BEST FOR BRITAIN'S
WEEKEND WIRE

Dear John 

The revolving door into Number 10 is fast approaching escape velocity. The new Prime Minister has waved his way into the top office in the Government, and he looks sure to set aside political differences and govern in the national interest.

Sorry, did we say national interest? We meant the interest of the Tories’ fast-tanking national polling numbers.

Second-chance Sunak

Rishi Sunak, with the rousing support of 200-odd Tory MPs, was appointed as the fifth Conservative Prime Minister since 2016 on Tuesday.

For a Prime Minister who cited serious mistakes made by the previous officeholders, Sunak’s cabinet appointees look much more like olive branches to warring factions of the Conservative Party than an attempt to right the ship.

Save Sunak himself, all the holders of Great Offices of State are the same as they were last week. Closer scrutiny reveals that 23/31 of this supposed competency cabinet attended Johnson or Truss cabinet meetings.

2 Suella 2 high of a risk to national security

Suella Braverman’s reappointment as Home Secretary was doubtless the most controversial move of Sunak’s first week in the top job. Ignoring the fact that she dreams of deporting asylum seekers to nations with spotty human rights records, there's also the matter of her having been sacked six days previously for a breach in the ministerial code.

While Braverman claimed that the breach was related to a single erroneously-forwarded email that she promptly reported, new reports this week suggest a long history of playing fast and loose with national security.

An explosive story this week asserted that not only was Braverman’s recent leak deliberate, but also that her time as Attorney General was so laden with leaks that MI5 conducted an inquiry into her office.

Endorsement whiplash

The raft of opportunistic endorsements of Boris Johnson, many of them coming from the 57 ministers who resigned from his Government this summer, set off a far more entertaining moonwalk after he pulled out of the race on Sunday night.

James Cleverly, Priti Patel, and BoJo consigliere Nadine Dorries were among those seduced by Boris 2.0. Jacob Rees-Mogg tweeted a graphic declaring “Boris or Bust” and then was forced to congratulate “Bust” on his appointment as PM.

But the largest egg landed on the face of Nadim Zahawi, whose Telegraph op-ed extolling the virtues of a second Johnson premiership and promising that he’d really learned his lesson this time, honest, was published Sunday evening–minutes after Johnson ruled himself out of the race. A hasty tweet endorsing Sunak quickly followed.

Stormont showdown

Today marked the deadline for the formation of a government in Northern Ireland, necessitating another election.

The country’s months-long political impasse has followed an election in May which saw Sinn Féin return the most seats. The deadlock has centred on the Northern Ireland Protocol, which the majority of parties in the Northern Ireland Assembly support. The second-placed DUP, however, has refused to negotiate without an unamended passage of the Government’s Northern Ireland Protocol Bill, which would not only break international law, but which would likely precipitate an economic response from the EU that will make the UK cost of living crisis much worse.

The next election is expected to be held on 15th December but if you have time before then, please sign our petition if you agree that the NI protocol Bill should be scrapped.

The environment? No need to worry about that

While he has yet to declare war on solar panels, Rishi Sunak’s first week as Prime Minister portends a fractious relationship between his premiership and, well, the Earth.

Concern arose from Sunak’s removal of COP26 President Alok Sharma from the cabinet. He completed the trifecta of COP snubs by announcing that despite other leaders including Macron and Biden making the trip, he would not attend the upcoming COP27 summit in Sharm el-Sheikh on Thursday and then warning the King against attending on Friday.

Red tape, red figures

Amidst globally difficult conditions for small businesses, new research from the British Chambers of Commerce revealed Friday morning that–surprise!--conditions are uniquely worse for those operating in the UK.

Their research found that one in five UK small businesses has ceased trading with the EU altogether, owing to increased red tape and duties that such small operations are unable to navigate. These findings bolster evidence heard in Thursday’s UK Trade and Business Commision session on the dire situation faced by UK businesses across all sectors.

While the government blusters about its emission-increasing, GDP-shrinking trade deals with Australia and New Zealand, British businesses cut off from their natural trading partners by Brexit.

Brexit animal hellfare

As the Government scrambles for an ideological win with their nonsensical Retained EU Law bill, animal welfare advocates have warned that its passage could spell the end of a sweeping slate of laws protecting farm animals.

Should the Government run out of time to assess over 2,500 EU animal welfare laws by the end of the year, the RSPCA warned on Friday, those protections, including battery hen bans and animal testing restrictions, could “vanish into thin air”.

EU laws protecting animals play a vital role in safeguarding their welfare as well as preventing disease and unnecessary cruelty. Their erosion would represent yet another broken Brexit promise: that the UK could enact more stringent protections outside the EU.

We have given up on predicting who will enter Number 10 next, save Larry the Cat. With the way the political circus has played out in the past weeks, we rule nothing out. If there’s a war declared on mice and decorative items on shelves by this time next week, you heard it here first. Have a great weekend!

Best wishes,

Tommy Gillespie
Press Officer, Best for Britain

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