Pressure to ease economic pain ‘weighs heavily’ – Rishi Sunak
Rishi Sunak sat down with the BBC’s Test Match Special programme on Saturday.
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Your support makes all the difference.Rishi Sunak has said the pressure of easing the economic pain felt by households “weighs heavily” on him.
The Prime Minister, who sat down with the BBC’s Test Match Special programme on Saturday, was quizzed on his promise to restore trust in politics during a mostly light-hearted interview with cricketing broadcaster Jonathan Agnew.
It comes as inflation continues to remain stubbornly high, while the Bank of England’s decision to hike interest rates threatens more misery for mortgage-holders.
In a lengthy interview during a break in the Ashes test, the Prime Minister was pressed on his motivation to get into politics and the pressure of the job.
“I’m very lucky, my family are incredibly supportive, but you know, gosh, I do and I did as Chancellor as well because you know, thankfully, it didn’t happen in the end, but people were forecasting millions and millions of people to lose their jobs.
“So it was my responsibility then, and I said at the time that weighed very heavily, and right now it weighs heavily on me,” he said.
“We have inflation at the level that it’s at and that’s having an impact on people’s pay packets, their budgets and what they can afford to spend time on, what they can do for their kids.
“Of course that weighs heavily on me, it’s my responsibility to fix it and make the situation better.
“And unfortunately, it’s going take a little bit of time for us to do that. It means I have to do some things that people don’t always love but they’re the right long-term things to help everybody.”
The Prime Minister, who used the interview to discuss his love of cricket, was seated at Lord’s not far from Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey.
Mr Agnew had initially promised to keep the conversation firmly on cricket, before veering into some of the political and economic turmoil of recent months.
Alluding to former prime minister Boris Johnson, the cricketing commentator asked Mr Sunak if the image of politicians has been damaged recently.
“I said it when I first got the job, actually, I think. I really wanted to restore trust in politics,” Mr Sunak said.
Of course that weighs heavily on me, it's my responsibility to fix it
“Because more generally, I can see that people were frustrated and upset. And part of my job is to restore trust. And there’s lots of different ways you can do that.
“It’s obviously acting with integrity, which I try and do. You’re doing the right thing, and hopefully people seeing that, but also just doing the things that you say.”
Referencing his much-repeated five priorities, he said he made them specific “deliberately”.
“I’m not going to waffle around and have some kind of generic-sounding language, ‘I want stronger this’ or ‘better that’.”
But when it was put to him that it was a tough challenge to restore trust in politicians, the Prime Minister said: “The vast majority of people who enter public service do it because they care.
“They care about making their community and their country a better place.”