Does Truss have a future?
LIZ TRUSS hasn’t been prime minister five minutes – well, all right, it’s a month – but already the talk in Tory ranks is of ousting her. She keeps saying her economic plan will work in the long run and that voters should give her a bit more time.
Everything that Rishi Sunak warned would happen about loss of confidence in the UK economy has happened. Her chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, is another avatar of Truss, so she cannot replace him with Rishi, even assuming he can be persuaded to take on the job.
According to Tory party rules, she is safe for a year. But then Boris Johnson was supposed to be safe for a year. Those who vote against her budget have been warned they will have their whips removed and so will not be able to stand as Tory candidates at the next election. But with her as leader many would lose their seats, anyway.
As with Boris, speculation about her future becomes almost a self-fulfilling prophecy. Will she be forced to resign? On radio, I heard a Tory say, “It’s not a matter of if, but when.”
I feel especially sorry for young people who thought they might somehow be able to scrape together enough money to afford a mortgage but have now seen their dreams trashed by Truss and Kwarteng. In the two years before a general election anything might happen. But, sadly, a lot of lives have been ruined by Truss’s act of self-harm.