By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
LONDON (Worthy News) – Britain’s parliamentary elections were underway, and the Conservative Party was expected to be defeated by Keir Starmer’s center-left Labour Party.
Opinion polls predicted that Thursday’s vote would end 14 years of Conservative government and hand Starmer the keys to the prime minister’s Number 10 Downing Street office on Friday.
The gloomy forecasts came despite Prime Minister Rishi Sunak covering thousands of miles (kilometers) in the past few weeks to convince voters to give him and his party another chance.
Yet Sunak’s 20 months in office didn’t impress his critics. Many voters say they are not driven by love for Labour but rather a deep dissatisfaction at the Conservatives, pollsters suggested.
Critics view Britain as a broken nation with issues ranging from massive immigration and a troubled economy to a crumbling National Health Service, sewage-filled rivers, and expensive, delay-ridden railways.
Many voters blame the Conservatives for this social upheaval and look set to punish them at the ballot box, pollsters and commentators say.
WILD CARD
Aside from Sunak and Starmer, this year’s wild card is Nigel Farage, an admirer and close friend of former U.S. President Donald J. Trump, whose anti-immigration party Reform U.K. is poised to capture millions of votes.
He was due to receive many ballots from Conservatives on the right and even from Labour, but not enough to form the next government.
The Liberal Democrats, led by Ed Davey, will hope to mop up votes in the centerground.
The Scottish National Party is also fighting to hold its dominance north of the border, while the Greens and Plaid Cymru — the Welsh independence party — were expecting single-digit seat hauls.
Yet whoever comes to power will have to tackle social upheaval more than for years after “Brexit” when Britain exited the European Union at 11 p.m. local time on January 31, 2020 (midnight February 1, 2020, on the other side of the Channel).
In Kent, sentiments felt strikingly similar to those across the Channel in Calais, France, where voters defeated government allies last week.
CHANGING POLITICS
“Things need to change,” said Anik, a taxi driver. “Look around. Dover is going down. We used to have a lot of tourists, but now, there are very few. The politicians haven’t helped, have they?”
Yet for Sunak, 44, who has led the country since 2022, the future remains bright whatever the outcome of Thursday’s polls: The son of Hindu immigrants of Indian descent, he became independently wealthy as an investment banker.
Yet his wife — Indian tech heiress Akshata Murty — is why his family is now richer than King Charles III, with an estimated fortune of 650 million pounds ($820 million).
He said Wednesday that whatever the outcome, he had a “clear conscience.”
“As long as I can look myself in the mirror and know that I am working as hard as I can, doing what I believe is right for the country, that is how I get through, and that is what I believe I am doing,” Sunak stressed.
(With reporting by Worthy News Europe Bureau in Budapest).
Copyright 1999-2024 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
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