Rishi Sunak's legacy: how the PM will be remembered

Margaret Thatcher "had the Falklands", Tony Blair "had Iraq", and David Cameron, Theresa May and Boris Johnson "will be remembered for Brexit". 

Liz Truss will be known as "the shortest serving prime minister long after the facts of her mini-Budget are forgotten", wrote John Rentoul in The Independent. But with the Conservatives almost certainly heading for defeat at the next general election, what legacy will Rishi Sunak leave behind?

The first British Asian PM

Britain's first non-white and first Hindu prime minister arrived at No. 10 with "little fanfare", stepping in after Truss's short tenure, said Sunny Hundal in the Financial Times in October 2022. That Sunak was tasked with leading the country is a sign that Britain "is increasingly comfortable with being a multicultural democracy".

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Global perception lagged behind "the quietly transformed British reality", said Fraser Nelson in The Telegraph. In the US, "The Daily Show" released a video sketch suggesting there would be a "racist backlash". But in reality there was "no fuss" at all – a silence that spoke volumes.

Rwanda Bill

Sunak's plan to send asylum seekers from the UK to Rwanda has become his showpiece policy. Passing the bill in April, he called it a piece of "landmark legislation", promising that the first deportations would start in July, despite the first flights being initially planned for the spring.

Sunak "has single-mindedly driven this policy through despite a torrent of personal abuse and the wrecking tactics of opposition parties, unelected peers and human rights lawyers", said the Daily Mail. While the plans still face legal hurdles, "the PM clearly means business".

Wrecking over fixing

The prime minister has been "too keen on wrecking" in his final year of power, said The Economist, with his decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 "the most obvious example". Cutting the link between Birmingham and Manchester supposedly freed up £40 billion to be "splashed elsewhere", yet "in reality, this funding will probably evaporate".

He has also watered down the country's net zero plans, although he claimed that UK emissions can still reach net zero by 2050.

A smoke-free generation

In a "landmark public health intervention", Sunak could become the prime minister who was able to "create the UK's first smoke-free generation", said The Guardian. 

Should the Tobacco and Vapes Bill pass, anyone who becomes 15 in 2024, or who is younger, will be banned from buying cigarettes. It will also aim to make vapes less appealing to children.

Some Tory MPs have expressed concern, including former PM Boris Johnson, who called the proposed legislation "nuts". But MPs voted to back the government plans by 383 votes to 67 in April. The proposed legislation will still need to pass through the Lords before it becomes law. 

The 'out of touch' leader

With his Silicon Valley background and billionaire in-laws, Sunak has frequently contended with accusations of being woefully disconnected with ordinary voters. A YouGov poll earlier this year revealed that 78% of the public – including 70% of 2019 Conservative voters – think that Sunak is out of touch.

When interacting with the public, he has "a toe-curling ability to say the wrong thing", said deputy political editor Jessica Elgot in The Guardian. He once asked a homeless man: "Do you work in business?" He has also been widely mocked online for appearing to be unable to use a debit card, and for borrowing a Kia from a Sainsbury's worker in a petrol PR photoshoot instead of using his government Jaguar.

'Doomed to fail'

After their drubbing at the local elections, the Tories still lag far behind Labour in the opinion polls. Sunak seems certain to be remembered for leading the Conservative Party to a historic defeat after 14 years in power. 

To be fair, he "started with the weakest hand of any prime minister in the modern era", said James Ball in The New European. "He had been roundly defeated in a leadership contest just seven weeks earlier, and was selected as leader, extremely grudgingly, by a party desperate to avoid the indignity of another contest."

The positioning of this "accidental prime minister" has since "ricocheted around like a pinball in a malfunctioning table", often valuing the "novel or the surprising over the sane". Yet each trick has been "doomed to fail".