Grant Shapps has insisted that the government’s “plan is starting to work” despite suggestions the party is on course for a huge 1997-style election defeat. A YouGov survey, reported by The Telegraph, of 14,000 people indicates that Rishi Sunak’s Tories could hold on to as few as 169 seats as Sir Keir Starmer’s Labour enters Downing Street with 385. “This government is working to a plan that is starting to work, I think we’ll see it work a lot more in the months to come, compared with no plan under Keir Starmer,” Shapps told LBC on Monday (15 January).