Within the span of three months, No 10 has seen a total of three prime ministers: Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and the recently appointed Rishi Sunak. This marks the fifth Prime Minister in six years and presents a sharp contrast to the 28 year period between 1979-2007 which saw a more conventional turnover of just three prime ministers– Thatcher, Major and Blair.

Following the resignation of Johnson, Liz Truss secured her first, and only (it would seem), victory in the Conservative Party leadership election. She became Britain’s third female prime minister and along with Kwasi Kwarteng, her Chancellor, introduced a controversial mini-budget including tax cuts of £45bn, funded largely by heavy government borrowing of up to £60bn. This led to economic turmoil with the value of the pound almost reaching parity with the US dollar, which in turn led to the Bank of England announcing an extensive emergency government bond-buying scheme of up to £65bn in an attempt to stabilise the pound and protect pension funds. (For more details, see the New Prime Minister’s Policies). Politically, Liz Truss also suffered a heavy blow. This is best exemplified by the 33% lead for Labour, the biggest opposition party, and the loss of Kwarteng, her long-time political ally, who she fired and replaced with Jeremy Hunt after witnessing the mass disapproval of their economic policies. To add the icing on top of an increasingly unstable cake, her trusted aide and Home Secretary Suella Braverman announced her resignation after sharing an official document from her personal email address with a colleague in Parliament in what she claims as “an honest mistake”. In her resignation letter, Braverman was highly critical of Truss’ leadership.

“Pretending we haven't made mistakes, carrying on as if everyone can't see that we have made them, and hoping that things will magically come right is not serious polities. I have made a mistake; I accept responsibility: I resign.”

It became apparent that these concerns Braverman voiced were those shared by the majority of her Tory peers as the day after her letter, on the 20th October Liz Truss announced her resignation and the end of her 45 day premiership. She claimed that after speaking with Sir Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 Committee (that consists of all Conservative backbench MPs), she believed she could not "deliver the mandate" on which she was elected by the Conservative Party. This made her the shortest-serving Prime Minister of the UK and sparked yet another Conservative Party leadership election that would determine the next Prime Minister.

Rishi Sunak, who was Chancellor under Johnson’s premiership and who had previously lost to Truss in the July leadership election, emerged as her successor. His main competition was largely said to be ex-Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Penny Mordaunt, a popular candidate who ranked third in the previous Conservative leadership election. Ultimately however, despite his rush back home in the middle of his holiday in the Caribbean, Johnson decided not to formally enter the race and Mordaunt was forced to withdraw after failing to produce 100 nominations from Conservative MPs. Rishi Sunak’s subsequent appointment as the Prime Minister made him the first British-Asian and first Hindu to hold the office.

Despite this impressive accolade, it seems that only time will tell how effective Sunak’s premiership will be.

by Connie Kiew

The Unprecedented Story of Three Prime Ministers in Three Months