(LONDON) Environmental activists briefly interrupted Downing Street candidate Liz Truss on Friday night during a campaign event in front of Conservative Party activists.
Posted at 4:09 p.m.
While speaking at the fourth big oral campaign of the internal campaign in Estbourne (south of England), the Minister of Foreign Affairs was interrupted by the intervention of several people in the ranks of the public, before the live broadcast on the party website is interrupted.
A video posted by Green New Deal Rising shows members of the group calling out to Liz Truss in succession, discussing rising energy prices and the climate crisis, before the audience shouts “out”, as the environment is virtually absent from the debates in the campaign to succeed Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
“I believe we have infiltrators and I will wait until they are expelled,” said Liz Truss, before, once the intruders were removed, to attack “militants who disrupt our country and our democratic process.
Hailed a second time later, Liz Truss explained that she took it “as a compliment to be so popular with Extinction Rebellion”, one of the UK’s leading environmental groups, which has known for its actions of massive blockages.
“We are angry young people who have watched these debates and are fed up with candidates who avoid the real crisis and whose only answer is to give tax cuts to their wealthy comrades and to companies like BP and Shell while the rest of us are asked to tighten our belts,” Green New Deal Rising member Fatima Ibrahim, who was kicked out of the room, told Sky News.
Whoever the prime minister is, the movement will face him, she continued.
“Tonight we went after Liz Truss […] about its shameful role in the cost of living crisis,” the movement tweeted, denouncing the government’s support for these “climate destroying” oil groups that “make BILLIONS”.
After Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s resignation was announced nearly a month ago, Tory activists – estimated to number nearly 200,000 – have until September 2 to choose their new leader at a a postal vote, who will become Prime Minister, the party having the majority in Parliament. The announcement of the result is expected on September 5.