Truss’s eastern trip opens new horizons

T IS easy to understand why the Foreign Secretary Liz Truss regularly tops the polls of Conservative Party members as the most popular and highly-rated member of the Government.

Her article for the Sunday Express today is another example of a politician whose finger is on the pulse of what is important for this country.

It is quite a contrast to the sound and fury of the debacle in Parliament over trying to change the standards rules last week – a row which, as Shakespeare might have put it, was “all sound and fury, signifying nothing”.

Despite being a Remainer in the EU referendum, Ms Truss had the courage to embrace Brexit and its opportunities like no other – first as International Trade Secretary, now as Foreign Secretary.

Her trip this week to South-east Asia is highly significant.

It should be a major milestone on the road towards Britain joining the Trans-pacific trade group – with a combined GDP of £8trillion and set to soon surpass the EU.

This is not just important for creating jobs and wealth in this country but also for a future where Britain and its allies will need to stand up to the growing menace coming from the Chinese Communist Party in Beijing.

Ms Truss is right that America too must understand the wider international dynamic and play its part in this.

She is correct also to link economic policy with military power and she needs to start reshaping our foreign aid spending to meet our strategic goals.

It is obvious as well that she understands that future prosperity and opportunity lie outside the narrow confines of the EU and its rigid customs barrier wall.

In fewer than 20 years Indonesia, a country she visits this week, is forecast to have replaced Germany as having the fourth biggest GDP for any country.

After the dark period of the Covid pandemic which we are hopefully just beginning to exit, Ms Truss’s message offers us hope and makes us optimistic that economic growth can turn around the fortunes of this country – and the world.