In politics, character is electoral destiny: which is to say, the voters have to know what they’re getting. Ever since she announced her bid to succeed Boris Johnson, Liz Truss has presented herself as the heir to Margaret Thatcher; a politician who scorned backsliding, deplored the “drift and delay” of past governments, and would “stay the course”, irrespective of the pressures piled upon her.
It is unfortunate, then, that the first five weeks of her premiership have been most notable for screeching U-turns. First, she and her Chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, yielded to immense pressure from their own side not to abolish the 45p tax rate after all. Yesterday, in a bid to reassure the markets, Kwarteng announced that his medium-term fiscal statement would be brought forward from November 23 to October 31.
