Economy eclipses other issues in race to be UK PM
euronews.comThe UK's next prime minister will take office amid turmoil: soaring inflation, a war in Ukraine, souring relations with China, a changing climate.
But not all those issues are getting equal attention as Foreign Secretary Liz Truss and former treasury chief Rishi Sunak vie for the votes of about 180,000 Conservative Party members. One of them will be elected on 5 September to replace the scandal-tarnished Boris Johnson, who stepped down as party leader this month.
With ballots due to be mailed out next week, polls put Truss in the lead, and she won the endorsement on Friday of the UK's respected Defence Secretary Ben Wallace.
Here is where the candidates stand on key issues:
With the UK facing its tightest cost-of-living squeeze for decades amid soaring energy prices and 9.4% inflation, the economy has unsurprisingly dominated the contest — and it’s here where the two candidates differ most.
Truss is promising immediate tax cuts, saying she will scrap a 1.25% income tax hike introduced by Sunak to help fund the nation's health and social care, and will cancel a planned corporation tax rise. She says she’ll fund the cuts through borrowing.
Sunak says he would get inflation under control before trimming taxes, although this week he pledged to scrap the sales tax on domestic energy bills for a year.
Both claim the moral high ground. Truss says hiking taxes amid a cost-of-living crisis is “morally wrong,” while Sunak says “it’s not moral” to pass bills on to future generations.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies, an independent think-tank, notes that “the candidates have been less forthcoming about their intentions for public spending.” They have made little mention of Johnson’s repeated promises to channel investment into deprived
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