SUNAK. Rishi Sunak became the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom this Monday, October 24, 2022. Here is his portrait.
[Mise à jour le 24 octobre à 15h31] There was no doubt about it, it is now official: Rishi Sunak is the new Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. At 42, he takes office to succeed Liz Truss, who resigned from her post after only 44 days. This Monday, October 24, 2022, Boris Johnson’s former finance minister was alone in the race after the abandonment of his only rival for the post, the current Minister for Relations with Parliament, Penny Mordaunt. Defeated at the beginning of September in a first race at 10 Downing Street after the crashing departure of Boris Johnson, Rishi Sunak thus becomes the first non-white man to be the head of the British government, after collecting more than 100 sponsorships from elected members of the Conservative Party ( right), minimum threshold to present. The one who was elected MP in 2015 in North Yorkshire (northern England) becomes the second Prime Minister of King Charles III.
Rishi Sunak takes over as Prime Minister amid an unprecedented crisis in the UK. Economically, households are facing immense difficulties that her short-lived predecessor, Liz Truss, had promised to reduce through drastic state aid in various forms. But his promises were untenable and that only worsened the situation across the Channel. In September, inflation had reached 10.1% over one year. Since the decision of the British to leave the European Union in 2016, he is the fifth personality to take the direction of the British government, proof of the instability which reigns.
What is Rishi Sunak’s program?
Rishi Sunak became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom without having campaigned publicly since the announcement of the resignation of Liz Truss. The former minister of Boris Johnson had however surveyed the country during the summer during the race for the succession of “BoJo” which he had led against Liz Truss. He had thus been able to develop his program.
the Telegram details that the aspirant to 10 Downing Street intends to lower the minimum rate of income tax from 20 to 16%, but not for now: he aims… at the end of 2029 to “ensure that the cuts will be financed by growth and not by borrowing” specifies the newspaper. Still on the economy, his proposals are vague, with simply aid announced for retirees and the poorest. In terms of energy, he aims for the kingdom’s energy independence by 2045, wishing to focus on wind, solar and nuclear power, while lowering VAT in this sector.
On the international side, Rishi Sunak announced this summer that he wanted to cap the number of refugees received each year in Great Britain and toughen the conditions for asylum applications. As for the war in Ukraine, he had announced that he would “double his efforts and strengthen[t] our policy of total support for Ukraine.” An increase in the defense budget is also on his agenda.
Biography of Rishi Sunak
Rishi Sunak, 42, was born in Southampton, in the south of England, almost on the edges of the English Channel. Coming from a family originally from India working in the medical field (mother a pharmacist and father a doctor), he graduated in philosophy, politics, economics and business administration after studying at Oxford and then Stanford, in the United States. It was there that he met Akshata Murthy, daughter of Narayana Murthy, Indian billionaire and co-founder of Infosys, a computer systems company. Passed through the world of finance for ten years at the beginning of 2000, notably at Goldman Sachs.
He then entered politics and campaigned, successfully, to be elected MP in the north of England in 2015. A position he has since ceased to occupy. A fervent supporter of Brexit, he joined Theresa May’s government in January 2018 and remained there until the summer of 2022, going from Under-Secretary of State to Chancellor of the Exchequer (Minister of Economy), after having occupied the position of number 2 within this ministry. On July 8, 2022, he resigned from his post to put pressure on Boris Johnson and force him to leave his post as Prime Minister.