The Tories attempted to emerge from the long shadow of Liz Truss's brief time in office today as Mel Stride hammered her 2022 mini-Budget for shredding the party's 'credibility'.
In a major economic speech the shadow chancellor Mel Stride laid into the former Conservative PM's 49-day tenure, saying it had 'put at risk the very stability which [we] had always said must be carefully protected'.
Mr Stride said that the public want to know that their government will act responsibly with their money and delivery a prosperous future for their families, adding: 'On much of that the Conservative Party was seen to have failed.'
His remarks triggered a spat with Ms Truss, who accused Mr Stride online of having 'kowtowed to the failed Treasury orthodoxy' and being 'set on undermining my plan for growth'.
His address to the Royal Society for Arts, Manufactures and Commerce is the first major attempt by a senior figure of Kemi Badenoch's shadow Cabinet to distance the party from a difficult time in its 14 years in power.
