Catastrophic local election results reveal how futile it would be for Sunak to tack hard right

Editorial: The prime minister must not be seduced by the whisperings of his party’s extreme cabal – reclaiming the centre ground is his only salvation if he wishes to compete at the general election

Rishi Sunak in Teesside for the mayoral result – a tiny ray of light for the Tories during the local elections (PA)

If constantly lurching to the right were the answer to the Conservatives’ problems, the party would have won every mayoralty in the country, have gained control of multiple councils, and be heading for a historic fifth successive general election win sometime in the next few months. Rishi Sunak would now be making plans to take Britain into the 2030s. It would have been the biggest comeback since Lazarus. Instead, the prime minister faces oblivion in a flood of biblical proportions.

This is, in fact, already the most right-wing government Britain has had in decades. So far from Rishi Sunak being the “socialist” he is accused of being by his own colleagues, absurdly enough, he has adopted steadily more rightist positions over the past few months, but to no avail. He has abandoned interim targets on the decarbonisation of home heating, and postponed the transition to electric vehicles. He has introduced ever more draconian legislation to make the ill-starred Rwanda policy a reality, made legal migration harder, and promised to ignore the European Convention on Human Rights if it suits him.

He’s dished out cuts in national insurance and offered the prospect of abolishing it. He’s announced potentially devastating cuts to disability benefits. He even gave the Conservative conference that infamously asinine soundbite: “A man is a man and a woman is a woman, that’s just common sense.” By background, he is a genuine, longstanding Brexiteer and Thatcherite.