Well, there it is. The UK’s third prime minister in just over three years is Liz Truss, the troubling result of a lab accident in which a community centre asset stripper was crossbred with a Live-Laugh-Love decal.
Her predecessor, Boris Johnson, left Downing Street this morning after an arrogant, lie-heavy speech, in which he displayed his character development after three years in office – precisely zero. None of his children was there (it’s actually quite a small street). He remains a short king over the water for any number of Conservatives who somehow still yearn to be shackled to a wildly underachieving narcissist who openly despises them. There’s being psychologically beaten, and then there’s … that.
A few hours later, Truss flew to Balmoral to meet the Queen, who she once wanted to abolish but now finds it more personally convenient to revere. Presumably Her Majesty asked Truss to form a government in the same way you might ask a telemarketer if you can call them back in five minutes. It’s always good when people explain what the Queen’s outfits mean; I assume that today’s choice telegraphed amused relief that she could be the only person spared having to hear Truss butcher a reading from Ecclesiastes at her funeral.
Truss uses the word “delivery” a lot for someone whose own delivery would lose the Bafta to an HGV announcing “This vehicle is reversing”. The vocal that will be delivering all the bad news to you this winter is slightly less appealing than a dental drill, if any of you are lucky enough to still have a dentist. Can you Auto-Tune the spoken word? I’d make Simon Cowell my comms chief if I were her. Truss does at least seem capable of reversing, having made “no handouts” a central feature of her campaign. The current best intel on her energy plan suggests that she might allow energy companies to avoid a windfall tax by freezing bills at the current level and setting the unit price centrally, meaning the taxpayer will be giving the handouts to the energy firms, who will be able to reward their shareholders with huge dividends and themselves with huge bonuses.
Anyway: let’s take a snapshot of the UK that Florence Olivier is taking charge of. Nigel Farage has just launched a personal red-white-and-blue gin range – a reminder that 40% proof spirits are the perfect accompaniment to the ongoing fallout of his political philosophy. He says his gin is “a taste of Brexit”; certainly, the blue liquid is the precise shade of the contents of a chemical toilet. Elsewhere, This Morning has pivoted its Spin to Win competition in the direction of “full dystopia”, with desperate viewers now offered the chance to have the peppy morning magazine show pay their apocalyptic energy bills. The Conservative party’s forever war is still raging, with less than half its MPs supporting Truss, and the leadership contest having landed its winner a smaller percentage of members’ votes than even Iain Duncan Smith, back when they tried that dadaist experiment.
Nevertheless, former Tory leaders have been weighing in with good wishes for Truss. There may well be a day when my reaction to any vanilla interjection from David Cameron is not to shout to an empty room: “You did this! You’re the reason we all live in the upside-down! YOU OPENED THE GATE!” That day, however, was not yesterday. The current bookies’ favourite to replace Liz Truss as Tory leader is … Boris Johnson.
All in all, a nation in rude political health, and absolutely not a deeply necrotic political culture where a significant number of grownups spent two days wetting their pants over a comedian pretending to take Truss seriously. Incidentally, if any of this feels somewhat downbeat, do consider that polls indicate a full 50% of the UK are disappointed that Truss is the new PM, against 22% who say they are very or fairly pleased. Maybe look at this column as an attempt to “deliver” to the majority.
Goodbyes-wise, it’s farewell to Priti Patel, floating off in the hope of a better life on the backbenches. Sayonara, too, to Nadine Dorries, who seems to have identified the moment of maximum opportunity for a peerage outside of a dream sequence. And the seal on the “brain drain” description remains unbroken with news that Lord Frost, the worst negotiator since France sold Louisiana, will also not “serve” in a Truss cabinet after rejecting two roles. Just assume he’ll be trying to unpick this decision in two months, like he did with his own Brexit deal.
Bright spots? Boris Johnson, a terminally immoral liar who turned out to be a terminally immoral liar, is no longer in office today. It is properly positive that none of the four offices of state in the country is likely to be held by a white man for the first time in history, no matter how some might prefer to dwell on whatever downsides they have decided to see in that. The shameful, thoughtless political limbo in which the increasingly panicky country has been left all summer is now over. Truss finally has no choice but to make contact with reality. Quite how many parsnips any of that will butter in a couple of months’ time is unclear – but it’ll need monumental political skill not to make a cheery “we are where we are” sound like a 10-year stretch.
Marina Hyde is a Guardian columnist
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Marina Hyde will be in conversation with Richard Osman at a Guardian Live event in London on 11 October. Join them in person or via the livestream – book tickets via the Guardian Live website
