by Lorcan Bonser-Wilton
On Monday, it was announced that the new leader of the Conservative Party would be Liz Truss, after months of campaigning alongside former chancellor Rishi Sunak. While it may be seen as unfair that 141,725 party members chose this (with an potential electorate of around 47.6 million voters), in this article I seek to discuss the main reasons for Truss’ victory. She has previously been labelled the ‘preferred comedy candidate’, but has somehow taken the highest office in the nation - I intend to find out why.
It could be argued that one major factor in Truss’ victory is her role (or lack thereof) in the fall of the Johnson administration. There is an old saying that ‘He who wields the dagger, never wears the crown’. In this case, Rishi Sunak wielded the dagger from the forefront, as his resignation was the first tipped piece in a long chain of dominoes. Sunak has been said to have come off as a ‘betrayer’, whereas Truss seemed trustworthy and loyal. Truss also bolstered this by stating that “I’m loyal to Boris Johnson. I supported our prime minister’s aspirations and I want to deliver the promise of the 2019 manifesto”. Therefore, Truss was able to much more easily canvas the support of many voters still loyal to Johnson. Another important reason was Truss' planned tax cuts. While these cuts are supposed to be a way to ease the mounting cost of living, they can also benefit many of the Conservative voters as a result. Truss has openly stated that she wants to give money back to the wealthiest in society through tax cuts, and owing to the affluence of many of the party’s members, this was a consideration during the vote. Hence, this likely had great sway over many of the voters during the campaign.
On the other hand, it could be argued that Sunak’s inadequacies and indiscretions were the reason for his loss. In a very famous scandal, Sunak was forced to explain his management of his family fortune, which is rumoured to be around $840 million, and is largely bolstered by the wealth of his wife Akshata Murthy. She is the daughter of an Indian billionaire and has shares in major Indian companies. The major controversy came when Sunak’s wife saved over £20 million in tax through dividends in her family’s IT business, therefore raising questions surrounding Sunak’s taxes. This snowballed into a huge scandal that was sure to have negatively impacted Sunak’s public image. A more simple explanation for his loss could be that he accepted defeat from the start. In an interview with the BBC, Sunak described his enthusiasm for “supporting the Conservative government in whatever capacity”, suggesting a lack of drive and desire behind his campaign that led to defeat. Finally, while I have said that a lot of the voters in the election are affluent, the most recent of Sunak’s scandals impacted his campaign horribly. A video surfaced recently of Sunak boasting about diverting money away from ‘deprived urban areas’ in order to fund the Kent commuter belt. The fact that he so flagrantly showed off about such an inequality-forging action, which also goes completely against the government’s plan of spreading wealth throughout the country, definitely did a good deal of damage.
In conclusion, whatever one believes about Truss’ new post, the British public seems to be less than optimistic. According to YouGov, 52% of British people expect Truss to be “poor or terrible”, while only 12% of Britons expect Truss to be a “good or great” leader. Truss certainly has a lot to deal with, what with a crushing cost of living crisis and high energy prices on the horizon, and we will have to see whether Truss’ promised plan will bear any fruit. It is an incredibly unstable time in the once great halls of Westminster, and I am sure that I am not the only one on tenterhooks, waiting to see what will happen next!
Sources:
https://www.politico.eu/article/how-liz-truss-did-it/
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62786336
https://www.wionews.com/world/five-reasons-why-rishi-sunak-lost-the-uk-prime-minister-election-513122
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