What happens if Liz Truss resigns today?
Prime Minister Liz Truss has had the worst start to her premiership than any other PM. And the last 48 hours in Westminster have been chaos.
There are rumours that the Liz Truss era is fast approaching its end, and many are plotting to oust her from No 10.
She has only been in the job since September 5.
In that time, the Queen died, Liz Truss crashed the economy, her mini-budget has been ripped up and replaced with policies that she campaigned against during the leadership race, she fired her chancellor and replaced him with a Rishi Sunak supporter, her home secretary resigned and offered up a scathing letter and there were reports of bullying from her cabinet at last night’s Commons vote.
Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng was fired after the mini-budget spooked the financial markets. Many argue that Truss should have gone with him as it was her financial vision as his.
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How does a Tory leadership election work?
According to the 1922 Committee, an incumbent Tory PM cannot face a confidence vote within their first year on the job. But there is speculation that this rule could be changed.
After that 12-month period, to trigger a contest vote, 15 per cent of Tory MPs would have to submit letters of no confidence to 1922 Committee chair, Sir Graham Brady. If at least 50 per cent of MPs then vote no-confidence in their leader, a leadership election begins.
Tory MPs who want to be in the race for the top job will then seek nominations from their colleagues. There will be a series of ballots which will see all the candidates whittled down to just two. The rank and file of the Conservative party will then choose the winner.
Boris Johnson won the general election in 2019 and although he was ousted and replaced with Truss there is no requirement for the Conservative party to call a general election.
Some MPs are understood to want to avoid putting the vote back to the ordinary members of the party. The Telegraph says some MPs want the parliamentary party to choose Truss’s successor, though others warn that this would require a complicated rule change.
This aligns with newspaper reports that say the Tories want to put Rishi Sunak and Penny Mordaunt in office on a “golden ticket” type deal.
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What happens if Liz Truss resigns today?
If Liz Truss resigns as Conservative leader and Prime Minister today, a leadership contest would begin.
Those wanting to get into No 10 would begin trying to get support for their campaign.
However, it is possible that the Tory parliamentary party could rally around a single candidate for the leadership. This would perhaps be seen as a better option as it will avoid time-wasting.
If Truss does not resign and attempts to cling on to power against the will of MPs and peers, the 1922 Committee could and would likely change the rules to allow an early challenge to her (changing the 12-month rule). This would likely see her removal from both leadership of the party and as prime minister.
Can we have a general election?
Labour and Liberal Democrats are amongst those calling for an early general election. But the government is not legally obliged to hold another general election before January 2025 – surely to the delight of Conservatives as the latest opinion polls suggest the Tories would lose most of their seats.
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Cliff Notes
- The UK government has announced an £18 million plan to train oil and gas workers for roles in the expanding clean energy sector, amid a decline projected to result in 40,000 job losses by the early 2030s.
- The initiative aims to create 400,000 additional green jobs by 2030, with a focus on skills transferability and establishing “Technical Excellence Colleges” for targeted training.
- Unions have welcomed the plan but stress the need for substantial investment in a domestic supply chain to ensure the creation of actual jobs in the green Economy.
Oil and gas workers offered cash to retrain, in major plan for future clean energy workforce | Science, Climate & Tech News
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Ministers have unveiled their flagship plan to train and recruit workers for the booming clean energy sector, which it is hoping to supercharge in the next five years.
Up to £18m of new money has been pledged by the UK and Scottish governments specifically to move those working in the oil and gas sector into new roles.
Their jobs are about to fall off a cliff as the industry declines, with at least 40,000 of the current 115,000 jobs forecast to disappear by the early 2030s.
Almost all of those roles are thought to be fairly easily transferable into green industries – requiring little more than a few months of extra training.
But in the absence of government help, workers have been moving abroad, industry says, taking with them the expertise Britain badly needs to for its new greener energy system.
And it has left them feeling forgotten about after years of working to keep the lights on, and increasingly swayed by Reform UK, both GMB and Unite unions have warned Labour.
Pledge to double green jobs by 2030
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband told Sky News that creating jobs in sectors like carbon capture and storage and hydrogen would help “create a future for those in the North Sea communities”.
The new £18m will pay for careers advice, training, and “skills passports” to enable oil and gas workers to make the switch without having to repeat qualifications.
The cash was announced on Sunday in the new Clean Energy Jobs Plan, which details how the government hopes to make good on its promise to double green jobs by 2030.
Mr Miliband said in an interview: “This plan shows 400,000 extra jobs in the clean energy economy by 2030.
“This isn’t a target. This is actually what we believe is necessary to meet all the plans we have across the economy.”
The first strategy of its kind hopes to plug the UK’s massive skills gap that threatens to derail the government’s target to green the electricity system by 2030.
It identifies 31 priority occupations that are particularly in demand, such as plumbers, electricians and welders, and lists a target to convert five colleges into new “Technical Excellence Colleges” to train workers.
‘You can’t train people for jobs that aren’t there’
Unions welcomed the plan, but pointed out that skills and training do not equate to new jobs.
They say it will mean nothing without extra money and a revitalised domestic supply chain to build all the green technology needed, from fibreglass wind turbines to aluminium sub-sea cables.
Sharon Graham, the Unite general secretary who has threatened to cut ties with Labour over its policy to end North Sea oil and gas drilling and watering down of a ban on zero-hours contracts, welcomed the “initial steps” but called for “an equally ambitious programme of public investment”.
Professor Paul de Leeuw from the Energy Transition Institute in Aberdeen said the plan was “genuinely new and different”, and had for the first time joined up relevant information and strategies in one place.
But “you can’t train people for jobs that aren’t there”, he added, also calling for an investment plan.f
Reform heartlands could benefit from Labour’s jobs plan
The boom in clean energy jobs stands to benefit Reform heartlands along the east coast of Britain.
That fact is more by luck than design, given the east coast’s proximity to offshore wind farms and carbon capture and storage fields in the North Sea.
Reform promises a radically different vision for the country’s future, based on reopening coal mines and maxing out nuclear power and what’s left of North Sea oil and gas to boost jobs and the economy.
Its deputy leader, Richard Tice, objects to land being used for solar panels and pylons.
Government modelling forecasts an additional 35,000 direct jobs in Scotland, 55,000 in the East of England and 50,000 in the North West.
To keep the unions sweet, the government will also have to follow through on its pledge to boost the rights of those working offshore in green energy.
A current loophole gives protections like the minimum wage to oil and gas workers in UK territorial seas, but not to workers in the clean energy sector.
