Well, it finally happened.

After months and months of non-stop speculation,

Rishi Sunak has finally announced the date of the next UK general election.

In a statement outside Downing Street today, against a grey and drizzly backdrop for Thursday the 4th of July.

Now, for many of you watching this video, you might feel like this came out of the blue.

And don't worry, it felt like this for everyone.

Prior to Wednesday, there was virtually no chatter whatsoever about a snap election.

The conventional wisdom remained that the most likely time for an election was towards the end of the year.

However, things really began to speed up just before PMQs.

And by mid-afternoon, most journalists were convinced a big announcement was imminent.

Turns out, just this once, they were right.

So in this video, we're going to have a look at what happened on Wednesday, why Sunak's thinking on the general election date changed, and what's likely to happen in the coming weeks and months.

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So let's start by explaining how all this actually happened.

Wednesday started with a rare economic win for Sunak.

The Bank of England announced that inflation had fallen to 2.3%, the lowest figure in almost three years, and just over the bank's 2% target.

As expected, the government was keen to try and jump on this and claim it as their victory, with Sunak's own Twitter page posting this graphic.

Now, this is important to bear in mind, as normally this is the sort of announcement that the government will want to keep in the news cycle for as long as possible.

However, very quickly, journalists began to jump on the news that an unusual cabinet meeting was set to take place at 4.15pm, with ministers being told under no uncertain terms that they had to attend.

This meant that two separate cabinet ministers, Lord Cameron and Grant Shapps, had to either cut foreign trips short or cancel them altogether in order to attend.

This cabinet meeting was set to follow a meeting of Rishi Sunak and his special advisers at 2pm, and reportedly also a meeting with the king.

With all this speculation reaching fever pitch,

Sunak had two options.

Either kill the rumours entirely, or, in not doing so, fuel even more frenzied speculation that an election announcement was imminent.

He opted for the latter.

Mr Speaker, speculation is rife, so I think the public deserve a clear answer to a simple question.

Does the Prime Minister intend to call a summer general election, or has he failed?

Aye.

As I have said repeatedly to him, there is, Mr Speaker, spoiler alert, there is going to be a general election in the second half of this year, and at that moment the British people will in fact see the truth about the hon. Gentleman opposite me, because that will be the choice at the next election, Mr Speaker.

A party that is not able to say to the country what they would do, a party that would put at risk our hard-earned economic stability, or the Conservatives that are delivering a secure future for our United Kingdom.

The election speculation continued through the day, with further reports of meetings and appearances being cancelled, until finally, just after 5pm,

Sunak stood in the rain in front of the famous Black Door, and, accompanied by an unwelcomed Labour anthem, finally put an end to all the guesswork.

Our economy is now growing faster than anyone predicted, outpacing Germany, France and the United States.

And this morning it was confirmed that inflation is back to normal.

This means that the pressure on prices will ease and mortgage rates will come down.

Not long after this, we saw Keir Starmer, looking a lot drier, responding to Sunak's statement.

Tonight the Prime Minister has finally announced the next general election.

A moment the country needs and has been waiting for.

And where, by the force of our democracy, power returns to you.

A chance to change for the better.

Your future, your community, your country.

Now it will feel like a long campaign, I'm sure of that.

But no matter what else is said and done, that opportunity for change is what this election is about.

Over the course of the last four years, we've changed the Labour Party, returned it once more to the service of working people.

All we ask now, humbly, is to do exactly the same for our country and return Britain to the service of working people.

This announcement actually raised more questions than it answered.

The two main ones being why call it now and what happens next.

So let's have a look at these in turn.

Now it's not entirely clear why Sunak decided that today was the day to call the election.

However, we can speculate.

The most obvious reason is that he thinks things are only going to get worse.

While inflation has come down, it's still coming down slower than expected and interest rate cuts now look unlikely.

Similarly, recurring problems with the Rwanda plan mean that there's no guarantee it'll get off the ground before the end of the year.

And generally, small boat crossings are more prevalent in the summer months when the weather is more favourable.

Another less obvious reason for wanting to call it sooner is that it just doesn't seem as though there'll be enough fiscal headroom for a big tax cut pre-election.

Alongside the inflation figures this morning, the ONS demonstrated that public sector borrowing was one and a half billion pounds higher than last year and that borrowing in April had hit 20.5 billion pounds, the fourth highest since records began in 1993.

This was significantly higher than the government were hoping for.

The Office for Budget Responsibility, for instance, had assumed that borrowing would come in at 19.3 billion pounds.

What this meant for Sunak was that his main reason for holding out for an election later in the year so that he can cut taxes in the run-up to it had just dissolved.

Anyway, whatever Sunak was thinking, we now know when the election is, and we also know just how much there is for MPs to do in the next few weeks.

As things stand, Parliament is expected to be dissolved or prorogued next Friday, with MPs between now and then taking part in something known as the wash-up period.

This is where the Commons desperately tries to rush through any remaining pieces of legislation still going through Parliament before dissolution or prorogation.

Now, technically, MPs can also pass something known as a carryover motion, which saves the piece of legislation it's specifically been passed for from being lost.

However, these motions also need to be voted for prior to dissolution or prorogation, so will need to be sorted by next Friday.

Once this is all done, or potentially even as this is happening, political parties will need to select their candidates.

Due to the short nature of the campaign period, they won't have enough time to properly vet each of their candidates, so it's likely that throughout the five weeks campaigning period, and possibly even during the next Parliament itself, we'll see candidates called up for all sorts of previous behaviour that regular vetting would likely have caught.

Now, this isn't the only by-product of a short campaign, though.

We'll also likely see plenty of hastily written manifestos, last-minute debates, and a good deal of political communication gaffes.

And don't worry, we'll be with you throughout the campaign period and beyond, bringing you explainer videos on everything from debates and party broadcasts to the manifestos and policy announcements.

We'll be doing that not just here on the UK channel, but also over on the TLDR podcast channel, where the team will regularly analyse and dissect everything going on in the run-up to this historic election in our brand new podcast series.

The first episode will go live over there later today, so make sure you check it out.

Now, heading into the election, according to polls, it appears that the Conservatives will lose quite a lot of seats, leading to many MPs closing the chapter on their political career and retraining in another.

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