Tory leadership race: Rishi Sunak vs Liz Truss: who won the TV debate?
After weeks of political turmoil in the United Kingdom, the race for the Tory leadership race has been narrowed down to two – former chancellor Rishi Sunak and foreign secretary Liz Truss.
The Tory leadership battle has so far been a case of vicious blue-on-blue attacks as the two battle it out to replace Boris Johnson.
TV debates are a popular way to engage the public in politics, but following the ITV debate, many accepted the main winner was the Labour party as the Tory candidates pulled each other apart.
It led to Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss pulling out of the next tv debate, but now it’s whittled down to the two of them, they agreed for their first head-on-head tv debate. And it was as expected, vicious and ugly.
So who won? Newspapers such as the Daily Mail and Express say Liz Truss, while more left-leaning papers aren’t so convinced.
Some papers point out that the real winner of this TV debate, like others, is the Labour party.
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The Times says Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss ignored the pleas from the Tory party to end the blue-on-blue attacks. Whilst the Guardian said the debate was “acrimonious” and describes the repeated clashes as “deeply damaging.”
“Gloves are off: Tory contest turns nasty” – that’s the headline splashed on the front of the i. The Daily Mail says the “fiery” debate will only have helped Labour, whilst the Daily Express says the “great divide” between the two candidates comes down to one question – should we cut tax now or later.
The Metro looks at Rishi Sunak’s concerns about Liz Truss’s plans for the economy and has the headline: “You’ll lose us the next election”.
The Daily Telegraph highlights Liz Truss’s likening Rishi Sunak to Gordon Brown and quotes her saying his refusal to cut tax would drive Britain into a recession. The paper also sets out what it says was a “fierce battle to spin the debate” which broke out moments after the broadcast.
The Daily Mail splashes with Ms Truss’s vow to stop “militant action from trade unions”, saying she wants to raise the minimum threshold of support for strike action and double the required notice period to four weeks. The Guardian claims the unions are furious and quotes Mick Lynch calling the proposals “the biggest attack on trade union and civil rights since labour unions were legalised in 1871.”
- Rishi Sunak claims Liz Truss will ‘tip millions into misery’
- Liz Truss accuses Rishi Sunak of ‘Project Fear’ in furious row over tax as Tory pair lock horns in TV debate
- Truss v Sunak: a sorry spectacle of playground bragging from a party without a purpose
- The Tory TV debates are like I’m a Celeb or Strictly, but without a public phone-in
- Liz Truss vs Rishi Sunak: The next Tory leader will have to unite a broken party
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