Free Republic

SNIP Her successor – due to be announced next week – will be the country´s third Prime Minister this year. So what on earth caused this mess? There are a number of reasons. But some of them are ones that America could learn from. SNIP All of the Western world is now suffering economic turmoil and cost of living crises. Nobody who is in power is going to look good at such a time. But it was the choice of politicians in Britain – as it was in America – to pump out free money since 2008. We did so...

Prime Minister Liz Truss has been on a media tour defending her tax-cutting ‘mini-budget’ amid fierce criticism from the left and central bankers. Truss, who is attempting to boost growth by, among other things, cutting green levies and, controversially, the top 45 per cent rate of income tax for earnings over £150,000 — rather than the 40 per cent rate of income tax on earning from £50,000 to £150,000, which impacts mainly on the squeezed middle class — has been accused of “undercutting” the country’s central bank, which is largely unaccountable to the government, by Mark Carney, its former governor.

Liz Truss, the U.K.'s new prime minister, billed herself to the public as that, but the mess she's made of the British economy, which includes a cave-in on a proposed tax cut, is pretty much the opposite of What Thatcher Would Do. According to Fox News:The U.K. is canceling plans to impose a major tax cut for the nation's top tax bracket following widespread frustration and market chaos, U.K. Prime Minister Liz Truss announced Monday.Truss' plan had called for eliminating the U.K.'s highest tax bracket, resulting in major cut for citizens making more than $168,000 annually. Truss and her government...

London (AFP) – Embattled British Prime Minister Liz Truss on Thursday faced more calls from her own party to step down after a key minister quit and lawmakers rebelled during "a day of extraordinary mayhem". Truss is being urged to resign just six weeks into office after a forced U-turn on disastrous tax cuts that caused a market meltdown during an already severe cost-of-living crisis. Right-wing broadsheet The Times reported the prime minister was "clinging to power", and cited a Truss supporter in her cabinet as saying: "It's terminal." Its tabloid sister paper The Sun ran the front page headline...

44 days

Liz Truss is to resign as prime minister after just six weeks, Sky News understands. Her time in office has been dominated by market chaos prompted by the mini-budget that was announced by former chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng last month. Developing...

The prime minister is facing calls to resign from within her own party just six weeks after entering Number 10, following the economic turmoil in the wake of the mini-budget. Tory MPs Crispin Blunt, Andrew Bridgen and Jamie Wallis have all publicly stated they believe she should resign, as Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer accused Ms Truss of being "in office but not in power". The Daily Mail reported that Tory MPs will try to oust Ms Truss this week, with more than 100 ready to submit letters of no confidence. It comes after the PM dramatically ditched a major...

LONDON — British Prime Minister Liz Truss has fired her finance minister, Kwasi Kwarteng, as she fights to hang on as prime minister after her budget crashed the markets. Truss will give a press conference later Friday, amid reports of another imminent U-turn on significant parts of her plan to cut taxes. Downing Street announced Jeremy Hunt, who has previously served as health secretary and foreign secretary, would replace Kwarteng as chancellor. Despite several attempts to calm the markets, including reversing a plan to cut tax for the highest earners and bringing forward a more detailed budget statement, Truss has...

LONDON — The British government has dropped plans to cut income tax for top earners, part of a package of unfunded cuts that sparked turmoil on financial markets and sent the pound to record lows. Treasury chief Kwasi Kwarteng said Monday that he will not scrap the top 45% rate of income tax paid on earnings above 150,000 pounds ($167,000) a year. “We get it, and we have listened,” he said in a statement. The U-turn comes as more lawmakers from the governing Conservative Party turn on government tax plans announced 10 days ago. It also comes hours after the...

British Prime Minister Liz Truss is going big. Her Chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, has unveiled an aggressive program of permanent tax cuts. The Wall Street Journal likes the plan:Mr. Kwarteng axed the 2.5-percentage-point increase in the payroll tax imposed by former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and canceled a planned increase in the corporate income tax rate to 26% from 19%. … Kwarteng also surprised by eliminating the 45% tax rate on incomes above £150,000. The top marginal rate now will be 40%.As a percentage of GDP, it shapes up as the biggest British tax cut since 1972. From the Telegraph:As you...

Environmentalists are threatening legal action in an attempt to halt the development of a new gasfield in the North Sea that has been given the green light by the UK government. Climate experts reacted with anger after the government announced it had given the Jackdaw field, to be developed by the oil multinational Shell, “final regulatory approval” on Wednesday. The business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, said: “Jackdaw gasfield – originally licensed in 1970 – has today received final regulatory approval. We’re turbocharging renewables and nuclear but we are also realistic about our energy needs now. Let’s source more of the gas...

More industry leaders have warned that factories could close this winter as soaring energy costs eat into profitability. They said the production of items and materials ranging from toys, clothes, chocolate, paper, glass, lime, cement, ceramics and chemicals is on the line. A worst-case scenario could see steel plants close for good. The business secretary Kwasi Kwarteng met with representatives of energy-intensive trades who said electricity costs were up five times on normal levels. Taking aim afterwards, UK Steel’s Gareth Stace said the government has done ‘nothing’ to alleviate the crisis. By contrast, he claimed several European governments were investing...

LONDON (Reuters) -The British steel industry's lobby group warned on Monday of an impending crisis due to soaring wholesale energy prices which could force plants into expensive shutdowns, stoke emissions and sow chaos through supply chains. A shortage of natural gas in Europe had sent prices for electricity and gas soaring, triggering sharp rises in the prices paid by people heating their homes or for major heavy industrial plants smelting steel. "These extraordinary electricity prices are leading to smaller or wiped-out profits and thus to less reinvestment," UK Steel, which lobbies on behalf of the British steel industry, said in...

It might have already happened if it wasn't for Brexit.Talks of a Tesla Gigafactory U.K. are back. The location would be in Somerset, England at a 635-acre smart campus called Gravity that’s currently under development.Minister of State for Business, Energy, and Clean Growth Kwasi Kwarteng said the government is considering the site for a Tesla Gigafactory. The minister believes the Somerset location will be able to sustain a Tesla Gigafactory. Gravity is a good candidate because it’s one of the few locations in England large enough to house a factory of that size. Not only that, it’s located near the...