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Rishi Sunak is ready to be UK prime minister after his final remaining rival, Penny Mordaunt, pulled out of the race for 10 Downing Avenue.
“All of us owe it to the nation, to one another and to Rishi to unite and work collectively for the great of the nation,” Mordaunt stated in an announcement on Twitter. The ruling Conservative Get together confirmed Sunak, who is because of tackle rank-and-file MPs at 2:30 p.m., has been elected chief.
It’s a exceptional turnaround in Sunak’s political fortunes, after the previous Chancellor of the Exchequer give up Boris Johnson’s authorities in July after which misplaced out to Liz Truss within the final Tory management contest over the summer time. However his repeated warnings that her plans would set off financial chaos proved appropriate and put him in pole place when Truss’s premiership imploded.
Even so, Sunak was no shoo-in given the bitterness and division within the Conservative Get together. He’s nonetheless tarnished within the eyes of many Tory MPs for his position in Johnson’s downfall, and the previous prime minister’s flirtation over the weekend with what would have been an outrageous comeback simply months after being ousted briefly threatened to derail Sunak’s hopes.Play Video
Rivals Drop Out
It effectively meant a coronation for Sunak, 42, who becomes the UK’s first Hindu prime minister and the country’s youngest in more than 200 years. Grassroots Tory members, who had the final say when Truss beat out Sunak last time, will have no input this time around.
But Sunak now faces a daunting task to try to bring unity to a party that has been through months of upheaval and is still tearing itself apart over fundamental issues including Brexit and the economy.
Some Tory MPs even say the party no longer has a mandate to govern, after a second change of leader since Johnson won the general election in 2019. “It will now be impossible to avoid a GE,” former Culture Secretary Nadine Dorries said on Twitter.
Turmoil
Truss’s decision to step down followed weeks of turmoil as investors jettisoned UK assets. Her economic plan, including borrowing to pay for massive tax cuts, rattled markets and turned voters further against the Tories in record numbers.
After firing her first finance minister and long-time political ally, Kwasi Kwarteng, Truss brought in Jeremy Hunt — who backed Sunak on Sunday — to try to restore calm.
Hunt managed that to a degree, but also put the government on course to impose another punishing round of austerity at a politically sensitive time as Britons struggle with soaring living costs.
In a column for the Telegraph newspaper late Sunday, Hunt indicated that he and Sunak are on the same page on how to tackle the economy. Sunak will “turn the page on what went wrong, take decisions in the national interest and rebuild the extraordinary potential of our economy,” Hunt said.
Hunt is due to deliver a major statement on the Treasury’s tax-and-spending plans on Oct. 31, a date picked to better inform the Bank of England on how quickly it should raise interest rates. UK bonds surged at Monday’s open on expectations of a Sunak premiership.
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