According to British media reports, the Conservative Party where Tras is located will quickly elect a new leader to take over the position of prime minister. Conservative officials said the new prime minister will be produced around October 28.
From "warrior" to "desergeant"
Until October 19, Tras denied the possibility of voluntary resignation in a parliamentary questioning. Faced with the laughter in the parliament hall, the prime minister, who had been in office for only 44 days, shouted, "I am a soldier, not a deserter!"
However, since September, Tras, a radical right-wing party, has vigorously promoted a large-scale tax cut policy. As soon as it was introduced, it lost market confidence and the pound fell, breaking the record in 37 years. Coupled with the "cost of living crisis" induced by external factors such as the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, Tras' voter approval rating had fallen to 16% by early October, without the "honeymoon period" of the previous poll in the first year of his premiership.
In order to avoid the defeat of the local election in early 2023, the Conservative Party’s top leaders have begun to discuss “timely stop loss” since early October, replacing Tras with candidates who understand the economy better and are more traditional and stable. But Tras, known for his toughness, was unwilling to admit defeat and only pulled back slightly to reform measures, instead accusing dissidents of "not real Conservatives" and further isolating himself. The two sides were once deadlocked due to the Conservative Party rules restricting votes of distrust in the first year of the prime minister's term.
The turning point of "party confrontation" occurred on October 14. Tras removed Cabinet Chancellor Kwaten and appointed "long-term political enemy" Hunter to succeed him. This is seen as her de facto abandoning resistance: On the one hand, Hunter, who is completely against the Trass tax cut plan, takes office as Chancellor of the Exchequer, means the end of the reform. On the day Hunter took office, the cabinet announced that it would return to the previous government's tax increase path and restart the plan to increase corporate income tax by 6%. On the other hand, the Minister of Finance is the second-person in the cabinet. Tras changed the Minister of Finance one month after taking office, and had to recruit political enemies on the condition of completely abandoning the original policy, which shows that he has no allies in the party.
Tras announced his resignation. Photo/BBC
In the end, Tras announced his resignation on the 20th, setting a record for the shortest term of 119 days set by Prime Minister Canning in 1827. However, Canning died of illness, not driven away.
"absurd drama " may be difficult to affect the political landscape of the UK
When Tras stepped down, British public opinion was asking: Why did the Conservative Party choose Tras? Since Trump was elected president of the United States in 2016, it is no longer shocking that the radical right has become mainstream in Western politics. In September this year, the third largest economy in the EU, , Italy just gave birth to the new government ", the most conservative since ," which was born. However, in major European countries such as Germany and France, the radical right has not yet been able to shake the "greatest common divisor" of the center-left and center-right. In the UK, the Conservative Party has been in power for 17 consecutive years. From the leaders of 2005, Cameron to Theresa May and Johnson , they are considered "more and more conservative" by the outside world, but they have never deviated from the traditional mainstream. Trass is the first radical right to successfully take office.
Time went back to July this year. The then Prime Minister Boris Johnson was forced to step down due to unfavorable elections and a decline in approval rating. The complex forces within the party eventually divided into the "stable faction" represented by the Chancellor of the Finance Minister Sunak and the "radical faction" represented by Foreign Minister Tras.
At that time, right-wing radicals accused traditional Conservatives of fear of being timid and afraid of reform, and tried to stimulate economic growth through large-scale tax cuts, including the cancellation of the current maximum income tax rate of 45% and the reduction of the basic tax rate from 20% to 19%. Sunak, who has dominated the Conservative fiscal policy for many years, once warned that the large-scale tax cut plan lacks financial support and means that it subverts the policy orientation of the Conservative Party's historic victory in 2019, which will seriously affect the market and people's confidence.Tras believes that compared with other developed economies, the UK government has a low debt ratio and the fiscal system is able to afford the cost of tax cuts. As for the confidence of the outside world, she said she is "willing to be unpopular."
In the end, the weak majority in the Conservative Party chose to make Tras "a gamble". Some British media believe that the Conservative Party’s top leaders originally thought that Tras would strengthen internal unity and use moderate reforms to deal with the harsh internal and external environment. But in fact, Tras, whose family background and political career are very different from traditional Conservatives, has exceeded the expectations of the Conservative Party's top leaders. Even her allies were shocked to the extent that she had subverted former Prime Minister Johnson's internal affairs and economic policies in a month's office.
The famous conservative publication "Bysayer", which Johnson once edited, commented that the problem of the current Conservative Party's top leaders is the lack of political and economic knowledge: parliamentarians pursue short-term political interests and have never systematically read classic texts, and there are almost no theorists in the party. This continuous ruling party has gradually forgotten why it has received the support of the widest range of voters, thus providing an opportunity for radical forces within the party to seize power.
Nowadays, the Conservative Party’s senior management has quickly achieved “forced the palace” to change the coach, and analysts believe that it may achieve the effect of “timely stop loss ”. Whether the new Prime Minister is Sunak, Modot or other candidates, as long as the next cabinet returns to the traditional mainstream, the Conservative Party is still likely to reverse the current 20% support gap with the Labour Party. Once the new prime minister gets the respite from the "honeymoon period", he can follow the Conservative Party's original plan to advance the general election in the fall of 2023, and strive to ensure that he continues to rule in the next five years.
However, European and American media also pointed out that Tras' brief "political absurdity" has exacerbated the division of the camp within the Conservative Party, and now "it is difficult to see that any candidate can be accepted by all factions within the party." Moreover, this will be the second time that the Conservatives have "selected" the Prime Minister without giving British people the opportunity to elect a general election. Labour leader Stamer said at the first time that this "absurd drama" should end with "successful elections immediately" to ensure that the British public has a say in the future of the country. Although the parliament under the control of the Conservative Party will not follow Starmer's wishes, there are still variables in how the new prime minister will bridge the division within the party and how to regain the support of the people.
Reporter: Cao Ran
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-