UK Conservatives stare defeat in the face even in stronghold

Even in Surrey, a historic stronghold of UK Conservatives, voters are tempted to give opposition parties a chance at the July 4 general election, saying successive governments have "made a mess of it".

With its pretty stone houses, window boxes and main street lined with small shops, Godalming is a typical country town in affluent southeast England, about an hour's train ride from London.

Many of the town's 20,000 residents are retirees and from wealthy backgrounds, and have always sent a Conservative MP to the UK parliament at Westminster.

Jeremy Hunt, the current finance minister, has served the constituency since 2005 but is now one of the most prominent Tories threatened with losing their seat, with polls suggesting the centrist Liberal Democrat party could come out on top.

Defeat for Hunt would be a political earthquake for the Tories, who have had five prime ministers during a tumultuous period in UK history that has encompassed Brexit, the Covid pandemic and more recently the cost-of-living crisis caused by high inflation.

"I'm normally quite right-wing, but this time around I have no idea to be quite honest," Claudette Forrester, a 61-year-old former finance employee, told AFP on the town's main street.

Forrester, who now cares for her disabled daughter, is disappointed by the Conservatives' 14 years in power.

"I feel like they don't know what the everyday person has to go through in life. When you go shopping, you've got to count the pennies because food is extortionate," she said.

"We need to change and we need improvements," agreed Ian, a 70-year-old retiree and former National Health Service (NHS) worker.

He said he would vote for the centre-left Labour, which polls predict will win a huge majority nationwide.

"I want the current Conservative government to go away. They have done terrible things to this country," he told AFP, outside a branch of the upmarket supermarket chain Waitrose.

He cited the struggles of the state-funded NHS, which now has record waiting lists, and the handling of the pandemic.

Other voters also said the state of the NHS was a major issue, along with the scandals of Boris Johnson's government, such as parties held in Downing Street during lockdown.

Most disgruntled voters say they will vote for Liberal Democrat Paul Follows, a local figure unknown at the national level.

- 'Abandoned' -

"I don't think the area has actually changed much in terms of its values... it's a progressive area," Follows said in a recent Guardian podcast.

"What has changed is Jeremy (Hunt) and what has changed is the Conservative party."

It "has moved, shifted significantly to the right, and people in a moderate progressive area like this feel abandoned by that group," Follows added.

Like the rest of Surrey, Godalming voted against Brexit.

Even Charlie Crowford, a 54-year-old retiree and loyal Conservative voter, said recent governments had "made a mess of it" and "squandered the opportunity."

"People are fed up with the Conservatives," he said, but he will still vote for them on July 4, partly because of Hunt, whom he called "a national figure" and "potential leader of the party".

Hunt, a Tory centrist, ran to be party leader in 2019 but lost out to Johnson. Despite the party's unpopularity, he remains respected locally, even outside his own camp.

"It's going to be a very big fight," Hunt acknowledged recently as he ramped up door-to-door canvassing.

Other senior party figures such as defence minister Grant Shapps and fellow minister Penny Mordaunt face a similar battle to be re-elected, with Labour holding huge national leads in opinion polls for months now.

Other centrists such as Michael Gove, also serving in Surrey, and former prime minister Theresa May have decided not to run, raising questions about what direction the party could take after a defeat that increasingly seems inevitable.

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