To be boring enough to stand out within the field of British politics – where charisma is hardly a prerequisite of success – is quite the achievement. Following Liz Truss’s conference speech yesterday, even right-wing commentators like Piers Morgan, writing in The Sun, were moved to lambast her as “droning, dull [and] stupefyingly undynamic.”

Truss’s choice of attire came under similar attack, with some some people speculating that the red dress she wore was a nod to a fascist politician played by Emma Thompson in BBC drama Years and Years. Loath as I am to defend Truss, she was photographed wearing the same garment before the series aired, and anyway: if she wanted a way to nudge and wink about her far-right intentions, she could probably find a better reference than a TV show which had poor viewing figures and is mostly remembered for its tepid liberal speechifying.

Besides, these days Tory politicians rarely bother with dog-whistles; they’re already speaking the language of the far-right all the time. While Truss’s speech didn’t go quite that far – she mostly just banged on about growth and tax cuts – there was plenty about it that was unpleasant. Below you will find some of the key messages, and most uninspiring rhetoric.

“CAN YOU GET A GOOD JOB LOCALLY?”

For lots of people, the answer to this rhetorical question is no. The north-south divide is getting worse; wages have stagnated for years, and the rise of the gig economy and zero hours contracts has made it harder than ever to secure a stable and sufficient income. Obviously, previous Tory governments bear responsibility for this, but it’s not like Truss represents some radical break with the past: she is offering more of the same but slightly worse.

Her policies will likely make it much harder for people to find a “good job” in their local area – particularly if you consider ‘a good job’ one in which you are entitled to paid holidays and rest breaks, and other rights which her government is actively trying to discard. 

“IS IT SAFE TO WALK DOWN THE HIGH STREET LATE AT NIGHT?”

Liz Truss’s planned economic policies – such as cutting benefits in real terms – will increase poverty and this will inevitably lead to an increase in the crime rate. No other factor correlates with crime more than income inequality, and no amount of “law and order” rhetoric will change that. 

She later went on to say that she wants to “to live in a country where women can walk home safely at night” – but if the Tory party were truly concerned about women’s safety, they wouldn’t have spent the last 12 years cutting funding to domestic abuse shelters and driven down prosecutions of sexual violence. It’s also likely that Truss’s austerity policies will make matters worse: poverty is a significant factor in increasing the risk of sexual exploitation, violence and domestic abuse. By cutting benefits in real terms, Truss will plunge more women into poverty and make them more vulnerable.

“CAN YOU GET A DOCTOR’S APPOINTMENT?”

If waiting times are long at the moment, it’s hard to see who could be blamed for this other than Truss’s predecessors in the Tory party. While Truss says she wants to make waiting times shorter, it will be extremely difficult if not impossible to address the problems facing the NHS while at the same time cutting taxes and reducing government spending. And her new target – that everyone will be able to see a GP within two weeks – isn’t exactly ambitious: the last Labour government set the same target for 48 hours and met it. It’s a sign of how bad things have been for so long that anyone could mistake Truss’s plans for the NHS as progress.

TRUSS WANTS US TO GO AHEAD AND TREAT OURSELVES

In a stirring hymn to personal liberty, Truss declared “I’m not going to tell you what to do, or what to think, or how to live your life. I’m not interested in how many two-for-one offers you buy at the supermarket, how you spend your time, or in virtue signalling.” As far as Liz Truss is concerned, you can do whatever the hell you like! Go completely crazy! Pick up that family-size pack of Maltesers for £1! In Truss’s zany, freewheeling, liberertarian utopia, absolutely anything goes – as long as you refrain from making too much noise the next time you head to a protest. 

As for banning two-for-one offers in a supermarket, what kind of authoritarian regime would even dream up such draconian legislation in the first place? What kind of interfering, nanny state busybodies would presume to think they could stop us from getting a good deal on a packet of digestives? Surely not… the Conservative Party of Great Britain and Northern Ireland?

TRUSS IS THE FIRST PRIME MINISTER TO HAVE GONE TO STATE SCHOOL (KIND OF BUT NOT REALLY)

I will admit that the fact that this even could be true reflects extremely poorly on Britain’s political system, but it’s not quite right – even the government’s own website contradict’s Truss’s statement. Gordon Brown went to a comp, even if he was enrolled in some weird ‘gifted and talented’ programme (I was surprised to learn this – say what you like about Gordon Brown but he doesn’t really have ‘former gifted kid’ energy). Theresa May, meanwhile, attended a selective grammar school that turned into a comprehensive while she was still a pupil.

But in any case, Liz Truss hardly represents an inspiring tale of rags-to-riches: her dad is an academic and she went to Oxford, along with the vast majority of prime ministers throughout British history. Then again, who am I to begrudge middle-class people who love banging on about having gone to state school as a badge of authenticity finally achieving some representation. 

“THIS IS A GREAT COUNTRY”

Source: dude just trust me.

“I HAVE SEEN PEOPLE LEFT WITH NO HOPE TURNING TO DRUGS”

That sounds very sad indeed! I imagine this experience must have left Truss with a life-long empathy towards people with addiction problems… right? Well, as a student Liberal Democrat she once put up posters reading “Free the Weed”, but her opinions on the matter have sadly gone downhill since then: during her tenure as justice secretary, she bizarrely advocated that dogs should be sent into prisons to bark at drones delivering drugs and scaring them off.

Under Truss’s government, we can expect to see even harsher policing and prison sentences, and further rejection of the harm reduction measures which every credible expert supports. It’s hard to square this with Truss’s apparent belief that people develop addiction problems in response to government failures beyond their control. Maybe a spell in His Majesty’s Prison Service will give them a much-needed dose of hope?

“THE ANTI-GROWTH COALITION” ARE SABOTAGING THE COUNTRY

There’s one thing holding us back in the UK right now, according to Truss, and that’s ‘the anti-growth coalition’, which includes Labour, the Lib Dems, the SNP, the militant unions, think tanks, talking heads, people who live in North London, podcasters, Extinction Rebellion and other environmental protestors (some of whom protested her speech). 

In contrast, the people of Britain who Liz Truss is standing up for are “the white van drivers, the hairdressers, the plumbers, the accountants, the IT workers.” If you’re a student protesting the destruction of the planet, you’re a member of an out-of-touch, foppish elite; if you’re an accountant, you’re a member of the salt-of-the-earth working class. This is one of the central ideas of modern conservatism.

BUT IN THE SPIRIT OF BALANCE, SHE DID MAKE ONE ACCURATE STATEMENT

“[Keir Starmer] has no long-term plan and no vision for Britain,” she said, which is hard to argue with.