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Out of the Blue review – the rise and fall of Liz Truss

How did Liz Truss become the seven-week prime minister? This juicy tale of high political farce hints at an answer

Famously, she was the first British prime minister to be outlasted by a lettuce.

More pertinently for the book industry, however, Liz Truss was also the first to unravel almost faster than a biographer can type. She quit eight days before the Sun’s political editor Harry Cole and Spectator diarist James Heale were due to deliver a portrait already being written at breakneck speed, and for a book to emerge at all in the circumstances arguably represents something of a heroic technical achievement. True, the writing is clunky in places. But nobody is going to be buying this book for its literary elegance; the point is to rubberneck at what remains of the crash site, and if that isn’t what Cole, Heale or most of their interviewees originally intended to deliver – well, life comes at you fast in British politics nowadays.

What emerges is a book of two parts, the second of which focuses heavily on her seven weeks in prime ministerial office and is essentially a Sunday newspaper long read on acid. Most of the clues as to what went wrong however lie in the first part, a very readable gallop through Truss’s childhood as the daughter of Guardian-reading, mildly eccentric leftwing parents, via her political awakening at university – first as a free market Lib Dem, then as libertarian Conservative – right the way through to her stint as foreign secretary, careering round the world in pursuit of the perfect Instagram shot. (It was during this stage that her ministerial “rider” was said to include multiple espressos in a flat white-sized cup and a bottle of sauvignon blanc chilling at every overnight stay.)

I was intrigued by Truss’s mother, Priscilla, who briefly moved to eastern Europe in the 1970s to “try out life under the communists”, took her children on Greenham Common protests and made herself a bright yellow banana costume in which to promote fair trade back home in Leeds. When Truss recalls schoolmates shouting “saw your mum in Tesco’s dressed as a banana again”, other 70s children of free-thinking parents may understand her seeming obliviousness to criticism a little better. You don’t grow up with a banana-clad mother, I suspect, without developing a certain sturdiness.

Obliviousness isn’t always a blessing in politics however, as becomes clear in her first job as early years minister under David Cameron. Truss had hatched a plan to cut childcare costs by slashing the number of adults required to supervise children, which unsurprisingly proved controversial. Instead of patiently trying to build public and political support for it, she simply put her head down and charged – much as she would a decade later with her mini-budget, and about as successfully. All young politicians make mistakes. What’s unusual about Truss is that the lesson she seemingly took from hers was to believe in herself even more, and listen to others even less.

An appetite for risk-taking emerges early. The authors recount sympathetically the well-trodden story of how an earlier extramarital affair with the married former Tory MP Mark Field nearly wrecked Truss’s search for a parliamentary seat, rightly noting the double standard that it never seemed to damage Field. But they also touch on some of the more explosive smears circulated about her during the leadership contest – including claims of an affair with an aide, allegations of predatory behaviour towards staff, and even one wild suggestion that there might be a sex tape of her in circulation. The authors interviewed her twice but their planned third session was canned when she resigned, so perhaps they simply never got to put these to her.

Despite his professional closeness to Truss, Cole and his co-author strive to put some distance between them in their final reflections on where it all went wrong. Putting aside her own fear, reportedly expressed to a visitor to the Foreign Office, that “I am weird and I don’t have any friends”, plausible theories for her implosion include that vaulting self-belief (even in her post-resignation speech to staff, she was still insisting she’d been on the right track) and determination to put the wrong people in cabinet.

But it’s perhaps significant too that she had got away with so much in the past, leading to an overconfidence about her ability to wing it – as she did even in the early days of her leadership campaign. If there’s one thing missing from this juicy tale of high political farce, it’s arguably a more unsparing account of what allowed a politician so flawed to rise so high at the expense of us all: a previous leader promoting her to spite his rivals, a dysfunctional Conservative party, but also an indulgent rightwing press that turned on her only when it was too late. Less a drama from “out of the blue”, perhaps, than a car crash waiting to happen.

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Who Is Liz Truss?

Oxford-born Liz Truss began her political rise as a Conservative MP from South West Norfolk in 2010. She became the youngest female cabinet member in British history in 2014, the first female lord chancellor in 2016 and the first female Conservative foreign secretary in 2021. Truss won her party's race to replace U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson in September 2022, but her tenure was marred by ill-fated economic proposals. She announced her resignation just six weeks later.

How Old Is Liz Truss?

Mary Elizabeth Truss was born in Oxford, England, on July 26, 1975.

Early Years and Education

Following another year abroad in British Columbia, Canada, Truss returned to England to attend the comprehensive Roundhay School in Leeds. Although she later criticized her educational experience at Roundhay, her sterling grades resulted in acceptance to the University of Oxford's Merton College.

An ardent member and eventual president of Oxford's Liberal Democrats, Truss advocated for the legalization of cannabis and famously denounced the monarchy in one speech. She also was involved with Oxford's Hayek Society, which celebrated the work of Austrian-British economist Friedrich Hayek, before graduating in 1996 with a degree in philosophy, politics and economics.

Early Career

Truss joined Shell as a graduate trainee in 1996 and settled in as a commercial manager for the energy giant. She then moved on to the telecommunications company Cable & Wireless, where she served as economics director until her departure in 2005.

Her political ambitions crystalizing, Truss became deputy director of the public services think tank Reform from 2008-10, during which time she contributed to papers about educational and economic policy.

Member of Parliament

After switching to the Conservative Party in 1996, Truss unsuccessfully ran for the House of Commons as a candidate from Hemsworth in 2001 and Calder Valley in 2005. She became a councillor for Eltham South in 2006 and finally won a coveted MP seat from South West Norfolk in 2010 after weathering reports of her affair with a political mentor.

Truss soon formed the Free Enterprise Group among like-minded MPs, who caused a stir with a 2012 publication, Britannia Unchained , that accused British workers of being "among the worst idlers in the world." Around that time, she was appointed under secretary of state for education and childcare and further boosted her profile with a publicized trip to Shanghai in early 2014 to investigate how Chinese children performed so well in math and science.

Cabinet Roles

In July 2014, the 38-year-old Truss became the youngest female cabinet member in British history with her appointment as secretary of state for environment, food and rural affairs. Although she sought to draw more tech-minded employees to the food industry, she perhaps was best known during this time for emphatically declaring the U.K.'s importing of cheese to be a "disgrace." Truss also used her platform to push for the U.K. to " remain " in the European Union, before later changing sides to champion the Brexit cause.

Truss broke down another barrier by becoming the first official female lord chancellor and secretary of state for justice in July 2016. However, her time in the department was short-lived after struggling to defend the judiciary from tabloid attacks. Moving on to chief secretary to the treasury the following year, she found a better home for her free-market ideals and cultivated a regular presence on social media.

Named the secretary of state for international trade and president of the Board of Trade in August 2019, Truss successfully negotiated post-Brexit deals with more than five dozen countries. She also became the minister for women and equalities during this time, though she was accused of both shirking the responsibilities of the position and a disregard for transgender rights .

Another cabinet shuffle in September 2021 made Truss the first female member of her party to hold the post of secretary of state for foreign, Commonwealth and development affairs. Along with taking a tough stance on Russia's invasion of Ukraine, Truss negotiated the safe return of British-Iranian nationals Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe and Anoosheh Ashoori to their families, but also threatened upheaval with her stated desire to revisit the Northern Ireland protocol.

Three days after U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced his resignation on July 7, 2022, Truss threw her hat into the ring to become the Conservative Party leader and new prime minister until the next general election. Although she consistently trailed former Finance Minister Rishi Sunak after several rounds of voting among Conservative MPs, 57 percent of the party's rank-and-file favored the foreign secretary, and on September 5, 2022, Truss was declared the winner of the race.

Prime Minister

Shortly after formally accepting the prime minister role in what turned out to be Queen Elizabeth II's final royal engagement , Truss drew praise for her public composure as the world mourned the death of the longest-serving British monarch.

From there, things rapidly went downhill for the new premier. Following her promise to cap household energy bills for two years, the tax cuts presented in Finance Minister Kwasi Kwarteng's " mini-budget " spooked investors to the point where the Bank of England stepped in to steady skyrocketing interest rates and the plummeting British pound.

Truss subsequently scrapped the planned tax cuts for top earners and corporations and forced Kwarteng to resign in mid-October. However, new Finance Minister Jeremy Hunt further gutted her agenda by eliminating the basic income tax rate reduction and shortening the energy-bill freeze from two years to six months.

The chaos continued when Home Secretary Suella Braverman admitted to using a personal email for official correspondence and tendered her resignation on October 19. Later that day, a motion to vote on a government fracking bill in the House of Commons reportedly resulted in Conservative MPs bullying colleagues to support the measure.

Resignation

On October 20, 2022, Truss announced that she was stepping down as leader of the Conservative Party and would relinquish her role as prime minister when a replacement was chosen.

Acknowledging her missteps "at a time of great economic and international instability," she declared she "cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party."

Truss's resignation announcement came on her 45th day in office, giving her the shortest tenure of any UK prime minister.

Husband and Children

Truss met accountant Hugh O'Leary at a Conservative Party conference in 1997. They survived an awkward first date in which he sprained his ankle and were married in 2000, their union producing daughters Liberty and Frances.

QUICK FACTS

• Birth Year: 1975
• Birth date: July 26, 1975
• Birth City: Oxford
• Birth Country: England
• Best Known For: Liz Truss became the United Kingdom's shortest-serving prime minister when she resigned after less than two months in the role in October 2022.
• Politics and Government
• Astrological Sign: Leo
• University of Oxford
• Roundhay School In Leeds
• Interesting Facts
• Truss has said her political hero is former U.S. President Ronald Reagan.
• Occupations
• Political Figure

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CITATION INFORMATION

• Article Title: Liz Truss Biography
• Author: Biography.com Editors
• Website Name: The Biography.com website
• Url: https://www.biography.com/political-figure/mary-elizabeth-truss
• Access Date:
• Publisher: A&E; Television Networks
• Last Updated: October 28, 2022
• Original Published Date: October 28, 2022
• We import two-thirds of our cheese. That is a disgrace.
• I recognize though, given the situation, I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party.
• My mum was a member of the CND and I have memories of going on marches with her when I was a child, so I suppose I had an awareness of and an interest in politics from quite an early age.

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Liz Truss: The Biography Paperback – Feb. 28 2024

• Print length 29 pages
• Language English
• Publication date Feb. 28 2024
• Dimensions 15.24 x 0.18 x 22.86 cm
• ISBN-13 979-8883179227
• See all details

Product details

• ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CWWCF48X
• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Independently published (Feb. 28 2024)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Paperback ‏ : ‎ 29 pages
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 979-8883179227
• Item weight ‏ : ‎ 95.2 g
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 15.24 x 0.18 x 22.86 cm

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IMDbPro Starmeter See rank

• Contact info

• Self - Conservative Justice Secretary & Contributor (Conservative) (as Elizabeth Truss)
• 2017 • 1 ep

Personal details

• Elizabeth Truss MP
• 5′ 5¼″ (1.66 m)
• July 26 , 1975
• Oxford, Oxfordshire, England, UK
• Hugh O'Leary 2000 - present (2 children)
• Children Frances O'Leary
• Parents John Kenneth Truss
• Francis Truss (Sibling)
• 1 Print Biography
• 1 Magazine Cover Photo

Did you know

• Trivia Prime minister of the United Kingdom (6 September 2022 to 25 October 2022), succeeding Boris Johnson .
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• How old is Liz Truss?
• When was Liz Truss born?
• Where was Liz Truss born?

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