Could Rishi Sunak’s emergence as this nation’s greatest gaffe machine since Prince Philip come in time to endear him to the electorate? At this point in his campaign, you’d have to say it’s a tactic he might as well lean into. After all, one of the best things about being British is the manner in which virtually everything becomes a funny and heart-warming story if you give it enough time.
Another day, another gaffe. This morning ITV began trailing the interview our increasingly hilarious prime minister so famously abandoned the D-Day commemorations in Normandy for by releasing a clip in which he seems to claim that despite now being a billionaire his inability as a child to watch Sky TV, on the basis his parents hadn’t installed it at home, was a hardship that keeps him in touch with the struggles of the British proletariat.
Between now and 4 July, Sunak should not be afraid to dial up the inner Bean
On first watch, it’s hard not to laugh. ‘You poor, poor love,’ you want to shriek. ‘Did they send you up chimneys, too? Is that where you became politicised?’ But on reflection there’s something so wonderfully guileless – Mr Bean-like, in fact – about the manner in which he makes this mad assertion in front of a rapacious political journalist paid to find weakness that it’s hard not to feel almost protective.
The actor Dennis Quaid recently said of Donald Trump: ‘People might call him an asshole – but he’s my asshole.’ While no one is making this same accusation against the seemingly well-meaning Sunak, at least not with any conviction, since Prince Philip’s death there has been a vacancy in public life for someone who can be relied upon on behalf of the nation to insert their foot into their mouth at the least opportune moments.
‘He may be a gaffe machine – but he’s my gaffe machine’. Might this work better than the current Conservative party election strategy for winning the people over to Sunak?
Certainly, it seems to be the direction of travel, whether intentional or not. Only three weeks into this campaign – which the Prime Minister memorably announced with what seemed at the time like an unsurpassable gaffe, inexplicably standing outside sans umbrella in a torrential rainstorm while goons at the Downing Street gates played ear-splitting music – already Sunak has served up a wonderful array of totally avoidable howlers.
First he asked workers at a brewery in Wales if they were excited about the coming Euros, despite the fact the Welsh football team has failed to qualify. Then in Northern Ireland he allowed himself to be asked in front of the dockyard where the Titanic was built if he was captaining a sinking ship. Glorious stuff.
He’s also been photographed standing beneath an exit sign (surely the most basic of campaigning errors), signed off a Conservative party political broadcast in which the Union Jack is seen flying upside down and been photo-bombed by opportunistic Lib Dem activists in a boat while canvassing voters for the benefit of the assembled media near a river in Oxfordshire. ‘This is just another small boat Rishi Sunak can’t deal with,’ said a Lib Dem spokesman. Ho ho ho. There have also been toe-curlingly disastrous experiments with Tiktok.
But aren’t these exactly the kind of gaffes a certain Boris Johnson might have relished, somehow turning them to his advantage with a rueful grin, a downward glance at his shoes and a bashful running of the hand through the hair?
My point is gaffes are survivable, and it’s for this reason I believe now is not the time for Sunak to start trying to change the narrative by portraying himself as the passionless technocrat his critics would have you believe he is. Rather, between now and 4 July, he should not be afraid to dial up the inner Bean.
I’m not suggesting he start making a fool of himself deliberately, the way Ed Davey seems to be, pretending to fall off paddle boards and the like to avoid being asked about his role in the Post Office scandal. Or that he start clumsily dancing in public, the way Theresa May clearly thought was so winning.
Rather I think over the rest of the campaign, for example at the next leaders debate, he shouldn’t be afraid to be himself. If the opportunity arises, he should talk, for example, about how difficult it is to fit Peloton classes into his daily routine, or about the very real struggles men who marry heiresses endure, or even about how hard it is to find good home help in California.
Why not? Gaffes reveal character, and deep down Brits like them.
If he really wanted to set tongues wagging, perhaps he could point out that finding a council home in Britain that doesn’t have a Sky satellite dish appended to it is nigh on impossible, and then do the mic drop/finger kiss thing Obama once famously pulled off at the Washington Correspondents Dinner. ‘Sunak out’, he might say, and then moonwalk off the stage.
If he does that, I’ll vote for him.
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