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Liz Truss, the new British foreign minister appointed by Boris Johnson a month earlier, remembers the Iron Lady by her nature, but also by her liberal ideology. Liz Truss is the Conservative Party’s most popular figure among activists today, in charge of the deployment of the United Kingdom’s new international policy, free from the European Union.
Liz Truss announced: “ [Le Royaume-Uni] He is always at his best when he is outward looking, optimistic and confident. This is the UK I want to see: patriotic and positive. People want to be proud of their country, they are fed up with decadent rhetoric about our place in the world. We are a great country: a modern, liberal country that succeeds thanks to free enterprise.»
Smiling, always elegant in her brightly colored suit, Liz Truss is the energetic, spirited and increasingly popular type. “She likes to put herself forward. She takes a lot of photos and is very active on Instagram.“, comments Jill Rutter, researcher at the think tank “UK in a Changing Europe”
«He’s incredibly optimistic, you’ll rarely hear him say something discouraging. She behaves like a coach who will be there to inspire the UK. And in this she is probably a member of the government that has the most affinity for Boris Johnson.she adds.
See also: United Kingdom: Boris Johnson expected on several fronts at Conservative Party’s annual congress
Post-Brexit economic strategy ambassador
Supported from the first hour of the Prime Minister, she is the ambassador of “Global Britain”, the new coalition as Jill Rutter, as part of the Brexit strategy and analysis of the British conquest of new markets.
She focuses on how to maximize the chances of Brexit… and relations with the EU are not high on her priority list! This was very clear in his speech at the Conservative Party convention last month: he barely mentioned Europe. She is an Atlanticist, close to the United States and Canada, and she defends rapprochement with the Indo-Pacific zone. In addition, just before that, as Minister of Commerce, he secured about sixty contracts, notably with Asian countries, Australia and New Zealand.
Practicality and efficiency are its watchdogs. She directly follows her neo-liberal view of the economy and international relations, but for the rest, her ideological background is not very marked: she didn’t really get wet during the referendum on Brexit, for example.
«She always keeps an eye on her career. At first, it supported the “Riemen” camp, perhaps to remain loyal to the then Prime Minister David Cameron, who did not want to leave the European Union. But then when the tide turned, it was not difficult for him to switch sides. partly, perhaps, because it’s not the first time“Says Jamie Gaskarth, a professor of political science at the Open University, who continues:”At university, she was one of the Liberal Democrats. Basically, free trade, deregulation of markets, reducing taxes, reducing the role of government, promoting trade relations and this is an ideological background that works very well at the grassroots level.».
Youngest Minister in the History of the British Government
The daughter of a father who was a maths teacher and a mother who was a nurse, she became Environment Minister in 2014, the youngest woman appointed to the government in British history. An opportunity for this ambitious 45-year-old woman to express her freedom of mind and her humour.
«I grew up in a left-wing family where we talked about Marx and Trotsky at the dinner table. my mom took me to a performance, i put up signs [contre Margaret Thatcher]. I haven’t done ballet, I’ve never owned a horse! The most useful thing I learned was to be heard in a crowd. But unlike others who remained in the leftist mold, I rebelled. I have become a conservative!», explains Liz Truss.
Today she is the most popular figure in the British Conservative Party. The rising star for whom a step is yet to be taken, that one day, who knows, about the Prime Minister.