The Sun and others praised the Prime Minister for his policies, claiming that ‘Rishi Sunak’s delay on petrol car ban gives him eight point surge in polls’.
In recent weeks, right-wing Tories and their cheerleaders in the right-wing press had heaped praise on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak for watering down net zero policies, which they claimed would be popular among voters, especially following the Uxbridge by-election result.
The ‘unexpected Tory win’ in Boris Johnson’s former constituency was put down to a backlash against the expansion of the Ultra Low Emission Zone, which the right-wing press seized on to push back more widely against policies aimed at tackling climate change, which they said was proving ‘too costly for voters’.
In the days that followed, Sunak sought to put his own narrow self-interests ahead of those of the rest of the country and future generations, choosing to row back on net zero policies, one of which included a five-year delay in the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars, meaning the requirement for all new cars to be “zero emission” will not come into force until 2035.
Despite the harmful impacts of climate change, which has included devastating heatwaves and wildfires in Europe this summer, Sunak was praised for rowing back on policies designed to tackle it.
The Sun and others praised the Prime Minister for his policies, claiming that ‘Rishi Sunak’s delay on petrol car ban gives him eight point surge in polls’. However, the latest polls show that Sunak’s wreckless policies on climate change haven’t quite given him the poll bounce that he had hoped for.
According to a poll of polls by Electoral Calculus, Labour’s lead over the Conservatives widened to 19pc last month, up from 17pc the month before. That would translate into a very large Labour majority if there were an election today.
According to the poll of polls, which includes a sample size of over 17,000 people, the Conservatives would gain 133 seats, while Labour would win 443, the Lib Dems 30 and the SNP on 21 seats, giving Labour a majority of 236.
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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