Liz Truss believes the UK needs its own Department of Government Efficiency - yes, really

Liz Truss, co-author of the disastrous (and inefficient) mini-budget with her chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng, believes the UK should follow Donald Trump’s lead and establish a Department of Government Efficiency – a department tasked with tackling “waste” and “fraud” in government spending which will soon be helmed by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy in the US.

In a statement on Monday, the president-elect said of Doge (yes, that’s really its acronym): “Together, these two wonderful Americans will pave the way for my Administration to dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure Federal Agencies – Essential to the “Save America” Movement.”

Truss, meanwhile, responded to the news by saying the department is “what is needed in Britain”.

The former South West Norfolk MP – who lost her seat in July’s general election – has become more involved in American politics in recent months amid the presidential election period, from holding her book upside down on Fox News to talking about shower heads at the Republican National Convention.

She also thought it was appropriate to criticise Democrat candidate Kamala Harris for being unable to “do the job”, and in one of her most viral moments in recent months, had a pro-Trump speech gate-crashed by a banner with a lettuce on it and the words “I crashed the economy”.

A willingness from Truss to see a UK department focussed on efficiency and tasked with restructuring government bodies also follows the Ten Years to Save the Westauthor playing down her catastrophic premiership, instead claiming the “deep state” and organisations such as the Office for Budget Responsibility and the Bank of England were responsible for her downfall.

Unsurprisingly, other Twitter/X users were quick to ridicule the suggestion from the person who still retains the title of shortest-serving prime minister:

While it wasn’t exactly known as ‘government efficiency’, Rishi Sunak’s government did appoint Esther McVey as a Cabinet Office minister tasked with pushing the government’s “anti-woke agenda”, in a role informally dubbed the ‘minister for common sense’ – to much ridicule.

One of her measures was to standardise the lanyards worn by civil servants, which soon sparked controversy.

And Truss isn’t the only Conservative to suggest that what’s happening stateside should be brought over to the UK, as former Tory MP Andrea Jenkyns called for Musk to be made prime minister back in August, writing on Twitter/X that he would “sort our great country out for the better” and “stop #TwoTierKeir”.

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