UK Prime Minister Liz Truss is alarmingly close to losing her office despite Kwasi Kwarteng resigning as the chancellor of the Exchequer, experts told Sputnik
MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th October, 2022) UK Prime Minister Liz Truss is alarmingly close to losing her office despite Kwasi Kwarteng resigning as the chancellor of the Exchequer, experts told Sputnik.
Earlier in the day, Kwarteng announced his resignation after reports leaked that he has been fired over a controversial tax cuts plan for big corporations, which triggered a negative reaction from both markets and general public. Kwarteng, who was relieved of his post barely three weeks after his appointment, is now replaced by Jeremy Hunt. The question remains if this would be of any help to the embattled prime minister, since she ran for Tory leadership as a committed Thatcherite and the now-scrapped economic policy is viewed as her brainchild.
"The economic credibility of the Truss Government lies in tatters. She has fired her Chancellor which may provide temporary respite. But the tax policies that have rocked financial markets in recent weeks were her policies. The prime minister may stagger on for a few more months but her days in Downing Street are surely now numbered," Patrick Diamond, a professor of public policy at Queen Mary, University of London, said.
His sentiment is echoed by Mark Garnett, a senior lecturer at the Department of politics,Philosophy and Religion at Lancaster University, who thinks that Truss cannot save herself by firing Kwarteng and that she will remain in office only if her fellow Conservatives lawmakers feel that replacing her would be even more troublesome.
"It seems that many MPs have already decided that things could not be worse than they already are. It is most likely that the sacking of Kwarteng will bring her own downfall closer," Garnett stated.
The expert went on to say that the prime minister clearly lost the authority over her cabinet even before Kwarteng's resignation.
"Even the ones who supported her in the leadership election will now be thinking mostly of saving their own careers," Garnett explained, adding that "she will not want to sack cabinet colleagues who are not directly connected to the failed policy: it is more likely that she will have to persuade the others not to resign."
As for the appointment of Hunt, Garnett noted that it will not play well with the Conservative party's grass-roots members with a reputation of an unabashed Remainer.
