Speaking to GB News Community Editor Michael Heaver in Westminster, Olivia gave her analysis on whether Rishi Sunak’s Tories are becoming increasingly divided.
Following Sunak’s grilling at PMQs yesterday, Utley said: “I think that there was a sort of truce, an uncomfortable truce, if you like.
“Between Conservatives who basically at the end of the Boris Johnson Government and then the Liz Truss Government thought, well, it would be an absolute suicide mission if we go on to get rid of Rishi Sunak and get a new Conservative leader in his place. So they all sort of begrudgingly rallied around Rishi Sunak.”
Olivia went on to explain however that: “It was always a fractious sort of coalition. And as you say, it’s now beginning to break apart.
“We’ve now had over a year of a Rishi Sunak government. Rishi Sunak said that he was going to steady the ship. Well, he studied the ship, but it’s steadied at the bottom of the sea.
“Conservative ratings were very low when he took office a year ago. There if anything a little bit lower now. So there hasn’t been much change, but there hasn’t been much improvement.
“So as you might expect, Conservative MPs are beginning to get a little bit fractious again. And I think what they’re feeling really annoyed about at the moment are the, the migration figures, both legal and illegal.
“And it’s sort of felt that Rishi Sunak has talked about especially illegal migration so much over the past year. And yet there isn’t much evidence that the numbers of people coming over here in small boats are really declining.
“There’s a little bit of a decline, but basically it’s thought that’s to do with the weather rather than to do with anything that the government’s doing. So there is frustration at Rishi Sunak at the moment.”
Looked forward to what we may see from Conservative MPs moving forward, Olivia revealed that: “There is consternation in the party.
“More and more we’re seeing speeches from both cabinet ministers and more junior ministers, even backbenchers, which sound a little bit like leadership pictures.”
