I’m a fighter not a quitter, says Truss as she battles to save premiership

LIZ Truss insisted she is ‘not a quitter’ yesterday as yet more Tory MPs heaped pressure on her premiership with public calls for her to quit.

In a brutal Prime Minister’s Questions, Miss Truss was forced to apologise for her mini-Budget shambles but vowed to battle on to save her job.

Echoing Labour grandee Peter Mandelson, she told the Commons: ‘I am a fighter, not a quitter.’ Yet this did little to quell a brewing rebellion among Tory MPs enraged by the persistent chaos engulfing her time in office.

William Wragg, vice chairman of the 19 Committee of Tory backbenchers, became the sixth MP to publicly call for Miss Truss to resign, saying he was ‘personally ashamed’ of telling his constituents to back the Conservatives.

He said he has submitted a letter to 19 Committee chairman Sir Graham Brady demanding a vote of no confidence in the Prime Minister.

‘The lack of foresight by senior members of the Government, I cannot easily forgive,’ he added. He also said he found the ‘trashing’ of the reputations of the Bank of England and the Office for Budget Responsibility during the Tory leadership contest to be ‘near Maoist in nature’.

And former minister George Freeman said ‘enough is enough’ after the sacking of Suella Braverman and Kwasi Kwarteng. ‘The Home Secretary “resigns” attacking the PM and government programme she had supported?’ he wrote on Twitter. ‘The Chancellor “resigns” for implementing the policies he and PM and Cabinet had agreed? Enough is enough. The Cabinet need to get a grip, fast.’

Tory MP Steve Double warned Miss Truss will probably have to stand down ‘quite soon’, telling Times Radio ‘she is absolutely in the last chance saloon’.

He said: ‘It’s becoming abundantly clear... we are going to get to the point where she really does have to consider her position and... step aside, and we will probably come to that quite soon.’

And last night backbencher Bob Seely apologised live on the radio for the Government’s ‘soap drama’. He told LBC: ‘I actually want to apologise, I really am getting fed up with this soap drama as much as your listeners are.’

Miss Truss tried to defy the mounting calls to quit in her first Commons outing since Monday’s humiliating U-turn on almost all of the measures in last month’s mini-Budget.

New Chancellor Jeremy Hunt reversed virtually every tax cut announced by his predecessor Kwasi Kwarteng as he sought to calm financial markets following weeks of turbulence.

Miss Truss told MPs during PMQs yesterday: ‘I have been very clear that I am sorry and that I have made mistakes.’ However she added: ‘The right thing to do in those circumstances is to make changes, which I have made, and to get on with the job and deliver for the British people.’