From tax cut bonanza to crunch battle on Rwanda, what to expect from Rishi Sunak in 2024 ahead of general election
BUCKLE up! If you thought 2023 was one hell of a year for British politics, the next 12 months are going to be even more blockbuster.
A looming General Election means the stakes could not be higher for Rishi Sunak and Sir Keir Starmer as they rev up their campaigns.
With the turn of a New Year firing the starting gun on the race to be PM, expect both leaders to hurtle out of the traps with fresh announcements to woo wavering voters - along with new attacks to harm their opponent.
And beneath all the high-drama played out in the theatre of Westminster lies real-word decisions that impact all of us.
So strap in, it is going to be a rollercoaster year of politics.
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GENERAL ELECTION
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you would have noticed Britain is heading for a General Election.
Technically, the latest Mr Sunak could go to the country would be January 2025, but he has ruled this out and confirmed it will be this year.
The biggest question now stalking through Westminster is "when".
Two main theories have emerged, that he will either go early in spring or sit tight until the autumn.
For spring, the logic is that by cutting his losses, Sunak would avoid a potentially bruising set of May local elections and allow an air of defeat to rumble on until the General.
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Whereas those touting autumn say it would let the cost of living crisis ease off and hope something comes his way, while also notching up two years in No10 under his belt.
Whenever it happens, the coming election will overshadow every political event this year, and every move by Sunak and Starmer will be viewed through that prism.
Mr Sunak is fighting to pull off an historic fifth term in power for the Tories, while Sir Keir wants to be the first Labour leader to win an election since Tony Blair.
The policy pledges will become juicer and the mudslinging will become uglier as polling day approaches.
And at the end of it all, Britain could have a new Prime Minister.
RWANDA
Without doubt immigration will be one of the dominant battlegrounds heading into that election.
The issue is a key dividing line between the Conservatives and Labour - none more so than the flagship Rwanda plan, which Sir Keir opposes.
Despite the policy in its current form being kiboshed by the Supreme Court, Mr Sunak is adamant he can still get the first deportation flights to Kigali off by the spring.
In the next few months he will try to ram beefed-up legislation and a new treaty through Parliament to salvage the scheme.
But he faces a familiar challenge in rebellious Tor rightwingers demanding the Bill be hardened even more - something ferociously opposed by his rump of centrist MPs.
Corralling the opposing factions of his party to stomach the Bill will be a crucial test of Sunak's premiership in the months ahead.
If the Rwanda policy is successful, Mr Sunak would have a tangible achievement to sell to voters. Fail, and it would be a major setback.
And then there is the killer question of the European Convention on Human Rights.
The drumbeat of Tory MPs clamouring to leave the Strasbourg court is only growing louder, although the PM is as yet reluctant to totally sever ties.
TAX CUTS
In the next few days, Mr Sunak will finally be able to declare himself a tax-cutting PM.
After a year of monkish restraint in a dogged mission to curb inflation, National Insurance will be slashed for millions of workers on January 6.
It will be the first tasty morsel ahead of a platter of giveaways expected in Jeremy Hunt’s March 6 Budget, which could well be the last fiscal event before Polling Day.
Inheritance Tax, Stamp Duty and Income Tax are all being eyed for pre-election pruning to put more money in people’s pockets.
FOREIGN WARS
The raging geopolitical conflicts of 2023 show no sign of dying down in the New Year.
Wars in Ukraine and Israel-Gaza will continue to dominate Britain’s foreign policy bandwidth in the coming months.
But new challenges are also surfacing, including Venezuela’s aggression in Guyana, and Chinese tension with Taiwan reaching boiling point.
For whatever domestic events take centre stage in Westminster this year, whoever is in No10 will find themselves constantly with one eye on world affairs.
RETURN OF TRUMP?
If one General Election wasn’t enough, America also elects its President in November.
It’s shaping up to be a re-run of 2020, with an ageing Biden refusing to call it quits, and Trump running away with the Republican candidacy.
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Despite his string of legal woes, it’s the brash billionaire who is currently edging it in the polls.
And if Trump does crash back into the White House, it won’t just have ramifications for the American people - but the world.