At around noon on Thursday, the House of Commons was doing what it does best. The benches were packed, the exchanges were combative. The place was full of the sound and fury of adversarial politics. On all sides, MPs were engaged, not least because what was being discussed was so crucial to the lives of the millions of families they represent.
The new prime minister, Liz Truss, was just two days into the job. But that counted for nothing. The Speaker, Lindsay Hoyle, conscious that few policy statements in recent years had been more important, savaged her government for failing to provide written copies of it in advance to MPs. “Rather than judging it to be deliberate, I will put it down to bad management or incompetence,” said Hoyle, brutally.
Seconds later Truss breezed into the chamber to loud cheers, and, radiating great confidence, offered no apology.
What followed from the prime minister would, on any other day, have been momentous news. Energy bills for a typical family would be capped at £2,500 for the next two years, Truss said. Treasury orthodoxy was being thrown out of the window. Borrowing would soar.
There would be an equivalent guarantee for businesses lasting six months. It was the biggest fiscal intervention by a British government of its kind in peacetime, and would cost an estimated £150bn – more than double the cost of the furlough scheme, which saw the state coffers drained to pay the wages of workers in the pandemic.
The political and economic magnitude of it all escaped no one. The key question was: how would this all be paid for? Truss told MPs those matters would be left for her new chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, to explain later this month.
The Labour leader, Keir Starmer, saw it as a defining moment in his quest for the keys of Downing Street. A crucial policy divide was opening up: Labour wanted to pay for freezing domestic gas and electricity prices in large part by taxing the £170bn excess profits of the energy companies. But Truss had ruled this out, saying such a tax would deter those companies from investing in increased production.
A left-right division had appeared in the key political and economic issue of the times, clear as day. “This is the basic political divide,” said Starmer. Under Labour, a few undeserving rich would meet the bill, while under Truss working people would be stung. “The government wants to protect the excess profits of oil and gas and energy groups; we want to protect working people,” Starmer told the house.
Then suddenly, at around 12.25pm, in a few disorienting moments that nobody who was there will ever forget, the House of Commons was transformed. Adversarial politics absented itself from its natural home. Arguments over price caps subsided. To adapt the words of Tony Blair, the kaleidoscope was shaken.
In the Commons chamber, rather like schoolchildren who see something that distracts them outside the classroom window, members’ heads turned.
Truss and Kwarteng looked up at the press gallery above, something ministers and MPs try never to do. The political reporters had left their places.
Nadhim Zahawi, the minister who had become responsible for constitutional matters two days before, rushed in to the chamber and passed a message to the prime minister. Truss looked ahead, blankly, for several few seconds.
A Commons clerk kept thrusting a phone into the Speaker’s eyeline to alert him to breaking news. A minute or two passed before the Speaker was presented by another official with a printed statement. He glanced at it, taking in its gravity. The SNP leader in parliament, Ian Blackford, was on his feet, losing his audience. Hoyle raised his hands, gesturing at Blackford to give way, initially to no avail. He repeated the gesture a second time, raising his palms a little higher this time and waving them with more urgency. Blackford saw, and gave way.
“Order. I wish to say something about the announcement that has just been made about Her Majesty,” Hoyle said.
“I know that I speak on behalf of the entire house when I say that we send our best wishes to Her Majesty the Queen, and that she and the royal family are in our thoughts and prayers at this moment. I am not going to take any contributions on this now; if there is anything else, we will update the house accordingly.”
MPs immediately knew to fear the worst. Outside the chamber, Andrea Leadsom, the former Leader of the House, was among those in tears. Another Tory MP in his 60s said it was clear to everyone what was about to happen, if it had not already done so. “Almost everyone on those benches, except perhaps Peter Bottomley [the “father of the house”, who was born in 1944] has known no other monarch but the Queen,” said the former cabinet member. “It is … well … a quite extraordinary moment.”
Even before rumours of the Queen’s decline had begun to filter down from Balmoral to Westminster, the magnitude of what was happening to the governance of the country and economy was proving hard enough to fathom.
Momentous events had been following one another at dizzying speed for several days. On Monday, Truss had been announced as the new Tory leader; then on Tuesday, after Boris Johnson had left Downing Street, she had headed to Balmoral. There, a beaming if frail-looking Queen had conducted the “kissing of hands” and invited Truss to form a government.
Back in No 10, Britain’s third female prime minister had moved fast and decisively, replacing every holder of the main offices of state – the chancellor, the home secretary and the foreign secretary – as well as the health secretary and the education secretary. The new incumbents had all appeared alongside side her for her first prime minister’s questions on Wednesday.
MPs who had not backed Truss for the leadership and supported Rishi Sunak had been shocked at the way Truss had packed her government with loyalists and Johnson supporters, making little or no attempt to unite the party. “It’s very confrontational,” one former minister said.
In Whitehall too, trepidation about the new regime had quickly turned to outright anger. Senior officials had already been alarmed by repeated briefings that figures such as Tom Scholar, the highly experienced permanent secretary to the Treasury, and Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, could be removed by the incoming Truss administration as it attempted to sweep away “orthodox” thinking.
Their worst fears had been realised when, as one of Kwarteng’s first acts, Scholar was told on Tuesday evening that his skills were no longer required. Despite having played a key role in steering government programmes during the pandemic, he was told that the Treasury required “new leadership” to go with the new premiership. What Truss was unleashing, at a time of economic emergency, was radical change, at the very top of both the government and the civil service. Fears of instability had been growing even before news of the Queen’s death was confirmed.
While most people at Westminster had tried to prepare themselves for the worst from lunchtime on Thursday, it was not until 6.31pm that evening that Buckingham Palace released its official statement saying that the Queen, the country’s longest serving monarch, had died peacefully during the afternoon at Balmoral. To mark the moment, the BBC played the national anthem that for 70 years had been associated with one person alone. It was the moment many at Westminster said the impact of her death hit home.
The prime minister issued a statement that was short on rhetorical flourishes. “The death of Her Majesty the Queen is a huge shock to the nation and to the world. Queen Elizabeth II was the rock on which modern Britain was built,” said Truss.
Starmer offered something more personal: “Nobody under the age of 70 has known anything other than Queen Elizabeth II on the throne. For the vast majority of us the late Queen has been simply the Queen, the only Queen.”
Within minutes, West End theatres cancelled productions and the Last Night of the Proms was called off. The Test match against South Africa was suspended next day, and the rail strike was cancelled. The Bank of England put off a decision on interest rates. This weekend’s TUC Congress was postponed.
In the Houses of Commons and Lords on Friday and yesterday, there was no politics. The day was set aside for tributes, which came from all sides. The chamber was packed again, but this time it was a sea of black. The economic difficulties facing families were not mentioned.
Many of the politicians’ memories of the Queen were moving, others were amusing, and some were both. The former prime minister Theresa May recalled her meetings with the Queen with great affection. “I am sometimes asked among all the world leaders I met, who was the most impressive and I have no hesitation in saying that from all the heads of state and government the most impressive person I met was Her late Majesty Queen Elizabeth II,” May said.
“I remember one picnic at Balmoral, which was taking place in one of the bothies on the estate. The hampers came from the castle, and we all mucked in to put the food and drink out on the table.
“I picked up some cheese, put it on a plate and was transferring it to the table. The cheese fell on the floor. I had a split-second decision to make.
“I picked up the cheese, put it on the plate and put it on the table. I turned round to see that my every move had been watched very carefully by Her Majesty the Queen.
“I looked at her. She looked at me and she just smiled. And the cheese remained on the table.”
Labour’s Harriet Harman focused on what the Queen had done for women. “In the 1950s, when she was crowned, I was a child, and I remember my mother warning me that people thought men knew more than women; that men’s views were valuable, while women’s were to be disregarded.
“It was in that atmosphere that she stepped up, as a 25-year-old married woman with two children, to take her place at the head of this nation and play a huge role on the world stage. What determination and courage that must have taken. The prime ministers she dealt with were mostly men, and mostly twice her age.”
Harman added: “As Sir Tony Blair said, she was the matriarch of this nation: a matriarch for us on the world stage, and a matriarch too at home, in her own family. As well as being our monarch, she was the mother of four children and had many grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and it is to her family that I extend my deepest sympathies for their loss and condolences for their grief, which we all share.”
In the House of Lords, Lord True, the new leader of the upper house, posed a question. “I ask how will people conceive of life without Her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth II? The heart and focus of our nation’s love and loyalty. For millions of people the mother of our nation. The literal embodiment of the United Kingdom which she so cherished.”
But normal life and normal politics must return soon. The extraordinary start to Truss’s premiership cannot stop government for long. Her new team of ministers must get to work in their new briefs even as the nation’s thoughts lie elsewhere. By the end of this month, Kwarteng is due to announce how the £150bn energy package will be funded. That itself will be an enormous task, with huge economic and political implications.
Already, however, there is concern among senior Tories about the choice of some of Truss’s ministers, her attitude to civil servants, and the long-term stability of her position at the head of a divided party, with the economy heading for recession.
Her refusal to appoint a “big tent” cabinet representing all wings of the party risks becoming a source of increasing tension. On an individual level, the appointment of new business secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg, one of Johnson’s closest allies, is seen as a huge risk. One former minister even asked if Rees-Mogg had found himself with the energy brief because “no one else would take it”.
Questions are being asked about his ability to deliver complex policy on energy, a field in which he has limited experience. His self-styled reputation as a Brexiter and staunch Thatcherite is also fuelling fears about his approach to the business community and the green agenda. “Not only is he on the wrong side of the energy debate when it is obvious we need to focus more on renewables, but he is unlikely to listen to business’s top ask, which is to improve access to European labour,” a source said.
More broadly, the Tory backbenches are now littered with senior and skilled parliamentarians who have no investment in Truss. Former chief whips Gavin Williamson and Mark Harper, for example, were ardent Sunak supporters. Meanwhile, there are concerns that those close to Johnson will abandon Truss the moment they see an opportunity for the former prime minister.
Whitehall insiders worry about what Scholar’s dismissal says about the politicisation of the civil service. “If a minister makes it clear they don’t have confidence in a perm sec then it’s only ever going to go one way,” said a source.
“It’s a worrying sign as Scholar is viewed as one his generation’s outstanding civil servants and he would loyally serve any new administration. They’re essentially saying he’s part of the problem. But policy is decided by ministers: it’s why we have a permanent and impartial civil service. It’s a step down the road of political appointments.”
Then there is the former prime minister. While few MPs are talking about it out loud, there is already a sense that even before Truss’s first week is out, Johnson is already managing to find a new stage.
After the Queen’s death was announced, Johnson soon released a statement talking of the nation’s grief at the death of “Elizabeth the Great”. His speech in the Commons on Friday, commended by many as well judged, sincere and heartening – in contrast to the less stirring contributions from Truss – has also been seen as a sign that, freed from the drudgery of running the government, Johnson will now be free to play to his strengths and become an instant alternative should Truss hit early trouble.
Yesterday an understandably exhausted-looking Truss attended the accession council ceremony of King Charles III. It has been the most extraordinary first six days as prime minister: in the space of a few days the country has a new king and a new prime minister at the head of a nation in mourning, at a time of grave economic difficulty. A nation that without its queen of 70 years, suddenly feels a lot less sure of itself.
