Lee Anderson’s defection from the Tories to Reform UK was hardly a surprise. In fact, it seemed almost inevitable. But that Anderson rose to the position he did within the Conservative party to become deputy chairman, before flouncing out, raises questions about Sunak’s political judgement. Anderson became an emblem of the Red Wall, yet is he really representative of voters from the north?

Sunak’s superficial reading of Anderson led him to think that he could be a bridge to the Red Wall

Anderson’s blunt language has powered his brief career as a Conservative MP. Because he said undiplomatic, unwise or unhelpful things, and because his background was unimpeachably and authentically working class, Rishi Sunak and his advisers chose him as a kind of avatar for ‘Red Wall’ voters.

The Prime Minister made a bad calculation. His own background – Winchester, Oxford, Stanford Business School, Goldman Sachs – gave him no insight into the former Labour strongholds whose support he inherited. His superficial reading of Anderson led him to think that the Ashfield MP could be a bridge to them. By promoting and seeming to listen to Anderson, Sunak would show that he understood the concerns of the Red Wall.

I see why the Prime Minister thought Anderson would be a Red Wall envoy, but I also understand why he was wrong. Anderson always had a whiff of a Southerner’s idea of what someone from the provinces was like. He had a history of troubling remarks, made crude quips about Travellers, and talked about sending would-be migrants ‘straight back the same day’. But this was simplistic and crude rather than authentic. In truth he has proved clumsy, showing himself not especially able or persuasive.

What his Tory party appointment showed was what Downing Street was missing.

QOSHE - What Rishi Sunak got wrong about Lee Anderson - Eliot Wilson
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What Rishi Sunak got wrong about Lee Anderson

10 1
12.03.2024

Lee Anderson’s defection from the Tories to Reform UK was hardly a surprise. In fact, it seemed almost inevitable. But that Anderson rose to the position he did within the Conservative party to become deputy chairman, before flouncing out, raises questions about Sunak’s political judgement. Anderson became an emblem of the Red Wall, yet is he really representative of voters from the north?

Sunak’s superficial reading of Anderson........

© The Spectator


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