This Thursday marks precisely one month since Liz Truss succeeded Boris Johnson and became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. But the conservative’s mandate started off on the wrong foot.
On September 8, two days after taking office, the Finance Minister announced the new package of measures to support families in the face of rising energy costs. But after 30 minutes the queen dies. For the next 10 days, the country’s attention is focused on the funeral of Elizabeth II.
At the same time, Downing Street is finalizing the details of the new Growth Plan. A kind of mini budget, as it was known. On September 23, Finance Minister Kwasi Kwarteng announced in parliament the biggest tax cut in 50 years.
“We believe that high taxes reduce the incentive to work, impede investment and are an obstacle to entrepreneurship. We are going to revise the tax system to make it simpler, more dynamic and fairer for families”, he defended.
The problem is that to compensate for the drop in tax revenue, the government chooses to resort to borrowing. The markets do not like it and react to it. The pound plummets and only recovers several days later. The interests of the public debt shoot up and drag those of the mortgage loans.
Given this scenario, the Bank of England is forced to intervene. The British regulator buys almost 75,000 million euros of public debt and saves the pension funds.
Opposition leader Keir Starmer says the government has lost “control of the economy” and the Bank of England’s attitude is “very serious.”
The worsening economic crisis is helping Labor increase its lead in the polls. One of them even put Labor 33 points ahead of the Conservatives, something that had not happened for 26 years.
October begins and with the new month comes the controversies inherited from September. Above all, the tax cut for the richest, provided for in the mini budget. Ten days after the announcement, and under pressure from all sides, including conservative colleagues, the finance minister backed down. “We just talk to people. We listen to people. I understand that. In addition to talking to people, we also saw how they reacted, ”he justified.
But October is also the month of the Annual Congress of the Conservatives. Amid the turmoil, Liz Truss takes on the party’s rank and file, wanting to turn the page. “We need Britain to move. We can no longer allow the country to continue to drift or fall further behind in this vital period”, acknowledges the prime minister.
In short, within a month of UK destinations, Liz Truss met two monarchs, presented a mini-budget, watched the chaos in the markets, watched the Bank of England save the economy, reversed announced measures, encountered domestic opposition, and crossed the fingers. .so that the polls do not go beyond that.
Source: TSF
