Liz Truss became prime minister of the United Kingdom roughly seven weeks ago. It has not even been two full menstrual cycles, and word on the street is that Truss won’t last the week. The Truss government has been in shambles from day one, especially considering that within hours of meeting Truss, Queen Elizabeth II was like “I’ve seen enough” and promptly died. Following the period of mourning, Truss has tried a Thatcher-like tax cut and a wholesale slashing of British entitlement programs. Her cabinet is in disarray, her would-be Tory allies are abandoning her at a steady clip and honestly, she might not last the day.
Liz Truss is fighting to save her job as Britain’s prime minister after more of her own lawmakers called for her to quit, incensed by a shambolic parliamentary vote and the resignation of her home secretary late on Wednesday. Truss’s government has “12 hours” to “turn the ship around,” Conservative lawmaker Simon Hoare said on Thursday, after a vote on whether to ban controversial fracking for shale gas descended into chaos.
Lawmakers reported that aides for Truss manhandled MPs into the voting lobby to force them to vote against the ban. The government initially presented the vote as a confidence motion in Truss’s government, but confusion remains about whether it was. A Downing Street spokesperson said on Thursday that Conservative lawmakers who didn’t participate in Wednesday evening’s vote will face disciplinary action, PA media said.
The chaos came hours after Suella Braverman, Truss’ home secretary or interior minister, dramatically resigned just six weeks into her job with a blistering attack on the PM’s leadership.
“The business of government relies upon people accepting responsibility for their mistakes. Pretending we haven’t made mistakes, carrying on as if everyone can’t see that we have made them, and hoping that things will magically come right is not serious politics,” Braverman wrote in a critique of Truss’s numerous U-turns on taxes and public spending. I have concerns about the direction of this government. Not only have we broken key pledges that were promised to our voters, but I have serious concerns about this Government’s commitment to honoring manifesto commitments.”
Truss, who fired her finance minister just last week after a disastrous and since-ditched financial plan caused turmoil on the markets, must now focus on getting to the weekend without her own MPs moving to oust her.
I’ve heard people say that they miss Boris Johnson, that’s how bad it is. Don’t skip over the part where, in Parliament yesterday, there were physical altercations and “bullying.” Tory-on-Tory crimes are happening. It’s fascinating. This is the British political system Rupert Murdoch and Viscount Rothermere want though. This is what the domination of a far-right-wing media agenda will get you. What’s also fascinating is that as yet another Tory government collapses, the current king is… whining about a Netflix show.
Update: Reportedly, Truss is going to resign as PM today. Like, within the next few hours. OH MY GOD.
Labour's Chris Bryant says he saw MPs being "physically manhandled" and "bullied" in the voting lobbies.
…this was supposed to be Liz Truss' "confidence" vote. pic.twitter.com/YZUoOMZQfo
— PoliticsJOE (@PoliticsJOE_UK) October 19, 2022
In case you missed this, the hot new livestream in the UK is “Will Liz Truss outlast this lettuce?” She will not.
Photos courtesy of Avalon Red.
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- British Prime Minister Liz Truss departs for PMQs – Downing Street, London, England, UK on Wednesday 12 October, 2022.,Image: 729986083, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: Please credit photographer and agency when publishing as Justin Ng/UPPA/Avalon., Model Release: no, Credit line: Justin Ng / Avalon
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- 14/10/2022. London, United Kingdom. Prime Minister Liz Truss Press Conference. Prime Minister Liz Truss holds a press conference at No9 Downing Street announcing Jeremy Hunt as her new Chancellor of the Exchequer.,Image: 730772080, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: This image is for Editorial use purposes only. The Image can not be used for advertising or commercial use. The Image can not be altered in any form., Model Release: no, Credit line: Andrew Parsons / Avalon
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- Downing Street, London, UK. 19th October 2022. British Prime Minister, Liz Truss, departs from Number 10 Downing Street to attend the weekly Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQ) session in the House of Commons.,Image: 731762904, License: Rights-managed, Restrictions: Supplied by AVALON – Fee Payable Upon Reproduction – For queries contact Avalon – sales@avalon.red London: +44 (0) 20 7421 6000 Los Angeles: +1 (310) 822 0419 Madrid: +34 91 533 4289, Model Release: no, Credit line: Photo by Amanda Rose / Avalon
One can only hope she’ll be gone by dinnertime. But definitely tomorrow if not today. Utter disaster
The irony is that she’s lasted longer than she would have done because the Queen’s death, funeral etc gave her some extra weeks…
Newsflash – SHE’S GONE.
Just resigned.
A new unit of measurement: the Truss.
Also, her resignation is not going to solve anything because the right wing is still in power. Good luck, GB.
“Unsolved Mysteries” voice: UPDATE
Do you call it a Truss or a lettuce?!
Well, there you are, Janey! She’s gone. And just as well, too. I had only one handful of popcorn left.
They are calling her Margarine Thatcher on twitter and I am here for it!
Omg that is hysterical. I love nicknames and this is a favorite.
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
To think that Truss’ spell as PM could amount to little more than a vacay for BJ is LUDICROUS and scary. The Tories favorability rating is down 30 points, FFS. I do not pretend to understand the British electoral/parliamentary process, but isn’t it past time that the British public get a chance to vote in a general election?!
Unfortunately not past time for a General Election – they’ve several more years before they have to call one and they’d be stir crazy to do it now. Not only would they not win but they’d likely be practically wiped out in the House of Commons.
Also the public don’t get to pick any leader of any party – it’s all done by a combo of party members and MPs but, usually, the choice of leader gets effectively ratified (or not) by the public when a general election happens. To date, Keir Starmer hasn’t been voted on by the public either.
Please don’t take this as me supporting Truss, btw. Can’t stand her – she comes across like an alien wearing a human skin badly with policies to match.
ETA HandforthParish made the same point but better than me below!
So the party in power decides when an election is going to be called, so they can just wait until they think its most beneficial to them? Is that how it works?
ETA seeing TrixC say down below that it’s every 5 years, but can it be shorter than that?
@Becks1 – yes, exactly that. Maximum term is five years but they can time it earlier if they want. Doesn’t always work though as Teresa May found out when she went for an early general election and it rebounded in her face.
The electoral cycles here are 5 years, but it’s up to the current government to decide exactly when the next election is called (technically, which they do by making a request to the King to dissolve Parliament). The last election was in December 2019 so the next one will be by January 2025 at latest. Many people are hoping it will be sooner, but given the current polls the Tories will do everything they can do avoid having one in the near future.
I don’t get how the government works over there. So they don’t have terms? People can just get ousted? Can someone lead me to the right pages so I can read about it?
No-one gets what is happening, this is totally unprecedented.
Normally party members elect a leader that will rule for 5 years.
When a vote of no confidence occurs MPs vote for a leader to stay in power or not. When many vote against it puts pressure on PMs to leave, which is what happens with Teresa May and then Boris Johnson.
Rules say you need a year’s delay before a new no confidence vote but it appears that Truss is so unpopular they will change the rules to get rid of her- which means another internal leadership contest etc,
The whole thing is an utter joke and there should be a General Election, but technically it is up to the ruling party to call it early, if not it will be in 2024.
The Tories really don’t want one as they will be crushed and probably be left with about 60 MPs, and the existing cabinet will probably all be out of a job.
So we get another unelected leader… and Brexit hitting the country, and mortgages rates exploding, and the pound falling, and inflation the highest it’s been since 1980, and the pension funds in a mess, and electricity and gas prices exploding….
The key difference with the US is that people do not vote directly for the PM. They vote for a local MP, who represents a political party – although of course many people vote based on the party rather than the candidate. Parties are allowed to change leaders between elections, although despite recent history it is quite rare for this to happen to a sitting PM. Each party has their own rules for how to choose a new leader – in the case of the Tories, Liz Truss was one of two candidates chosen by her fellow Tory MPs, followed by a vote of Conservative Party members – a small number of people who are mostly rich, old and white.
So it’d be kind of like if the president was chosen by the party in control of Congress?
We don’t vote directly for president either. We vote for something called “electors”. Don’t get me started. At least when the British vote for a party, the popular vote counts.
Democracy is on the rocks everywhere, it seems.
@Becks1 – sorry following you around on the comments – not stalking I promise 😉
It would be slightly more accurate to say that the President would be the leader of the party in control of Congress. Normally parties elect the leader they think would be most likely to lead them to victory in a general election – not get elected and then choose someone, if that makes sense.
LOL @TheHench you’re fine! I have a lot of questions bc its easy to think that your system is the same as ours and I think there are a lot of similarities but then there are also obviously some key differences as well. I like hearing about it from you all!
Theirs is a parliamentary system. In the US, we have a presidential system.
That’s the difference. The British PM is chosen by party leadership so they can be switched mid-term.
England put the monarchy in a box 200 years ago and it is a totalitarian gov’t w/o representation.
Americans can’t get past thinking a British PM=US President bc the bc PM stands on the same world stage. No.
And calling Truss, “Thatcher” makes no sense. One was a successful (for the time) world leader and the other is a lobbyist that got accidentally promoted to run a gov’t already in shambles
@ellee I really don’t understand what you have meant by this statement:
England put the monarchy in a box 200 years ago and it is a totalitarian gov’t w/o representation.
I’m not saying that you’re wrong but how is it totalitarian exactly?
Also, could I respectfully ask that you refer to the UK or Britain, rather than ‘England’. I am Scottish but this situation affects me and my family because Scotland is part of the UK. England is just one of the UK’s nations.
Sitting down with popcorn to wait for the delicious takes of our brilliant British celebitchies 👀
And Kaiser, bravo forever for “not even two full menstrual cycles”. I’m dead.
If these kinds of shenanigans were going on in some other part of the world, I can imagine certain types of people saying that country just wasn’t ready for democracy. What’s going on, Conservative Party?
No, this shows that the UK democracy IS working. We have a similar system here in Australia, and have had the same thing happen (not after 7 weeks, but we’ve had prime ministers ousted mid term).
In this form of government, citizens vote for their local member of parliament (MP). We do not vote for a “prime minister” as such. (For example, the only citizens who can physically vote for Liz Truss are the people who live in her electorate.)
Whichever party gets more MPs voted in forms a government, and the head of that party becomes the Prime Minister. If that person fails to deliver, they can be ousted from the leadership position (ie demoted back to just a normal MP), and a new person rises from the ranks to become the Prime Minister. Theoretically, this is the will of the people in action, because the people elected the representatives making this choice.
In reality, it’s often due to party in-fighting etc. But the mechanism itself is a good one.
I’ve often wished the US had a parliamentary system to break the horrible gridlock of a two party system. Technically, though, we don’t elect a president either. We elect party electorates who vote for the president. That’s just a formality, though. The ballots list the person for whom the electorates will vote, but the buffer still exists as the founders intended in case the people turn out to be too stupid to wisely choose a president the electorates can vote for someone else. They don’t though even when the people have clearly demonstrated being too stupid to wisely select a president.
Yes, I know how it works, we have it here in Canada as well. But if it’s really working well, a complete incompetent wouldn’t make it that far.
If shes ousted, do you think W or C will go to the climate conference?
LOL
“Tory on Tory crimes.” You love to see it.
‘Queen Elizabeth was like I’ve seen enough and promptly died’ … I am laughing so hard at this brilliant line! Getting lots of looks from passersby, LOL!
Same here. 🤣 I snorted.
I mean, it really does feel like she met Truss and just “nope-d” out of this whole mess, lol.
Ditto 💀😂😂😂
Great one, kaiser. Ole Brenda was like, “This bitch? Aw hell nah! Peace out, I’m gone.”
I about fell on the floor when I read that sentence. Brilliant.
The entire post was fire but that was my favorite line. I can’t stop laughing.
Also the “Tory on Tory crimes” I wasn’t ready for this today. I want whatever Kaiser had for breakfast..
Hahahahaha, things are certainly in a shambles, and there doesn’t seem to be ANY competent replacement for Truss, either in the Tory or the Labour party. Where is the person who will cometh, now the hour is here? Winnie would be spinning in his grave! Also had to laff, it was reported when KCRex met Liz Truss his first words were “dear oh dear”, as if to say, what fresh hell is this, and why did they pick you? Perhaps he sees it as a sad reflection on his sad ascension that this is the first PM they send him!!! His mother would laugh, who was her first PM? I could look it up, but can’t be bothered. Karma is grinning from ear to ear!
Winston Churchill (who allegedly stalled the Coronation to stay in power). Somehow Liz doesn’t really measure up.
@antipodean – Churchill was Elizabeth’s first PM.
The second, way-way-lesser coming of Margaret Thatcher? Who can blame Liz? 🤣🤣🤣
I am never going to stop laughing!
Truly a great line. I’m thinking about how the Queen’s health was in decline, yet she wasn’t wearing gloves when she shook Truss’s hand the day before she died.
I wish the grown-ups would come back to British politics! But what really scares me is the risk of affected people STILL voting Tories, even though there’s literally poop flowing into the sea, crazy energy costs, and food banks have seem to become normalised.
Well they want Boris back….
Boris, who is still a sitting MP and should be representing his constituents and is instead on holidays in the Caribbean.
I just heard the most brilliant quote today and I think it fits.
“There are no adults.”
I’m betting she’s gone in time for the evening news. It amazing to see someone competing with our would be Orange Dictator for worst political career but here you go. I have to agree Kaiser, does anyone in the gov’t or monarchy care about the millions who may not have heat, good or homes by winter? To hear them all the worst problem they have is Netflix and mansions with too many bathrooms …
You win!!! 🎉
The lettuce people are over the moon
Omg wow!
Liz Truss as a lettuce livestream: I fully admit to enjoying this. It changes slightly throughout the day and night.
In and amongst the shenanigans of yesterday, liz Truss was also forced to suspend her senior advisor Jason Stein , who’d apparently referred openly to the previous chancellor Sajid Javid as an incompetent sh*t and is now being investigated by the ethics committee. Stein was previously Prince Andrew’s media advisor at the time of the BBC interview- some day I’m going to do a Venn diagram showing the overlapping of these palace flunkies, senior Tory advisors and clown shows…….
Wow. Just…wow.
Holy Wow indeed! I mean yikes, that would be some Venn Diagram!
@Liz – lol – I had the exact same reaction ..
Well, Sajid Javid is an incompetent sh*t. Even by Tory standards, which are already below the Earth’s mantle. They’re basically U.S.-style Republicans (not small r) with posh accents.
The issue is that there’s no “unity candidate” that the Tories are all willing to back to replace Truss with. Talks swirl it could be Jeremy Hunt (the new chancellor) but again not everyone has agreed to gotten behind him. Some aren’t even sure if Truss should go in the first place. Then there’s also the issue of placing a second unelected PM onto the public.
So is it looking very bad for her? Yes. But could she hold, even for a few weeks because of the factors mentioned above? Possibly.
Edit: Huh wow okay she’s gone. Leadership contest next week it seems. Reckon they’ll make Jeremy Hunt PM then.
I’ve seen strong talk of bringing Blow Job back – if they did it would be a massive eff you to the public and we are ALL calling for a Gen Election but so far there is no sign they are going to give us one.
Am not a big fan of Starmer but he is better than ANY Tory.
Being Prime Minister has become such a poisoned chalice that only a change of party in power could salvage something.
Bringing him back would be ridiculous (which is exactly why I can buy that some Tories are genuinely thinking like that). Hunt has taken himself out of the race according to the BBC so the rest of the options are: Sunak and Mordaunt. Plenty don’t like Sunak but Mordaunt might have a better shot.
Hunt is not going to run- he’s ‘rescued’ the economy and is banking on staying Chancellor and running the show behind the scenes.
There’s a reality show on right now called ‘Make Me Prime Minister’. They could do worse than hauling one of the candidates off there and electing them at this rate.
At least she won’t have to bother working on her embarrassing curtsy. And that lettuce stream? Brilliant!
It’s official. The lettuce won.
honestly you got to hand it to the Brits, the lettuce was comedy gold !
Did Truss have time to choose her own wallpaper?
She’s gone – now its time to DEMAND a General Election, no more Tory musical chairs while continuing to tank what’s left of the UK economy. They have made us an international laughing stock with their desperate bid to cling to power.
The Tories are going to fight calling a general election tooth and nail. They know they would be crushed.
I already heard one of them yesterday saying it was impossible because they wouldn’t have enough MPs and it is in ‘the public interest’ to have a strong opposition.
Wow wow wow. this is so messy. I feel so bad for the British CBers, this is just a huge mess and I can’t imagine the stress and anxiety many are feeling right now as the winter approaches.
I’m trying not to dwell on it but as I am self employed I do worry about how it will affect me and my job prospects (i have just finished a contract and looking for a new one and its quite quiet in the market for what I do even in London).
She fkd our economy to hell and back and is walking away with a nice pension to live off. She and that twatty former Chancellor neighbour of hers should be dragged into court and forced to explain themselves. They pushed through a mini budget without it being costed properly and wiped £65b off the economy within 2 weeks. Am sure Kwarteng’s investor friends made a killing off betting against the point – it was alleged that he told them what he was going to do before he did it.
I had the same thought, the pair of them promised all this and more to their friends to get elected / in place, then they wreak bloody havoc on us normal folk, achieve absolutely nothing besides making our nation a laughing stock. I despise the woman.
Sorry to hear you too are facing uncertain times ahead. I’m NHS so pretty safe but friends are also seriously concerned. I was actually giving serious thought to emigrating this morning.
She’s gone. Unbelievable.
The Romaine Empire has fallen. *sees self out*
Actual lol.
@PunkyMomma – I salute you.
Hahahaha!
Lol this thread! Thank you @PunkyMama Lettuce applaud you!
🤣🤣🤣👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾😈😈
LMAO!!!
🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬🥬
So many amazing comments on this thread
The lettuce will always win.
Even her resignation statement was deluded, she made no apology and basically blamed it all on Putin and other external factors. I’ll back a lettuce over her any day. Reckon we’ll end up with Jeremy Hunt as PM now, Rishi Sunak back as Chancellor, or possibly vice versa.
I’m all for blaming stuff on Putin, who’s a genocidal fascist, but this? No, this looks like homegrown Tory clownery to me.
Hunt has come out and stand he’s not going to stand again – my money is Blow Job making (or trying to) make a come back. He said he would come back and if he has the party’s support he and Carrie Antoinette will flounce back in.
If he becomes PM again our international humiliation will be complete. And we would deserve it for continually voting for them.
Hunt ruled himself out , so im hoping for Rishi as PM
And she’s gone! She couldn’t even last 70 days, 1 day for every year of QE II’s reign. The damage she did in 44 days: crash the currency, people’s mortgages and lives, and the market.
I think it’s past time they appoint Larry the Downing Street Cat to PM. Maybe that was his actual plan–he was Chief Mouser, but he was plotting a coup all this time. How many PMs has that cat lived with? Cameron, May, Johnson, and now Truss?
Hell, he can’t do any worse. He may as well select the Queen’s corgis to be his deputy ministers.
There’s a Downing Street cat?! How did I never know this?! Now I want to know all about Larry!
Aviva – article and pic here for starters!
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/09/06/world/europe/larry-cat-10-downing-street.html
Larry the Cat is a legend. He’s about 100 years old and the other day was caught on camera chasing off an urban fox.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vmvsppJbh5E
“In 2019, during President Donald J. Trump’s visit to Britain, Larry made an appearance in photos, then held up proceedings by taking a nap under the presidential vehicle — a $1.5 million armored Cadillac known as the Beast.”
🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣
a photographer mate of mine is good friend’s with Larry. Larry often goes up to him when he’s working at No10 and Justin usually posts about Larry as well.
He usually does a Larry calendar every year that is quite popular.
If you want regular Larry updates:
https://twitter.com/justin_ng
Seriously—Larry the Cat has been Twitter-kicking Truss’ butt at least three times a day from day one. She should have figured she was doomed. 🤣🤣
@lanne, love that you brought Larry the Cat up. His twitter reads are awesome. Plus he ‘s cute. Giggled at learning in the twitter comments that cat treats are called ‘dreamies’ over the pond.
@Aviva, you must look at Larry the Cat’s twitter-highly entertaining and educational. Very funny BoJo comments.
Larry expressing his interest in Liz Truss.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zjobbZ58GU
Wow that was fast
It is so tiring, the internet jokes are helping but I am so fed up of this constant rotation of conservatives. We really need a general election but even then I can’t get my hopes up – the tory voters always seem to find a way.
My husband just commented, “They should put the head of lettuce in. ‘The policies we need, for a leafier, greener Britain.’ “
Too funny.
“It’s 2040. Our president is a plant.”—Ghostbusters.
Aaaand she’s outie!
“I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected.”
No shit, Lizzy.
Bravo for being more up to date about this than my news alerts 😂. Condolences, British celebitches. I’m on pins and needles in Texas about the upcoming elections here. I hope they call a General one for y’all.
Very sorry for the chaos for all of our UK celebitchies. Hopefully something good comes out of it in the end.
Lettuce live stream was amusing! Also, Kaiser you crack me up!
Headline 2025: “The Crown producers are currently screening heads of lettuce to play the iconic rival of PM Truss for Season 10 of The Crown. It is expected that the lettuce will be selected from a competitive offering from Lidl. Charles is livid at the “massively inaccurate” portrayal of the first six weeks of his reign and says that he feels like she should have been represented by a sturdy cabbage”
Aldi’s twitter account is fire – https://twitter.com/AldiUK/status/1583078768448778242.
Brilliant! 😂
2 PMs within 6 weeks yet they still won’t hold a general election and are forcing the country to stay with a failing party?
Wow. She didn’t even make it to 5 Scaramuccis.
I celebrate you. This comment is amazing.
+1
I appreciate watching another democratic country flail about because they too voted in someone completely incompetent. I don’t celebrate it, because like with Trump real people are hurting because of her leadership. If I spotted England across a crowded room, we’d totally lock eyes and beeline for each other.
I thought she was voted in because those making the decision were not ready to vote in a person of color.
Probably, he also didn’t do himself any favours getting recorded whilst bragging about diverting funds from the poorest areas of the country and funneling them into his affluent constituency whilst chancellor. Then again, that is peak tory behaviour so yeah, racism.
She was supported by the fail tabloid, since they could not keep Boris, a choice they happily shared with Putin for different reasons.
People said the monarchy brings stability to the people and government…LOL
Idelogically she was the right fit, the markets refused to fund reganomics, fifty years on.
Pity.
Yes! And you can follow him on Twitter