UK’s Liz Truss is in danger as the interior minister resigns and lawmakers argue

• British Prime Minister Liz Truss has lost two of her most senior ministers in less than a week.
• Interior minister Suella Braverman resigned over a “technical” violation of government regulations.
• Conservative lawmakers argued in parliament over a vote on fracking for shale gas.

After her interior minister resigned and Conservative lawmakers publicly argued in parliament over a vote on fracking for shale gas, British Prime Minister Liz Truss is struggling to save her position.

With the departure of Suella Braverman on Wednesday due to a “technical” violation of government regulations, Truss has now lost two of her most senior ministers in the span of less than a week. Both of their replacements were elected officials who did not support Truss for the position of prime minister.

Braverman claimed that after breaking the law by emailing a formal document from her personal email account, she resigned. She criticized Truss in her resignation letter by stating that she was “concerned [ed] about the course of this government.”

Governmental operations rely on citizens taking ownership of their errors, she said. “Serious politics” is not acting as if we haven’t made mistakes, acting as if no one can see that we have, and hoping that everything would suddenly turn out okay.

Popular on the right of the Conservative Party and a supporter of more stringent immigration laws, Braverman unsuccessfully stood for party leader in early September, a position gained by Truss.

Grant Shapps, a former Cabinet minister, took over from Braverman as the minister in charge of immigration and law and order.

He is a well-known supporter of Rishi Sunak, the former Treasury secretary who Truss defeated in the Conservative leadership election’s final round.
The debate over whether the vote on fracking was a vote of confidence in Braverman’s administration escalated to physical fighting and shoving among lawmakers hours after her resignation.

With a sizable Conservative majority in Parliament, a call for a fracking ban was easily defeated by 326 votes to 230. However, some lawmakers were upset that Conservative Party whips said the vote would be treated as a motion of no confidence, which would mean the government would fall if the motion was successful.

During and after the vote, there were tense scenes in the House of Commons, and party whips were accused of using coercive methods to win votes. Chris Bryant, a Labour lawmaker, claimed that he “saw members being physically manhandled… and being abused.”

Despite the denials of conservative officials that there had been manhandling, the official record shows that Truss herself did not cast a ballot because of the commotion. The situation of the Conservative Party left many legislators dejected.

Charles Walker, a conservative lawmaker, called it “a disaster and a disgrace.”

He told the BBC, “I hope it was worth it for all those people who put Liz Truss in [office].” “The damage they have done to our party is immense,” the Cabinet member said, “therefore I hope it was worthwhile to sit around the Cabinet table.”

Truss, who has been in office for less than six weeks, has been fighting for her political life since she unveiled a “mini-budget” on September 23, an economic plan featuring large unfunded tax cuts that rocked the financial world.

A few lawmakers have publicly called for her resignation, and others have considered a possible replacement. Following the events in parliament, there were claims that both the disciplinary officer and deputy for the Conservative party had resigned.

When asked on television if the rumors were accurate, business minister Jacob Rees-Mogg responded, “I’m not fully clear on what the issue is.”

Later, according to Truss’ office, both stayed in their positions, but the incident highlighted the government’s disarray and the prime minister’s waning influence.

The extraordinary events occurred just days after Truss sacked Kwasi Kwarteng, her Treasury chief, after their economic plan, which included $50.4 billion in unfunded tax cuts totaling 45 billion pounds, caused the pound to crash, interest rates to skyrocket, and The Bank of England to step in.

On Monday, Kwarteng’s successor, Jeremy Hunt, reversed nearly all of Truss’ tax cuts as well as her signature energy program and pledge to avoid cutting public spending.

Before he releases a medium-term budget strategy on October 31, he claimed the government will need to make “many unpleasant decisions” and save billions of pounds.

William Wragg, a conservative lawmaker, announced that he had joined a small group of others in writing a letter of no confidence in the prime minister. After the mini-budget, Wragg claimed he was “ashamed” to face the electorate.

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