Rishi Sunak to face PMQs and 1922 Committee as poll suggests third of Tory voters want different leader – UK politics live

Good morning. Hands up who’s heard of John Robert Clynes? He was leader of the Labour party at the time of the 1922 general election and, according to a new history of Labour in opposition, he is the only leader of the party ever to be defeated in a leadership challenge. That is extraordinary when you consider that, at least since the 1970s, Conservative leaders normally haven’t resigned at a time of their own choosing and, even if they have not all been forced out after a leadership contest, at least the last three quit because they knew defeat after a leadership challenge was otherwise inevitable.

(Why the difference? Short answer, Labour doesn’t have a 1922 Committee, and its leadership rules are different.)

All of this helps to explain why today is a tricky day for Rishi Sunak; as Conservative party leader, you are permanently on probation, and today he has a tricky “performance appraisal” with his employer – the aforementioned 1922 Committee. He has also got PMQs, another form of performance review.

Last week Lee Anderson defected, and No 10 did not handle the Frank Hester controversy well, leading to leadership challenge chatter reaching perhaps the 7 out of 10 point on the crisis index. But it is not all bad news; today inflation has hit a two and a half year low.

Ahead of his meeting with the 1922 Committee, Sunak has published an article in the Daily Mail restating his commitment to abolish employees’ national insurance. He says:

We are well and truly on the path to sustainably lower taxes.

We started that journey in the autumn with a 2p cut to National Insurance worth £450 for the average worker on £35,400 a year. And the Chancellor cut taxes again in this month’s budget which now means that 27 million employees will get an average tax cut of around £900 a year.

We did this because I believe in the fundamental dignity of work. When people work hard, they should be rewarded, not taxed more. It’s not right that income from work is taxed twice, while all other income is only taxed once. This is why I have cut National Insurance, the second tax on work, by a third in the last six months. And it is why my long-term plan, ultimately, is to cut it to zero.

But there is bad news for Sunak in the Daily Telegraph. It has published polling from Savanta suggesting more than a third of Conservative voters (37%) want someone else to lead the party into the next election. Only 45% say Sunak should stay in post until polling day.

The book about Labour in opposition is Keeping the Red Flag Flying: The Labour Party in Opposition since 1922 by Mark Garnett, Gavin Hyman, and Richard Johnson. It’s out next month and, on the basis of what I’ve read so far, it’s a very good read if you’re interested in Labour history.

Here is the agenda for the day.

9.40am: Ed Davey launches the Lib Dems’ local election campaign.

10am: Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, gives evidence to the Commons culture committee.

12pm: Rishi Sunak faces Keir Starmer at PMQs.

Afternoon: Vaughan Gething is due to be nominated in the Senedd at Wales’s next first minister.

Afternoon: Peers vote on amendments to the safety of Rwanda (asylum and immigration) bill that would reintroduce safeguards originally passsed by the House of Lords, but removed from the bill by MPs on Monday.

5pm: Sunak addresses Conservative MPs at the 1922 Committee.

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