BAD TIMES

Across

Clue 1

Pig-headed leader and architect of 9 across (5, 7)

Clue 2

Trump's second opponent in his second presidential race (6)

Clue 3

Below Budget Corporation (3)

Clue 4

The main theme of this crossword which might bore some (8)

Clue 9

Staple of Conservative economic policy since 2010 (9)

Clue 11

Decision taken on a 52/48 decision in 2016 in the UK (6)

Clue 13

The Party that launched the Rwanda Plan (13)

Clue 15

Political party that's not a party but a business (6,2)

Clue 16

Currency that Britain fought hard not to join (4)

Clue 18

Sleepy President (3,5)

Clue 20

Socialist Labour Leader who didn't make it to number 10 (6)

Clue 23

Labour Ed who bears a resemblance to Aardman's Wallace (8)

Down

Clue 1

First black female MP who drank a Mojito on a train and made headlines (5, 6)

Clue 2

Party leader named after the founder of the Labour Party (4, 7)

Clue 5

Tory with a billionaire heiress wife and misjudged calling a general election (5, 5)

Clue 6

News outlet that hires Lee Anderson and Nigel Farage on its team (2, 4)

Clue 7

Rayner who's deputy Prime Minister or Merkel who was German Chancellor (6)

Clue 8

Former party leader with name being slang for the male appendage (5,7)

Clue 10

930-year-old gargoyle that owns Fox News, The Times and The Sun (6,7)

Clue 12

Sometimes Party leader and MP when it suits him whose name rhymes with Garage (6)

Clue 14

What the world keeps digging for despite it leading ultimately to our destruction (3)

Clue 17

Tugendhat who finished in fourth place in the Conservative leadership election of 2024 (3)

Clue 18

Hunt who often got called a ruder word beginning with C (6)

Clue 19

Home of Vladimir Putin (7)

Clue 21

Badenoch who's leader of the Conservatives (4)

Clue 22

Trump's real Germanic sounding surname (6)