Rishi Sunak, the prickly PM

Even when Sunak fails, he eventually succeeds. He ran for leadership against Liz Truss and Lizz Truss won but she imploded after a few weeks, and so he became Prime Minister instead. It’s great to be Rishi Sunak; if you want something, you usually get it.

The only problem, really, is that “Prime Minister” isn’t exactly a job that leads to you getting everything you want, all the time. It is something that Sunak ought to have noticed before deciding to give it a go, but it is not obvious that it’d ever crossed his mind. 

Then again, Boris Johnson hated reading briefing papers and Theresa May hated speaking to journalists, so clearly he isn’t the first Tory PM to have applied for the gig without reading the full job description.

What this means in practice is that Sunak will, on occasion, do something utterly mortifying while unaware of how it is making him look. Take Marbles Gate, which is still unfolding as we speak. 

The PM was due to meet with his Greek counterpart Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Tuesday, but the latter was told on Monday that he would be meeting with deputy prime minister Oliver Dowden instead. Mitsotakis refused, not wholly unreasonably taking the last-minute change as a snub, and headed back to Greece early.

Why did Sunak suddenly decide to make himself scarce? Easy. On Sunday, Mitsotakis appeared on Laura Kuenssberg’s show and argued that the Parthenon Sculptures – or the Elgin Marbles, as they’re better known here – ought to be returned to his country. 

As a senior Conservative source told the BBC, “It became impossible for this meeting to go ahead following commentary regarding the Elgin Marbles prior to it.”

“Our position is clear – the Elgin Marbles are part of the permanent collection of the British Museum and belong here. It is reckless for any British politician to suggest that this is subject to negotiation.”

Or, to rephrase this slightly: “we were shocked and appalled that the Greek Prime Minister decided to talk about long-standing Greek government policy when asked about it by a journalist. We did not see it coming and are still furious and reeling. We are confident that our fury is not making us look stupid in the slightest.”

Of course, their fury is very much making them look stupid. Well, it may be even worse than that; it is making Rishi Sunak appear petulant and thin-skinned. Anger issues can sometimes be swept under the carpet, if you’re a senior politician. Your spin doctors can explain that you got carried away, and that the job is stressful, yadda yadda. 

Being easily offended is a terrible trait to have in politics, because it marks you out as fundamentally unfit for the job. You picked a world in which everyone has to both dish it out and take it; what are you doing here if you bruise so easily?

Sunak will almost certainly get out of Marbles Gate unscathed, largely because no-one really cares about the location of a handful of statues if they can’t afford their bills and can’t see their GP. Still, the incident should be treated as concerning by those in charge of keeping the Conservatives in power.

There is an election coming and the campaign will have to involve Sunak speaking to people – regular citizens, journalists, other politicians, and heaven knows who else. Even the best operations team in the business cannot prevent events from happening on the road. If Sunak cannot handle the mere idea of a meeting with a PM from a friendly country with whom he has one minor disagreement, how will he fare during a general election?

The scene will end soon enough and the plot will carry on but, if you listen closely, the Greek chorus is beginning to sound ominous.