Liz Truss resinged as the prime minister of the UK after 45 days in power, the shortest term for a British premier. AP
It started as a joke by a British tabloid. Then the world wanted in on it. Will Liz Truss outlast a head of lettuce, Daily Star asked. Now everyone knows the answer.
Truss announced that she was resigning as prime minister, making her the shortest-serving premier in the history of the United Kingdom. Her tenure lasted for 45 days.
She said that she could not deliver the mandate on which she was elected as a Conservative Party leader and notified King Charles III that she was stepping down.
Also read: Why UK PM Liz Truss’ troubles are a good sign for Rishi Sunak
“I recognise that given the situation I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party. I have therefore spoken to His Majesty the King to notify him that I am resigning as leader of the Conservative Party. I will remain as Prime Minister until a successor has been chosen,” Truss told reporters on Thursday.
A leadership election for MPs to select her successor will be “completed within the next week”, she added.
The ‘Iceberg Lady’ goes
Truss was in office for six weeks and was fighting for survival even as the number of Conservative Patry MPs asking for her to step down grew by the hour. British tabloid Daily Star had the last laugh as she did wilt fatser than that lettuce they pitted her against. To the strains of Britain’s national anthem, it declared the lettuce the victor on Thursday.
The Liz vs Lettuce battle has the world hooked. The idea for the prank came from a column in The Economist. It called the UK PM “the iceberg lady” with the “shelf-life of a lettuce”. The October 11 column noted that between a near-immediate political implosion at the beginning of her tenure and the 10 days of mourning after Queen Elizabeth II died, her grip on power amounted to seven days, or “roughly the shelf-life of a lettuce”, according to The New York Times (NYT).The disastrous economic programme
During her six weeks in office, Truss rolled out an economic programme that sent shockwaves through the market and left the Tories divided. When it was unveiled by the government last month, it financial turmoil and a political crisis and a breakdown of discipline in the governing Conservative Party. The outcome was the sacking of her finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng.
Liz Truss, followed by her husband Hugh O’Leary, walks back into 10 Downing Street after making a statement where she announced her resignation as prime minister, in London. AP
Seen as like-minded as Truss, he announced a mini-budget which detailed the price of an energy scheme worth $67 billion over the next six months. But he did not have measures to raise funds. Instead, he announced massive new borrowing to pay for sweeping tax cuts – including for top earners – along with scrapping a cap on bankers’ bonuses.
These measures drew immediate political fire for being unfair, and the pound plummeted towards parity against the dollar. Truss was then forced into a humiliating U-turn, scrapping the planned cut in the top rate of income tax.
Braverman’s quitting
The next came the resignation of Britain’s interior minister Suella Braverman. She became the second senior Cabinet minister to depart within a week, hastening Truss’ ouster. In her resignation letter, Braverman criticised Truss, saying she had “concerns about the direction of this government”. Replacing her was, Grant Shapps, who had not backed Truss for the PM post and was removed as transport minister when she came to power.
Truss lost control faster than she thought. Lawmakers’ anger grew after a Wednesday evening vote over fracking for shale gas — a practice that Truss wanted to resume despite opposition from many Conservatives — produced chaotic scenes in Parliament.
Within hours, a growing number of lawmakers called for Truss to resign.
‘She isn’t up to the job’
Earlier, Conservative lawmaker Simon Hoare said the government was in disarray. “Nobody has a route plan. It’s all sort of hand-to-hand fighting on a day-to-day basis,” he told the BBC on Thursday.
Truss quit after a meeting with Graham Brady, a senior Conservative lawmaker who oversees leadership challenges. Brady was tasked with assessing whether the prime minister still has the support of Tory members of Parliament — and it seemed she did not, reports The Associated Press.
“It’s time for the prime minister to go,” Conservative lawmaker Miriam Cates said earlier Thursday. Another, Steve Double, said of Truss: “She isn’t up to the job, sadly.” Legislator Ruth Edwards said, “It is not responsible for the party to allow her to remain in power.”
Britain’s shortest-serving PMs
It has been 45 days of economic and political distress in the UK. Until today, the shortest-serving prime minister was Conservative Party’s George Canning. He held the job for just 119 days before dying of pneumonia in 1827.
Like Truss, his short tenure was characterised by a war within the party – his short tenure was made possible only by the support of the opposition Whigs and independent MPs, according to a report in South China Morning Post.
His successor did not last too long either. Frederick John Robinson, Viscount Goderich, was appointed by King George IV. He survived just 144 days before quitting as he failed to solidify the Tory-Whig coalition at the time. He was nicknamed “The Blubberer” for he would often burst into tears when under stress, the report says.
In the 20th Century, two prime ministers, both Tories, lasted for less than a year. Andrew Bonar Law served 211 days from 1922 to 1923 before resigning due to poor health, and Alec Douglas-Home managed 364 days in 1963 and 64 until losing a general election.
Labour’s Gordon Brown also had a fairly short tenure. He stayed in office for two years and 318 days.
With inputs from agencies
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