Liz Truss vows to ‘reclaim Brexit’ by reviving vision of UK as low-tax SINGAPORE ON THAMES
THE secrets of Boris Johnson’s Cabinet reshuffle were kept on a portable whiteboard, wheeled into the Prime Minister’s office on a trolley and pointed discreetly towards his corner desk, where aides thrashed out various sackings and promotions.
By the middle of Wednesday morning, hours before the first announcements were made, many of the moves were still in flux. But one key role had been set in stone – Liz Truss’s promotion to the Foreign Office in place of a seething Dominic Raab.
The latest stage in the rise and rise of Ms Truss has been interpreted by many as a Machiavellian move by Mr Johnson – keeping her out of the way of adoring local party associations and ‘setting her up to fail’ by handing her over to the hostile forces of the pro-EU mandarinate at the Foreign Office.
These bullets are, as usual, bouncing off Ms Truss, who professes herself delighted by a portfolio that she believes gives her the perfect platform to mould her vision of post-Brexit Britain.
The Tory Party’s first female Foreign Secretary is understood privately to share the dissatisfaction of backbenchers, who complain that the reality of the UK’s departure from the EU falls short of the buccaneering picture portrayed by its architects.
Instead of witnessing Britain’s transformation into a low-tax, low-regulation ‘Singapore on Thames’, they have seen the imposition of a new £12billion annual levy to fund health and social care, been told to prepare for a corporation tax hike from 19 per cent to 25 per cent by 2023 and grown restive over the speed at which EU red tape has been cut.
Ms Truss is also impatient to ‘reclaim Brexit’ with Britain becoming an incentivising hub on the edge of Europe which could beat France and Germany in the battle for billions in international investment through low taxes and the removal of Brussels’s regulatory shackles.
As one ally puts it: ‘Liz wants to focus more on what she calls “economic diplomacy”, with Britain being more competitive in the global market
‘Rishi Sunak is doing his typical submarine act’
place and promoting free enterprise across the world.’
Some senior Government figures are concerned by her promotion, however, with one source saying: ‘Liz will need a strong team around her. The Foreign Office civil servants killed Raab, and they could do the same to her.’
No10 has kept Ministers on their toes about the reshuffle over the past fortnight, sending out false signals about its imminence.
Even as late as Wednesday morning, some advisers were being dropped hints that it was coming on Friday – although a leak on one WhatsApp group warning the printing of the Cabinet line-up for next month’s Tory Party Conference had been delayed from Tuesday to Thursday was a bit of a giveaway.
Preparations had been under way for several weeks, with the Prime Minister – and former Daily Telegraph columnist – taking what one source described as a ‘journalistic’ approach: ringing round trusted advisers and scribbling down notes as he canvassed opinion.
Central to the process were Dan Rosenfield, No 10’s chief of staff, and Declan Lyons, Mr Johnson’s Political Secretary, who marshalled the views of No10 advisers and fed them to the Prime Minister.
Inevitably, Michael Gove posed the biggest conundrum – how could he be handed a portfolio commensurate with his skills and experience without disrupting the Cabinet power balance?
The solution – making him Minister for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities – is being spun by everyone as a victory: by his allies, because it gives Mr Gove a central role executing the Tories’ flagship ‘levelling up’ policy, and by his enemies because it falls short of being a great office of state. Plus, he will be forced to define what ‘levelling up’ actually means.
He will also have to defuse party tensions over planning reforms and continue his fraught dealings with First Minister Nicola Sturgeon over Scottish independence.
Allies of Mr Rosenfield also present it as a ‘wing-clipping’ exercise because it supposedly highlighted the limited reach of a cabal of ‘Goveite’ advisers in No10.
While the Prime Minister relished the freedom to make changes without the influence – or interference – of former adviser Dominic Cummings, the reshuffle came at a difficult time for him: shortly after the death of his mother.
It meant he was moving, or sacking, people who had just offered their condolences, heightening the emotional temperature further.
At least one sacked Minister left Mr Johnson’s office in tears.
For others, their fears proved unfounded. Home Secretary Priti Patel had grown increasingly concerned that she was going to be ousted by Mr Gove, and had prepared a trenchant defence of her record in Government. Unnecessarily, as it turned out.
A source said: ‘Boris’s relationship with Priti is stronger than people think. This reshuffle was all about cultivating and retaining loyalists.’
Observers are divided about whether Chancellor Rishi Sunak can be counted as one of those. At least one backbencher claims that Mr Sunak privately believes the Health and Social Care levy was a ‘mess’ which he had been ‘bounced into’ – something that the Treasury denies.
The source added: ‘Rishi is doing his typical submarine act, choosing his battles but mostly staying out of trouble. How long can that last?’