This election should not descend into personal abuse, which only serves to lower leaders’ reputations

Of the many bizarre aspects of the British general election of 2024, still in its first week of campaigning, one of the strangest is the sudden emergence of personal briefings by the Conservatives against Sir Keir Starmer. Some – in an all-too-clumsy echo of the Trump style of politics – have tried to nickname him “Sleepy Keir”, or “Sir Sleepy”, even though he is a good 20 years younger than Joe Biden.

Sir Keir, a fairly vigorous 61-year-old who can play indifferent football for his amateur team for a full 90 minutes plus stoppage time, has had to do his talking off the pitch as well as on it. Tackled by reporters during his key speech events about claims emanating from the Tory chair, Richard Holden, and his circle that he is “weary”, Sir Keir could only point to the work he and his team do, and remark that his opponents sounded desperate. After the Conservatives’ desperately poor start to the campaign, that sounds about right.

The Tories will need to do better than adapting lazy, unconvincing Trumpian insults if they want to overhaul Labour’s 20-point lead. Drawing attention to the personal qualities of the two contenders for the premiership is probably not the way to inject more life into their efforts to persuade the public to give them a fifth term in office.

The Tory strategists seem to think that Mr Sunak is still impressing the public as he did as a fresh new technocrat when he presented himself outside No 10 in October 2022 and promised “integrity, accountability and professionalism” at every level. As the fashionable phrase goes: “How’s that working out, then?”

Obviously, Mr Sunak’s aides haven’t been studying recent opinion polls showing a steady but inexorable decline in the public’s perceptions of the man. Net satisfaction with how Mr Sunak is doing his job is at the kind of dismal level experienced by John Major and Jeremy Corbyn at their respective nadirs in 1994 and 2019. In terms of who the British public believes will make the best prime minister, Sir Keir’s figures haven’t moved very much since Mr Sunak took over from Liz Truss, but Mr Sunak’s have slid below those of Boris Johnson (though, to give him credit, he has yet to rival the despair that Ms Truss inspired).

Both main parties have opted, thus far, for a “presidential” approach, which is odd when neither man appeals that much to the voters. This election is, essentially, a popularity contest between two unpopular men. Sir Keir, who ceaselessly parades his working-class credentials, has suffered from a “dull” image and unfavourable comparisons with Tony Blair, but he still wins on being more the sort of chap you could share a joke with.

Of course, that is not what being a prime minister is all about, and it is always worth recalling that Neil Kinnock also did well in such comparisons against the forbidding prospect of a night out with Margaret Thatcher or John Major; it did him no good when the time came to choose a prime minister, as history shows. The problem for Mr Sunak is that the voters not only don’t want to go for a pint with him, they also think he’s no good at running the country – and, on balance, they’d prefer Sir Keir in No 10.

We shall see how “presidential” the campaigns are. Regardless, both leaders would be well advised to make more of their effective media performers – James Cleverly and Penny Mordaunt in the Tory case (and possibly Boris Johnson); Rachel Reeves, Wes Streeting and John Ashworth for Labour.

In a parliamentary system, party often proves more important than party leader in determining outcomes. A striking example of this was the 1979 election, when the Tories enjoyed a comfortable lead over the incumbent, and exhausted, Labour administration, even though the statesmanlike prime minister, James Callaghan, led the relatively inexperienced or engaging Margaret Thatcher on the personal ratings. Her leadership qualities only became apparent after some time as premier. She grew in office after she had won “her” election, just as Tony Blair did; by the time they’d won their respective hat-tricks, they were revered as all-conquering geniuses (until, of course, soon after they weren’t).

Mr Sunak, unfortunately, has rather shrunk in political stature during office. Unless something quite unexpected happens in the coming weeks, the British people will soon see what power does to Sir Keir, and his image.