The comments made by Liz Truss, the Prime Minister, on 8 September 2022.
The whole country will be deeply concerned by the news from Buckingham Palace this lunchtime.
My thoughts – and the thoughts of people across our United Kingdom – are with Her Majesty The Queen and her family at this time.
The comments made by Liz Truss, the Prime Minister, on 8 September 2022.
Decades of short-term thinking on energy has failed to focus enough on securing supply – with Russia’s war in Ukraine exposing the flaws in our energy security and driving bills higher. I’m ending this once and for all.
I’m acting immediately so people and businesses are supported over the next two years, with a new Energy Price Guarantee, and tackling the root cause of the issues by boosting domestic energy supply.
Extraordinary challenges call for extraordinary measures, ensuring that the United Kingdom is never in this situation again.
The email sent by Liz Truss to Conservative Party members on 6 September 2022.
Good afternoon.
I have just accepted Her Majesty The Queen’s kind invitation to form a new government.
Let me pay tribute to my predecessor.
Boris Johnson delivered Brexit, the Covid vaccine, and stood up to Russian aggression.
History will see him as a hugely consequential Prime Minister.
I am honoured to take on this responsibility at a vital time for our country.
What makes Britain great is our fundamental belief in freedom, in enterprise, and in fair play.
Our people have shown grit, courage, and determination time and time again.
We now face severe global headwinds caused by Russia’s appalling war in Ukraine and the aftermath of Covid.
Now is the time to tackle the issues that are holding Britain back.
We need to build roads, homes, and broadband faster.
We need more investment and great jobs in every town and city across our country.
We need to reduce the burden on families and help people get on in life.
I know we have what it takes to tackle those challenges.
Of course, it won’t be easy. But we can do it.
We will transform Britain into an aspiration nation with high-paying jobs, safe streets and where everyone everywhere have the opportunities they deserve.
I will take action this day, and action every day, to make it happen.
United with our allies, we will stand up for freedom and democracy around the world – recognising we cannot have security at home without security abroad.
As Prime Minister, I will pursue three early priorities.
Firstly, I will get Britain working again.
I have a bold plan to grow the economy through tax cuts and reform.
I will cut taxes to reward hard work and boost business-led growth and investment.
I will drive reform in my mission to get Britain working, building, and growing.
We will get spades in the ground to make sure people are not facing unaffordable energy bills and we will also make sure that we are building hospitals, schools, roads, and broadband.
Secondly, I will deal hands-on with the energy crisis caused by Putin’s war.
I will take action this week to deal with energy bills and to secure our future energy supply.
Thirdly, I will make sure people can get the doctors’ appointments and NHS services they need. We will put our health service on a firm footing.
By delivering on the economy, energy, and the NHS, we will put our nation on the path to long-term success.
We should not be daunted by the challenges we face.
As strong as the storm may be, I know the British people are stronger.
Our country was built by people who get things done.
We have huge reserves of talent, of energy, and of determination.
I am confident that together we can ride out the storm, we can rebuild our economy, and become the modern, brilliant Britain that I know we can be.
This is our vital mission to ensure opportunity and prosperity for all people and future generations. I am determined to deliver. Thank you.
Liz Truss
Prime Minister
Leader of the Conservative & Unionist Party
The text of email from Liz Truss to Conservative Party members on 7 September 2022.
I am immensely grateful for everyone’s support throughout the leadership campaign and since I was elected on Monday. Whether you voted for me or not, I can assure you I will deliver for you as Leader of our Party and as your Prime Minister.
You are the backbone of the Conservative Party. While often the unsung heroes, it is the tireless efforts of our members that have delivered four consecutive General Election victories, and I know, that with your support, we will win again.
Our country faces immense challenges. Covid and Putin’s war in Ukraine mean the issues facing us today are stark, and there is a lot of work to be done over the next two years.
Together with my new Cabinet, I will work tirelessly to deliver, deliver, deliver for the British people.
We will begin work immediately to deliver a bold, Conservative plan for Britain – with three key early priorities.
Rapid action on energy bills to help people through the months ahead, while tackling the root cause of the energy crisis.
Growing the economy in a Conservative way by cutting taxes and slashing red tape.
And putting our NHS on a firm footing for the future so it works for patients.
Together we will get through these tough times and unleash the full potential of our great country.
And with your support, we will win again in 2024 and stop the Anti-Growth Coalition of Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the SNP getting their hands on the keys to Downing Street.
Yours sincerely,
Liz Truss
Prime Minister
Leader of the Conservative & Unionist Party
The speech made by Liz Truss, the Prime Minister, on 6 September 2022.
Good afternoon,
I have just accepted Her Majesty The Queen’s kind invitation to form a new government.
Let me pay tribute to my predecessor.
Boris Johnson delivered Brexit, the Covid vaccine, and stood up to Russian aggression.
History will see him as a hugely consequential Prime Minister.
I’m honoured to take on this responsibility at a vital time for our country.
What makes the United Kingdom great is our fundamental belief in freedom, in enterprise, and in fair play.
Our people have shown grit, courage and determination time and time again.
We now face severe global headwinds caused by Russia’s appalling war in Ukraine and the aftermath of Covid.
Now is the time to tackle the issues that are holding Britain back.
We need to build roads, homes and broadband faster.
We need more investment and great jobs in every town and city across our country.
We need to reduce the burden on families and help people get on in life.
I know that we have what it takes to tackle those challenges.
Of course, it won’t be easy. But we can do it.
We will transform Britain into an aspiration nation…with high-paying jobs, safe streets and where everyone everywhere has the opportunities they deserve.
I will take action this day, and action every day, to make it happen.
United with our allies, we will stand up for freedom and democracy around the world – recognising that we can’t have security at home without having security abroad.
As Prime Minister, I will pursue three early priorities.
Firstly, I will get Britain working again.
I have a bold plan to grow the economy through tax cuts and reform.
I will cut taxes to reward hard work and boost business-led growth and investment.
I will drive reform in my mission to get the United Kingdom working, building, and growing.
We will get spades in the ground to make sure people are not facing unaffordable energy bills and we will also make sure, that we are building hospitals, schools, roads, and broadband.
Secondly, I will deal hands-on with the energy crisis caused by Putin’s war.
I will take action this week to deal with energy bills and to secure our future energy supply.
Thirdly, I will make sure that people can get doctors’ appointments and the NHS services they need. We will put our health service on a firm footing.
By delivering on the economy, on energy, and on the NHS, we will put our nation on the path to long-term success.
We shouldn’t be daunted by the challenges we face.
As strong as the storm may be, I know that the British people are stronger.
Our country was built by people who get things done.
We have huge reserves of talent, of energy, and determination.
I am confident that together we can:
Ride out the storm,
We can rebuild our economy,
And we can become the modern brilliant Britain that I know we can be.
This is our vital mission to ensure opportunity and prosperity for all people and future generations. I am determined to deliver. Thank you.
The acceptance speech made by Liz Truss on 5 September 2022.
Well, thank you, Sir Graham. It’s an honour to be elected as leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party.
I’d like to thank the 1922 Committee, the party chairman and the Conservative Party for organising one of the longest job interviews in history. Thank you very much.
I’d also like to thank my family, my friends, my political colleagues and all of those who helped on this campaign. I’m incredibly grateful for all of your support.
I’d like to pay tribute to my fellow candidates, particularly Rishi Sunak. It’s been a hard-fought campaign. I think we have shown the depth and breadth of talent in our Conservative Party.
I also want to thank our outgoing leader, my friend, Boris Johnson. Boris, you got Brexit done. You crushed Jeremy Corbyn. You rolled out the vaccine and you stood up to Vladimir Putin. You are admired from Kyiv to Carlisle.
Friends and colleagues, thank you for putting your faith in me to lead our great Conservative Party, the greatest political party on earth.
I know that our beliefs resonate with the British people – our beliefs in freedom, in the ability to control your own life, in low taxes, in personal responsibility, and I know that’s why people voted for us in such numbers in 2019. And as your party leader, I intend to deliver what we promised those voters right across our great country.
During this leadership campaign, I campaigned as a conservative and I will govern as a conservative. My friends, we need to show that we will deliver over the next two years. I will deliver a bold plan to cut taxes and grow our economy. I will deliver on the energy crisis, dealing with people’s energy bills, but also dealing with the long-term issues we have on energy supply.
I will deliver on the National Health Service. We will deliver for all for our country and I will make sure that we use all the fantastic talents of the Conservative Party, our brilliant Members of Parliament, and peers, our fantastic councillors, our MSs, our MSPs, all of our councillors and activists and members right across our country, because, my friends, I know that we will deliver, we will deliver and we will deliver. And we will deliver a great victory for the Conservative Party in 2024, thank you.
The statement made by Liz Truss, the Foreign Secretary, on 1 September 2022.
The report by the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights provides new evidence of the appalling extent of China’s efforts to silence and repress Uyghurs and other minorities in Xinjiang.
It includes harrowing evidence, including first-hand accounts from victims, that shames China in the eyes of the international community, including actions that may amount to crimes against humanity.
This includes credible evidence of arbitrary and discriminatory detention, torture, sexual and gender-based violence, violations of reproductive rights, and the destruction of religious sites. UN Member States must now be given the opportunity to consider the report fully.
The UK has already led international efforts to hold China to account at the UN, imposed sanctions on senior Chinese government officials, and announced measures to help ensure no UK organisations are complicit in these violations through their supply chains.
We will continue to act with international partners to bring about a change in China’s actions, and immediately end its appalling human rights violations in Xinjiang.
The comments made by Liz Truss on Sky News on 7 June 2022.
INTERVIEWER
[Has Prime Minister’s authority been undermined?]
LIZ TRUSS
What we saw in yesterday’s vote was a clear majority in support of the Prime Minister. And what we’ve been doing today is getting on with the business of government. We’ve had a Cabinet meeting. We’re working on making housing more affordable, making childcare more affordable, lowering taxes. And that’s what the public wants us to be doing.
INTERVIEWER
On the Prime Minister’s authority, though, if you go back to that first question, has it been undermined?
LIZ TRUSS
As I said, the Prime Minister remains committed to our agenda, he’s already delivered on Brexit, he’s delivered on COVID and on helping the economy recover. He’s delivered on supporting Ukraine in the face of appalling Russian aggression and that’s what the cabinet want him to carry on doing and that’s what the country wants him to carry on doing.
INTERVIEWER
So what’s your message to those 148 of your colleagues who declared they had no confidence in the party leader?
LIZ TRUSS
My message is we had a vote yesterday, there was a clear result in that vote. Now is the time to get behind the Prime Minister to deliver on what people in Britain want to see, which is dealing with issues around the affordability of housing, the affordability of childcare, getting taxes down, getting our economy going, that’s what people want to see.
INTERVIEWER
What does this mean with regard to your ambitions potentially, for the leadership of the party?
LIZ TRUSS
My 100% focus is on my role as Foreign Secretary. There’s a lot to do, we need to carry on supporting Ukraine, we need to make sure that Russia is driven out of Ukraine and that we get successful peace for Ukraine and we need to help them rebuild. I’m also working on the Northern Ireland protocol, making sure we restore the balance for the Belfast Good Friday Agreement, bringing forward legislation. I can assure you that is taking up all of my time.
INTERVIEWER
Should colleagues feel able to continue to criticise the Prime Minister?
LIZ TRUSS
Well, we had a vote yesterday. The Prime Minister won a clear majority. It’s time to draw a line, move forward and focus on what people want us to be talking about, housing, childcare, delivering on lower taxes.
INTERVIEWER
Now you mentioned the Northern Ireland protocol. Are you willing to risk a trade war with the European Union to sort this all out?
LIZ TRUSS
What we want to do is create clear green lanes for goods flowing into Northern Ireland and a red lane for goods flowing into the EU. That will protect the EU single market, at the same time as enabling goods to flow freely around the UK. That’s a win-win for both of people of Northern Ireland and protecting the EU single market.
INTERVIEWER
You also mentioned bringing taxes down. Lord Frost today has said that the National Insurance increase should be reversed, that the corporation tax rise should not go ahead. Do you agree?
LIZ TRUSS
Today at cabinet the Prime Minister confirmed that he wants to see taxes come down. That is very, very important. We need to make sure people have more money in their pockets, we need to get the economy going and the way to do that is lowering taxes. Thank you.
The speech made by Liz Truss, the then Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, on 19 May 2016.
Thank you very much Fiona. It’s a great pleasure to be here at the Food and Drink Federation dinner. You’re a fantastic organisation and this is a fantastic part of our economy. Food and drink is our biggest manufacturing sector. It’s bigger than cars and aerospace put together. We had a celebration at Number 10 last week where we have these fantastic posters up and we had food and drink manufacturers and producers from across the UK. And the Prime Minister gave a speech at the end of the event and he said that he knew that food and drink was our largest manufacturing sector, because I have mentioned this at Cabinet on several occasions.
So I think the message is getting through to my Cabinet colleagues, but as we say in politics, when people are starting to get bored of a message, it’s just when you need to start repeating it even more. So I’ll be saying it even more and making that case right across our government, but also right across the wider economy, across the media, because food and drink deserves to have an even higher profile than it’s got at the moment. We have some of the world’s best chefs who are all involved in the Great British food campaign whether that’s Ken home or Angela Hartnett.
We have some of the most innovative companies and we produce more new products every year in food and drink than France and Germany put together and we also have some of the world’s best farmers producing fantastically high yields with the best animal welfare standards in the world as well. Creating a brilliant landscape which we all enjoy, whether it’s the Lake District where I’ve been today, whether it’s the South Downs National Park, and we should be tremendously proud of what we do and that is why we launched the Great British food campaign this year. That’s also where we introduced the great British food unit, which is all about exporting our fantastic food right around the world.
Now it’s a bit difficult before the 23rd of June, not to mention the EU referendum. I’m sure people in this room would be horrified if I didn’t talk about it. But I do think that the decision on the 23rd of June probably will have a greater impact on the food and drink industry than it would have on any other parts of the economy. That’s because if we look at trade, the food and drink industry exports 60% of all its products to the EU. If we look at particular areas like lamb, 40% of all the lamb that is produced here in the UK goes into the EU, into the EU market that represents 97% of lamb exports. Now why is that? Well, it’s because that we have the single market. And what we know is that countries outside the single market, whether it’s the US where I was recently or whether it’s China, still don’t allow quite a lot to our fantastic British food stuffs into those markets.
And of course the great British food unit is working to get entry for new products. But that is why that European market is so precious. Because we share the same regulations, we share the same rules over things like food safety, over animal health and welfare, over bottles. And the white whiskey industry and I’ve been doing a bit of a UK tour recently, the whiskey industry will tell you how important it is that because we share those regulations over bottling labelling. They can simply export their products to Paris just as easily as they can sell them in a supermarket in Preston. Now, if we were to leave that EU single market, what that would mean is that those products would face additional costs and getting them into those markets. It would mean in some cases that we could see markets closed and I’ve had a lot of people say to me, ‘well surely the European Union won’t close its markets’. But it’s fairly recently that of course the French closed its markets to UK beef, and we had to fight in the European Court of Justice to get British beef back on French menus because there is a policing mechanism in the European single market to make sure that if a product is complying with those European rules that we’ve all agreed, then we are able to sell it. So that is a very important message.
And this campaign has been dominated by some quite strong statements, some quite major warnings. But what I think is really important is we get the message across to people and that’s the people in your companies. It’s the people that we all work with, it’s the people in the entire food chain, which employs a massive amount of people across this country, that we get the message across about just how difficult it would become to do business. If we are a country like Norway, we’d have to fill in 50 boxes every time on a form every time we went to export something. In products like agricultural products, there’s a regime of quotas and tariffs.
I know how difficult it is getting products into markets like the US and China. DEFRA has just filled in an 1,000 page form which is one part of an eight stage process to get British beef and lamb and we’ve still got to get a resolution passed by Congress to allow that British lamb into the market. So I think we’ve got to be very careful about taking that single market for granted and being outside that single market, and the single market isn’t something that is a sexy, exciting thing to explain. But it is really crucial to the amount of growth we’ve seen in food and drink exports over the past 40 years. It is really crucial to that.
The second point I want to make is about investment. And I’ve just been over in the US talking to some of our major investors. We’ve got some of our major investors in the UK economy here in this room companies like Nestle or Mondelez putting huge amounts of research, of expertise, of new capital and machinery into our economy, improving the productivity of our food and drink sector which is so vital and I’m delighted that the Food and Drink Federation is focusing on productivity. We know that’s a challenge for the UK economy.
Now the reason many of those investors want to invest in the UK market is because we have access to 500 million consumers. Yes, the UK is a hotbed of innovation, but we are also a passport into that wider market. Now I’ve spoken to many investors who are saying that they would be concerned if they invested in the UK, whether it’s in R&D, whether it’s in capital to improve our productivity, whether it’s in new production, and I want to see more investment in areas like dairy processing capacity, I think we’ve got massive potential here in the UK. They will be worried about whether or not those investments continue to have access to the single market. And the Out Campaign has been very clear. They said they don’t want to be part of the single market. I think that’s a real worry for investment and I do want to see more capital investment in food and farming.
And what I would say to you is there are some people in this room who said to me, yes, we are concerned about this, but we don’t want to necessarily take a position. I can understand that as businesses, but I do think it’s in all of our interests to communicate the real impact on the ground. The real impact this would have on jobs on livelihoods, because what we know is less trade would mean fewer and fewer investments. It will mean fewer jobs, and that will feed through to people’s incomes. And that doesn’t just affect you and me in this room, that affects all of us in the overall economy. So even if you’re in a company that doesn’t export, the company that does export will be buying less of your services. And I think that’s the message we really need to get across in the closing weeks of this campaign.
But I have great faith in the British people. I think the British people are sensible people. They understand fundamentally, that economically Britain will be better off staying in a reformed EU. I’m very grateful for the Food and Drink Federation publicly coming out and saying that, of course the National Farmers Union have also come out and said that. I think getting that message across is really important over the next few weeks.
But what I want to do is following, I hope an in vote, is to really focus on what we can do next to bring this industry up to the next level, to really make sure this industry, the biggest manufacturing industry in our economy, an industry with huge potential, because we know the demand for food is growing across the world. We know demand for high quality, healthy, innovative food is growing across the world. I think we can do even more.
So one of the things we’re focusing on is apprenticeships. At the moment I think the average part of the economy has 2.3% of its employees in apprenticeships across food and drink. That’s just 1%, that’s partly because we have a lot of small companies in the sector. But I’m very pleased to say that recently the Department of Business has said the apprenticeship levy can be used to support jobs right through the food chain. So I think there’s a huge opportunity for food manufacturers, for supermarkets and for others involved in the food industry to support apprenticeships in primary production to support apprenticeships in other suppliers as part of that supply chain. And to really make sure we upskill the industry.
I had a recent round-table on International Women’s Day with some fantastic women farmers who were telling me that 75% of all the people they now need to recruit have STEM skills. This is a high skill industry, it’s a technically advanced industry. And what we need to do is get that message across to the wider public so that when people think about food, they don’t just think about the brilliant chefs, the fantastic products, our great protected food names, whether it’s Halen Môn sea salt, or whether it’s Scotch smoked salmon, but they also think about some of the innovation, the technology, the precision farming, the robotics that I saw at the Mr. Kipling factory, putting together those amazing cakes, which I’ve since been selling in Washington DC. We had an event in Washington and we were selling both curry and cakes. It was an interesting combination, but it went down very well with the Americans.
The final thing I’d like to say is about Brand Britain, because what has become clear to me when I travel the world is how appreciated the British brand is. The Union Jack on the pack really does mean something to people overseas. It stands for quality. It stands for heritage, it stands for safety, and it stands for innovation, and that is a really important message that we need to get across. We’ve been consulting extensively with our lawyers, and we can use the term British to promote our food, whether it’s by the government backed AHDB, which is the farming levy body, whether it’s by our campaigns which we run as a government, and I think what’s happening now is we’re seeing different parts of the food industry, the manufacturers, the farmers, the retailers, the hospitality industry, work much more closely together to get that message across about British food, both here in the UK, and in those overseas markets that have such huge potential.
It’s fantastic to be here today Fiona, to celebrate your success with you but also to say that I think we’ve got huge potential over this industry. Let’s get through the 23rd of June, on the right side of the argument and then we will be launching our food and farming 25 year plan. We will be having a major food business summit where we talk about how we’re going to get more investment into the food industry. And I think this can really be an exciting springboard for the future. Thank you.
The speech made by Liz Truss, the then Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, at the Agrihive Conference on 18 November 2015.
We have some of the most exciting and inventive people in our food and farming industry in this country. And one of the things we’re doing is tonight, we’re launching Great British Food, which is a new campaign celebrating those pioneers, but also talking about how we can get the message out about how exciting British food is, how exciting British farming is, and what we are doing here in our industry to make sure that we can compete internationally, as well as make sure we’re buying selling and growing more British food here in our own country. And there’s been a lot of work in the dairy area.
I know a lot of exciting innovations. Only a couple of weeks ago when I announced the extension of the Yorkshire Dales National Park, I visited the Wensleydale Creamery, and I think it’s a brilliant example of a business which operates within a national park. It succeeded in expanding and it does very good job with local farmers, so they are supplying the milk to the dairy. It also promotes itself as a visitor attraction and it’s attracting increasing visitors in the Yorkshire Dales.
In fact I first came across the people from Wensleydale in Paris, when they were at the CL trade fair and their stand was being mobbed by Japanese buyers wanting to buy into that unique product from Yorkshire. It’s a protected product and I think success stories like Wensleydale who’ve now launched their first yoghurt product. This shows what can happen and where dairy businesses can succeed in the future. I’ve said before at the moment we’ve got a big opportunity on products, we still import the majority of our butter and our cheese. We import 40,000 tonnes of cheddar every year which after all, is a British product kicked off here in the UK.
So I think there are opportunities, of course we know that many farmers are struggling at the moment and we’ve worked hard at a European level to secure that additional funding, which will be paid in December. We’re also making sure that the BPS payments go out on time which I know many farmers are concerned about, but what we also need to do whilst making sure we retain the strength of our industry in the short term is building up those longer term opportunities.
So we’re working at looking at the grocery chain adjudicator now at a European level to reflect the nature of the food chain and the way it goes beyond national boundaries. We’re looking at futures markets in dairy to help farmers plan for the future. And we’re consulting on tax averaging over five years to help farmers maintain those long term businesses. We’re also very focused on exports and we’ve seen a 60% increase in dairy exports since 2009. I think there are many more opportunities out there. I’ve highlighted Wensleydale, but we’ve got a whole host of dairy companies coming with us next week on our visit to China on our trade mission to China.
So there are lots of opportunities but I think an event like this Agrihive, that really involves the leaders of the industry. And those working with the industry is really important to get those ideas out there to look at the pioneering efforts across British dairy, because I’m absolutely clear that dairy is a core part of our food and farming industry. You know, we need to not just maintain it for the long term, but also help build up the industry and I think it is the pioneers. It’s the people with ideas, with new ways of doing things, to make sure that we can maintain our productivity, our competitiveness, and really win in those international markets.
It’s really important of course, the government is a very big procurer of food. Last year we launched the Bonfield report, which is all about making it easier for public sector bodies like schools and hospitals to buy British food so they can now look at things like where it’s from, is it local, they can look at the quality of the product, rather than just going on the price and that is having an impact. We are seeing more British dairy bought across the public sector. And I want see more progress on that in the next few years.
So we’re setting an example in government. I think there’s more we can do across the country to support our dairy industry and we are in discussions with supermarkets as well about that, but also, the industry has a major role to play in putting itself forward in grasping those potential. opportunities both here and overseas. But thank you very much for having me along today. It’s a great innovation and I hope to see you all soon. Thank you