Prime Minister of England, Liz Truss has resigned from her duties on October 20th 2022.
She will remain in office until her successor is chosen. From outside the steps of Number 10 Downing Street, Truss said a leadership election would take place over the next seven days.
Her resignation follows weeks of political and economic crisis, after the government introduced a new “mini-budget” which was roundly criticized. Truss’ economic plan, which called for £45 billion in tax cuts, was immediately criticized and led to a financial market crisis that resulted in Truss firing her own finance minister just days after the plan, now abandoned, was announced.
In her resignation speech outside Downing Street, she said: “I recognise that I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party.”
Liz Truss’s favourability as prime minister plummeted to -70%, according to a YouGov poll.
The favourability rating measures the difference between the proportion of people saying they have a favourable opinion of her and those who have an unfavourable opinion.
The study spoke to 1,724 British adults between October 14 and 16 – that is, before the tumultuous events of this week.
Liz Truss replaced Boris Johnson as leader and became PM on 6 September then resigned 45 days later. The previous record was set at 119 days by George Canning who died in office in 1827.
Meanwhile, Sir Ed Davey reiterates it is time for the Conservative Party to go and for an election to be called.
“I think there’s a big movement in the country for a general election,” the Liberal Democrat leader says.
He adds: “I can’t believe Boris Johnson is considering putting himself forward. There’s an inquiry into whether he misled parliament and the whole of the British people.
“It’s quite outrageous if Tory MPs allow him back.
“Moving the deck chairs on the Titanic is not what this country needs.”
Russia’s foreign ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has welcomed the departure of Liz Truss as prime minister, saying that “Britain has never known such a disgrace of a prime minister,” and that Truss “would be remembered for her catastrophic illiteracy”.
Zakharova was likely referring to a comment Truss made when she was the foreign secretary, in which she appeared to confuse two regions of Russia with Ukraine.
Ireland’s finance minister Paschal Donohoe hopes the engagement between the EU and the British government on the Northern Ireland Protocol can continue in the wake of Liz Truss’s resignation.
The Northern Ireland Protocol part of the Brexit deal, and it means goods lorries don’t face checkpoints when they go from Northern Ireland – in the UK – to the Republic of Ireland in the EU.
It has been a source of tension since it came into force at the start of 2021.
Reacting to Truss’s resignation, Donohoe told reporters in Dublin “resolution of this longstanding challenge will be a really positive signal amidst the many different difficulties that we’re all dealing with”.
The Queen appointed Liz Truss days before she died and her leadership began with a 10-day mourning period.
Source-BBC
