Theresa May asked the country to elect a strong and stable government on 8 June and to avoid a coalition of chaos with Labour and the Scottish Nationalists running the country. But, instead she has given us a weak and wobbly government only kept in office through confidence and supply agreement with Ulster’s Democratic Unionist crackpots.  

In short, she is in government but not in power.

Earlier this year, Councillor Hodge, as Leader of Surrey County Council, sought more money from central government to fund local services. He also sought to enlist the 11 Surrey Conservative MPs, including four Cabinet Ministers, to help him. But they came back from Westminister with nothing, saying that there was no “magic money tree”.

Furthermore, Councillor Hodge underpinned his financial forecasts for the future with the expectation that this Council would be able to retain the business rates raised in the county next year under a pilot scheme to reform local government finance. A proposal that this Council’s Conservative Councillors were depending on but a proposal which the new Conservative government, reliant DUP support, has ditched.

And whilst Councillor Hodge and Surrey’s 11 Conservative MPs get nothing for supporting the government, the 10 DUP MPs supporting the Government have shown that the “magic money tree” denied to Surrey’s Conservative MPs really does exist. They have obtained an extra £1billion for schools, hospitals, infrastructure, and public services in Northern Ireland. In fact, just the sort of money that Surrey needs to protect its services.

This really does beg the question: If ten DUP MPs can get £1billion for supporting the government, why can Surrey’s 11 Conservative MPs not get anything for providing similar support to the government?

Similar numbers of MPs but in reality very different levels of influence over the Prime Minister. And Surrey loses out.