Category Archives: kwasi kwarteng

Kwasi Kwarteng Lashes Out At Liz Truss Over His ‘Trumpian’ Sacking

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Liz Truss’s spurned former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has taken aim at the ex-PM for sacking him in a “kind of Trumpian” manner.

Truss appointed Kwarteng as her chancellor as soon as she was elected – but she gave him the boot just 43 days later, blaming him for the chaos of their mini-budget of £45m of unfunded tax cuts.

Not that this decision saved the ex-PM’s skin. Six days after that, Truss was forced to resign herself and had to to hand the reins over to her Tory leadership rival Rishi Sunak.

Still, more than a year later, Kwarteng has said his rapid departure from government was “one of the things that I feel bad about” because Truss reacted so quickly to the pressure to remove him.

Speaking to the One Decision podcast, Kwarteng compared his sacking to the way ex-US president Donald Trump famously fired his own members of staff while in the White House.

He explained that he was returning from a meeting in Washington with the International Monetary Fund when he scrolled through social media – and saw messages about his own future in politics.

He said: “I was sacked, essentially on Twitter. So, kind of Trumpian.”

Kwarteng continued: “I was due back on the Saturday morning, and I came back on the Friday morning and I was driven to Downing Street and I was essentially sacked.

“But on the way to Downing Street, I could see on Twitter, I think it was Steve Swinford of the Times had said… ‘The chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, sacked’ [or] ‘was sacked’ or ‘has been sacked’ – I don’t know what tense it was but the message was clear.”

The ex-chancellor said his meeting with the then prime minister after that was “definitive”.

While Truss did not actually tweet that she was going to fire Kwarteng before she announced it to him (like Trump), the ex-chancellor did still find out via social media.

The two were close allies, having both entered parliament as new Tory MPs in 2010 and rising through the ranks of government together.

It seems they were destined to leave government together, too – as Kwarteng told the podcast, “it was obvious to me that once I’d been sacked it was over for her”.

The ex-chancellor has mostly avoided the spotlight since then, and has announced he will be stepping down as an MP at the next general election.

Truss, meanwhile, has been focused on appealing to a more right-wing audience, reforming her image and promoting her new book Ten Years To Save The West.

She has also endorsed Trump to be the next US president.

Both have refused to take responsibility for the chaos of their mini-budget, suggesting it was more the speed at which they introduced the reforms rather than the reforms themselves.

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Kwasi Kwarteng Doesn’t Think People Are Angry With Him For Crashing The Economy

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Kwasi Kwarteng has refused to apologise for the financial meltdown unleashed by his time in office alongside Liz Truss – saying “what was done was done”.

The former chancellor also suggested people were not angry about mortgage rates soaring as a result of his mini-budget – and that instead they say “you tried your best”.

On September 23, Kwarteng announced the biggest raft of tax cuts for half a century. The mini-budget triggered turbulence in the financial markets, sending the pound tumbling and forcing the Bank of England’s intervention.

Truss ended up resigning after only 44 days in office, with her economic measures swiftly ripped up by new chancellor Jeremy Hunt and her successor in No 10, Rishi Sunak.

“I’m not going to apologise,” he told Channel 4 News on Wednesday.

“I’ve said very clearly, you know, what was done was done, but I don’t believe that politicians are endlessly, you know, apologising for everything that has gone in the past. I’m looking forward.”

Asked whether he felt people’s anger about crippling mortgage rates, he said “no”.

He added: “I know the media will want to go to a world where people are being angry and outrage … but actually, what I found is that some people will come up to people and say, ‘I’m very angry, I’m very upset.’ You get that.

“I’m very struck, actually, by the fact that people are ‘you tried your best. We understand what you were trying to do. It was difficult.’”

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2022 Review: A Look Back At A Year When Politics Went Mad

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Every year in British politics is now almost always weirder than the last. But surely 2022 – which saw the country rattle through three prime ministers – will be peak stupid?

Below is a quick rundown of some, if not all, of the bonkers moments of the last year. May it rest in peace.

January

At the start of the year, Boris Johnson was prime minister and under intense pressure over the partygate scandal. On January 12, he admitted had actually attended a No.10 garden event during lockdown. Having previously insisted no rules were broken in Downing Street.

February – Jimmy Savile smear

Johnson spent the first few days of February doubling down on a discredited smear that Keir Starmer failed to prosecute Jimmy Savile. The then prime minister made the allegation during heated Commons debate over the Sue Gray report into partygate. The false claim led Munira Mirza, his policy chief, to resign.

March – Boris’ Russia links

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine saw the British government rollout sanctions on people close to Vladimir Putin’s regime. Johnson himself came under pressure to explain his links to prominent Russians including former KGB agent Alexander Lebedev and Lubov Chernukhin, the wealthy Tory donor and wife of a former Russian minister. Dominic Raab explained it away as the PM simply being “very social”.

April – Partygate fines

On April 12, Johnson was handed a fixed penalty notice by the police for breaking his own Covid lockdown rules. It was the first time a sitting prime minister was found to have broken the law. Despite this, he did not resign.

May – Tractorgate

Tory Neil Parish formally resigned from parliament after he admitted watching porn on his phone in the Commons. Twice. The Tiverton and Honiton MP said it had been a “moment of madness” as he initially was innocently looking at pictures of tractors. Easy mixup.

June – Blue wall blues

On June 23 by-elections were held in the Tory seats of Tiverton and Honiton and Wakefield. The party lost the former to the Lib Dems and the latter to Labour. Ed Davey celebrated his party’s victory with a classically stupid stunt. The double by-election loss did little to settle the nerves of Tory MPs about Johnson’s leadership.

July – Bye bye Boris

After a wave of resignations finally triggered by the Chris Pincher scandal, Johnson resigned as prime minister on July 7. Yet the previous day he had been determined to cling on. The farce was captured live on TV as he was told a delegation of cabinet ministers was at that very moment in No.10 waiting to tell him to quit. The group included very loyal Nadhim Zahawi, who Johnson had promoted to chancellor 24-hours earlier.

Johnson’s resignation triggered a months long Tory leadership contest which included so many idiotic moments it has its own list here.

August – The lady’s not for turning

Perhaps the, highlight, of the contest was Liz Truss announcing plans to pay workers living in cheaper areas of the country less than their counterparts in places like London and the South East.

Tory MPs were livid, with one describing it as “austerity on steroids”. Truss complained there had been a “wilful misrepresentation” of the plan by the media. There had not. Quickly U-turning on the proposal, Truss said it showed she was “honest and decisive”. Perhaps the signs were there all along.

September – Trussonomics

Truss hit the ground as prime minister on September 6. Her tenure lasted 49 days, during which time the Queen died, her mini-Budget caused the markets to have a panic attack and Tory poll ratings cratered. In a boost for Global Britain, the race for survival between her and the Daily Star’s lettuce became international news.

October – Rishi v Boris

Rishi Sunak succeeded Truss as prime minister on October 26, having lost out to her in the contest to takeover from Johnson. But over the course of a crazy weekend at the start of the month, Johnson flew home from his Caribbean holiday to try and stage a dramatic comeback as PM. Before then dropping out of the race in the face over overwhelming opposition from Tory MPs.

November – Hancock in the jungle

As health secretary Matt Hancock helped lead the country through its biggest crisis since WWII. In November 2022 he decided it was a good idea to join ITV’s I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out Of Here. He promptly had the party whip withdrawn and everyone else had to listen to constant jokes about him eating testicles.

December – normal service resumed?

The final month of 2022 in Westminster was somewhat stable when it came to nonsense, as the government grappled with strikes, inflation and the war in Ukraine. This could signal 2023 will be more serious if not calmer. But let’s not count on it.

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Labour MP Perfectly Sums Up The Chaos Caused By The Tories This Year

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A Labour MP perfectly summed up the chaos caused by the Tories this year as she grilled Jeremy Hunt.

The chancellor was left squirming as Angela Eagle ran through the astonishing political events of the last 12 months.

Hunt was appearing in front of the Treasury select committee to face questions on last week’s autumn statement, which came just weeks after his predecessor Kwasi Kwarteng’s disastrous mini-budget.

Hunt unveiled £55 billion of tax rises and spending cuts as he tried to undo the damage caused in part by Kwarteng’s unfunded spending spree, which sent the value of the pound plummeting and interest rates soaring.

Kwarteng was only in the job for six weeks, having been appointed by Liz Truss after she succeeded Boris Johnson as prime minister in September.

Eagle told Hunt: “Chancellor, this year alone your party has given us three prime ministers, four chancellors, four different versions of the Conservative government and six fiscal events.

“One hundred and forty-seven members of the government, including 32 cabinet ministers, have resigned or been sacked.

“What effect do you think this chaos has had on our economic prospects and our international reputation.”

In response, the chancellor insisted the UK’s economic woes had been “primarily” caused by the war in Ukraine and the global rise in energy prices.

He said: “I wish we hadn’t had that level of instability, but I produced an autumn statement that is designed to restore economic stability and consistency of economic policymaking and I hope we can turn the page on all that instability.”

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Kwasi Kwarteng Says He Told Liz Truss To ‘Slow Down’ On Economic Reforms That Crashed The Markets

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Kwasi Kwarteng has revealed he told Liz Truss to “slow down” with her radical economic agenda as the ex-prime minister was moving at “breakneck speed” after the disastrous mini-budget.

In his first interview since his ousting, the ex-chancellor says he warned her of being out of No 10 within “two months”.

The “slow down” claim is likely to raise eyebrows as two days after the mini-budget – which included plans to scrap the 45p income tax rate paid by the highest earners, cut stamp duty, reverse the rise in national insurance and cancel a planned rise in corporation tax – he told the BBC there was “more to come”.

Kwarteng also criticised the then-prime minister’s “mad” decision to sack him for implementing her tax-cutting agenda.

Truss ended up resigning after only 44 days in office, with her economic measures swiftly ripped up by new chancellor Jeremy Hunt and her successor in No 10, Rishi Sunak.

Kwarteng refused to apologise for the financial turmoil unleashed by his and Truss’s disastrous mini-budget, but acknowledged “there was turbulence and I regret that”.

He said the “strategic goal was right”, but “I think we should have had a much more measured approach”.

He said he bore “some responsibility” for the timetable of the mini-budget, but that Truss “was very much of the view that we needed to move things fast”.

“But I think it was too quick,” he added.

“Even after the mini budget we were going at breakneck speed. And I said, ‘You know, we should slow down, slow down’.”

“She said, ‘Well, I’ve only got two years’ and I said, ‘You will have two months if you carry on like this’. And I’m afraid that’s what happened.”

On September 23, Kwarteng announced the biggest raft of tax cuts for half a century.

The mini-budget triggered turbulence in the financial markets, sending the pound tumbling and forcing the Bank of England’s intervention.

Asked if he wanted to say sorry to the people facing extra costs in re-mortgaging, Kwarteng said: “I don’t want to relive the past.”

He added: “I do feel sorry, actually, for the people who are going through this difficult time in terms of re-mortgaging.

“I’m not going to wash my hands of what we did, I think the strategic goals (were) the right thing, but as it said, the delivery and implementation, there was no real tactical plan, there was no real timetable for it and I think we should have done that.”

The ex-chancellor said he first learned of his firing via a tweet as he travelled to a meeting with Truss in Downing Street.

“I can’t remember whether she was actually shedding tears but she was very emotional,” he said.

Describing his thinking at that moment, he said: “This is mad. Prime ministers don’t get rid of chancellors.

“I think I said to her at the time, ‘This is going to last three or four weeks’.

“Little did I know it was only going to be six days.”

Kwarteng added: “She can’t fire me for just implementing what she campaigned on. And, you know, we had a conversation.

“And I think it was very much the view that somehow she would survive if I took the fall on that.”

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Cabinet Ministers Dutifully Declare ‘Support’ For Liz Truss By Posting An Infographic

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Members of the Liz Truss cabinet have rallied round the beleaguered prime minister – but their efforts failed to convince.

On Friday, the plagued mini-budget struck again as the PM sacked her chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng as she abandoned plans to freeze corporation tax.

A desperate attempt to reset her premiership saw Truss appoint Jeremy Hunt as Kwarteng’s replacement in the Treasury, which was followed by a press conference that was as short as it was unapologetic.

But some in her top team offered support, taking to Twitter to post an infographic with a quotation from the media briefing, where she said: “We will deliver the strong and sustained growth that can transform the prosperity of our country for generations to come.”

Simon Clarke, the chief secretary to the Treasury, raised eyebrows when he simply tweeted: “The prime minister has my support.”

It also brought to mind footballer Victor Anichebe’s “tweet something like” classic.

Therese Coffey, Ranil Jayawardena and Jake Berry followed.

But Tom Tugendhat, minister of state for security who attends cabinet, resisted adding a message of support to the graphic – while Kemi Bandenoch resisted adding the graphic to her message of support.

The international trade secretary, who came fourth in the Conservative party leadership contest earlier this year, wrote: “To say it’s been a difficult day would be an understatement. We knew the scale of the challenge this autumn given multiple global headwinds would be unprecedented. Our Prime Minister is working flat out to get the country through these turbulent times. She has my full support.”

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A Bad Day For Liz Truss – But Twitter Has Been Very Good

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Another day, another round of Tory chaos.

But while the pound bounces around the bottom and mortgage rates surge, the slither of a silver lining is the quality of the content on Twitter.

On Friday, the catastrophic mini-budget struck again as Liz Truss sacked her chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng as she abandoned plans to freeze corporation tax.

Part of a desperate attempt to save her premiership saw Truss appoint Jeremy Hunt as Kwarteng’s replacement in the Treasury, which was followed by a press conference that was as short as it was unapologetic.

Many political reporters, speaking to Tory MPs, suggested the media briefing – eight minutes, just four questions – made things worse. You can see why they might say that.

Speaking of time, here’s a handy refresher.

For reference, the UK has now had four chancellors since July.

Meanwhile, the new chancellor didn’t get off to the best start.

And there was a reminder not to stand too close to either of the top two in government …

… especially if they are indulging in a spot of campanology.

And Britain appeared to be living up to its ‘Normal Island’ nickname.

Back in his constituency, Truss critic Michael Gove was getting on with business.

No, there was absolutely no trolling going on as the former cabinet minister referred to “trip hazards”, “strong leadership”, “funding pressures” and “recruitment and retention”.

And Ed Miliband had been saving one in the chamber for seven years.

As ever, The Thick Of It got there first.

And soon came the memes.

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Jacob Rees-Mogg Suggests Kwarteng Could Ignore OBR While Trashing Watchdog

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Jacob Rees-Mogg has taken aim at the independent fiscal watchdog that analyses government budgets despite the huge market unrest.

On the day the pound plunged again, the business secretary trashed Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecasting and even suggested chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng could ignore them if they were overly negative.

OBR assessments of the UK economy will accompany the chancellor’s plan to pay for his economic measures and reduce debt on October 31.

A lack of such forecasts during last month’s seismic mini-budget are thought to have contributed to the recent chaos in financial markets – with the cost of government borrowing soaring and the Bank of England forced to intervene.

In a pre-recorded interview on ITV’s Peston, the cabinet minister said: “Let’s see what the Office for Budget Responsibility has to say rather than guessing what it may say.

“But its record of forecasting accurately hasn’t been enormously good.

“So, the job of chancellors is to make decisions in the round rather than to assume that there is any individual forecaster who will hit the nail on the head…

“There are other sources of information. The OBR is not the only organisation that is able to give forecasts.”

His comments are unlikely to reassure investors seeking a firm commitment from the Government to get the nation’s finances under control.

Rees-Mogg also lashed out at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) after it called for the UK’s economic support package to be more targeted and for fiscal policy to be tightened.

He said: “I think the IMF is wrong on both counts. I think it’s particularly wrong on energy, and frankly doesn’t know what it’s talking about…

“The IMF is not holy writ and the IMF likes having a pop at the UK for its own particular reasons. I’m afraid I would never lose too much sleep about the IMF.”

Earlier, the senior Conservative accused Today programme presenter Mishal Husain of failing to meet the BBC’s impartiality standards after she suggested the mini-budget had unleashed the market turmoil.

Rees-Mogg sought to claim that the Bank of England’s decisions on interest rates had caused the turbulence, rather than Kwarteng’s plans to borrow more to fund tax cuts.

Labour’s shadow chief secretary to the Treasury Pat McFadden said: “Even now, Tory cabinet ministers do not appear to have learned lessons since their disastrous mini budget.

“The more they publicly trash economic institutions like the OBR, the more they undermine market confidence in their plans and their management of the UK economy.

“The Tories are out of control and working people are being made to pay the price with higher mortgage payments.”

Financial experts have roundly rejected the business secretary’s analysis that interest rates were to blame for the market turmoil.

Gillian Tett, Financial Times US editor-at-large, told Channel 4 News: “To use a non-technical term, that’s pretty much bollocks.”

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Tory MPs Attack ‘Wooden’ Liz Truss After Disastrous Commons Showdown

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Liz Truss has been savaged by Tory MPs after a disastrous meeting with her backbenchers.

In a bid to win over her mutinous MPs, Truss on Wednesday evening addressed the Tory backbench 1922 Committee, including high-profile critics Michael Gove and Grant Shapps.

But one MP described her performance as “crap” while another told HuffPost UK she was “wooden”.

The showdown in Commitee Room 14 of the House of Commons came as the economic chaos sparked by Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget continued.

Truss told the MPs present that the government’s energy price guarantee would protect households and businesses from soaring bills this winter.

She called on her colleagues to “highlight the devastation that would have been caused to small business had we not acted”.

But her attempts to win over her own MPs failed, with one telling HuffPost UK that almost all of the questions she was asked were critical of the government.

One said: “She was crap and the atmosphere was pretty flat in the room. Even the whips couldn’t be bothered getting people to ask supportive questions.”

One backbencher said her remaining supporters were “libertarian Jihadists who are wrecking the party”.

Former minister Robert Halfon, the Tory MP for Harlow, told Truss she had “trashed blue collar conservatism” by weakening the government’s commitment to affordable housing and lifting the cap on bankers’ bonuses.

Another MP said: “I would say it was worse than anything Theresa May ever faced when she was leader.

“What was really noticeable was the failure of the whips to organise a Praetorian guard of supporters around her. There was only one mildly supportive question and the rest were hostile.

“There was clapping on tables when the government’s policies were criticised and groans when the PM was giving an answer on interest rates and saying they were going up around the world. Try telling that to voters who are seeing their mortgages go up.”

The MP added: “She was wooden, cardboard, lacking in empathy. It’s very bleak.

“It felt very sombre and the mood was a bit like ’what’s going to happen next to bring this to a conclusion?”

The meeting capped another difficult day for the prime minister after she endured a tough prime minister’s questions in which she stunned MPs by declaring she would not impose any spending cuts to pay for the government’s tax giveaways.

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Tory MP Blasts ‘Comedic Figures’ In Government In Threat To Rebel Over Budget

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A Conservative MP has hit out at the “comedic figures masquerading as government ministers” as Tory anger over Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-budget continued despite an astonishing U-turn on income tax cuts for the highest earners.

Johnny Mercer, who was last month removed as veterans affairs minister by new prime minister Liz Truss, said “they can do whatever they like with the whip” as he warned he would be speaking out in the Commons about the controversial package.

Tory MPs who vote against the prime minister’s tax measures have been warned they will be kicked out of the parliamentary party – known as losing the whip.

In a Facebook post, the Plymouth MP wrote: “You know I will not accept budgets like the ones we saw last week. It is hard watching these rather comedic figures masquerading as government ministers sprawling around in the media.

“Last week my friend had to close his coffee shop. Another had his mortgage pulled. It is deeply unfunny for normal people, and I will waste no time in letting them know in the Commons at the first opportunity.

“I will not support anything that doesn’t help the brilliant people of Plymouth through intensely difficult times – they can do whatever they like with the whip.”

When Mercer was fired, his wife, Felicity Cornelius-Mercer, took to Twitter to call Truss an “imbecile” as she said the Cabinet system “stinks” and “treats people appallingly”.

The MP’s comments came on the same day as Kwarteng abandoned plans to scrap the 45% rate for earnings over £150,000 to stave off a Tory revolt.

Former Cabinet minister Michael Gove suggested he could now support the package and fellow potential rebel Grant Shapps welcoming the U-turn.

But HuffPost UK has reported that many angry Conservative MPs now want the government to stick by Boris Johnson’s promise to raise benefits by the rate of inflation — something Truss and Kwarteng have so far failed to do as they draw up plans to slash public spending.

One MP said: “Thank the lord for the 45p U-turn, but that’s after billions lost from shares, £65 billion spent by the Bank of England to prop up pension funds, asking MPs to defend the indefensible and threatening MPs with losing the party whip if they vote against.

“What they have to do now is maintain the real term increases in benefits and spending for essential public services. If not, that’s when people will speak out again.”

At the Tory party conference in Birmingham, the chancellor joked about his humiliating 45p tax rate U-turn.

“What a day,” he told the Tory conference as he admitted there had been “a little turbulence” since his mini-budget, a reference to the economic chaos caused by his unfunded tax cuts.

Unease is mounting among Tory backbenchers as the Labour Party has mounted a 30-point poll lead in at least two surveys in the last week, enough for a landslide election victory.

Johnson loyalist Nadine Dorries has called for an early election as she accused Truss of trashing the former PM’s legacy.

The former culture secretary said there is “widespread dismay at the fact that three years of work has effectively been put on hold”.

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