Rishi Sunak has been ‘taken prisoner’ by rebels on Tory right, says Labour

Rishi Sunak has “become a prisoner” of right-wing MPs in the Tory party “with dangerous views” as he tries to cling on to power after calamitous local election results, according to the Labour Party.

The UK prime minister spent yesterday bunkered down after his party lost almost 500 council seats in the local elections, suffered a stunning defeat in the West Midlands mayoral race and a humiliation in London where Sadiq Khan was easily re-elected.

But details have emerged of how the right of the Tories have already capitalised on Mr Sunak’s weakness and lack of support among Tory MPs who have spent the weekend debating his future behind the scenes.

At a meeting in the last fortnight between the prime minister and two grandees from the right – John Hayes and Edward Leigh – Mr Sunak was told to move further to the right if he wanted to stay as prime minister.

Following that meeting, Mr Sunak pushed through his controversial Rwanda Bill to allow deportations of asylum seekers to east Africa. He then authorised the filming of asylum-seekers being rounded up into the back of vans just ahead of the local elections.

Mr Hayes publicly backed the prime minister to keep his job following the asylum-seeker stunt and claimed the images of asylum-seekers being rounded up for deportation “ensured that we held on to seats we would have otherwise lost”.

He added: “We need half a dozen more headlines like that and then we can win again.”

It has confirmed the view of Labour that Mr Sunak is now “a prisoner of the right”. Jonathan Ashworth, Labour’s shadow paymaster general, said: “Every week there is some new story about Rishi Sunak being pushed around by his own Trussite MPs pressuring him to lurch even further to the right.

“It’s clear he’s nothing but a prisoner to those with the most dangerous views within his party, and he’s simply too weak to say no.

“The British public deserve better than this constant psychodrama under the Tories. Only the changed Labour Party can deliver that.”

But now plans are in place to push the government even further to the right, fuelled by fears of Nigel Farage and Reform UK.

A tweet by Tory chairman Richard Holden seemed to confirm the view that they believe Andy Street lost in the West Midlands because 34,471 votes peeled off to Nigel Farage’s right-wing Reform UK party.

Mr Holden quoted Reform leader Richard Tice saying: “We stopped Andy Street from winning in the West Midlands. We’re delighted by that.”

The Tory chairman added: “A vote for Reform is a vote to help Labour win. Mr Tice’s own words.”

A senior Tory MP said the election results proved “Reform cannot win” but showed “they can be wreckers in tight seats for the Conservatives”.

The influential Common Sense Group of Tory right-wing MPs, obsessed with immigration and the culture wars, is now expected to write to Mr Sunak this week calling for an urgent meeting with a list of demands.

A key figure on the right, former home secretary Suella Braverman, who is close to Mr Hayes and the Common Sense Group, has already listed demands that he brings rightwingers like her back into his cabinet, adopts a policy of leaving the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR) and caps legal immigration.

She told the BBC yesterday she now “regretted” supporting Mr Sunak when he ran against Boris Johnson for the leadership but said: “there is no superman or superwoman to replace him now”.

Ms Braverman added: “The plan is not working and I despair at these terrible results. I love my country, I care about my party and I want us to win, and I am urging the prime minister to change course, to – with humility – reflect on what voters are telling us, and change the plan and the way that he is communicating and leading us.”

Another right-winger, Andrea Jenkyns, has added that Mr Sunak also needs to allow Mr Johnson to run for parliament at the next election.

She has put in a letter of no-confidence in the prime minister but describes Mr Johnson’s return as “a plan B alternative” to changing leader. All this comes as a number of respected Tory voices have publicly warned Mr Sunak not to “drift to the right” including defeated West Midlands mayor Andy Street.

Mr Street, who lost in the West Midlands to Labour’s Richard Parker by a mere 1,508 votes, was asked by Sky News if picking a new leader from the right would be the wrong idea.

He replied: “Categorically yes! The reason is that in [the West Midlands] this most urban, youngest, most diverse place in Britain we have come within 1,500 votes of winning.”

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