SOPHY’S CHOICE

AND WE’RE OFF! The election starting gun has been fired and I’m delighted to be writing for the Sunday Express.

The shock announcement by Rishi Sunak put Westminster in a tailspin but now momentum is building in the race for No10.

I’ll be honest with you: no Prime Minister has ever turned around a poll deficit as big as the Tories are now grappling with in just six weeks.

And the early polling data suggests the gap could be getting bigger rather than smaller. The first Sky News/yougov poll of the race showed Labour’s lead lengthening to an eye-watering 27 points.

It might not be surprising, given the gaffe-strewn first week of campaigning for the Prime Minister.

I was broadcasting from a damp Downing Street on the day Mr Sunak called the election – the kind of rain where I had to tip my handbag upside down to let the water out after I had mistakenly left it ajar.

But we had umbrellas – it beggars belief the PM was allowed out in the downpour to deliver one of the biggest speeches of his political life.

‘Anything can happen in politics (just ask the lettuce that outlasted Liz Truss) but this election is Keir Starmer’s to lose’

A rain-sodden back isn’t the image the Conservative Party would have wanted to start the campaign with.

Things only got worse with a visit to the Titanic quarter in Northern Ireland (yes, really – the headlines write themselves) and a cringeworthy moment in Wales when he asked pub workers whether they were looking forward to a summer of football… before one pointed out Wales hadn’t qualified for the Euros.

Anything can happen in politics (just ask the lettuce that outlasted Liz Truss) but this election is Keir Starmer’s to lose. There’s one sliver of hope for Rishi Sunak, however.

Last week I travelled to Grimsby, to present my show Politics Hub. It’s a key marginal won by Boris Johnson in 2019 that Labour is desperate to win back. I was expecting to find more enthusiasm for Sir Keir – but most voters were lukewarm.

“He says one thing and does the other,” one complained. Another said: “I don’t trust him – he says what people want to hear.”

Don’t get me wrong, the signs are still pointing to a Labour victory.

But it may be a case of the Tories losing the election rather than Labour winning it.

Sophy Ridge presents Politics Hub every weekday at 7pm on Sky News (Freeview channel 233).