British PM Liz Truss fires finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng

120 days. 

That’s how long Liz Truss must last in her job to avoid claiming the most unenviable record in politics: the shortest prime ministerial term ever, currently held by George Canning. 

She’s less than a third of the way to the mark, and her premiership is already on the ropes. Truss fired Kwasi Kwarteng as her chancellor on Friday, and ditched another key plank of her fiscal plan, but attempted to stand firm on her economic vision in an eight-minute news conference.

But it seems Friday has merely accelerated another political crisis that has engulfed Downing Street and emboldened Truss’s critics.

Many in her own party are nervously searching for an exit route, some openly critical of her and others noticeably silent as she fights to save her job. 

The Labour Party, enjoying a polling lead it could hardly have dreamed of one year ago, is twisting the knife, calling for a general election as the Tories hemorrhage public support.

And the all-important markets are hardly jumping for joy, with Truss’s news conference doing little to ease investors’ fears.

The names of Truss’s possible successors are being thrown around Westminster already. Britain already has its fourth finance minister in four months; the question now is whether its fifth prime minister in six years is on their way too.

Newly appointed UK finance minister Jeremy Hunt will deliver the government’s medium-term fiscal plan on Oct. 31, the UK government confirmed in a statement on Friday.

Hunt was appointed as the new finance minister earlier on Friday after Prime Minister Liz Truss asked Kwasi Kwarteng to “stand aside.” 

The government had already been forced to bring forward the statement to Oct 31, more than three weeks earlier than initially planned.

The plan will be published alongside a full forecast from the Office for Budget Responsibility, the statement said.

Also on Friday, Truss announced she will retain plans to increase corporation tax – plans that she had previously said would be scrapped.

The Bank of England confirmed that it ended its emergency UK government bond-buying plan on Friday as planned.

The bank on Friday bought just over 1.45 billion pounds of UK government debt, bringing the total amount of spending to 19.3 billion pounds, it said in a statement.

When the bank launched the scheme in September, it said it was willing to spend up to 65 billion pounds — around 5 billion pounds a day — to support the market.

The Bank of England was forced to announce the emergency plan after the UK government’s mini-budget sparked market turmoil. The pound and UK government bonds crashed, forcing some pension funds near default and pushing them to dump assets as a hedging strategy came unstuck. Mortgage rates also shot higher.

Newly appointed UK finance minister Jeremy Hunt has arrived at No. 10 Downing Street, according to a CNN team outside the prime minister's office. 

Hunt was appointed as the new UK finance minister earlier Friday after Prime Minister Liz Truss asked Kwasi Kwarteng to stand aside from the position.

The British Conservative Party’s economic reputation and growth agenda has been left in “tatters,” former UK Chancellor Philip Hammond said Friday.

Hammond made the remarks in an interview on BBC Radio 4.

“[Truss’ government] haven’t fully resolved the economic question, and I do not think they can resolve the political damage that has been caused," Hammond said.

“I’m afraid to say we’ve thrown away years and years of painstaking work to build and maintain a reputation as a party of fiscal discipline and competence in government. And many of the arguments that we routinely deploy against the labour party around fiscal management will look extremely limp in light of what has happened over the last few weeks," he added.

Hammond’s comments come as the UK faces significant economic turmoil. He spoke before Truss gave a news conference at Downing Street where she formally announced a major U-turn on corporation tax.

Hammond criticized Truss’ economic policy on growth and said she “will have to go back to a more conventional economic policy.” 

“Liz Truss’ economic agenda was very simple: you cut taxes, and growth comes automatically. That approach, which means using borrowing to fund the cost of tax cuts until the growth kicks in, if it ever does, is now off the agenda,” he said. 

Hammond does think Truss can survive as prime minister and did not call for her to resign.  “I do not believe the country will tolerate another change of leader without a general election,” he said.

What Truss is saying: In firing finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng and announcing another reversal on her mini-budget, Truss acknowledged the difficulty of her task Friday but said she “acted decisively” to calm the markets.

Truss says Jeremy Hunt, her new chancellor, is “one of the most experienced and widely respected government ministers and parliamentarians.”

Facing fierce criticism, she declined to apologize to her party or the public over the instability her economic plan caused.

UK Prime Minister Liz Truss fired her finance minister Kwasi Kwarteng and ditched a central plank of economic policy Friday, just three weeks after their discredited growth plan crashed the value of the pound and UK government bonds, and drew rebukes from the International Monetary Fund and ratings agencies.

The crash forced the Bank of England to intervene to prevent a market meltdown with an emergency £65 billion program of bond-buying and new facilities to help banks and pension funds secure cash.

That bond-buying is supposed to end on Friday, but the former chief economist of the IMF, Raghuram Rajan, says Bank of England Governor Andrew Bailey will need to proceed very cautiously.

“The primary role of central banks is to provide liquidity, I don’t think he has a choice. He cannot let the market for gilts collapse,” he told CNN.

Bailey made clear earlier this week that the support would end Friday. Rajan said that would be difficult because investors have gotten used to central banks pumping trillions into markets in recent years.

“Of course, he wants to withdraw. The problem is the amount of liquidity they’ve supplied in the past makes it very tough for him to withdraw quickly. He has to withdraw slowly. It is hard to fix a final date ... It is a tough situation, but he has to muddle through,” Rajan said.

Keir Starmer, the leader of the opposition Labour Party, has condemned Liz Truss's "reckless approach" to the economy.

"Changing the Chancellor doesn't undo the damage made in Downing Street," Starmer wrote.

"We need a change in government," Starmer added. "With my leadership, Labour will secure Britain’s economy and get us out of this mess."

Starmer's Labour Party is enjoying a monumental lead over the Conservatives in opinion polls, leading many Tories to fear for their jobs and prompting speculation that the party will move to oust their new leader.

UK government bonds and the British pound rallied in recent days, as investors cheered reports that Prime Minister Liz Truss would roll back more of her much-criticized economic program.

On Friday, Truss made it official, scrapping plans to reverse a rise in business taxes.

But the market wasn't satisfied. The price of 30-year UK debt, which had been gaining ground, fell slightly after the press conference. The British pound was down 1.3% against the US dollar, trading below $1.12.

The U-turn on corporate taxes will save £18 billion ($20 billion), easing some investor concerns about the UK government's growing debt load. But traders are still desperate for more information, as confusion reigns about what policies are still in play.

Liz Truss's eight-minute press conference has done little to shift the narrative that she is losing control of the Conservative Party, the public and Britain's economy.

Truss was criticized by reporters for taking just four questions before rapidly leaving the podium.

"Aren't you going to apologize," a reporter called out as she left the room.

"We were genuinely shocked" at the lack of questions Truss took, Sky News Political Editor Beth Rigby said on the channel after the news conference ended.

Tory lawmakers were notably quiet on social media after the news conference finished, but Truss was roundly attacked by opposition MPs.

"None of this is fair on our country and the people whose lives and livelihoods are hanging in the balance because of this shambles of a government," Labour's shadow Health Secretary Wes Streeting said after Truss's press conference wrapped up.

"Changing the Chancellor doesn't undo the damage that's been done," his colleague, the shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves, added earlier. "We don't just need a change in Chancellor, we need a change in government.

"This is a Tory crisis, made in Downing Street," Reeves said.