Embattled British Prime Minister Liz Truss faced fresh woes on Thursday after a prominent Conservative party insider said some of her own MPs were considering pushing for two of her former rivals to replace her.
“All sorts of different people are talking about all sorts of different things because the Conservative backbenchers are casting around for a possible replacement for (finance minister) Kwasi Kwarteng, even for a possible replacement for Liz Truss,” Paul Goodman told the BBC.
The former Tory MP, who is editor of the influential ConservativeHome blog, said that less than 40 days into her premiership “all sorts of names are being thrown about” to replace the beleaguered leader.
They included former finance minister Rishi Sunak, who stood against Truss for the leadership of the Tory Party and “even Boris Johnson”, who she replaced as premier and party leader early last month.
“One idea doing the rounds is that Penny Mordaunt and Rishi Sunak, who, after all, between them got pretty much two-thirds of the votes of MPs (in the leadership contest), come to some kind of arrangement and essentially take over.”
Mordaunt, a former defence minister, also stood against Truss, and is currently a member of her government.
