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British general election in 44 days
In the United Kingdom, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has a large amount of freedom to decide on the date of the election within a generous period of time. photo
© Yui Mok/PA Wire/dpa
For months, the British opposition has been urging the Prime Minister to finally set a date for the next general election. Now the time has come.
He has this plan, unlike the opposition Labour Party. Only a conservative government led by him will stabilize the economy, said Sunak. Commentators spoke of a bold step in view of the large gap between Sunak’s Tory party and the polls.
According to polls, the social democratic Labour Party is around 20 percentage points ahead of the Tories. If this result occurs in the election, the Conservatives, who have been in power since 2010, are likely to suffer a historic defeat. Sunak has been in office since October 2022. He is already the third head of government since the previous election in 2019, after Boris Johnson and Liz Truss.
Unlike in Germany, in the United Kingdom the Prime Minister is largely free to decide on the date of the election within a generous period of time. He must give notice at least 25 working days in advance. The opposition has been urging Sunak for months to finally set an election date. She accused him of delaying the election date as long as possible given the poor poll numbers.
Despite several announcements and recently improved economic data, Sunak’s Conservatives have so far failed to close the gap to Labor. Most recently, they lost hundreds of seats and a key mayoral post in local elections in England, as well as a constituency in north-west England in a parliamentary by-election. The right-wing populist Reform UK party, the former Brexit Party, is also putting increasing pressure on the Tories.