After Kwarteng, Tories Grasp Toward a Post-Truss Era
A ruling party with an unassailable majority now is incapable of governing the country
Hello, I must be going.
Photographer: Hollie Adams/BloombergFive weeks ago, the world watched in awe as Britain bid farewell to Elizabeth II and welcomed Charles III with impeccable pomp. Today, it’s watching aghast as the government shatters into smithereens and the British economy goes into convulsions. “Oh dear, oh dear,” the king was heard to mutter as he met Prime Minister Liz Truss for the first of their routine weekly meetings.
The political situation is both depressing and surreal. Chancellor of the Exchequer Kwasi Kwarteng flew back from a meeting of the world’s most powerful financiers to be sacked, after only 38 days in office. The foreign secretary, James Cleverly, has declared, unprompted, during a radio interview that “changing the leadership would be a disastrously bad idea, not just politically but economically.”