The shortest-serving prime minister in UK history, British Prime Minister Liz Truss, announced her resignation on Thursday, just six crisis-filled weeks after taking office.
In order to prevent the drawn-out election that Truss won over Rishi Sunak in the summer following Boris Johnson’s own departure, the Conservative party promised a quick election that would have a new leader chosen by October 28.
As her right-wing tax-cutting program collapsed and a large number of Conservative MPs rebelled, Truss was forced to concede that she “cannot achieve the mandate” on which she was elected.
Labour leader Keir Starmer, whose opposition party has surged in opinion polls on the back of Truss’s short, eventful tenure, demanded a general election “now”.
“This is not just a soap opera at the top of the Tory party,” he said, warning of “huge damage” to the UK economy, although the pound surged against the dollar after Truss’s dramatic announcement.
Speaking outside 10 Downing Street, Truss said she would stay on as prime minister until a successor is chosen to serve as Tory leader.
“We’ve agreed that there will be a leadership election to be completed within the next week,” she said, after senior backbench MP Graham Brady told her the game was up.
“This will ensure that we remain on a path to deliver our fiscal plan and maintain our country’s economic stability and national security.”
Brady assured reporters, without providing further specifics, that the new leader will be in place by Friday of the following week, in time for Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt to make an important budget announcement on October 31.
In response to Sunak’s concerns that her debt-fueled plans faced higher inflation and market turbulence, Brady’s statement suggested the party could find a way to avoid the Tory rank and file who elected Truss.
