hit fast-forward to the election results, let’s take a closer look at today’s manifesto pledges.  

At the first ITV head-to-head debate, we saw Rishi Sunak claim that a Labour Government would result in a £2,000 tax rise per household. Despite this statistic since being disputed, it certainly landed blows to Starmer in the first debate (12 to be precise), where Sir Keir came out with a pretty tepid 49% favourability rating. A disappointing result for Labour on the eve of a landslide election victory. 

And so, with this manifesto launch, the Conservatives are keen to once again draw battle lines based on taxation: Labour equals high tax, Conservative equals low tax. A time proven strategy, if delivered correctly.  

The manifesto pledges another 2p reduction in national insurance, representing an overall tax cut worth £1,300 to the average worker. However, it seems unlikely this will be enough to move the needle on the Tories’ electoral fortunes. Surely now would be the time to roll the dice and take a bigger, bolder risk.  

Other headline policy announcements include a new Help to Buy scheme for new builds under £400,000, a commitment to cut income tax personal allowance for pensioners, and a pledge to make permanent the £425,000 stamp duty threshold for first-time buyers. Rishi Sinak’s speech also reiterated the “triple lock plus” plan and leaned into the “anti-woke” agenda, pledging to protect single-sex spaces. 

The real debate begins now, as political analysts and Labour Party economists pick through the detail of the full manifesto document.  

Rishi Sunak has already faced tricky waters during this campaign for policy announcements with little detail or thought sitting behind them, namely the National Service announcement which unravelled under the microscope within hours. So it’s now time for Rishi Sunak to hope that his special advisers have done their sums correctly, as the more punishing scrutiny and media rounds begin. So far, Keir Starmer has accused the Prime Minister of “building this Jeremy Corbyn-style manifesto, where anything you want can go in it, none of it is costed”, and the Institute for Fiscal Studies has already suggested that the £12 billion projected savings from welfare reform look “difficult in the extreme”.  

All in all, the Conservatives leave Silverstone today less with popping champagne corks and a trophy, and more with the smell of burnt rubber in the air.  

It’s now over to the Labour Party for their own manifesto launch on Thursday. Can they further accelerate their poll lead to new heights? 

By Victoria Murphy, Associate Director. To get in touch with our Public Affairs team, please contact victoria.murphy@grayling.com.