TRUSS. Liz Truss is expected to be the new Prime Minister of the UK. But it is in a very particular context that she could take over from Boris Johnson.
[Mise à jour le 1er septembre à 16h41] The game is (almost) done. Liz Truss should become the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, following the vote of the members of the British Conservative Party which closes this Friday, September 2, 2022. A month after the start of the suffrage, the current Minister of Foreign Affairs of Boris Johnson , which she seems destined to succeed, has one last time measured up to her adversary, Rishi Sunak, the former British Minister of the Economy. During a final debate organized in London – on the 12e since the start of the campaign, the forty-year-old has once again defended her project in which she promises a tax cut as soon as she takes over as head of government. However, if she is largely the winner in the polls, the possible third woman in history installed at 10 Downing Street would not take office in a serene climate.
The United Kingdom is hit hard by violent inflation and the response of a tax cut that Liz Truss wishes to bring does not seem to correspond to expectations. The annual gas bill will literally double. However, the candidate for the post of Prime Minister does not intend to put in place a price freeze or public aid to help households pay the bill. A major difference with France, in particular, to whom it did not particularly reach out during the campaign.
Furthermore, a survey Ipsos carried out with 2164 Britons and published on Tuesday August 30 indicates that 51% of them want an early general election, namely the renewal of the 650 deputies, initially planned for January 2025. In the process, Yougov indicated that the Voting intentions were more in favor of the Labor Party (39%) than the Conservative Party (31%), which currently has a majority in the House of Representatives. British opinion therefore seems to be tilting rather to the left. If the way to 10 Downing Street seems clear for Liz Truss, taking office should not be easy.
What link would Liz Truss have with France if she became Prime Minister? Asked during a meeting about her position vis-à-vis Emmanuel Macron and France on Thursday August 25, the candidate remained very enigmatic. “Macron, friend or foe?” Asked the host of the evening? “The jury is still deliberating,” she said, before adding: “if I become prime minister, I will judge him on his actions and not on his words.” For his part, Emmanuel Macron replied that “the nation which is the United Kingdom is a friendly, strong and allied nation”, also warning that “if we are not able, between French and British, to say whether we are friend or foe – the term is not neutral – we are heading for serious problems.”
Liz Truss therefore faces Rishi Sunak for the post of Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and to replace Boris Johnson. Minister and Secretary of State continuously since 2014, the member of the conservative party qualified for the final duel of her political family which should make it possible to designate the future boss of the Matignon of the monarchy. At 46, she was chosen by the deputies of her camp, just like Rishi Sunak. His candidacy will be submitted to the vote of the members of the conservative party. During a first vote of the members of the deputies of the conservative party allowing to designate the final duel, Rishi Sunak had collected 137 votes, in front of Liz Truss (113 votes), which had preceded Penny Mordaunt (105 votes), secretary of State in Trade.
Liz Truss appears to be the favorite in this internal election for the British Conservative Party and seems to be heading straight for the post of Prime Minister. On August 18, the Yougov polling institute published a survey of 1,089 members of the Conservative Party. 66% were in favor of a victory for Liz Truss, far ahead of Rishi Sunak. Since the announcement of her final duel against her former government colleague, the forty-year-old has never been worried by her rival in the polls. Will the results confirm this trend?
What is the essence of Liz Truss’ program?
Presented as more conservative than her opponent, Liz Truss defends lower taxes, particularly on companies, promises to cancel the rise in social security prices and to abolish the green levy (an environmental tax on the principle of polluter-pays ). Affirming that she will not question Brexit, she affirms, on the environmental level, to want to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050, while building new nuclear power plants, she who is opposed to photovoltaic power plants.
If she appears today as a fervent defender of Brexit, Liz Truss has not always come out in favor of leaving the European Union. At the time of the 2016 referendum, she even held an opposite position… namely that she wanted the United Kingdom to remain in the Union. “I support ‘remain’ because I think it’s in Britain’s economic interest and it means we can focus on vital economic and social reform at home,” she tweeted on 20 February 2016, four months before the referendum, which had seen the “leave” (leave, editor’s note) win by a short head. “I voted to stay because I was concerned about the economy,” she confirmed to the BBC a year later.
I am backing remain as I believe it is in Britain’s economic interest and means we can focus on vital economic and social reform at home.
— Liz for Leader (@trussliz) February 20, 2016
Since then, it is an understatement to say that she has made a reversal, decided to support Brexit, justifying the end of July 2022, always with the BBC to have “fully embraced the choice the British people have made.” Before adding: “I was wrong and I am ready to admit that I was wrong. Some of the omens of doom did not occur and instead we have, in fact, opened up new opportunities.”
Liz Truss to the BBC on Brexit: I was wrong and Im prepared to admit I was wrong. Some of the porters of doom didnt happen and instead weve unleashed new opportunities.
— Dan Bloom (@danbloom1) July 21, 2022
In an interview at Telegram, she explained in the spring of 2022 that “what I have seen both in my work in commerce and in my role as foreign minister is the new freedom and the impetus that having a independent trade policy and an independent foreign policy allowed us to do so.” And said: “If I could come back in 2016, I would vote to leave.”
Biography of Liz Truss
Her real name Mary Elizabeth Truss was born in 1975, whose parents were a nurse for the mother and a math teacher for the father, both rather on the left according to her words. After wandering around the United Kingdom due to successive moves of her family, she joined the University of Oxford and graduated in philosophy, politics and economics. Invested in the Liberal Democrat cause during her studies, she opposed the monarchy… before switching to the conservative side in 1996 and entering politics. She ran to become a deputy in 2001 and 2005, without success, then was finally elected in 2010. Two years later, she entered the government, as Under-Secretary of State at the Ministry of Education, then saw herself alternately entrust the leadership of the Ministry of the Environment (2014-2016), Justice (2016-2017), the position of number 2 of the Ministry of Economy (2017-2019), then takes the head of the ministry of International Trade (2019-2021), at the same time in charge of Women and Equality, before being appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs in 2021. Despite this meteoric rise, Liz Truss was a figure of… anti-Brexit ( read above), before changing position on the subject. And to take the place of the figure of this historic decision?