Overestimating Liz Truss

At the first Parliamentary Labour Party meeting of the new term, this evening Keir Starmer said told MPs that one should not underestimate Liz Truss. "She is a talented politician", he said, "who has got to the top through hard work and determination. She is nobody’s fool and she will do whatever it takes to keep them in power." One should never underestimate a Tory Prime Minister, but at the same time it ill behoves a Labour leader to talk them up for that is the path to over caution and paralysis. And like many a Labour MP, Starmer misrecognises low Tory cunning for talent and nous.

Having an accurate read on Truss's character matters because exploiting her weaknesses are key to driving the political agenda from opposition. Since Starmer became leader, he's struck lucky on this three times: free school dinners, an excess profits levy on oil and gas firms, and latterly the energy price freeze. On the first of these, the Tories were deaf to the mood (and arguably, Labour were only trailing public opinion), on the second Labour bounced Rish! Sunak into adopting a variation of their policy, and with the freeze Truss thought it smart politics to keep mum and let Labour own the issue.

I will give Starmer this. His "do not underestimate" warning is the right one ahead of Truss's energy price announcement. Thanks to the briefings across the press today, it appears she's also down for an energy price freeze. Albeit not one funded by energy companies - remember the indecently intimate relations between fossil fuel interests and the Tories - but funded by bill payers. Despite, apparently, getting rejected by Truss on its first presentation the plan drawn up and backed by energy companies themselves is back on the table. That is the government gives energy companies a £100bn loan to freeze prices, which is then paid back by levies on energy bills over 10-20 years. Company profits are protected, a price freeze is achieved until the Spring, it goes away as an immediate, all-consuming issue, and the size of the bail out makes Labour and similar opposition schemes look paltry. This is what Truss would be hoping for with the eye-watering sum being so big that it will simply stun and stump onlooking punters.

On the face of it, such a scheme should be easy to oppose. Why should people reeling under the cost of living crisis pay back energy company debt? Unless Labour carefully pitches its critique as a subsidy for oil and gas profits, it could come across as carping - something Starmer fell into when he tempered his critique of the Tories' Covid strategy by not contesting their framing and policy responses to the crisis. This way Truss could seize back the initiative after spending the summer on the back foot - so Starmer had better be prepared (and, shock horror, it appears a populist-looking rejoinder is ready to go).

That said, this is a hypothetical at the moment and we have to deal with what we know. And that is Truss enters Number 10 as an unpopular and politically compromised figure. Having won 57% of the 141,735 votes cast, this is not just the worst result received by an incoming Tory leader since the members' ballot was introduced by William Hague's reforms, with Iain Duncan Smith she is one of two Tory leaders not to win an absolute majority of the membership altogether. Except to IDS's 48%, she did worse with 47%. Like IDS she takes office without the explicit backing of most Tory MPs. 'Won't say' was the winner among parliamentary Tories this Summer. This means her room to move is tightly circumscribed. The £100bn loan scheme, if it comes forward, might be too much for some to stomach; especially if she immediately couples this with the promised tax cuts. For anyone with Thatcherite instincts, this is fiscal incontinence and loud grumbling could easily derail her plans. This could be headed off if Truss invited the Sunak/old establishment wing of the party into government, but if the leaks are to be believed the cabinet will be filled with right wingers and supine careerists. The spectrum of opinion in the parliamentary party might not be that broad, but a government of the farthest of the party's far right does not suggest happy times are ahead.

The other problem is Liz Truss herself. The campaign has had its share of unforced errors and stupidities. With everyone praising her work ethic, what she's actually done while burning the midnight oil has received less scrutiny. Lest we forget, her diligence as Environment secretary meant declaring war on solar panels on farm land and loosening the rules to allow the water companies to dump sewerage into the rivers - a story you might have heard about this summer. At the Treasury she spent more time poring over her social media analytics and asking officials their times tables than on economic policy, and likewise as Foreign Secretary she embarrassed herself in front of her Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, by saying she would never recognise their sovereignty over the Rostov and Voronezh regions. Regions that have been part of Russia since the 15th and 16th centuries. But she stood up to Putin, so none of this matters, especially as it afforded nicely choreographed selfie opportunities. Being Prime Minister doesn't mean she becomes a heavyweight over night, nor that the irresistible tic of sticking her foot in her mouth will be cured. To mangle her victory statement, she campaigned as Liz Truss and will govern as Liz Truss.

Whatever happens, whether Truss is able to move decisively and neuter the energy bill issue or not, another leadership election between now and 2024 is unlikely, so we're stuck with her. It's going to be a long couple of years.

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