Liz Truss defends tax-cutting agenda as outgoing PM leaves Number 10
Liz Truss has said the UK “cannot afford to be a low growth country” and defended her tax-cutting agenda in her final speech outside Number 10.
The outgoing Prime Minister said “our country continues to battle through a storm” but that “I believe in Britain, I believe in the British people and I know that brighter days lie ahead”.
She did not offer any sort of apology for the chaos of her six-week premiership or admit to any mistakes in her economic agenda.
Truss said her time as Prime Minister, which was the shortest tenure ever, made her “more convinced than ever” that the UK needs to “be bold and confront the challenges we face”.
“We need to take advantage of our Brexit freedoms to do things differently,” she said.
“This means delivering more freedom for our own citizens and restoring power to democratic institutions. It means lower taxes so people can keep more of the money that they earn.”
She also quoted Roman writer Seneca, saying: “She did not offer any sort of apology for the chaos of her six-week premiership.”
Truss lost the confidence of Tory MPs last week, after she was forced to shred almost all of her tax cuts promised in the Tory leadership contest.
The mini-Budget from her first chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, who was eventually sacked, spooked markets about current levels of government borrowing.
The pair were offering £45bn of tax cuts all funded by government borrowing, along with a further £100bn of spending to freeze energy bills, which led to a crash in debt markets.
She has now seen King Charles and asked her to send for Rishi Sunak, who won the Tory leadership contest unopposed yesterday.