Liz Truss slams ‘enemies of enterprise’ as she doubles down on case for slashing taxes in Tory conference speech
LIZ Truss yesterday blasted the “enemies of enterprise” who are holding Britain back — and gave her three priorities for our economy: Growth, growth and growth.
In her first conference speech as Tory leader, the Prime Minister doubled down on her case for slashing taxes.
She said letting people keep more of their wages was “morally the right thing to do”.
Her bid to rally the troops at the end of the gathering in Birmingham was briefly disturbed by anti-fracking protesters — capping a week marred by Cabinet warfare over her tax plans and benefit cuts.
But the PM ploughed on as the protesters were thrown out, using her speech to divide the world into grafters versus grifters.
She slammed an “anti-growth coalition” of opposition parties, unions, wonks, eco-zealots, talking heads and Brexit-deniers who “prefer protesting to doing.”
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She accused them of moaning on Twitter over “taking tough decisions” as “they taxi from North London townhouses to the BBC studio to dismiss anyone challenging the status quo”.
And she claimed they think strikers and “the people who stick themselves to trains, roads and buildings” are heroes.
She added: “From broadcast to podcast, they peddle the same old answers. It’s always more taxes, more regulation and more meddling. Wrong, wrong, wrong.”
Instead she stated her “growth, growth, and growth” priorities.
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In a passionate defence of hardworking taxpayers, the PM said these “enemies of enterprise’’ do not “understand the British people, they don’t understand aspiration”.
She added: “The real heroes are the people who go out to work, take responsibility and aspire to a better life for themselves and their families and I am on their side.
“My friends, does this anti-growth coalition have any idea who pays their wages?
“It’s the people who make things in factories across our country. It’s the people who get up at the crack of dawn to go to work. It’s the commuters who get trains into towns and cities across our country.
“I’m thinking of the white van drivers, the hairdressers, the plumbers, the accountants, the IT workers and millions of others up and down the UK.
“The anti-growth coalition just doesn’t get it. This is because they don’t face the same challenges as normal working people.
“These enemies of enterprise don’t know the frustration you feel to see your road blocked by protesters, or the trains off due to a strike.
In fact, their friends on the hard Left tend to be the ones behind the disruption.”
In a swipe at the Tory rebels undermining her premiership, the PM said: “I know how it feels to have your potential diminished by those who think they know better.”
She added that she is used to being treated differently “for being female, or for not fitting in”, but insisted this only made her more “determined to change things”.
In a bid to quell market unease over her borrowing plans, Ms Truss insisted she would make “difficult but necessary choices” in a hint at looming spending cuts.
She also said she would reduce the size of the public debt, but failed to explain when or how.
She reaffirmed her pledge to raise defence spending to three per cent of national output by 2030 — meaning cuts will have to be found elsewhere.
‘The status quo is not an option’
Ms Truss said: “This mission will be difficult but necessary. We have no alternative if we want to get our economy growing again.
“I am ready to make hard choices. You can trust me to do what it takes. The status quo is not an option. That is why we cannot give into the voices of decline.”
But after days of plunging popularity in the polls, the PM admitted: “As the last few weeks have shown, it will be difficult.”
In her 34-minute speech, she said she was in “lockstep” with her “dynamic” Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng despite the humiliating U-turn on scrapping the 45p top rate of tax.
The PM outlined her fury at the 70-year high tax burden and her intention to make Brits richer as she grows the economy and brings down the nation’s debt. She said: “Cutting taxes is the right thing to do morally and economically.
“Morally, because the state does not spend its own money. It spends the people’s.
“Economically, because if people keep more of their own money, they are inspired to do more of what they do best.”
The Government was rocked by reaction from their own MPs and the markets following Mr Kwarteng’s mini-Budget. He will now come forward with a growth plan.
Labour hit out at Ms Truss saying that as a minister she had been at heart of building a Tory economy that has “led to flat wages and low growth”.
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But the Taxpayers Alliance’ said the PM was “right to give both barrels to the enemies of enterprise”
It added: “To go for growth, Britain has to break free from the shackles of our gruelling tax system and the sluggish status quo.”