Sunak's error? Promising too much and delivering too little

After such an emphatic - if not downright rude - rejection by the electorate, it takes more than a little imagination to recall the day that Rishi Sunak became prime minister. On 25 October 2022, Sunak stood outside No 10 and made his first speech in charge of the country. In it, he made his first mistakes, too.

- SEAN O'GRADY

He promised rashly, in hindsight - that the government he was to lead "will have integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level". Given the already evidently wayward habits of his backbenchers, he probably should have taken that out at the draft stage. It did indeed become a terrible hostage to fortune, right up to and during the 2024 election campaign, when the scandal of insider betting broke.

Sunak also committed another unfathomable crime for a prudent politician one that he was, tragically, to repeat time and again during his time in office. He overpromised. He said he would deliver on the 2019 manifesto - by then surely impossible, given the state of the public finances, as he knew better than most.

He even went so far as to itemise, bullet point style, the first of many lists of things to do, each one a rod for his own back: "Stronger NHS. Better schools. Safer streets. Control of our borders. Protecting our environment. Supporting our armed forces. Levelling up and building an economy that embraces the opportunities of Brexit, where businesses invest, innovate and create jobs."

He followed that up in subsequent months with his famous list of the five "people's priorities", most of which were not fulfilled. The one that was (cutting inflation) was largely the work of the Bank of England. He failed to "stop the boats" or reduce NHS waiting lists. Last autumn, he cancelled the northern extension to the HS2 project, a flagbearer for the regeneration of the North and a rare substantial, tangible contribution to the "levelling up" agenda the Conservatives had pursued since David Cameron and George Osborne came up with the idea. That some of the HS2 money 7 - none was actually "saved" - went instead to filling potholes in Leighton Buzzard, among other distinctly southern locations, was also grimly symbolic.