Opinion

Alex Kane: Truss is not even pretending to care about Northern Ireland

Alex Kane

Alex Kane

Alex Kane is an Irish News columnist and political commentator and a former director of communications for the Ulster Unionist Party.

In her keynote speech to the Conservative conference, Prime Minister Liz Truss failed to mention the protocol. Photo: Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire
In her keynote speech to the Conservative conference, Prime Minister Liz Truss failed to mention the protocol. Photo: Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire In her keynote speech to the Conservative conference, Prime Minister Liz Truss failed to mention the protocol. Photo: Stefan Rousseau/PA Wire

Liz Truss doesn’t do irony. During her conference speech on Wednesday morning she said: “Wherever there is change, there is disruption and not everybody will be in favour of change.”

Well, now on their fourth prime minister since 2016, along with two general elections, a perpetual Avengers-style civil war and government as soap opera, it is clear that the Conservative party loves disruption. Loves it so much, in fact, that it will change PMs on a regular basis just to fuel disruption.

And don’t you just love the way she talks as though the Conservatives haven’t been in government since 2010?

“For too long our economy has not grown as strongly as it should have done.” “I know what it’s like to live somewhere that isn’t feeling the benefits of economic growth.” “I have seen the boarded-up shops.” “I have seen families struggling to put food on the table.” “Can you get a doctor’s appointment?” “Is it safe to walk down the high street late at night?” “I believe in fiscal responsibility.” “I believe in sound money and the lean state.” “I know how you feel today.”

Of course, she knew how the conference audience (top-heavy with the fully lobotomised) felt. And that’s because the lengthy list of concerns and fears she set out in the speech haven’t been addressed over the last twelve years of Conservative governments. Indeed, in her first three weeks as PM she did more to undermine the economy, push up mortgage and interest rates, stoke inflation and fuel recession than any of her immediate predecessors. The United Kingdom is a more dangerous place now than it was when David Cameron became PM in 2010 and it isn’t going to become safer under her watch.

For good measure she blamed just about everyone else for the failures of the governments she has been a member of: “I will not allow the anti-growth coalition to hold us back. Labour, the Lib Dems and the SNP, the militant unions, the vested interests dressed up as think-tanks, the talking heads, the Brexit deniers and Extinction Rebellion and some of the people we had in the hall earlier. The fact is they prefer protesting to doing. They prefer talking on Twitter to taking tough decisions. They taxi from north London town houses to the BBC studio to dismiss anyone challenging the status quo. From broadcast to podcast, they peddle the same old answers. It's always more taxes, more regulation and more meddling. Wrong, wrong, wrong”.

The status quo she talks about is successive Conservative governments. A Conservative party which has prioritised its own internal angsts over and above everything else. A Conservative party still fighting the battles that began when the UK joined the EEC in 1973. A Conservative party which is already turning on her and plotting against her. A Conservative party which has abandoned its usual middle class membership base for a new demographic which might be described as the Borgiaoisie. A Conservative party so wrapped up in its own psychodrama that it abandoned the role it was elected to fulfil—governing the entire United Kingdom collectively and responsibly.

She is right to say that the status quo is not an option. But a Conservative government—the one she leads for now—is the status quo. So why would we believe her when she asks us to “trust me to do what it takes”? Take her stance on Brexit, for example. She was a rock-solid Remainer who became a rock-solid Leaver. She introduced a bill a few months ago to undo the very protocol she voted for as part of Boris Johnson’s ‘oven ready deal’. Yet now, it seems, she is prepared to go off-piste and reach a softer deal that would negate the need for the bill. Yes, of course we should trust her!

Talking of trust, what should unionists make of the fact that, while Northern Ireland rated a single mention in passing, the protocol wasn’t mentioned at all?

She did say this though: “We are seizing the new-found freedoms outside the European Union. We are the party who got Brexit done and we will realise on the promise of Brexit. We are building an economy which makes the most of the huge opportunities Brexit offers. By the end of the year, all EU-inspired red tape will be history. Instead, we will ensure regulation is pro-business and pro-growth”.

Northern Ireland is clearly not entirely outside the EU, which left an opportunity for the new PM to mention the NI Protocol Bill and her promise of a few months ago to deliver change. But nothing. Not even the smallest of small bones. She didn’t even bother with the pretence of caring. No one at the conference was prepared to hold her feet to the fire on the issue: not even a delegation of local Conservatives, some of whom just appeared to be along for the photo-ops with their latest ‘Dear Leader.”