Cuts and strikes No respite for Truss as a perfect storm of crises builds

Liz Truss is hoping her conference speech on growth, growth, growth” last week will have set a new agenda for her party, drawing a line under the disastrous week of her U-turn over the 45p tax rate and 10 days of market turmoil after the mini-budget. However, there are multiple potential crises on the horizon. Here are some of the most difficult and intractable problems.

- Rowena Mason

The public finances

Draft figures from the Office for Budget Responsibility OBR) on the state of the public finances should by now have landed on the desk of Kwasi Kwarteng, the chancellor. These will shine a light on whether and when it is realistic that promised tax cuts are likely to lead to higher growth. And they will give an indication of the impact of more than £70bn ($77bn) of extra borrowing. Kwarteng has already brought forward the date of his debt-cutting plan to 31 October after pressure from MPs. The chancellor told the Commons Treasury committee he would use the new date to announce his “medium-term fiscal plan”.

The threat of winter blackouts