Rishi Sunak seemed to give satirists a helping hand after he was caught on camera using a hammer the wrong way around.
On a trip to West Yorkshire on Thursday, the prime minister visited a few small business owners in Farsley’s Sunny Bank Mills and took part in a jewellery workshop at Emma White Jewellery Studio.
The visit was meant to promote the “huge investment” the government is handing over to Bradford to fund a new rail station – that’s money which has been repurposed from the cancelled HS2 expansion.
But, it was actually his supposed lack of DIY skills which drew the most attention once ITV News published a particular clip of him on the visit.
When Sunak tried to create some jewellery, he was seen using a small hammer – only, he appeared to have it positioned it the wrong way round.
With one of the most well-known DIY tools in his hand, Sunak started to hammer down on a bit of metal by slamming the side of the hammer’s head down instead.
Here’s the excruciating clip of the prime minister – who voters have already criticised for being unrelatable – as proof...
However, the full clip – as the BBC’s Ione Wells pointed out – actually shows he was instructed to do that by the other person in the clip.
And in the footage, the prime minister can even be heard asking if he really has to use the tool sideways.
But, by then it was too late – he was already being hammered over the shortened footage on X.
The official Labour Party X (formerly Twitter) account was quick to rinse him over it.
It was also spotted by the leader of the SNP at Westminster, Stephen Flynn, too, who joked: “He’s nailed it.”
The Liberal Democrats soon jumped on the mockery bandwagon as well.
Sunak wasn’t even safe from people who were once his colleagues, as former culture secretary Nadine Dorries also weighed in on the footage (briefly).
She compared it to Sunak’s previous blunders, such as being unable to pay for petrol via contactless payment or fill up his own car – but deleted her post once she realised the full context of the clip.
Still, the rest of social media had their own jokes at the ready.