Tory talent? There’s not much in this leadership race

Letters to the editor: our readers share their views. Please send your letters to letters@independent.co.uk

The leader of the pack, Rishi Sunak, is also overrated and untested (Getty)

The Tory party keep reminding the public that they have lots of talent on the backbenches but the question is: where’s this talent hiding? If I was a Tory, I would be worried at the lack of talent in their ranks.

The last general election in 2019 hollowed out the Tory party of its remaining talent. The party is now full of overrated and populist headbangers and extremists. The fact that so many candidates are standing to become the next Tory leader and believe they have a chance of winning is because the quality of runners is second-rate.

The leader of the pack, Rishi Sunak, is also overrated and untested. He made his name on the back of offering everyone lots of honey during the pandemic, but he has never made a difficult decision in his public life and lacks steel.

If all the candidates were businesses pitching for finance from investors, they would all be sent packing as none of them have anything original to say except offering phantom tax cuts that will contribute to inflation and result in higher interest rates.

Moreover, most of the candidates are against inflationary pay rises but favour ridiculous tax cuts that will have the same net effect. In fact, giving a wage increase to the most deserving in a targeted way is likely to be less inflationary than giving everyone a tax cut.

The Tories no longer understand the real economy but use economic levers to bribe the electorate. Finally, why isn’t Jacob Rees-Mogg standing to become the next PM – friendless like Boris or too scared to lose?

J Khan

Address supplied

Leadership race hubris

I read Tom Peck’s column with interest and although I wouldn’t go that far, it has been a decidedly lacklustre leadership contest so far, with contenders falling over themselves to declare implausible scenarios with hubristic fanfare.

Perhaps it will calm down as the elimination process begins but this country is crying out for a sane, sensible and pragmatic prime minister. Perhaps the present hot environment has gotten to the cool, dispassionate thinking parts of their brains.

Judith A Daniels

Great Yarmouth

A form of torture

Please, please, make it stop. We are coping with a hideous heatwave of frightening proportions that is making most people over 10, without a swimming pool or access to the beach, feel ill, worried and wretched. As if that were not enough, we have the cavalcade of horrors from the Tory party swamping the news with their various disturbing presentations and I, for one, have had enough.

The vast majority of us have no say whatsoever in which of these threats will win the prime ministerial crown, but we are still tormented. Their boasts and promises, their tax dodges and blunders, their newfound integrity, their preening and posturing – it’s a new and pernicious form of torture.

And the power to select one of these candidates to actually lead this country lies in the hands of a very small, unrepresentative group of people who are so Tory in their views they are actually party members. And this misery goes on until 5 September!

Penny Little

Oxfordshire

Tory hypocrisy

I have tried, via your Letters page, to highlight the hypocrisy surrounding many of the current crop of would-be Tory leaders but could never aspire to the brilliant analysis I read today by Nadeine Asbali. Definitely a piece to cut out and keep.

G Forward

Stirling

Sir Mo

In view of Mo Farah’s courageous declaration of illegal immigration as a child, do we now expect the Conservative government to deport him to Rwanda?

Ed Sturmer

Hertfordshire

For the few

“Britain deserves better than this. We need a fresh start,” says Labour leader Keir Starmer who adamantly refuses to break from 43 years of neoliberal economics, which have impoverished the working class, ruined the infrastructure of the UK and made a tiny elite obscenely wealthy.

Sasha Simic

London

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Heatwave deniers

Reading through the latest updates and advice around the soaring temperatures in the UK brought a number of questions to mind: will the usual suspects commence a new campaign either denying the heat, the cause of the heat or the dangers?

Will they refuse to stay at home and tell others to take to the streets? Will they refuse to use factor 50+ suntan lotion and burn their sun hats outside Downing Street? Will they claim the advice to drink copious water is a ploy to control the populace through centrally added mind-altering drugs?

If you think that no one is this unreasonable, then think back; they did the equivalent during the pandemic, didn’t they?

Robert Boston

Kingshill