We’re closing this liveblog now. Thanks for reading.
Two vacant positions on the executive committee of the 1922 Committee have been filled by Tory former ministers after an election.
The group of Conservative backbenchers oversees votes of confidence and leadership contests, making it instrumental in any possible moves to oust Liz Truss.
The Walsall North MP, Eddie Hughes, has been elected vice-chair and the Lincoln MP, Karl McCartney, got a spot on the executive.
Updated
The former government minister Steve Double has joined fellow Tory backbencher Maria Caulfield in saying he would not vote for an end to the triple lock on pensions.
He quoted a tweet from Caulfied, in which she said she would not back such a move in the Commons, with the caption: “Nor me.”
Updated
Liz Truss told Tory MPs from the European Research Group that she found axing her tax-slashing programme “painful” and did it “because she had to”.
The PM’s deputy press secretary told reporters after the meeting in Westminster: “Touching on recent days, she talked about her disappointment in not being able to follow through on the tax cuts, although she stressed that of course, the NICs (national insurance contributions) cut has gone through.
“She said she found it painful and that she did it because she had to.”
Truss declined to answer questions from journalists as she left the meeting.
Updated
Liz Truss is facing cabinet unrest over her plans for brutal public spending cuts across all departments after the disastrous mini-budget put major pledges at risk, including the pensions triple lock, writes Pippa Crerar and Jessica Elgot.
The prime minister held a 90-minute cabinet meeting on Tuesday in which she warned ministers that “difficult decisions” lay ahead.
The chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, told them “everything is on the table” as he strives to find tens of billions of savings after ditching Truss’s economic plan. Health, education and welfare are among those expected to be hit.
One Whitehall official said departments were already preparing for cuts “significantly higher” than previously planned, with Hunt’s tax U-turns estimated to raise £32bn, leaving a £38bn hole in the public finances.
The Cabinet Office minister Brendan Clarke-Smith told Times Radio pensioners can breathe easily tonight: “We want to look after our pensioners. The triple lock was a manifesto commitment.”
He was responding to comments from a No 10 spokesperson this afternoon that Liz Truss wasn’t making an commitments on government spending, including the triple lock.
Clarke-Smith added: “But when you say we’re not taking anything off the table, I do think it’s reading too much into it to pick out specific things like triple lock, which hasn’t specifically been mentioned.”
Updated
Gove: 'Matter of when not if Truss is removed as prime minister'
Michael Gove believes it is a matter of when not if Liz Truss is removed as prime minister.
The former cabinet minister, who backed Rishi Sunak in the summer, also warned Britons to expect “a hell of a lot of pain in the next two months” due to the economic situation.
At a private event, Gove was asked whether it was “no longer a question of whether Truss goes, but when she goes”. He agreed that was “absolutely right”.
He added: “The question for any leader is: what happens when the programme or the platform on which you secured the leadership has been shredded?”
In remarks first reported by the Guardian (see 16.54), the former education secretary said when Truss was a junior minister at that department he had been her boss — “a role which is now a jobshare between Jeremy Hunt and the bond markets”.
Gove suggested Sir Keir Starmer’s first question at prime minister’s questions tomorrow could be: “Why?”
Gove told the Guardian the comments had been made under the Chatham House rule.
Updated
The Bank of England said it will delay the sale of government bonds to 1 November due to the fiscal announcement by the new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, scheduled for 31 October.
The central bank had been due to start buying UK government bonds, called gilts, at the end of this month.
It comes after the Financial Times reported that the Bank would stall the bond sale in an effort to foster greater stability in the bond market.
In a statement, it said: “The first gilt sales operation was scheduled to take place on October 31 2022 and proceed thereafter. “In light of the government’s fiscal announcement now scheduled for October 31 2022, the first gilt sale operation will now take place on November 1 2022.”
Updated
Liz Truss made an “unequivocal commitment” to increasing defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030 at a meeting of European Research Group (ERG) Tory MPs, ERG chairman, Mark Francois has confirmed.
He told reporters after the gathering: “We were delighted to hear her make an unequivocal commitment to spending 3% of GDP on defence by the end of the decade.
“She was asked very specifically about that. She was very clear that that commitment remained.
“So we’ve had a very positive meeting.”
Updated
Jacob Rees-Mogg said Liz Truss’s meeting with Tory MPs from the European Research Group went “extremely well”.
The business secretary made the comment to reporters as he left the meeting early.
The European Research Group is a collection of Brexit-supporting Tory MPs.
Liz Truss made 'unequivocal commitment' to raise defence spending, Reuters told
Liz Truss made an “unequivocal commitment” to raise defence spending to 3% of gross domestic product by 2030 at a meeting with MPs, a source told Reuters.
Updated
Tory MP Maria Caulfield, a former minister, said she will not vote to end the pensions triple lock, after Downing Street indicated ministers could ditch the commitment.
The MP for Lewes tweeted: “I will not be voting to end the pensions triple lock.
“Pensioners should not be paying the price for the cost-of-living crisis whether caused by the war in Ukraine or mini budgets.”
Liz Truss has arrived at a meeting of Tory MPs from the European Research Group (ERG) in Westminster.
The PM smiled at reporters as she arrived, and table-banging was heard as she entered the room.
Conservatives seen going into the meeting include the business secretary, Jacob Rees-Mogg, the former party leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith, and the ERG chairman, Mark Francois.
Updated
The levelling up minister Paul Scully said Ben Wallace and James Heappey will have done “pretty well” in their roles if they are around to resign in 2030 over the pledge to spend 3% of national income on defence.
Heappey, the armed forces minister, has publicly threatened to quit if the new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, ditches the commitment to meet the threshold by that date.
Scully told BBC Radio 4’s PM programme: “If Ben Wallace and James Heappey can be around to resign in 2030 when that pledge needs to be met, then they’ve done pretty well as defence secretary and minister of defence.”
He added: “What we’re going to find with a number of issues, and I don’t know about defence, because it’s for the defence secretary and the chancellor to work together in the round, but what you’ll find is, you might find some reprofiling of increases.
“That’s what I meant about things increasing a little bit more slowly … which [is] not quite the same as a cut.”
Updated
Liz Truss has spoken to the French president, Emmanuel Macron, about the latest situation in Ukraine, Downing Street said.
“The leaders discussed their deep concern at Russia’s recent barbaric attacks on civilian areas in Ukraine,” a No 10 spokesman said.
“They agreed the UK and France will continue to work closely together with allies to support Ukraine and coordinate our response to Russian aggression.”
Updated
Liz Truss has been described as “charmless, graceless, brainless and useless” by the former Conservative minister Edwina Currie.
Asked if the PM can survive, she told GB News: “Oh, no, of course she can’t survive.
“Oh my goodness. I’m going to put this on record: I think she is charmless, graceless, brainless and useless.
“And what do I mean by that? Charmless: she doesn’t have any of the skills that, for example, Margaret Thatcher had, to put across her argument, to be persuasive, to charm people into supporting what she’s trying to do.
“Graceless: even her last statement with all the I, I, I, I – you never got Margaret Thatcher doing that. I’m going to say this … you sack senior civil servants, you ignore all the systems that are there and then you wonder why the markets really get freaked out?
“Brainless, because however valuable and useful the tax-cutting agenda is going to be, and it will be at some future point, it took Margaret nine years to get there. And you can’t do it now and she should have realised that, and as a result, she’s useless.”
Updated
People could die because of Thérèse Coffey’s “ultra-libertarian ideological” reluctance to crack down on smoking and obesity, a Conservative ex-health minister has warned.
The strongly worded criticism of the health secretary came from Dr Dan Poulter, a Tory MP and NHS doctor who served as a health minister in the coalition government from 2012 to 2015.
Poulter claims Coffey’s “hostility to what the extreme right call ‘nanny statism’” is stopping her from taking firm action against the “major killers” of tobacco and bad diet.
His intervention in an opinion piece for the Guardian was prompted by Coffey making clear that she opposed banning adults from smoking in cars containing children, even though the practice was outlawed in 2015 and is credited with reducing young people’s exposure to secondhand smoke.
In the Commons debate on the public order bill the Conservative MP Sir Charles Walker launched a fierce attack on the government’s plans for serious disruption prevention orders. These are designed for use against people who repeatedly stage disrputive protests, such as the Just Stop Oil activists. They could be banned from particular places, or required to wear tags. Breaching an order will be a criminal offence, with a maximum penalty of up to six months in jail.
Walker said he was totally opposed to the proposed orders. He told MPs:
They leave me absolutely cold. In fact, I go as far as to say they are appalling. Absolutely appalling, because there are plenty of existing laws that can be utilised to deal with people who specialise in making other people’s lives miserable …
The idea that in this country, we are going to ankle tag someone who has not been convicted in a court of law ... I mean, I tell you what, those Chinese in their embassy will be watching this very closely at the moment, they might actually be applying for some of this stuff when we pass it in this place, as I suspect we will.
This is as unconservative as our budget of a few weeks ago. This is not what the Conservative party does. We believe in proportionate laws, like we used to believe in sound money.
So I will be voting against this. I will be joining with honourable members across the house to vote against this piece of legislation.
That’s all from me for today. My colleague Nadeem Badshah is now taking over.
Updated
YouGov has released yet more polling. This one suggests that 77% of people disapprove of the government’s record, and that its net approval rating is -70. That is the same as Liz Truss’s net favourability record (see 10.06am), implying that people (understandably) don’t really differentiate between the PM and her government when making a value judgment.
77% of Britons now disapprove of the government, the highest in 11 years of YouGov tracking data
— YouGov (@YouGov) October 18, 2022
Approve 7% (-6 from 9 Oct)
Disapprove 77% (+7)https://t.co/EDgUC0o8KB pic.twitter.com/LnRiX9XfJf
MPs have approved government amendments to provide the home secretary with the power to apply for injunctions in cases where protest-related activity causes or is likely to cause “serious disruption” to key national infrastructure or access to essential goods or services, PA Media reports. PA says:
In the debate on the public order bill, these went through on the nod.
Labour’s new clause four, to enable a high court judge to order an injunction to prevent serious disruption to effective movement of essential goods or services, was rejected by 188 votes to 313.
Truss v lettuce live-streamed survival battle attracts global media attention
The live-streamed battle for survival between Liz Truss and a lettuce has become a global talking point, from Buenos Aires to Madrid.
Political pundits across the world have been poring over the Daily Star’s broadcast in recent days as the British prime minister’s future has been plunged into doubt.
“Who will win? Liz Truss or a lettuce?” wondered Portugal’s Renascença network alongside a video summarising the prime minister’s predicament.
“I think that right now the lettuce is in a stronger position than the prime minister,” the journalist José Luis Sastre told listeners of Spain’s Cadena Ser radio network on Monday.
Over the Atlantic in Latin America, the stand-off between Liz Truss and the lettuce has also sparked an outpouring of pity for the politician, as well as admiration for “el humor británico”.
Mexico’s Aristegui Noticias was among the outlets which this week reported on the lettuce contest and wondered how long “la dama iceberg” would cling to her job.
In Peru’s El Comercio newspaper, Milagros Asto Sánchez also asked whether Truss would outlast “a decomposing lechuga”.
In Brazil, which is in the midst of a political crisis of its own, political scientists and pundits have been glued to the vegetable live-stream.
“Liz Truss took over as prime minister less than a month ago, but the chaos ... in which her government finds itself has led many to ask how long she will remain in Downing Street,” Brazil’s Folha de São Paulo informed its readers as the Truss v lettuce struggle went on.
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Gove says Britons face 'lot of pain' in coming months as Truss's departure now inevitable
Michael Gove has said: “All of us are going to face a hell of a lot of pain in the next two months”, and that “we are going through hell”.
At an event this morning organised by the JLA Speakers Bureau, Gove, the former levelling up secretary, cited Dante in saying: “After hell comes purgatory and paradise”. He said:
Purgatory is going to be a tough economic medicine applied in this country and elsewhere. For how long I don’t know. But until and unless the interest rate increases, and other measures required in order to kill and reduce inflation are in place, then we won’t get out of this mess.
Gove said he was a “relentless optimist” for paradise, saying “scientists and technologists [...] have been responsible for all of the major elements of progress throughout human history”.
Referencing his criticism in 2016 of experts, he joked that “what will solve us, resolve us, save us in the future, I have to say and confess are experts overall”.
When the event’s host, the LBC presenter Sangita Myska said she thought it was “no longer a question of whether Liz Truss goes, but when she goes”, Gove said she was “absolutely right”. He added:
The question for any leader is: what happens when the programme or the platform on which you secured the leadership has been shredded.
Asked by Myska if Jeremy Hunt was credible as a chancellor, Gove said he was, citing Hunt’s experience with the 2012 Olympics, and his time as health secretary, and in the Foreign Office.
Gove, who previously supported David Cameron and Boris Johnson in their preparation for prime minister’s questions, suggested Keir Starmer’s opening question to Truss could be: “Why?”
Gove also joked that he had been Truss’s boss, which is “of course a role which is now a jobshare between Jeremy Hunt and the bond markets”; and that “we all know now” why Truss had gained the nickname “the human hand grenade”.
Gove said he thought fracking would not take place anywhere in the UK “because no community will be sufficiently incentivised to do it”.
He told the Guardian his remarks were made under the Chatham House rule, but this was not raised by the host of the event at the time, or at any stage while registering for the event.
Updated
Northern Ireland faces assembly elections before Christmas unless power sharing restored soon, says Heaton-Harris
Northern Ireland will face assembly elections before Christmas, unless power sharing is restored in the next 10 days, the government has confirmed.
Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, hinted at an 8 December or 15 December polling day during evidence at a Commons select committee.
He told MPs he was using all his “charm” and guile to “coax everybody” to return to a Stormont devolved government by the 28 October deadline but none of the parties expect this to happen in light of continued boycott by the Democratic Unionist party amid a row over the Northern Ireland protocol.
He told MPs the negotiations over the protocol were “tough” but they were talking about what a “landing zone” looks like.
He said the foreign secretary, James Cleverly, was leading the talks but refused to comment any further.
Updated
Chinese diplomat involved in violence at Manchester consulate, MP says
One of China’s most senior diplomats in the UK was involved in the violence against pro-democracy protesters at the Manchester consulate, Alicia Kearns, the new chair of the Commons foreign affairs committee, has told MPs. My colleagues Josh Haliday and Emma Graham-Harrison have the story here.
Mark Drakeford loses temper with Welsh Tory leader over UK government's economic 'mess' and threat to NHS budget
Mark Drakeford, the Labour first minister in Wales, is generally seen as one of the most calm and level-headed figures at the top of politics in the UK. He has even been described as a bit dull (not that there’s anything wrong with that). But in the Senedd this afternoon, he lost his temper when Andrew RT Davies, the Welsh Conservative leader, quoted someone saying that Wales had become a “third-world country” for healthcare under Labour. Drakeford told Davies:
You have chosen to use that language here this afternoon. And what do those people face? They face cuts to their pay because of the policy of your government. And now they face cuts to the budgets that the health service itself will have at its disposal.
It is shocking. It is absolutely shocking to me that you will think that you can turn up here this afternoon with the mess that your party has made to the budgets of this country, to the reputation of this country around the world. That you promise those people there will be more to come.
And you think you turn up here this afternoon and claim some sort of moral high ground? What sort of world do you belong in?
Earlier today No 10 confirmed that the health budget is not exempt from the requirement for all departments to find savings. (See 2.08am.)
Nation.Cymru has a full report of the Drakeford/Davies exchanges here.
Updated
70% of Britons favour closer relationship with EU, and 59% think Brexit has worsened economy, poll suggests
The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change has published some extensive new polling on Brexit. For anyone interested in the topic, it’s a data goldmine, but two findings stand out.
More than two-thirds of voters (70%) favour a closer relationship with the EU over the medium term, the poll suggests. The report setting out the poll findings says:
When asked what the UK’s place within Europe should be in the next 10-15 years, just under a quarter (23 per cent) say “inside the European Union”. This is followed by a preference for “a new kind of association with the European Union unlike anything we know today” (19 per cent), a relationship “outside the European single market, but with a closer trade and security partnership than today” (17 per cent) and “outside EU political institutions, but within the European single market” (11 per cent). Only 7 per cent of the public wishes to “keep things as they are now after Brexit” and another 7 per cent would prefer “no or minimal economic and political ties with the European Union”.
Overall, about a third of the public favour at least the single-market type relationship with the EU. Another third favour a closer relationship than today while remaining outside the EU and the single market, but do not have a clear idea of what that relationship might entail.
Most voters think Brexit has made the economy worse, the poll suggests. The report says:
Most Britons (59 per cent) think that Britain’s exit from the EU has worsened our economy, with 20 per cent thinking that it has made no difference and just 14 per cent seeing an improvement. Only a small percentage of the public (6 per cent) don’t know, meaning that voters have largely made up their minds about the economic effects of Brexit – and their views are mostly negative.
While there is a 2016 effect, with over four-fifths of Remainers thinking Brexit has worsened Britain’s economy, even Leavers are unenthusiastic about the economic effects of Brexit. Over two-thirds of Leavers say that it has either worsened the UK’s economy (34 per cent) or made no difference (35 per cent), compared to only about a quarter (24 per cent) who think that Britain’s economy has improved as a result of Brexit.
Commenting on the findings, Tony Blair said:
Those like myself who were passionately opposed to Brexit will continue to believe it was a mistake. But we should acknowledge that it will not be undone under this generation of political leadership.
Those who supported Brexit should give up trying to ‘prove’ to the rest of us that it was the right decision if only we believed in it enough.
This polling shows that the British people want a sensible way forward on Brexit which recognises that in the foreseeable future at least the decision to leave Europe cannot be reversed. But that Britain needs a constructive relationship with the continent of which we are a part.
What therefore makes sense is for the British government to fix the problems arising from Brexit, notably on the Northern Ireland protocol, and then build, over time, the right trading, security and political cooperation for the future.
Updated
Some Tories privately admit it's time for a Labour government, Starmer claims
Keir Starmer has claimed that some Tories are privately saying that it’s time for a Labour government. In an interview on the Jeremy Vine Show, Starmer said Conservative MPs had to decide whether to put the country first or their party first. He went on:
At the moment, they’re putting their party first. Quite a lot of them are saying, behind the scenes, we do think a change of government to Labour might be a good idea, but it wouldn’t be good for our party. That is the wrong way round.
Starmer also renewed his call for a general election. He said:
They’ve had, what, four chancellors in four months. We’re now having an open discussion about whether they’re going to have a further change of prime minister – three prime ministers in three years.
We can’t go on like this, shutting the public out, and I think many people now feel that the real risk now is carrying on with this lot rather than actually having a general election, bringing in a Labour government and securing our economy. That’s the first thing that absolutely needs to be done.
(On his excellent The Rest is Politics podcast recently, Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair’s former communications chief, pointed out that Labour has only had four chancellors since 1967. But that still points to a much better survival rate than for recent Tory chancellors.)
Updated
Truss gets through cabinet without any minister telling her she should quit, No 10 says
And here is a full summary of the Downing Street lobby briefing. The PM’s spokesperson answered questions about the cabinet meeting, having been allowed to attend as an observer this morning. Most spokespeople for the PM have attended the cabinet, but the current one (Max Blain) was not allowed to attend the first few meetings under Liz Truss.
Liz Truss is no longer committed to maintaining the triple lock on pension, No 10 said. (See 1.35pm.)
But the PM’s spokesperson said Truss was still committed to raising defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030.
No one at cabinet said Truss should resign, the PM’s spokesperson said. Asked if anyone did suggest this, the spokesperson replied: “No.” Asked if Truss was concerned about ministers discussing the need to replace her in private, the spokesperson said:
Her view is she needs to be focused on what is right for the country rather than on any internal discussions among the party at the moment.
But, as the Mirror’s Dan Bloom reports, another answer from the spokesperson suggested ministers were not necessarily 100% supportive.
Asked if ministers offered their support to the Liz Truss in today's Cabinet meeting, her spokesman replied: “I think certainly ministers were, um, er, very, er, involved in the discussions around, erm, preparations for the Medium Term Fiscal Plan."https://t.co/oab6TZH1Ip
— Dan Bloom (@danbloom1) October 18, 2022
Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, told ministers that, although spending would rise overall, departments would have to make savings, the PM’s spokesperson said. But Hunt said cuts or savings should be focused on areas where frontline services would not be affected. The spokesperson said:
[Hunt told cabinet] public spending would continue to rise overall but that departments would continue to be asked to look at finding ways to save taxpayers’ money, with public spending standing at around £1 trillion currently.
The chancellor said this work should focus on areas which should not affect the service the public receives.
Asked if the Department of Health and Social Care would have to find savings too, the spokesperson said Hunt addressed this in the Commons yesterday. Hunt refused to commit to protecting the health budget, but he said as a former health secretary he was well aware of the pressures it faced.
Truss told cabinet the original mini-budget had gone “too far and too fast”, the spokesperson said.
Updated
Truss no longer committed to maintaining triple lock on pensions, No 10 says
Liz Truss is no longer publicly committed to defending the triple lock – the guarantee that the state pension will rise every year in line with inflation, earnings, or 2.5%, whichever is highest. In their 2019 manifesto the Conservatives said they would “keep the triple lock” and in interviews only two weeks ago, during the party conference, Truss confirmed that she was still “committed” to it.
Not any more. At the Downing Street lobby briefing after cabinet, the PM’s spokesperson refused to say that Truss still feels bound by this. He did not say it would definitely go, but he clearly signalled that it is up for negotiation. Asked if Truss was still committed to the triple lock, he replied:
We are very aware of how many vulnerable pensioners there are. And, indeed, our priority ahead of this fiscal plan will be to ensure we continue to protect the most vulnerable in society.
The chancellor has been clear, the prime minister and the chancellor are not making any commitments on individual policy areas at this point.
But, as I say, the decisions will be seen through the prism of both what matters most to the most vulnerable …
[The PM’s] view, and the chancellor’s view, is that at this point it is not right to start pre-empting a collective piece of work which needs to be carried out across government on all spending.
Although the spokesperson said the commitment to the triple lock no longer applies, he said Truss was still committed to raising defence spending to 3% of GDP by 2030. Ben Wallace, the defence secretary, has signalled he would resign if Truss were to abandon that pledge.
Asked why Truss would not commit to the triple lock, but would commit to raising defence spending, the spokesperson said that the defence pledge related to 2030, and that it had been made in the context of the war in Ukraine and the UK’s membership of Nato.
The questions about the triple lock were triggered by comments that Jeremy Hunt, the new chancellor, made in the Commons yesterday. Downing Street echoed the language used by Hunt, who told MPs:
I am very aware of how many vulnerable pensioners there are, and of the importance of the triple lock. As I said earlier, I am not making any commitments on any individual policy areas, but every decision we take will be taken through the prism of what matters most to the most vulnerable.
With the inflation rate for September expected to be around 10%, keeping the triple lock would see pensions rise by that amount for 2023-24. With Hunt looking for savings in all areas of government spending, it is not hard to see why abandoning it for a year might be tempting.
Last year the triple lock was suspended for 2022-23 because Covid led to a freak 8% rise in earnings, as wages soared back up after the end of lockdown. Ministers argued that it would be unreasonable to give pensioners 8% because of distortions in the labour market, and instead a “double lock” was imposed, with pensioners guaranteed a rise in line with inflation or 2.5%.
But the government had said the triple lock would apply again for 2023-24.
Updated
Tory members think MPs should choose unity candidate to replace Truss, rather than hold new ballot, poll suggests
The YouGov poll also suggests that, if Truss were to stand down, party members think the best option would be for MPs to agree on a single unity candidate as a replacement. This is what happened in 2003, when Iain Duncan Smith lost a confidence vote and was replaced by Michael Howard.
Some MPs have been worried about the membership feeling snubbed if they were to be shut out of the selection process in this way, but the YouGov poll suggests that members would prefer MPs to select a unity candidate than a normal contest. This probably reflects their fear that another contest so soon after the last one would look ridiculous.
Members think the worst option would be for MPs to hold a contest, but for members to be refused a say as a result of an agreement that the runner-up in the parliamentary contest would withdraw from the contest at that point. This is what happened in 2016, when Theresa May became leader after Andrea Leadsom pulled out once she was on the final ballot. Leadsom’s decision was a personal one, which took the party by surprise. But some MPs have floated the idea that, if Truss does resign, candidates should only be allowed to stand on condition that they would accept the winner of the MPs’ ballot.
Updated
Majority of Tory members think Truss should resign, poll suggests
A majority of Conservative party members – including 39% of members who voted for her in the summer – think Liz Truss should resign, according to new polling from YouGov.
SNAP POLL: A majority of Conservative party members want Liz Truss to resign
— YouGov (@YouGov) October 18, 2022
All members
Resign: 55%
Stay: 38%
Truss voters
Resign: 39%
Stay: 57%https://t.co/ftgIKn7xZv pic.twitter.com/PGwCCtkamr
In his analysis of the polling, YouGov’s Matthew Smith says 55% figure for members who say Truss should resign is similar to 59% who wanted Boris Johnson to quit shortly before he did announce his departure.
Asked who should replace Truss if she were to resign in the next few weeks, Boris Johnson came top (on 32%), ahead of Rishi Sunak (23%) and Ben Wallace (10%).
Were Liz Truss to resign, Boris Johnson tops the list of potential successors Tory members would most like to see replace her
— YouGov (@YouGov) October 18, 2022
Boris Johnson: 32%
Rishi Sunak: 23%
Ben Wallace: 10%
Penny Mordaunt: 9%
Kemi Badenoch: 8%
Jeremy Hunt: 7%https://t.co/ftgIKn7xZv pic.twitter.com/fOxT2Ixjuc
But the poll also suggests that members would be almost equally happy with either Johnson, Wallace or Sunak. Penny Mordaunt and Jeremy Hunt are not far behind.
Updated
Headteachers in England to be balloted on industrial action over pay and funding, union says
Headteachers in England are to be balloted on industrial action in a row over pay and funding, the school leaders’ union has said.
As PA Media reports, speaking at the TUC conference in Brighton, Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT, said the union’s members have told him they “cannot continue to run their schools in the current circumstances, and “neglect” of pay and funding is “eroding” education.
He said he has written to Kit Malthouse, the education secretary, to say they are “officially in dispute” and school leaders across England and Wales will be balloted.
The NAHT said a survey responded to by 64% of its members found 84% of respondents indicated they wanted to be balloted on taking action short of a strike, with 55% wanting to be balloted on taking strike action.
Updated
Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters
TUC leader Frances O'Grady calls for general election now
The TUC general secretary, Frances O’Grady, has called for a general election now.
In her final speech to a TUC conference before she stands down, O’Grady told delegates in Brighton:
Some say Liz Truss must go. I think they’re wrong. This whole rotten Tory government must go. The Tories are toxic. It’s time for change. We need a general election now.
O’Grady described the government’s plan to lift the cap on bankers’ bonuses, while public sector pay is being held down, as “Robin Hood in reverse”. She went on:
I have a message for Liz Truss: working people are proud of the jobs we do; we work hard. We work the longest hours in Europe.
Yet, thanks to your party’s 12 years in government, millions are struggling to make ends meet. We don’t need lectures on working harder. This country needs a proper plan for fairer, greener growth.
She also said it was not a time for pay restraint.
It’s time for profit restraint. Taxpayers helped business with their bills. Now it’s time to make business play their part. No lay-offs this winter. No boardroom bonanzas and no shareholder sprees. Put the cap back on the bankers’ bonuses. Let’s have a bigger windfall tax on greedy energy giants, and don’t just bail out them out - bring them into public ownership.
Updated
Daily Mail and Sun close to urging Tories to abandon Truss and replace her with new leader
In the Conservative leadership contest in the summer, Liz Truss was strongly endorsed by all the main pro-Tory newspapers. The Times did back Rishi Sunak, but it is not pro-Tory in the way that the Daily Telegraph or the Daily Mail are, and is better understood as a pro-establishment paper.
But now two of the most influential rightwing papers, the Daily Mail and the Sun, have all but given up on her. They are both saying that if Truss cannot rescue the situation quickly, the Tories should replace her.
In its leader this morning, the Daily Mail says that Truss’s authority is “as good as shot” and that it may be time for her party to get rid of her. It says.
By lurching from crisis to self-inflicted crisis, the Conservatives risk irrevocable damage to the party, its electoral fortunes and, as a result, the whole country.
It’s time for the wise men and women of the Conservative party to decide whether the loss of confidence in Miss Truss is terminal. If it is, they must come to a solution – and fast – that can command the support of MPs and millions of Tory voters looking on in horror.
The editorial appears alongside an article by Stephen Glover saying that Truss’s stint as PM is “plainly over” and suggesting she should stand aside for someone else. As Alan Rusbridger, the former Guardian editor points out, today’s editorial (on the right) is a contrast with what the Mail was saying about Truss in the summer (on the left).
Buyer’s remorse pic.twitter.com/fhPmXZPewT
— alan rusbridger (@arusbridger) October 18, 2022
The Sun’s editorial says much the same. Describing the thought of Truss taking PMQs tomorrow as “almost tragic”, it says Rishi Sunak or Ben Wallace would be preferable. It says:
So what happens next? The thought of a broken PM having to appear at PMQs tomorrow is almost tragic. Yet allies insist she wants to fight on — and Tory MPs have no clear plan to replace her.
What is not needed now is either an election, or another interminable leadership contest.
If Truss cannot quickly sort herself out, the grown-ups need to get in a room with 1922 Committee chairman, Graham Brady, and agree a peaceful transition to a sensible figure like Rishi Sunak or Ben Wallace.
This is from my colleague Pippa Crerar.
Quite something when a Tory prime minster looks close to losing the Daily Mail and The Sun. pic.twitter.com/87uNoLvLt8
— Pippa Crerar (@PippaCrerar) October 18, 2022
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‘The ghost PM’: what the papers say about Liz Truss’s hold on power
This morning’s papers make dire reading for No 10. My colleague Samantha Lock has a summary.
Cabinet is over, Sky’s Sam Coates reports.
Cabinet leave Number 10 - avoiding cameras, grim faces
— Sam Coates Sky (@SamCoatesSky) October 18, 2022
Ministers want to change the law to prevent former RAF pilots from training the Chinese military, amid reports at least 30 British personnel are believed to have taken advantage of “very generous” recruitment packages offered by the superpower. My colleague Jamie Grierson has the story here.
Liam Fox, the Tory former international trade secretary, told Sky News this morning that Liz Truss’s future would partly depend on whether the financial markets settle down following the latest mini-budget U-turns. He said:
We can all read the polls and I don’t need to tell you what the atmosphere is like at Westminster. People will be weighing up what the prime minister said last night - that she had made mistakes, that she learned from those, and that the measures that Jeremy Hunt had put in place seemed to be providing the necessary economic stability in the markets.
If the markets don’t believe that a Conservative government is able to manage public finances sensibly then that government has had it.
So that, really, is the number one priority and I think that most of my colleagues will be looking to see if the measures being put in place have achieved their effect.
It looks at the moment as though they have - that will take the political temperature down somewhat.
Wallace cancels select committee appearance for urgent trip to US
Ben Wallace has hastily cancelled an early afternoon appearance before the Commons defence committee for an urgent trip to Washington DC, prompting speculation as to the purpose of the visit.
James Heappey, a defence minister, said “my boss Ben Wallace is in Washington this morning” in an interview in Sky News and offered a cryptic explanation of his presence there. He suggested that Wallace would be having “the sort of conversations” that had to take place face to face.
Heappey also said that the MoD was doing “a good job keeping our nation safe at a time of incredible global insecurity” – although it was unclear exactly what he may been referring to.
A day earlier, questions were raised after a beleaguered Liz Truss did not appear in the Commons to handle an urgent question about the conduct of her government. Penny Mordaunt, deputising, had told MPs she had a “genuine reason” for not being present – but the reason was not explained and it is not clear if it is related to Wallace’s sudden travel.
Wallace had been due to take questions from the committee on a range of issues, including political engagement with the US administration on military operations, the W93 nuclear missile and US protectionism and export controls.
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Photograph: Dan Kitwood/Getty Images
The Liberal Democrats have been fined £1,500 for the late reporting of donations and filing of the party’s spending return from the 2019 general election, the Electoral Commission has said. In a statement the commission’s director of regulation, Louise Edwards said:
Political finance laws are in place to make sure the system is transparent and accurate. The requirements for political parties are clear so it’s disappointing when they are not me.
In the case of the Liberal Democrats, our investigations found offences related to the late reporting of donations and its spending return from the 2019 UK general election.
Where we find offences, we do not automatically issue sanctions. We balance the evidence and take into consideration a range of factors before making our final decision.
Jacob Rees-Mogg, the business secretary, gave a ringing endorsement of the prime minister when he arrived at Downing Street for cabinet this morning, PA Media reports. PA says:
While other colleagues were tight-lipped, Rees-Mogg appeared delighted to see the reporters opposite No 10, asking: “How are you? Very nice to see you.”
Rees-Mogg said that ministers were “fully” behind Liz Truss, before heading into a cabinet meeting.
Colleagues were more reticent, with a number ignoring shouted questions about the prime minister’s survival.
When asked if Truss would remain in office, work and pensions secretary Chloe Smith offered only a terse “yes” before entering No 10.
Defence minister James Heappey hints he will quit if PM drops pledge on defence spending
James Heappey, the defence minister, has suggested he would resign if the prime minister did not fulfil her leadership promise to raise defence spending, after the new chancellor, Jeremy Hunt, said no department would be immune to cuts. My colleague Jessica Elgot has the story here.
'Vast majority' of Tory MPs do not want to see Truss replaced as leader, minister claims
Here are some more lines from James Heappey’s morning interview round on the Tory leadership crisis.
Heappey, a defence minister, said Liz Truss could not afford to make any more mistakes. Asked how many more errors she could make, he told Sky News: “I suspect given how skittish our politics are at the moment, not very many,” he said. Pressed how many, he said: “I don’t think there’s the opportunity to make any more mistakes.”
He claimed he thought Truss was doing a good job. He said:
She’s very much our prime minister and for what it’s worth I think she’s doing a good job.
He claimed that the “vast majority” of Tory MPs did not want to see Truss replaced as leader. He said:
There are a few colleagues in parliament who are irreconcilable and the government needs to work to bring them back into the fold as best we can.
But the vast majority of colleagues recognise that after the last few months – indeed after the last year when we’ve been going through all of the angst over Boris Johnson, which has divided our party deeply – what we cannot do is reverse the decision of a leadership election that we’ve literally only just completed.
Most journalists who have spent time talking to Tory MPs in private in recent days say the opposite. They say Conservatives do want a new leader, although there is no consensus as to who is should be, how he or she should be installed, or when.
Truss is more unpopular 'by some distance' than any British leader in past 20 years, says polling firm
Liz Truss is now more unpopular than any British political leader has been in the past 20 years, according to the polling firm YouGov. It has released new figures that suggest her net favourability rating is -70.
Liz Truss's net favourability rating has fallen to -70
— YouGov (@YouGov) October 18, 2022
Favourable: 10% (-5 from 11-12 Oct)
Unfavourable: 80% (+9)https://t.co/ZJ7P5Or91I pic.twitter.com/ih99Faagay
The findings are good for Keir Starmer, whose net favourability score is much higher than those of four leading Tory rivals.
Net favourability ratings (14-16 Oct)
— YouGov (@YouGov) October 18, 2022
Keir Starmer: -5 (down 7 from 11-12 Oct)
Rishi Sunak: -21 (up 14 from 24-25 Aug)
Boris Johnson: -36 (up 4 from 8-9 Aug)
Jeremy Hunt: -41 (up 7 from 13-14 Jul)
Liz Truss: -70 (down 14 from 11-13 Oct)https://t.co/ZJ7P5Or91I pic.twitter.com/gpSdH3tUeL
In his write-up of the findings, YouGov’s Peter Raven says both Truss and Starmer have lower net favourability ratings than their parties. But Truss is a lot more unpopular than her party, whereas Starmer is only marginally more unpopular than his. And the Labour party is viewed far, far more favourably than the Conservative party.
The prime minister is also less well-liked than the Conservative party as a whole, which has a net favourability score of -53, down from -44 in the previous poll. The party is considered favourable by 18% of the British public, down from 22% earlier in the month.
Labour leader Keir Starmer continues to be considerably less unpopular than his Conservative rivals, with 41% of people liking him and 46% disliking him, a net score of -5. Labour themselves are slightly more popular still, with 45% having a favourable opinion of the party compared to 44% who don’t, giving a net score of +1.
This point is important because it suggests that, although the Tory brand is deeply unpopular, having Truss as leader in election campaign would hold it back even more.
YouGov’s Patrick English says “by some distance” Truss is the most unpopular leader the company has tracked since it was set up in 2000.
Unprecedented unpopularity.
— Patrick English (@PME_Politics) October 18, 2022
Liz Truss is now by some distance the most unpopular leader we have tracked.
Her net favourability of -70 is now a full 15 points worse than Corbyn's worst ever score of -55 (June 2019) *and* 17 points beyond Johnson's worst of -53 (July 2020). https://t.co/otqfhPQouI
Labour says James Heappey’s admission that no one in the cabinet realised the mini-budget was flawed (see 9.30am) shows the Tories have lost all economic credibility. In a statement, Pat McFadden, the shadow chief secretary to the Treasury, said:
The frank admission that they all approved the disastrous mini-budget shows the Conservatives have lost all economic credibility.
They couldn’t run a bath let alone a major G7 economy. They have put a Tory premium on people’s mortgages and reduced the UK to nervously watching its gilt yields day by day.
Labour will match the financial stability the country needs with a proper plan for growth based on the efforts of the whole country, not tired and failed trickle down economics.
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Minister tries to defend Truss by saying cabinet failed to realise mini-budget would backfire
Good morning. Liz Truss finally did something half-sensible last night and apologised for the problems caused by the mini-budget. It is not clear yet what, if anything, this will do to improve her survival prospects, and in her interview with the BBC’s Chris Mason she also said that she would “lead the Conservatives into the next general election”.
In normal circumstances, this would be a mistake, because fighting an election with her as leader is the last thing that Tory MPs want, and unpopular prime ministers who insist that they want to “go on and on” normally only incentivise those plotting to get rid of them. Boris Johnson did not do himself any favours by musing about serving a third term in the summer, only weeks before he was forced out. But when Mason asked Truss if she would “definitely” still be leader at the time of the next election, she paused and then laughed, before saying something about not wanting to focus on internal Tory debates. It was a rare moment of self-awareness that signalled to viewers – and Tory MPs – that her answer was a formality, and that she did not actually believe it.
James Heappey, the defence minister, has been giving interviews this morning, and he has followed the interview with lines that were intended to be helpful to Truss but that could turn out to be counterproductive. There were two that stood out.
Heappey claimed that Truss deserved credit for admitting that she made a mistake with the mini-budget. He told Sky News that her apology to the public was “a contrast to a year ago when the previous prime minister’s woes began” and Boris Johnson refused to apologise for Partygate. Heappey went on:
She has fronted up to her mistake very quickly and there are people in the parliamentary party who don’t want that to be the end of it. But for an awful lot of us we recognise this is a moment when this country needs its government to knuckle down and get back on with the day job.
But Truss did not accept that she had made a mistake quickly. At the Conservative party conference two weeks ago, when it was already clear that the mini-budget had alarmed the financial markets, Truss used her interview with the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg to say that it was the presentation of the mini-budget that was at fault, not the substance, and she implied the market turmoil was mostly a result of global factors. And even on Friday last week, at the press conference following the sacking of Kwasi Kwarteng, when Truss was specifically asked if she would apologise for what happened, she refused.
Heappey said that no one in the cabinet realised the mini-budget would backfire in the way that it did. Heappey, who attends cabinet even though he is not a full member, told Times Radio:
It’d be completely disingenuous to claim that on that morning, when the cabinet was presented with the mini-budget, that there was anybody sat around the table who said that it was a bad idea. Each and every one of the measures within it were coherent with a desire to drive growth.
I think what the cabinet failed collectively to recognise is that it was an awful lot of measures being unleashed simultaneously on unsuspecting markets. And the reaction from the markets is clear.
This may be true. But it does not reflect well on the cabinet as a whole, and it highlights the fact that Truss’s cabinet did not include her leadership rival, Rishi Sunak, who predicted exactly what would happen if Truss introduced policies like this. He told Tories in the summer:
The lights on the economy are flashing red, and the root cause is inflation. I’m worried that Liz Truss’s plans will make the situation worse. If we just put fuel on the fire of this inflation spiral, all of us, all of you, are going to just end up with higher mortgage rates, savings and pensions that are eaten away, and misery for millions.
I will post more from Heappey’s interviews shortly.
Here is the agenda for the day.
Morning: Liz Truss chairs cabinet.
11am: Frances O’Grady, the outgoing TUC general secretary, addresses the rescheduled TUC conference.
11.30am: Downing Street holds a lobby briefing.
11.30am: Brandon Lewis, the justice secretary, takes questions in the Commons.
After 12.30pm: MPs debate the remaining stages of the public order bill.
2.30pm: Chris Heaton-Harris, the Northern Ireland secretary, gives evidence to the Commons Northern Ireland affairs committee.
5pm: Truss is due to hold a private meeting with Tory MPs from the European Research Group.
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