Truss: double trouble ahead

If Liz Truss hoped that scrapping the contentious plan to abolish the 45p tax rate would quieten down her MPs, she was wrong.

On the contrary, the first sign that that she is willing to cave to pressure appears to have emboldened dissenters.

The beleaguered PM now faces another rebellion within her own party for her refusal to commit to increasing benefits in line with inflation – something Rishi Sunak, when he was chancellor, had already pledged to do.

While Truss has confirmed that she will increase pensions at the pace of rising prices, when it comes to benefits, she has said: “We have to be fiscally responsible.” As the PM searches for ways to cut costs to fund her tax cuts, she appears eager to update benefits via earnings (by 6%) rather than via inflation (by 10%). This would, however, amount to a real-terms cut amid a cost of living crisis.

Ex-Tory leaders, Iain Duncan Smith and William Hague, as well as former work and pensions secretary, Damian Green, and, needless to say, top rebel Michael Gove have all called on the government to honour the increase promised under Boris Johnson’s government. If Truss tries to press ahead with anything less than an increase in line with inflation, Hague warns: “The government will end up defeated in parliament.” Truss doesn’t have the numbers in the Commons.

Even some of the PM’s top team are breaking ranks to side with Gove and co. Penny Mordaunt, former leadership candidate and new leader of the Commons, said today: “Whether it’s pensions, whether it’s our welfare system, I’ve always supported keeping pace with inflation. It makes sense to do so.” Her comments put Truss in an awkward position – as she well knows.

Universal Credit isn’t the only issue exposing fractures within the party today.

Ben Houchen, the charismatic Tory mayor for Tees Valley, has challenged another of her budget policies, demanding that she reinstate the cap on bankers bonuses.

Meanwhile, according to Politico, a bunch of MPs involved with the Conservative Environment Network are plotting an intervention to demonstrate that the government doesn’t have a majority on overturning the fracking ban.

Signs are quickly emerging that securing the backing of just a third of Tory MPs – and banishing Sunak supporters to the backbenches – has, as many predicted, left Truss vulnerable to these mini-style rebellions.

Truss’s home secretary, Suella Braverman, also vented her frustration at the government’s 45p tax cut U-turn, scolding fellow Tory MPs for “staging a coup” to force the PM to abandon the measure.

Yet Steve Double, the Tory MP for St Austell and Newquay, offered a scathing response: “Doing what we believe to be right for our constituents is not “a coup” or unprofessional. It is called doing our job as backbench MPs,” he said. Double added: “If this is the approach the cabinet take we’re in for a bumpy ride.”

Of course, the majority of these rebels aren’t actually hoping to see Truss booted out of the top job. Well, not all. Regardless of how they feel about her, most of them realise that entering another leadership contest so soon would not just be bad optics but make a laughing stock of the party. So for now, it’s more a matter of staging the odd rebellion until they decide what to do: get behind her or get rid of her ahead of the next election.

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