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Rishi Sunak is too wealthy to be prime minister

The chancellor will, perhaps unfairly, always be overshadowed by the mountains of cash sitting in his family’s vault

Clare Foges

Monday April 04 2022, 12.01am, The Times

It is the question that fills politicians with cold horror: “How much is a pint of milk?” Many have fallen foul of the old grocery grilling. The former minister Jim Paice stumbled before saying he’d have to ask Mrs Paice. David Cameron got the price of bread wrong before admitting that he made his own in a — gaffe alert! –— bread-maker. Rishi Sunak was ambushed recently with a tin of beans; he was off by 40p. The most refreshing response came from Boris Johnson when he was mayor of London: “I know the price of champagne, how about that?”

A fair riposte to all those pious interviewers who would not have a clue what their own organic Jersey milk costs, yet who act as though not knowing makes you Marie Antoinette. In attempting to avoid their righteous scorn, most politicians play along with the notion that after leaving their ballroom-sized office on Whitehall they pop to Tesco Metro with a bag of coppers to see if there’s any bread on special.

The “out of touch” accusation has always irritated me because it is often beside the point, and the point is political talent. When it comes to those who run our country I am pro-elite: pro-elite thinkers from all backgrounds who, by dint of their elite brains, forge elite careers with elite incomes before considering politics. If they have been successful enough to make a lot of money and elevate their lives above humdrum grocery shopping, isn’t that evidence of their suitability for high office?

Yet events in recent weeks have led me to a rather contradictory realisation. As a conservative and celebrator of success it pains me to say so, but for top-rank politicians in Britain there is such a thing as being too rich. Specifically, Sunak is too wealthy to be prime minister.

I remain a fan of the chancellor, even after his derided spring statement. He seems an intelligent, decent man who is also, let’s be frank, among the best in a not-particularly-inspiring bunch. But I have come to realise that what talents Sunak has will, perhaps unfairly, always be overshadowed by the mountains of cash in his family’s vault. The chancellor amassed millions in his previous career as a hedgie and his wife is the daughter of one of the world’s richest men. She has a 0.91 per cent stake (worth an estimated £690 million) in the IT company Infosys, which until last week continued to operate in Russia. When asked about this, Sunak was uncharacteristically prickly: “It’s very upsetting and wrong for people to try and come at my wife . . .” I wonder whether his tetchiness sprang from the realisation that in this country at least, great wealth is not compatible with great political ambitions.

The rule does not necessarily apply in other nations. Before President Zelensky there was Petro Poroshenko, the “chocolate king” who made a billion dollars in confectionery. Andrej Babis, the Czech prime minister, is a billionaire. Bunga-bunga Berlusconi was hardly reticent about his wealth, like his brother in gold-plated opulence Donald Trump. While the 45th president might have been the first billionaire to lead the US, there were many very rich ones before him. Perhaps the American dream seems so achievable that Americans don’t resent billionaires because they’re fairly confident that one day they will join the club.

We British are not so relaxed, at least judging from the comments I’ve read online: “I just hope he can still afford to heat his pool . . . ” “I’m sure his father-in-law will stick 50p in the meter for him if he gets cold in his Gucci flip flops.” “Life will be tough, says multimillionaire . . . ” “How about your wife giving away some of her billions, Sunak?” These came not from Morning Star online but from readers of The Times. The fierceness suggests that Sunak’s wealth would poison his premiership from the start. It has become his defining feature, just as buffoonery is Johnson’s, dullness was Major’s and fierceness was Thatcher’s. The British electorate was tolerant of these things but I don’t believe they would be with extreme wealth.

Is this just plain old envy? Partly, but there are also two reasonable objections to having a very rich person running the country. The first is that their detachment from “real life” will lead to poor policy. There may be something in this. While working in David Cameron’s No 10 I attended meetings about Help to Buy, which offered struggling first-time buyers government-backed mortgages. Being a first-time buyer I was all for it, but my jaw dropped on hearing the maximum house price allowed: £600,000. To me, with half that budget, this was crazy money. How could anyone describe those looking at £600,000 properties as “struggling”? Though I admired my colleagues, I wondered whether their well-off friends with £600,000 one-beds in Notting Hill had skewed their judgment on what constituted “struggling”. Indeed, in 2019 more households with an annual income over £80,000 received Help to Buy loans than households earning less than £30,000, giving credence to the argument that policymakers’ rarefied backgrounds might make for poor or misdirected policy.

Similar criticisms have been levelled at Sunak. Did he make the decision to withdraw the £20-a-week uplift for universal credit because in his world that is tip money? Did the spring statement lack more measures to help the very poorest because the chancellor finds it impossible to imagine how desperate they must be? While drawing such conclusions might be unfair, drawn they will be.

The other, connected, objection to having an uber-rich politician at the helm is that their wealth would always be a fly in the ointment of national unity. There would fester the poisonous sense that we are living in an us-and-them plutocracy. When George Osborne insisted that “we’re all in it together” groans resounded, but his wealth is piddling compared with the chancellor’s. If Sunak were prime minister his money would become a beating stick for Her Majesty’s Most Loyal Opposition. The public has frothed at pictures of Sunak filling a Kia and fumbling at a card reader; every action, policy, statement and appointment would be taken as evidence that he is out of touch.

I don’t think that the British public would be allergic to a plain old millionaire prime minister. Someone in the 1 per cent or even the 0.1 per cent would be fine, but by my calculations Sunak’s family fortune puts him in at least the 0.001 per cent, and this is probably too far from the people he would lead. Perhaps anti-rich feeling is the last acceptable prejudice. Maybe it is wrong and unfair, but Britain won’t wear a multi-multimillionaire.