Truss’ first move as Prime Minister: assembling her right-wing dream team

My sympathies to whoever runs the Prime Minister’s official Twitter account, who was forced to spend much of last night sharing updates on appointments to Liz Truss’ cabinet. And what a team the new PM has assembled. Incoming Business Secretary Jacob Rees-Mogg, whose brief will include energy, has blamed “climate alarmism” for high energy prices, said the government wants to extract “every last drop” of oil and gas from the North Sea and expressed support for restarting fracking. The British Pregnancy Advisory Service has described new Health Secretary Therese Coffey’s record on abortion rights as “deeply concerning”, while Home Secretary Suella Braverman is expected to take an even harder stance on migration than her predecessor Priti Patel (who, let’s not forget, championed the government’s Rwanda scheme). And, in Chloe Smith, we have a Work and Pensions Secretary who voted for a reduction in spending on benefits on 49 occasions.

The TUC has slammed the economic vision of Truss and her Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, describing it as “ideological and reckless”. Writing in the Financial Times ahead of his confirmation as Chancellor, Kwarteng said growth would be at the centre of Truss’ plan for the economy. But the TUC said Truss’ stance on workers’ rights was “completely at odds” with any plan for real economic growth. The new Prime Minister is reportedly planning to review existing EU worker protections, such as the 48-hour working week, in an attempt to “improve the competitiveness of the UK economy”. The union body declared that workers now face a “double whammy” as the government threatens to “rip up” their legal rights while at the same time attacking their ability to defend their working conditions through strike action.

In an exclusive interview with LabourList, due to be published in full later today, Frances O’Grady said she has no faith that the government is going to have a “road to Damascus conversion” on workers’ rights. “We know that parts of the Conservative Party have long had precious rights, like limits on unsafe working hours, in their sights. They want to attack them, they want to attack the 48-hour a week maximum. They want to attack paid holidays and rights to rest breaks. And we’re saying hands off, because you’ll pay a heavy political price for making working lives worse,” the TUC general secretary declared.

The union body released polling today showing strong support among voters of all parties for strengthening workers’ rights. The research found that 74% of respondents were in favour of ending ‘fire and rehire’, rising to 77% among Conservative voters. 68% of those surveyed supported a ban on zero-hours contracts – including 66% of Tory voters – while 77% were in favour of the introduction of ‘fair pay agreements’ across whole sectors, rising to 78% among Conservatives. Commenting on the findings, O’Grady told LabourList: “We’re sending a big message to Liz Truss, which is: ‘Don’t be the Prime Minister for P&O.’  Slashing workers’ rights is not going to deliver growth. On the contrary, it will hurt the country and hurt working people.”