Liz Truss: A strong economy is needed to confront Russia

Liz Truss met her party colleagues on the last day of the party convention. She has been prime minister for just under a month, but is already in the midst of a serious crisis of confidence.

The “mini-budget” funded by a £45 billion loan that she and Finance Minister Kwasi Quarting made last week has led to economic turmoil in Britain, with the pound falling and mortgage rates soaring. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) questioned the measures, and the Bank of England was forced to buy a large subsidy of British government securities.

— I’ll give her 10 days to restore confidence — said former Transportation Secretary Grant Shapps after Truss was forced to make a humiliating change in one of the proposals on Monday — lowering marginal taxes for the most affluent.

But there is still a long line of other tax cuts financed by budget loans. In her talk, Liz Truss tried to motivate them.

– For a very long time, the political debate has been about how to distribute a limited cake. Instead, we need to make the pie grow, so everyone can have a bigger piece.

She added:

Tax cuts are right, both from an ethical and economic perspective.

At the moment, the turmoil seems in the markets. But the prime minister said she understood the concern that the national debt could rise – and promised that it would eventually fall relative to gross national income (GNI).

This may mean that savings are expected next year. Truss didn’t touch on the size or scale of the savings in this case.

On this day, she preferred to talk about something her party would agree to: support for Volodymyr Zelensky’s government in Kyiv.

The brave Ukrainian people are fighting not only for their freedom, but for the freedom of all of us. We must not give in to those who want to see a peace deal move away from Ukrainian territory. We stand by Ukraine. Truss said Ukraine can win, Ukraine must win, and Ukraine will win, which was met with a long round of applause.

to face Russia The prime minister made clear that a strong economy was needed – and linked it to post-Brexit tax cuts, deregulation and reduced bureaucracy.

– I won’t let the “anti-growth coalition” hold us back, Truss said, referring to the Social Democratic Labor Party, labor unions and various environmental movements.

The speech was at one point interrupted by Greenpeace activists who entered disguised as delegates.

They raised a Greenpeace banner and shouted, “Who voted for this? Who voted for ‘fracking’?” and noted that Truss had given the green light for hydraulic fracturing (fracking) to extract more gas and oil.

People like this would rather protest than make difficult decisions. In their media ads, they always have the same old answer: more taxes, more regulation, and more government intervention. Wrong, Wrong, Wrong, Truss said.

She left the party convention as the leader of a divided party. On the other hand, there are hawks like Interior Minister Soyla Braverman, who talk of a “coup” against the government and who are disappointed that Truss made concessions at all.

On the other hand, there are former ministers such as Michael Gove and Grant Shapps, who are expected to continue to criticize Truss in Parliament.

Truss was not given a stronger position. But the speech itself went relatively well, according to most British observers, and did not weaken her position anyway.