Crass, tactless – could Rishi Sunak’s trans blunder lose him the election?

The prime minister’s mockery of Keir Starmer on trans rights – when the mother of murdered teenager Brianna Ghey was in the Commons gallery – exposed his lack of a sixth political sense, writes John Rentoul

Rishi Sunak may have just had his ‘Gordon Brown moment’ (PA Wire)

When prime ministers lose general elections there is often, looking back, a moment that defined when public opinion turned against them. When, for example, a chance exchange involving a member of the public shows them in their true light.

It happened to Gordon Brown in 2010 when he was recorded by a live microphone calling Gillian Duffy, a Labour voter he met on an election walkabout, a “bigoted woman”. Brown duly led Labour to defeat after 13 years in power.

Today may have been Rishi Sunak’s “Gillian Duffy” moment. Making a crass jibe at Keir Starmer about “defining a woman” on the day that Esther Ghey, the mother of murdered trans teenager Brianna Ghey, visited the Commons was Sunak at his most unempathetic.