It’s been a mere three weeks since Liz Truss became prime minister, and already the former secretary of state has been meme-d beyond all belief after a series of chaotic – and somewhat disastrous – false starts in her new role.
Her new chancellor of the exchequer, Kwasi Kwarteng, implemented a controversial mini budget that many condemned as fiscally irresponsible, the British pound fell to its lowest value since 1971 and for the first time in two decades, Labour has grasped the biggest lead in polls. Now, reports warn of ‘no confidence letters’ being sent from Tory MPs hoping to trigger yet another leadership election.
But what’s really going on with all this? On Google Trends, ‘votes of no confidence in Liz Truss’ is a breakout search query up 250% - alongside, ‘Liz Truss no confidence letters’ and about five other variations of the phrase. Presumably, people want to know just how serious these rumours are, and who sent the no confidence letters in Liz Truss.
Will there be a vote of no confidence in Liz Truss?
Whispers of no confidence come from sources to The Mirror and Sky News – one Tory MP telling the former that ‘there has been some mobilisation’ and ‘there are letters’ being sent to 1992 Committee chair Sir Graham Brady.
An ex-minister told Sky News, ‘Liz is f*****. She is taking on markets and the Bank of England… playing A-level economics with people’s lives. They are already putting letters in as think she will crash the economy.’
‘The issue is government fiscal policy is opposite to Bank of England monetary policy – so they are fighting each other,’ the source continued. ‘What Kwasi gives, the Bank takes away ... You cannot have monetary policy and fiscal policy at loggerheads.’
So why the lack of noise about these supposed letters? Well, it’s because as it stands, they have very little impact. Under current Conservative Party rules, Liz Truss is safe from a leadership election due to no-confidence. This is because they had one for Boris Johnson in June this year, which he survived, and their rules dictate that there must be a 12-month period between no confidence votes.
That being said, MPs have threatened to scrap the threshold in the past, and it’s not outside the realms of possibility that enough ministers could mobilise to do so, or at the very least force a resignation from Truss – as they did with Johnson last month.
Perhaps it’s the lack of impact that these supposed no confidence letters are likely to have that’s causing all of the confusion around what could happen next – but make no mistake, Liz Truss is not in for an easy ride with the escalating tension around Kwarteng’s economic policy decisions. Let’s just hope that warnings about the collapse of the economy are heeded in enough time to actually help those of us hardest hit.