Discussion is happening at all levels in the Conservative party about whether the prime minister can survive – even if she replaces her chancellor.
As one senior minister in her government put it to me this morning before reports that Kwarteng would be sacked: “I honestly don’t think either of them, Liz or Kwasi have a clue, I don’t think they know what they’re doing.”
“They’ve got one shot to satisfy the markets,” the minister said – with a full U-turn on the corporation tax freeze and perhaps more: “The worst possible thing, now the markets have priced in a U-turn on corporation tax would be mealy-mouthed partial U-turn.”
“But my instinct is she won’t survive. She’s introduced herself to the country in the worst way imaginable, and people’s views of her are quite settled now.
“Even if she stays, you can’t have a chancellor who has lost the confidence of the markets, that’s never happened before that I can remember”. The minister said the prime minister might need a complete reboot of the Treasury team to restore confidence, but having jettisoned key parts of her economic programme, “she is a husk.”
This minister and others point out that her controversial supply-side reforms are likely to be opposed in parliament – as are spending cuts on the scale that may be needed to pay for her measures.
Other MPs also say she will need a humiliating change of direction to survive. One long-serving MP said: “It’s unfair for Kwasi to go in the sense that it was all her idea, but politics isn’t fair. It’s a matter of survival for her now, there are discussions going on but it’s not organized yet.”
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Source: Skynews