This is not a good week for Liz Truss; she feels helpless, degraded, called a “ghost” prime minister, and likened unfavourably to a head of lettuce.
Yesterday, after a Treasury head she was obliged to hire to prevent a collapse in the financial markets ripped up and rejected her economic plans, Britain’s prime leader was scrambling to regain control of the situation.
Because to disagreements within the Conservative Party on how to succeed her, Truss is still in government for the time being.
Truss had a Cabinet meeting yesterday in an effort to do business as usual. According to her spokesman, there was a “in-depth discussion” of the new economic strategy, and she was not asked to quit.
Truss said on Monday that “mistakes were made,” but she remained resolute and claimed she would lead the Conservatives into the next general election.
Few people think that. The notion that Truss is doomed is uncommonly shared by the lively partisan press in Britain.
The Sun, a tabloid that supports the Conservatives, referred to her as “a ghost PM” and declared that “for the sake of the country, we cannot continue on like this.” Truss hasn’t defected from her party, according to the left-leaning Guardian, which compared the Conservatives to a mutinous ship’s crew. But it seems to have moved on from her.
The tabloid Daily Star set up a live stream featuring a photo of the prime minister next to a head of iceberg lettuce, embellished with a blond wig, eyes, and a mouth. This was in response to The Economist’s statement that Truss’ time in control of the government, prior to the September 23 “mini-budget” that set the markets aflame, was “roughly the shelf-life of a lettuce. It poses the question, “Can Liz Truss outlast this lettuce?,” which, after five days, is progressively fading to brown.
After her government’s package of unfunded tax cuts totaling 45 billion pounds (NZ$89. 5 billion) alarmed the markets, driving up government borrowing costs, increasing home mortgage costs, and sending the pound plummeting to an all-time low against the dollar, Truss initially tried to maintain course. Due to bond market volatility, the Bank of England was compelled to step in to protect pension funds.
Under intense political and economic pressure, Truss last week fired her ally Kwasi Kwarteng as Treasury chief, replacing him with the Cabinet veteran Jeremy Hunt, who had been sidelined since 2019.
On Monday, Hunt revoked nearly all of Truss’ tax cuts as well as her signature energy strategy and her pledge that there won’t be any changes to public spending.
The market for British government bonds and the pound weakened yesterday as relief over the government’s about-face was tempered by the recognition that the new policies are likely to mean slower economic growth.
Many Conservatives now think that replacing Truss is their last chance of avoiding electoral doom because opinion surveys consistently show the opposition Labour Party with a sizable and expanding advantage.
Truss is protected from a leadership challenge for a year under Conservative Party rules, but those rules can be modified if enough lawmakers demand it. Additionally, some Conservative lawmakers think Truss might be driven out if the party can settle on a replacement. Some Conservatives believe Truss ought to be given another shot. But lawmaker Charles Walker said that if Truss led the party into the next election, “I think we’ll be out (of power) for 15 years. “.
“The shelf-life of a lettuce”: UK media make fun of Truss’s presidency
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