Liz Truss will call for unity from European leaders to “address the fundamental causes” of energy and migration challenges as she attempts to move beyond splits within her party.
The Prime Minister will attend a summit of European leaders in Prague on Thursday, with French president Emmanuel Macron among those she is expected to meet.
Ms Truss travels to the Czech Republic for the meeting of the European Political Community after a difficult Conservative Party conference dominated by internal division and backbench opposition to some of her key policies.
Nadine Dorries supported Liz Truss’s campaign to be Conservative Party leader (Kirsty O’Connor/PA)
Conservative former cabinet minister Nadine Dorries, a backer of Ms Truss during the leadership race, warned that the PM needs to change course or risk leading the Tories to a landslide defeat at the next general election.
Ms Dorries told The Times: “I understand that we need to rocket-booster growth but you don’t do that by throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You don’t win elections by lurching to the right and deserting the centre ground for Keir Starmer to place his flag on.
“If we continue down this path, we absolutely will be facing a Stephen Harper-type wipeout. I’m sure she’s listened and will stop and rethink.”
Former Canadian prime minister Mr Harper lost power to Justin Trudeau in the 2015 election.
It was also reported the Conservatives have stopped working with Isaac Levido, the Australian political strategist who played a key role in the Tory election win in 2019.
Lee Cain, former communications chief to Ms Truss’s predecessor Boris Johnson, said it was a “monumental error” given that Mr Levido helped spearhead the “best election campaign in decades”.
Ms Truss is expected to meet Mr Macron for a bilateral meeting on Thursday after holding talks with him during a UN summit in New York last month.
Downing Street said Ms Truss’s talks with Mr Macron and Dutch prime minister Mark Rutte will focus on migration and aim to secure progress on joint operations to disrupt people-trafficking gangs.
No 10 added that the Prime Minister will encourage countries to act more quickly to end Europe’s reliance on Russian energy supplies in light of its invasion of Ukraine.
Ms Truss is expected to tell the opening plenary session in Prague: “Europe is facing its biggest crisis since the Second World War. And we have faced it together with unity and resolve.
“We must continue to stand firm – to ensure that Ukraine wins this war, but also to deal with the strategic challenges that it has exposed.”
Ms Truss will seek to stress the UK’s role in European matters – including Ukraine – despite leaving the EU, Downing Street said.
The Prime Minister will say: “The threat was left to fester for far too long. Now, at last, we are tackling Putin’s aggression head on.
“And we should take the same approach with other challenges before us – including long-standing regional issues like energy and migration.
“Instead of the old approach which merely dealt with the symptoms, it’s time to address the fundamental causes.”
Ms Truss is expected to join Czech premier Petr Fiala for a working lunch.
As foreign secretary she was a sceptic of the planned summit, so her decision to attend has caused some surprise.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel