What are the challenges for the next UK PM?

Unrest among workers is already fomenting as rail staff, postal workers, teachers and trial lawyers all declare walkouts or debate doing so, prompting parallels with the 1970s and the era’s mix of runaway prices and work stoppages.

The end of Boris Johnson’s run as prime minister may ease the sense of political chaos, but it won’t fix the issues plaguing the UK.

(Left to right) Former British health secretary Sajid Javid, ex-chancellor of the exchequer Rishi Sunak and acting Prime Minister Boris Johnson. (AP)

“There is a cacophony of problems on the next Prime Minister’s plate, not least the cost-of-living crisis causing voters so much financial pain,” said Susannah Streeter, senior investment and markets analyst at Hargreaves Lansdown.

Whoever replaces him, by winning a vote of Tory MPs and a subsequent ballot of party members, will inherit an economy buffeted by a cost-of-living crisis as inflation accelerates the most in four decades.

Unrest among workers is already fomenting as rail staff, postal workers, teachers and trial lawyers all declare walkouts or debate doing so, prompting parallels with the 1970s and the era’s mix of runaway prices and work stoppages.

The new leader will also have to repair a fractured party that’s looking tired after 12 years in power and suffered as Johnson’s administration has lurched from one crisis to another. And they’ll have to mend relations with the EU that have been strained to near breaking point by Johnson’s threats to renege on the Brexit agreement he negotiated.

US President Joe Biden has also made clear his concern at Johnson’s bid to dismantle the arrangements that keep Northern Ireland in the bloc’s single market, while creating a customs border with the rest of the UK. Johnson enjoyed close relations with then President Donald Trump, yet his ties with Biden have been cooler.

In the election of that year, his Conservatives won a large majority because of Johnson’s “Get Brexit Done” messaging and his ability to attract northern English voters who had traditionally preferred Labour.

His successor will need to find ways to rally similar support from the “Red Wall”, especially as Johnson struggled to deliver on his campaign promise to “level up” the British economy. They’ll also have to regain the trust of traditional Tories in rural and southern areas who abandoned the party in droves in favour of the Liberal Democrats at three special elections in little over a year.

Then there is the matter of growing discontent with Westminster leadership in Scotland. Johnson said now was not the time to revisit the question of a vote on Scottish independence, in a letter to Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon on Wednesday.

Last week, Sturgeon announced plans for a second independence referendum to be held on October 2023, and vowed to take legal action if the British government blocks it.

“As our country faces unprecedented challenges at home and abroad, I cannot agree that now is the time to return to a question, which was clearly answered by the people of Scotland in 2014,” Johnson said, referring to a referendum when Scots voted against independence by 55% to 45%.

Responding to Johnson’s resignation, Sturgeon said on Twitter, For [Scotland], the democratic deficit inherent in Westminster government doesn’t get fixed with a change of PM. None of the alternative Tory PMs would ever be elected in Scotland. And in policy terms, it is hard to see what real difference hard Brexit supporting Labour offers.”

A Panelbase survey showed 48% of respondents were in favour of independence, 47% were opposed and 5% did not know.