Liz Truss resigns, uncertainty over new budget

UK Prime Minister Liz Truss । Photo:Collected

British Prime Minister Liz Truss has resigned under intense pressure from within the Conservative Party. Six weeks ago, he took over as the new Prime Minister of Britain. But within six weeks his economic decisions came under criticism. BBC reported that he resigned from the post of Prime Minister of Britain on Thursday.

Britain's new finance minister, Jeremy Hunt, scrapped almost all of the austerity budget announced three weeks ago on Tuesday. He said that the minimum income tax remains at 20 percent, which Truss reduced to 19 percent. Truss in his 'brief budget' has capped electricity bills for the next two years. In this regard, Hunt said, this rule will be in force until next April, not two years. Then the decision will be taken after looking at the state of the economy. Apart from this, the new Finance Minister has also canceled the proposal of Truss for the exemption of direct value added tax (VAT) for foreign tourists.

Earlier, Liz Truss himself withdrew two short budget proposals last Friday. He had earlier announced that corporate tax on industry would be reduced from 25 percent to 19 percent. Apart from this, Trus wanted to reduce the upper tax limit from 45 to 40 percent for the highest taxpayers in the country. But under pressure, Truss said on Friday, in both cases, this tax exemption is not being introduced for now.

As per the schedule, the full budget is scheduled to be presented on October 31. But Hunt did not want to delay after receiving the responsibility of finance minister. He presented the budget proposal in the House of Commons last Tuesday. The new finance minister claims that these proposals will show a new direction to Britain, which is drowning in economic crisis. But in the meantime, only time will tell what will happen to his budget now that Liz Truss has resigned.

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