Liz Truss (whom I have seen repainted as 'Dim Lizzie' and 'Thick Lizzie' - I like that last one - it has a ring to it) is bonkers. The whole campaign is taking on the gloss of a US presidential election when the job of a PM is most decidedly NOT the same as a president. There is no separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches - they are on one side of the same coin. I remember when Tony Blair talked about the Blair Administration - I cringed then, but I do not suppose he started it.
Yesterday morning Liz Truss said she would appoint regional pay boards for civil servants outside London and thereby save £8.8 billion a year. The theory was that because the cost of living is so high in London, civil servants who are currently on a single pay scale could have their salaries reduced if they lived in Manchester or (Oh! The Humanity!) Cornwall or Wales or some other bleak outpost of civilization. It was pointed out to her that the whole civil service annual salary bill was £9 billion so a reduction of 97% seemed a little far-fetched. The only way her arithmetic would work would be if the whole public sector - i.e., civil service plus police plus teachers plus nurses - would be subject to these cuts in pay.
Tory MPs of course were furious - some of them even have consciences despite their best efforts to place them on a shelf in a cool dark place where they can be retrieved at the end of the working day - because, well, these people vote. So in less time than it takes to say 'If you don't like my principles I have others' Thick Lizzie revoked: (From the Guardian:)
Alarmingly, she is apparently 34% ahead of Rishi Sunak - who has at least a veneer of competence - in the opinion polls among the 1% of Tory voters who also have the means and the incentive to actually pony up the annual £25 ($30-ish) to be a real live (I use the word loosely) member of the Party. But in a hypothetical race between the disgraced Boris Johnson - who, BTW, has just started his summer vacation - you'd think that as he will be out of a job in just four weeks he might have postponed that little jolly - these are the poll results:Truss abruptly withdrew the policy on Tuesday, little more than 12 hours after it had been floated, claiming in an awkward interview that it had been “misrepresented”.
“There has never any intention to affect teachers and nurses, but I don’t want to worry people, I don’t want people to be concerned, so I am being very clear that we will not be going ahead with the regional pay boards,” she told ITV.
Asked if the move was a U-turn, she said: “I’m someone who is honest and upfront, and I do what I say I will do, and I am being clear, I will not be doing that.”
Be afraid. Be very afraid.