Sunak’s worst week yet just keeps getting worse
Astaggering degree of ineptitude this week, even by Rishi Sunak’s standards. It’s an object lesson in how not to deal with a political crisis.
The Prime Minister’s mishandling of the Frank Hester racism row did not actually begin this week, but a fortnight ago, when he issued an apparently impromptu speech about extremism.
George Galloway had just won in Rochdale. Labour had come unstuck when its candidate was found to have made antisemitic comments. There had been a row in Parliament about the number of amendments the Speaker could pick in an Opposition Day debate on Gaza. Evidently, Sunak visualised a narrative in which he could appear to stand above the fray and also score party political points against Keir Starmer. He would battle extremism in all its forms.
Well, not quite all of them. He had spent most of the previous week refusing to say whether Lee Anderson was Islamophobic, despite the former Tory deputy chairman’s claim that “Islamists” had “got control” of London Mayor Sadiq Khan. In response, Sunak removed the whip but refused to admit the remark was racist. Various ministers were sent out with the impossible task of convincingly arguing that Anderson was “wrong” but without being able to say why.
Sunak should have taken two key messages from this. First, that refusing to call very obviously racist things racist is not a tenable communications strategy. And second, that he needed to get his own house in order, or at least look like he was serious about doing so, before making speeches about extremism and violence outside Downing Street.
Unsurprisingly, he failed to learn either lesson, so now he finds himself in similar circumstances. Hester, the Tory party’s biggest donor, is quoted as saying that Labour MP Diane Abbott made him “want to hate all black women” and she “should be shot”. Hester has apologised for making “rude” comments.
Work and Pensions Secretary
Mel Stride was wheeled out for the morning media round to speak the most preposterous gibberish imaginable. “I think the critical point here is, I don’t think what he was saying was a gender-based or a racebased comment,” he said.
It really is difficult to think of a more “gender-based” or “racebased” comment than “hate all black women”.
In the afternoon, the Business Secretary, Kemi Badenoch, broke the line and said the comments were racist. Shortly afterwards, Sunak submitted to the inevitable and conceded the same.
The absurd rigmarole then began all over again. This time business minister Kevin Hollinrake was the sacrificial victim. He tried to establish an improbable distinction between being a racist and sounding like one. “I think the key thing now is, is Mr Hester himself a racist?” he pondered on Sky News. “I don’t believe so from what I know, and I don’t know him.” He wanted to “move on from this now”. So did the Prime Minister’s spokesperson. The donor “has now rightly apologised for the offence caused, and where remorse is shown it should be accepted”, they said.
So this is the new line: Hester’s apology showed that he was not a racist so the matter is settled. But that is barely a stronger position than the one the party held on Tuesday, and it does not make sense on the basis of the admission Sunak has himself made.
Hester’s apology, which Downing Street’s demand that we “move on” relies upon, stated that his “criticism had nothing to do with her gender nor colour of skin”. In other words, he has not actually apologised for the racism and the remorse cannot therefore be accepted.
In all likelihood, the real reason Sunak does not want to go further is because he does not want to give back the £10m Hester donated to the party. And even if he did, there’s a chance Hester would do like Anderson did this week and direct his support towards the Reform UK party.
But even with that limitation, Sunak’s approach has been poor to the point of absurdity.
It is actually astonishing how bad Sunak’s party is at handling this sort of issue. Its defects are now visible for all to see – including his own ministers, who now look as foolish as the man who presides over them.
Sunak’s approach has been poor to the point of absurdity