Literally nobody formats letters like that.
What a stupid practice.
Why do that ?
I assume the answer is "something something tradition something something rule Britannia something something"
Probably. I'm not defending the practice, but on a day where there are So. Many. Reasons. to take shots at Truss and the Tories, don't choose one that all PMs would be 'guilty' of
Yet they do it seems and have for a long time.
To sum up the last 13 years of the Tories.
Put it on loop. It's strangely zen and calming - but only because we don't live in the UK.
Has nobody ever read a letter from the PM before? We've had enough this year alone for people to know about the style. Same nonsense was all over the web earlier.
It's not. It's the style for letters from the PM. Have you not read any of the hundreds of letters sent out from that office over the last few years?
It's the new "Vincent Vega/John Travolta" meme.
The funny thing about that moment is she was desperately searching for a "friendly" journalist who might give her an easy question but instead they all went in studs up on her.
Patrick Minford very upset in his interview with Michael Portillo right now
Javid was PM a few months ago. I was at a friend's wedding in Mayo on the 4th August and I recall wondering who'd be the new PM. Seems so long ago.
Look. Politicians failing to answer the questions put to them is hardly a new or startling concept; but even by the metrics of that game of dissembling and waffle, these answers were pitiful.
Just boilerplate, robotic answers without an ounce of conviction - or even irritation. Christ if she at least got a bit insulted or combative towards the journalists, it might have mader her look energised. Nope, she just trotted out the same tedious nonsense about "economic stability" - while her humming and hawing between questions just made her look like a dullard perusing a menu.
If your Premier League soccer team went through managers like that the place would go nuts but this is the fekin minister for finance.
Failing to pass a budget collapses a government and in a common sense world this should too.
Someone screwed up a hundred years ago and rather than admit the mistake they pretended it's how it's supposed to be done
From the Guardian.
Senior Conservatives will this week hold talks on a “rescue mission” that would see the swift removal of Liz Truss as leader, after the new chancellor Jeremy Hunt dramatically tore up her economic package and signalled a new era of austerity.
A group of senior MPs will meet on Monday to discuss the prime minister’s future, with some wanting her to resign within days and others saying she is now “in office but not in control”.
Between 15 and 20 former ministers and other senior MPs have been invited to a “dinner of grown-ups”, convened by leading supporters of Rishi Sunak, to plan how and when to remove Truss and install Sunak and fellow leadership contender Penny Mordaunt as a unity pairing.
A source familiar with the conversations said: “They are just going to have to sit down and work things out. It now becomes a rescue mission for the Conservative party and the economy. That’s where we are.”
Truss’s remaining allies are now battling to shore her up. Loyalists are urging the PM to force a no-confidence vote to go ahead rather than to agree to step down, should she be approached to do so.
Monday should be interesting...
And if you don't like this Prime Minister, don't worry there'll be another one along in a moment. There'll be endless books written about this period. The fictionalised dramas are no doubt already being scribbled by authors.
I'm reading the Lib Dems have already started speaking of a new general election; I can't see how those noises won't get louder if this polite coup takes place and Sunak is "inserted" into power. Surely he has even less mandate than this lame duck PM.
I think Sunak has missed the bus.
He was rejected by the elderly members of the Tory party, so he has no mandate with the membership. He has little mandate with the MPs who failed to give him a majority in any of the early votes.
I think they will put in a One Nation Tory as a caretaker, and then hope (s)he will rescue the party.
@pixelburp
I've long suspected that if the LibDems are to have any real future they will turn into something like the German FDP and go all in on the home counties.
With all the talk of MPs ousting Truss I wonder how many of the young vibrant Tory grassroots membership are getting pissed off their choices are getting the boot from the MPs.
Johnson and Truss were both the overwhelming choice of the membership, MPs look like they'll do for both.
I don't think the party 'can' be rescued. There appears to be a load of different factions and much infighting - it's difficult to see how one person could possibly unite a party that is at war with itself.
I agree. I don’t think it can be rescued in its current form. It needs to reorganise in opposition and IMO it has to splIt in order to become governable. The competing philosophies within the party cannot be reconciled, and even if one faction or the other is suppressed, it will never have gone away.
My reading of the current state of the party futures is as follows (based on nothing more than my own preconceptions and bias).
In a Tory safe seat, the errant Tories will not migrate to Labour but prefer the LibDems.
In a Labour red wall seat, they will return to Labour.
In the normal marginals, Labour will be returned. In their safe seats, they should be safe.
It is possibly most unlikely, but the Labour and LibDems could have a pact to reinforce these tendencies. Labour will want to contest every seat, and LibDems would like to do the same.
If they both has PR/STV in their manifestos, they could bring that in without a referendum.
Labour are too close to victory after all these years to messing round with contentious issues like PR.
It will just become another tradition and patriotism issue like inches and blue passports.
Leaks from the treasury this evening say that unfunded gap is not £60bn but £72bn. Jesus. Goes without saying now that there’ll be a programme of tax increases across the board as well as spending cuts
I’d say the markets are going to respond pretty badly tomorrow.
With all due respect I think the members have shown they have terrible judgement and can't be trusted to make such an important decision. If we've learned anything from this fiasco and Jeremy Corbyn's time as Labour leader, it's that MPs should probably get the final say, or at least the larger say, in who their leader should be.
Oh yeah because the ERG MPs (the currently dominant faction of the Tories) have shown themselves to be sensible human beings.
Was it not MPs who put the candidates forward.
Yes and they knew that Sunak hadn't a chance against Liz based on the membership so it's arguable they chose her.
It wasn't that close but Truss didn't win by as much as expected despite nearly all MPS of name recognition getting in behind her and the Boris crew obvious loathing of Rishi. I do wonder if a few more big hitters hadn't jumped on the Truss bandwagon then it could have been much more interesting.
Johnson v Hunt was different...members loved Boris at the time and were lukewarm on Hunt, endorsements didn't matter to much then.
https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-60037657
Ben Wallace once again being touted as saviour.