She fought Rishi’s tax hikes and the Whitehall blob – that’s why I’m backing Liz Truss

FoR the next Prime Minister we need a candidate who is committed to realising the benefits of Brexit, with a strong economic agenda designed to bring down inflation and restore growth, as well as the determination to cut Whitehall down to size.

In my role as Brexit opportunities Minister nobody has given me more support than Liz Truss. Without her backing we would have imposed border controls in July that would have increased the cost of food.

She also wants to see a sunset on retained EU law, unlike the Treasury, which has argued to keep tax policy in lockstep with the European Union in perpetuity.

Liz showed her mettle as International Trade Secretary. She spearheaded the trade agenda, setting in motion brand new trade deals with Australia and New Zealand, as well as expanding and improving on countless EU deals with countries like Mexico and Japan. We may have a trade deal with India this year, thanks to the foundations laid by her.

As Foreign Secretary, she has been one of the strongest and most convincing advocates for Brexit in Government. Apart from her support for me, she faced off against the erstwhile Chancellor Rishi Sunak who tried to stop her and the Prime Minister securing the integrity of the United Kingdom by tackling the Northern Ireland Protocol.

With global supply chains under strain, there is no candidate I trust more than Liz to actually deliver the economic reforms which will cut prices, increase growth and resilience, and tackle inflation once and for all.

Her political philosophy is one with which all Conservatives should agree: putting the voter, the taxpayer and the consumer first; reforming the economy to help British businesses to compete with the whole world; and trusting businesses, entrepreneurs and the free market to grow the economy free of interference from overbearing regulators.

She knows how to get the most out of Whitehall and tackle the blob: in 2020 she banned the Civil Service from using pernicious unconscious bias training and improved the way in which the Government addresses inequality, by including economic and geographical factors, instead of the crude methods preferred by woke officials and the Labour Party.

Britain faces grave challenges today. Liz has rejected the path that Rishi Sunak wanted to take us down.

She opposed his breaking of our manifesto promise, with the National Insurance hike when the British people had barely recovered from the shock of the pandemic. She opposed him raising the tax burden to the highest since the socialism of 1950s Labour. While the economy was at its most fragile, she opposed his plan to raise Corporation Tax by around 30 per cent next year, which will deter investment and economic growth when we need it most.

Sunak has squandered the Conservative Party’s decade-long efforts to build a competitive tax regime and it will be the French and the Americans who will benefit, instead of the British people. With Liz Truss as Prime Minister, we will have the best chance to undo these errors and right Britain’s course.

LIZhas the most compelling and credible vision for how to restore our economy to growth, tackle inflation and pay for public services without taxing the public into submission.

outside the European Union, we can harness the benefits of Brexit, remove redundant EU regulations from our books and make businesses more efficient and dynamic – and the British people more prosperous. This is the agenda which will restore the British economy to health and rebuild the public’s trust in the Conservatives.

It is undoubtedly true that the Conservative Party has suffered a difficult period after an extraordinary victory by Boris Johnson in 2019. Boris gave our party a mandate to deliver on the promises of Brexit and unleash the economic potential of the entire United Kingdom.

For the good of the country, Conservative Party members and all MPs, we must choose the candidate who will complete this task, and respect the choice of our voters who made their decision in December 2019. I believe that the best way of fulfilling this mandate is by voting for Liz Truss as leader of the Conservative Party.