Liz Truss just can’t help herself.
Lawyers for Britain’s shortest serving prime minister have sent a “cease and desist” letter to her successor-but-one urging him to stop saying she “crashed the economy.”
They said statements by Labour Prime Minister Keir Starmer caused “serious harm to her reputation” and were likely to “materially impact public opinion,” which contributed to Truss losing her South West Norfolk constituency at the general election last year. It made her the first former prime minister to lose their seat in parliament since 1935.
“Their publication is not only extremely damaging but also grossly defamatory and indefensible,” the letter said.
The letter — first published by The Telegraph newspaper — referenced three occasions during the general election campaign in which Starmer mentioned Truss “crashing the economy.” Truss’ mini-budget in September 2022 precipitated market turmoil, sending the pound crashing and reducing investor confidence. She was forced to leave office the following month, but blamed a “deep state” pushback at her tax-cutting policies, which weren’t vetted at the time by the country’s fiscal watchdog.
Truss has argued that financial volatility was instead caused by pension fund mismanagement of investment bonds, known as LDIs, and poor oversight by the Bank of England.
The letter said the absence of any impact on unemployment, gross domestic product growth and the long-term value of sterling meant it could not be classed as an economic crash.
Truss urged the prime minister to “immediately cease and desist” from repeating or republishing the “defamatory statements” and said they hoped the matter can “now be resolved.”
A spokesperson for Starmer said Thursday that the prime minister stood by his previous comments and had no plans to moderate his language.
Truss’ words came amid fresh economic turmoil in the United Kingdom government borrowing costs surged this week to their highest level for 16 years. Treasury Minister Darren Jones insisted Thursday that “financial markets are always evolving” and that there is “no need for any emergency intervention.”
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