Who will sit in the prime minister’s seat vacant by Boris Johnson in the UK continues to be a matter of curiosity. The reactions to Prime Minister candidate Liz Truss, who criticized the ‘mentality and attitudes’ of the workers, were very harsh. Truss’ comments were found ‘offensive’.
It Turned Out That Foreign Minister Liz Truss , Who Is The Leading Candidate Of The Conservative Party In England and will assume the post of prime minister if elected , said that British workers should “make more effort”. The main opposition Labor Party accused Truss of “stigmatizing British workers as lazy”, describing his comments as “offensive”.
Workers’ spokesperson for Work and Pensions, Jonathan Ashworth, criticized Truss and said, “Workers all over the country are working hours to find a place to lay their heads, put Food on the table and take care of their families.”
In an audio recording released by the British Guardian newspaper, Truss says the British lack the “skills and practices” that foreign nationals have.
Truss did not deny these words. “What we need in this country is more productivity and more economic growth across the country,” he said when asked at the Conservative Party leadership race event on Tuesday evening.
“The UK should increase productivity,” said an official from Truss’ campaign, noting that the comments were from five years ago and were taken “out of context”.
About 180,000 members of the party are voting for their next leader to replace Boris Johnson as prime minister.
Members choose between Liz Truss and former Finance Minister Rishi Sunak.
The winner of the election will be announced on September 5.
The Guardian, on the other hand, wrote that Truss made the comments on the audio recording while he was serving as Undersecretary of the Treasury between 2017-2019.
Emphasizing the theme of patriotism and tax cuts in his leadership campaign, Truss emphasized that a change in the working culture is needed to make England richer, but complained that people were not very keen on this issue.
In the two-minute recording, Truss says the “mentality and attitudes” of British workers are partly responsible for producing less per hour than their foreign counterparts, suggesting they need “more effort”.
‘LONDON IS VERY DIFFERENT’
Truss says in the recording:
“I actually think it’s partly a matter of mindset and attitude. Yes, it’s basically the culture of work. If you go to China, I can assure you it’s quite different…
“There is a fundamental problem with British work culture. Essentially that needs to change if we are to become a richer and more prosperous country. But I don’t think people are that willing to change that.”
Regarding the productivity gap in the UK, Truss says London is “very different” from the rest of the country. London is the city with the highest concentration of foreign workers.
The UK’s Office for National Statistics says output growth per worker in every country since 2009 has been slower than it was before the financial crisis.
OECD data show that in 2019 the UK ranks fourth among the G7 countries in GDP per hour worked.
Truss, who appears ahead of his rival Rishi Sunak in the polls, states that he will go for tax cuts to increase economic growth.
Truss’s remarks echoed the controversial arguments for describing British workers as “the world’s worst idlers” in the 2012 book “Britannia Unchained”.
When asked about this earlier, Truss claimed that the statement was made by Dominic Raab, the co-author of the book and Deputy Prime Minister who supports Sunak.
Raab said that many of the book’s authors accepted “collective responsibility” for the book’s content.