The Tory party hasn’t had the best week, what with one of their MPs defecting and their biggest donor embroiled in a racism row. But if Conservative politicians were looking for somewhere to go in Westminster this evening to lift their spirits, Mr S would not have recommended J. L. Partners’ ‘Election 2024’ event. Organised in word clouds and colourful charts, polling by the firm dubbed Rishi Sunak ‘weak’, showed the public want more ‘honesty’ in politics and revealed that a not insignificant proportion of 2019 Tory voters would rather, um, Martin Lewis the money-saving expert as their PM. It’s all a rather poor indictment of the Tories’ track record as they head into the next election…

Panellist Will Dry — the former Sunak campaigner and No.10 SpAd turned member of the mysterious Conservative Britain Alliance group (CBA) — has been recently thrust into the spotlight. He was linked to bombshell polling commissioned by Lord Frost and funded by anonymous donors that suggests the Tory party is facing ‘an extinction event’. Dry refused to discuss either No.10 or the CBA, but he did issue a number of subtle warnings to his former boss. On priorities, the ex-SpAd insisted that ‘voters want to stop the boats and…illegal migration to fall’, adding that even if a flight to Rwanda took off before the election, it would not be enough to shift the dial for the Tories. The former Sunak campaigner told the crowd that the ‘Conservatives’ failure’ is that they have become ‘particularly less popular’ with ‘more socially conservative’ voters. Had the results he’d seen suggested anything more about how voters viewed the Tory leadership? Dry refused to be drawn on individual politicians. He did hint, however, that a ‘controversial’ question had been part of the polling. How very cryptic…

But Labour didn’t get off scot-free. Voters see Keir Starmer as boring, untrustworthy and, er, ‘unsure’, according to J. L. Partners’ research. Though Labour is trouncing the Tories in the polls, Starmer’s own net favourability rating remains rather low, at -11 according to Ipsos. And there may be more bad news ahead. In fact, Dry predicts that Starmer ‘will become the most unpopular elected leader that we have ever had’. ‘What about Truss?’ fellow panellist Tom Baldwin asked. ‘No, no — elected,’ Dry responded. Ouch.

Neither Sunak nor Starmer emerged from the discussion unscathed. But with a 20-point poll lead, the Labour leader’s starting position is slightly more comfortable. Is there any hope left for the Tories? ‘I think it’s pretty difficult at the moment to be optimistic if you’re a Conservative,’ Dry admitted, later adding: ‘I also think that the Tories are really underestimating how difficult it will be to be heard in opposition.’ That doesn’t sound promising…