Rishi Sunak has allegedly said this year will be the Tories “bounce back” year – but, judging from the reaction online, not everyone is so convinced.
According to reports published on Sunday, the prime minister said: “There is a real sense that the economy is turning a corner will the economic indicators pointing in the right direction.
“This year, 2024, will be the year Britain bounces back.”
Sunak’s comments come amid mounting agitation on the Tory backbenches over his ongoing leadership, and a growing list of Conservative MPs who have confirmed they will be stepping down at the next general election.
And let’s not forget February’s confirmation from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) that the UK did sink into a recession – two quarters of negative growth – at the end of 2023.
That’s despite the PM’s promise he would grow the economy at the start of 2023.
There are hopes that inflation will continue to fall this week and the Bank of England will start to bring interest rates down once again.
But, after 14 years of a Conservative government, plenty of people on X (formerly Twitter) think this promise of a bounce back is too little too late for the Tories...
Technically, the current parliamentary term does not have to be dissolved until December with an election held next January.
So some people took his comments as a sign that he was going to wait until the last possible moment to call the next general election.
His remarks also drew the inevitable comparisons with the satirical character Alan Partridge – even within Tory circles, according to Bloomberg reporter Alex Wickham.
While some astute X users pointed out that we are already more than three months into Sunak’s supposed “bounce back” year.
In that time, the Tories have fallen to a new low in the opinion polls, and they’ve lost three by-elections.