Liz Truss - why didn't we realise?

[ARoyalSubject]

Turn the clock back a month, and we knew she was stupid, and that more than likely she was the wrong choice for a sensible, responsible prime minister - but did people join the dots and realise that she was such an ideologue / so in thrall to ideologues?

AIBU to say that the media didn't spell out exactly what a Truss premiership meant?

She and Kwazi have written a book on exactly what's happening now for god's sake! Why wasn't the possibility they would act on it examined in more detail?

I'm not a member of the Tory party - did they realise what they were voting for?

Sometimes party members get it right and the leader is elected, last election for example

Sometimes they get it really wrong - on both sides and the person tanks in the election

I haven’t done a tally of which process gets it right more often (not that committed) but as a process it’s not been great for this time

I'm afraid those 'ordinary people' who thought Brexit was a great idea only bought into the 'less EU immigration and that a shortage of workers would up their rates ' end of the spectrum- they didn't think about the whole ideology of the current Tory party and that is to reduce rights, reduce the state and basically make it dog eat dog.

Anyone with an ounce of 'one party nation' decency has left or been voted out or crossed the floor in a few cases. We are left now with mainly the ideologist , 'libertarian' weirdos- basically the 'Apprentice' candidates.

Their are some people who benefit from these policies, mainly older well off people with savings and no mortgages or high earners still working with savings and no /low mortgages . Now some will give a shit that it's affecting their families (kids) , plenty really don't. However if pension funds totally tank, then they might. It's not hard to see how Truss was voted in- most of those Tory members fit the above criteria, plenty really don't give a shit about others. .

It's very obvious on even mumsnet who is in a good position to benefit. Some benefit but don't like the way things are going , but plenty are still in the 'all is well in my village in Surrey, on £250k a year, no mortgage, plenty of holidays etc.

I am not a radical socialist but I am of the view that a good society is far more balanced than turning it into the wild west, like some kind of USA but without the better wages in certain careers, the weather or neighbourhood school buses etc - we appear to be gaining all the worst aspects of USA but little of the better ones.

Truss won also because she was seen as Johnson’s rightful heir, whereas Sunak was portrayed as a traitor to the ‘dear leader’. Sunak warned us about these tax cuts and the elderly, well-heeled Tory membership has a lot to answer for for voting for the least capable candidate.

@Dreikanter don't know about you but I think Rachael Reeves background as an economist and at BOE is a tad more relevant!

How is she allowed to do this? She has no mandate from the British people. The English voted Johnson for Brexit but they haven’t voted for this. The Tories have precedent for holding a general election when a new PM comes in (Theresa May and Boris Johnson both held elections). That should have been what she did first.

Are the government not representing the royal family as well? I know they generally stay out of politics but this goes beyond that. I don’t think they should stay quiet on this.

Anyone following Truss during the leadership contest (or even before that) knew what she was doing to do though. She didn’t keep her plans secret.

Morbidly curious to see if Truss will try to go the whole week without making a media appearence.

The media did point it out. Even the ones who suddenly swung behind her made it clear she was all about the Tory funders, big businesses and didn't give a stuff about anyone else.
I'm watching the 'ordinary' Tories that I know with interest because usually they're quite moderate and quite vocal eg they hated Boris and his complete lack of values. But with Truss ... crickets. Which is odd since even The Times' readers are very unhappy.

Well, did austerity work?
Truss is going for growth. A different tactic.
Ultimately, the lockdowns have cost the country approx 300 billion GBP (some estimates are more).
This money has to be found from somewhere. Up to now, it has been quantitative easing (inflation).
My own view. The 45% tax rate apparently did not bring in very much anyway, so why remove it. In other words, I think the tax cuts were a bit too generous.
The pound is suffering because interest rates were expected to rise by 0.75 last week, instead of the 0.5 percent actual.

Well, quite. I wouldn't call Kwarteng an economist for one thing.

I also think Truss won because the Telegraph wanted her to win.

DH - who unfortunately has a free online torygraph subscription because of some wine purchases- started mentioning her name months ago.

The Conservative party members effectively voted for who they were told to - probably and ironically to their own detriment, as many are like my DPs, well off but certainly not in that ultra high tax band.

Funny how the government have been undermining the civil service in the past few years leading up to this point. I see Rees- Mogg's hands all over this. The very people we rely on to keep everything running smoothly when the government of the day goes to shit. Kwarteng sacking the permanent secretary at the Treasury was a big clue as to the direction he was about to take:

www.ft.com/content/9571c1f7-55b2-42ac-a126-ec0fcdeefca4

I agree that we should have a general election.

The only way out of this is to elect a Labour government. And I hope they will blend with the Lib Dems as an unequivocal sign that they are reinhabiting the centre.

And who is behind the Telegraph: the billionaire Barclay brothers (or rather brother as one has died.)

Murdoch behind the Sun. Rothermere behind the Mail.

All the Brexit papers have shifty billionaires behind them.

Frankly they voted for the person who was not Asian. Followed by all the stuff that appeals to Conservative Party members. Usually, white , affluent, middle aged/elderly males who lap up those policies.

Everyone else knew, none of them had a say.

Poor Sunak said this would happen!

He did, but although he may be a bit better than Truss and Kharteng his support of Brexit and love of unbridled market capitalism is in the same camp. He is part of a government that have wreaked such economic misery on the U.K. since 2010.

I mean this gently but -- Why didn't you realise? It's been said loudly and clearly by many, many commentators. You don't even have to go to the Guardian: the not so left wing Rishi Sunak was saying this multiple times in the run up to the election.

But I know what you mean -- why are so many papers legitimizing these unhinged economic charlatans? Why did the Telegraph, Mail, Times etc. go on about what a great budget this was, how at last they had a truly conservative budget.

There's a massive lie about MSM: that it's dominated by 'the left'. It's an absolutely insane view you just need to look at the backgrounds of bbc correspondents, the owners of the major newspapers which has somehow managed to get traction and which has somehow become mainstream. In fact, the media is ruled by rightwingers who are becoming bolder and bolder, to the point where, just a few days ago, they were cheering this budget on as, at least, a truly conservative budget.

I don't know what the solution is the Mail isn't quite lying to you but it presents such a distortion of the truth and does so so effectively that the attempt to curb it looks like censorship. We laugh at the Russians and their papers 'Pravda', nut until we see these papers sly, organised, coordinated propaganda far cleverer and insidious than anything Putin could invent, we're going to keep on voting for people and parties and structures that mean to rob us while enriching themselves.

It's extraordinary, isn't it? Is there something wrong with her?

And OP - we DID realise, but we didn't have a vote, we couldn't stop it, and we're not to blame. Cheers.

As I said above the ERG plan is to turn the U.K. into a low tax, low, reg, low social protection economy - Singapore meets the US. First the Brexiters needed to get rid of the EU, and now this is Part Deux.

Spot on. Truss and K were putting in place the next step of deregulation that began with Brexit, but they made the mistake of lowering tax before showing how they would fund it (more public service cuts) spooking the markets.

I don't think those pulling the strings cared that Sunak was Asian, I think they noticed that he actually appeared to give a bit of a damn about the economy.

Sure he was a Tory, but he genuinely appeared horrified by the tax cut promises being made by Truss at the leadership discussions.

He made a fair few blunders of his own - Eat out to Help out anyone - but he didn't seem
a puppet mouthpiece which is what we've got in Truss.

It's definitely worth considering! At least they have cute faces!!

Precisely this, and remoaners did warn you. Over and over again but we were told it was Project Fear, or maybe it was what Brexiteers wanted. I don't think so though.

My main reason for voting to stay in the EU was employment rights. I was actually surprised that the government didn't start dismantling them the second Brexit was done, but then covid got in the way.

Now they don't care. Well Rishi might not be saying I told you so, but I am.

I thought Liz Truss voted Remain?

@yossell

why are so many papers legitimizing these unhinged economic charlatans? Why did the Telegraph, Mail, Times etc. go on about what a great budget this was, how at last they had a truly conservative budget.

There's a massive lie about MSM: that it's dominated by 'the left'. It's an absolutely insane view you just need to look at the backgrounds of bbc correspondents, the owners of the major newspapers which has somehow managed to get traction and which has somehow become mainstream. In fact, the media is ruled by rightwingers who are becoming bolder and bolder, to the point where, just a few days ago, they were cheering this budget on as, at least, a truly conservative budget.

Very true. It’s an intentional campaign from right wingers to get control of the media political narrative. Hence the neutering of the BBC the sell off of C4.

But she does have a mandate, the mandate lies with the democratically eleceted party. People vote for the party, who then in turn vote for the leader.

Whether one likes her or not, hard to see how you could, she does have a mandate.

I know two people who voted for her and I’m sad to say that it was 100% motivated by racism (they are family and I’m stuck with them). They both openly said they didn’t think an Asian man should be U.K. prime minister.

Not surprising that they both joined the Conservatives during the Brexit debate and are both fairly badly informed about domestic and international politics and have not the first clue how government works (we have talked about it a lot and the gaps in their knowledge are staggering). Both heavy Facebook users who are every influenced by right wing posters.

This probably doesn’t represent ALL of the 80,000 but I would imagine it is the vast majority.

But she does have a mandate, the mandate lies with the democratically eleceted party. People vote for the party, who then in turn vote for the leader.

But the democratically elected party DIDN'T vote for her, it was the unelected party members.