Steerpike

So much for the honeymoon. Liz Truss closes her first 'proper' fortnight of politics this weekend with her backbenchers in open revolt and talk already building of a mounting government U-turn. There have been plenty of damning verdicts on last Friday's 'mini Budget' but none more so than the YouGov poll which put Labour a whopping 33 points ahead of the Truss's Tories. And now Mr S brings news of fresh woe to the under-fire PM as she battles to save her premiership. A poll by Redfield and Wilton of Conservative voters at the 2019 election shows just how few were impressed with the headline measures of her first fiscal event. Nearly three times as many (56 per cent) oppose lifting the bankers’ bonuses cap versus 19 per cent who support the move.

Gosh! Cripes! Gazooks! It seems that those tireless seekers of truth at the Guardian have done it again. They've stumbled on something of a scoop: so toxic is new Prime Minister Liz Truss that even her former colleagues don't want to vote for her. This afternoon the newspaper published a scathing piece by Nick Boles, the MP for Grantham and Stamford between 2010 and 2019. Headlined: 'I was a Tory MP, but Truss and Kwarteng have convinced me to vote Labour' it opens with this gem: 'Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng possess a level of intellectual self-confidence usually found among undergraduates. They always have' before rattling through 30 years of British economic policy-making, ending with this lacerating conclusion: In two years’ time, voters will be given a choice.

As day four of Labour conference begins here in Brighton, Mr S has been touring the conference centre and World Transformed festival to see how Keir Starmer's party is preparing for government. A quick tour reveals that there's far less cranks now attending the official shindig, with far less Hawaiian shirts, Corbyn merchandise and Socialist Worker newspapers than last year's Brighton bash. Still, whether it's Beijing Barry Gardiner on the decks at Dawn Butler's Jamaica night, Wes Streeting on the mike at the Mirror's karaoke night or Mark Drakeford snapping pics on a Massey Ferguson,  all sorts of exotic creatures have been spotted among the clubs, pubs, fringes and forums of Brighton. Below is Steerpike's guide for all those unlucky enough not to have got a ticket...

Oh dear. Things couldn’t have been going better for Labour leader Keir Starmer. The left has been routed, the Tories are divided, the pound is plunging and the markets are panicking. But in true Labour style, his MPs are always on hand to pull defeat from the jaws of victory. Speaking at a British Future event, Labour MP Rupa Huq – who has now had the whip suspended – made a rather unpleasant swipe at new Tory Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng. Huq, one of the hard-of-thinking drones in the Starmer Army, checked whether the Chatham House rule applied before telling attendees that Kwarteng was only ‘superficially’ black: ‘Superficially he is a black man… if you hear him on the Today Programme, you wouldn’t know he is black.

It’s day two of Labour conference and there’s no end of attractions for bleary eyed delegates. Rachel Reeves, Ed Miliband, David Lammy: all the party’s intellectual heavyweights are up before the faithful. But away from all the centrist paeans and ritual Tory bashing, Mr S couldn’t help but observe the roaring popularity of one of the fringe stalls in the conference hall. ‘My Death, My Decision’ are campaigning to legalise assisted suicide in the UK, urging delegates to pressure MPs to change the law on euthanasia. A novel approach to win the grey vote? Intrigued – and all too aware of the obvious puns – Mr S sidled up to hear the elevator pitch.

Labour are very keen these days to be seen as the natural party of government. And it’s in that spirit that Sir Keir and his aides have hit upon a brilliant wheeze: singing the national anthem on the first morning of their annual Party conference. It’s intended to mark the death of Her Majesty and show that the Starmer Army is A Serious Party once more.Unfortunately for the onetime republican, not all his fellow socialist are happy to play at being merry monarchists. Delegates arriving in the Liverpool conference hall are greeted by leaflets from the Labour for a Republic campaign, who are none too happy at pledging fealty to Charles III. And it seems that Labour HQ are worried that not all attendees share their leader’s patriotic fervour.

Oh dear. Liz Truss’s team were hoping for a welcome reaction from the markets as Kwasi Kwarteng unveiled a whopping £45 billion in tax cuts from the dispatch box this morning. The Chancellor is placing a bet on growth with this mini-Budget, and hopes that this will take the edge off increases in government borrowing. Mr S wonders though whether the Treasury’s keenness to find silver linings may have ended up backfiring. As the pound rallied against the dollar this morning while Kwarteng announced his tax cuts, Chief Secretary to the Treasury Chris Philp declared that it was ‘Great to see sterling strengthening on the back of the new UK Growth Plan’. https://twitter.com/CPhilpOfficial/status/1573240072060682240?

After a brief hiatus during the course of the country’s morning period, it appears that the British broadcasters are back to doing what they know best: namely, trying to catch out politicians. Mr S wonders though if some of them may need a bit better material. This week the new Secretary of State for Digital, Michelle Donelan appeared on the broadcast round where she was grilled by Sky’s Kay Burley. In the interview, clearly thinking she was onto a winner, Burley quizzed Donelan about her brief 36-hour period as education secretary before she resigned over the Chris Pincher scandal, which entitled her to a severance payout of just under £17,000. In the interview Burley asked whether Donelan had given the money to charity as she had originally promised.

There'll be corks popping in Horseferry Road tonight. Following the Queen's funeral yesterday, normal politics has now resumed with gusto. Culture Secretary Michelle Donelan was duly wheeled out on Sky this morning, where she revealed that the government is now 'reexamining the business case' over the privatisation of Channel 4. It comes after extensive lobbying from the arts industry, with hundreds of producers, directors and stars urging ministers to call off the sale. Donelan's appointment to the post follows the departure of Nadine Dorries, an ardent advocate of flogging off the right-on broadcaster, arguing it will struggle to survive in the era of Netflix. Now it seems that the change of minister has brought with it a change of policy too.

Poor Liz Truss. While Boris Johnson is recognised the world over thanks to his famous ruffled hair, Britain's new Prime Minister isn't quite as well known overseas. As the great and the good arrived at Westminster Abbey for Her Majesty the Queen's funeral service earlier today, Truss was shown with her husband entering the church. Unfortunately, two Aussie commentators, broadcasting on the country's Channel Nine, had no idea who Truss was. 'Who's this? Maybe minor royals,' said presenter Peter Overton. 'We can't spot everyone unfortunately', said his colleague Tracy Grimshaw. 'They look like they could be local dignitaries,' she added.  https://twitter.com/Shahryar_Sultan/status/1571811768946642946?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw Oh dear.

It’s been an eventful few weeks for Liz Truss. Our new Prime Minister has faced a baptism of fire not seen since by an incoming premier since Churchill and the fall of France in 1940. War, inflation, a-cost-of-living crisis and the death of the Queen: so much for a honeymoon. Still, Her Majesty’s passing has meant a brief hiatus from normal politics, which is expected to resume with gusto on Tuesday. And one issue which we can expect Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer to probe with relish is Truss’s newly appointed Chief of Staff, Mark Fullbrook.

Since becoming the Tory leadership favourite early last month, Liz Truss is used to all sorts of people coming out of the woodwork. Old friends, former allies and even the odd foe have been very keen to share their opinions on Truss, the onetime Lib Dem radical turned Brexit-backing cabinet mainstay. But one person who we haven't heard much from is Mark Field, her fellow former Conservative MP, with whom Truss had a headline-grabbing affair in the mid-2000s. But now the Camden New Journal have set tongues wagging with a cheeky little piece in this week's edition about what Field has been up to since leaving parliament in late 2019.

First it was Brexit, now it's the Queen. That the New York Times has a near-pathological loathing for Britain is nothing new at this point; but it seems that the motivating factor for the 'Gray Lady's' Anglophobia has switched in recent days from the 2016 referendum result to the passing of our beloved monarch. Barely had the Queen's death been announced then the NYT was furiously publishing opinion pieces denouncing the woman as a symbol of British imperialism. This was just hours after her death and ignored the salient facts that Elizabeth's reign coincided with the end of the British Empire and that she loved the multi-racial Commonwealth. Even Cyclops would struggle to write something so one-eyed.