Politics

Labour peer stuns Cameron with hilarious Liz Truss burn

Labour peer Lord Grocott delivered a stunning take-down of Liz Truss in the House of Lords as the foreign secretary took questions.

The former prime minister, who lasted just 49 days in office, said she would like to see the United Nations abolished in her latest attention-seeking outburst designed to help sell more books.

Truss, who served as foreign secretary under Boris Johnson, accused the UN of playing a “damaging” role in the Israel-Gaza conflict.

She also questioned Chinese and Russian membership of the UN Security Council, a group of 15 countries that has struggled to reach agreement on North Korea and Syria in recent years.

Speaking on the BBC’s Newscast podcast, she said: “I can’t see a purpose for the UN as it stands. At present it has been very ineffective at dealing with international situations, in fact positively damaging, for example, on Israel.”

Asked whether she wanted to abolish the UN, she replied: “I do recommend abolishing quite a lot of things in my book. I’m not a UN fan. I think the best use it has is actually as a meeting point for governments.

“But certainly the UN Security Council, as it’s currently constituted with both China and Russia on, is not keeping the world safe … I much more support alliances of like-minded countries like Nato.”

Lord Grocott raised the matter in the House of Lords today as the foreign secretary took questions. Here’s what he had to say:

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Jack Peat

Jack is a business and economics journalist and the founder of The London Economic (TLE). He has contributed articles to VICE, Huffington Post and Independent and is a published author. Jack read History at the University of Wales, Bangor and has a Masters in Journalism from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

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