Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss clashed bitterly on issues ranging from tax cuts to TikTok last night in their first head-to-head Tory leadership debate.
With recent polls putting Truss ahead among Tory party members, who will choose the next Conservative leader, Sunak “desperately” needed to produce “not just a good performance, but a brilliant, game-changing one” for the live clash on BBC One, said Sky News.
The former chancellor came out swinging, according to The Times’ Clare Foges, who said that he “was front-footed, energetic, rather fierce at times”. Iain Dale agreed in The Telegraph that Sunak “came out of the traps firing on all cylinders” at the debate at Victoria Hall in Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent.
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But, Dale added, Sunak “was so dominant it often came across as domineering mansplaining” – a verdict echoed by many social media users.
Sunak also received mixed reviews in this morning’s papers. According to The Guardian, “the tone of the front pages of titles that were most loyal to Boris Johnson are strongly in favour” of Foreign Secretary Truss, with Sunak “struggling to shake off his image as the man who knifed the outgoing prime minister”.
Truss ‘walking verbal tightrope’
Although Truss was more assured than in previous debates, “it felt as though she was walking a verbal tightrope, carefully sticking to an internal script lest she say something spontaneous and mad, and blow her chances out of the water”, said Foges.
The foreign secretary accused Sunak of “scaremongering” with claims that her plans would lead to huge interest rate increases, as part of “Project Fear”.
“This is the same line that we heard from Gordon Brown,” she said, referring to Sunak’s argument that immediate tax cuts would fuel soaring inflation.
Sources close to Sunak insisted that he had “won the argument” on the economy, according to BBC political correspondent Ione Wells. But “behind the scenes, Truss’s camp feel positive too, claiming that while she stayed calm, Sunak was ‘flustered’”, Wells added.
Varying applause
The immediate reaction from debate audience members suggested that Sunak may be the favourite among Tory voters in Stoke, one of the so-called Red Wall seats that the next Conservative leader must woo to win a majority at the next general election. The ex-chancellor received three rounds of applause compared to Truss’s one.
And a snap survey by Opinium of 1,000 voters from across the board found that 39% thought Sunak came out on top in the televised showdown, while 38% who plumped for the foreign secretary.
But critically, among Tory voters, Truss was seen as having won by a margin of 47% to 38%. The result will be “disappointing” for Sunak, who has tended to lead in polls of the general public – but trails among the Tory members who will decide the next leader”, said the Daily Mail.
‘Buoyant mood’
Truss – who turned 47 today – is likely return to the campaign trail in a “buoyant mood” after her rival “seemingly failed to deliver the decisive blow many think he needs to change the course of the contest”, said Politico’s London Playbook.
The New Statesman’s Rachel Wearmouth agreed that Sunak “did not provide a game-changing moment” and “remains the underdog, hamstrung by his decision as chancellor to raise taxes”.
But while Truss may be claiming debate victory, Wearmouth suggested that the Labour Party was the biggest winner of last night’s clash, which “made the Tories look more divided than ever”.
