Memo shows May was warned snap election carried ‘a lot of risk’

Theresa May was warned by campaign chief Sir Lynton Crosby that her gamble of calling a snap general election carried “a lot of risk”, a leaked memo has revealed.

The missive, written in April, just days before the Prime Minister announced her surprise decision, said voters did not want the uncertainty that an election would cause but did not say she should abandon the idea.

The document set out key planks of the strategy used by Mrs May during the election, including the heavy focus on her personal appeal rather than that of the wider Conservative Party.

Mrs May lost her Commons majority and was left politically weakened after her snap election gamble backfired on 8 June.

Extracts from the document were published by Sunday newspapers yesterday.

The leaked Election Strategic Note – April 2017 memo, drawing on focus group research and national polls, opened by warning that it found “there is clearly a lot of risk involved with holding an early election – and there is a real need to nail down the ‘why’ for doing so now”.

Voters were “actively seeking to avoid uncertainty and maintain the status quo and yet by calling an election the Conservatives are the ones who are creating uncertainty”.

The memo went on to say that voters were worried about the risk of a hung Parliament creating “chaos over the delivery of Brexit”.