Portrait of the week: Truss says sorry, Hunt reverses mini-Budget and Kanye West buys Parler

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Liz Truss said in a BBC interview as Prime Minister that she wanted to ‘say sorry for the mistakes that have been made’. Declaring that she would lead the Conservatives into the next election, she addressed blocs of MPs: the One Nation group one day, the European Research Group the next. She watched Jeremy Hunt, the Chancellor of the Exchequer whom she had just appointed to replace Kwasi Kwarteng, deliver a statement to the Commons reversing most of the provisions of the ‘fiscal event’ of 23 September. The new Chancellor announced the end of current subsidies for domestic energy bills in April, preferring something that ‘will cost the taxpayer significantly less than planned while ensuring enough support for those in need’. Cornwall Insight, a previously reliable forecaster, said that typical household energy bills could reach £4,347 a year from April. The Chancellor announced that National Insurance would still not be increased and stamp duty would still be reduced, but corporation tax would be raised after all, from 19 per cent to 25; the basic rate of income tax would no longer be reduced from 20 per cent to 19; even duty on drink would rise. Downing Street said that the Chancellor had told the cabinet that public spending would continue to rise but that departments would be asked for cuts. The annual rate of inflation rose to 10.1 per cent in September, from 9.9 per cent in August. Ms Truss said she was no longer promising to raise state pensions in line with inflation, as she had a fortnight earlier.

Ben Wallace, the Defence Secretary, hurried off to Washington for talks on Ukraine with Lloyd Austin, his US counterpart. Andrew Bailey, the governor of the Bank of England, speaking in Washington, warned that interest rates might rise by more than expected; he said that when he spoke to the new Chancellor ‘there was a very clear and immediate meeting of minds’. The Queen Elizabeth II Bridge over the Thames at Dartford was closed for two days running by protestors against the use of oil. Dame Carmen Callil, who founded Virago Press in 1972, died aged 84. Katherine Duncan-Jones, the Shakespeare scholar, died aged 81.

Britain warned former military pilots against working for Chinese forces; perhaps 30 had gone to train members of China’s People’s Liberation Army. A Hong Kong protestor outside the Chinese consulate in Manchester was dragged into the grounds and punched by masked men; the Foreign Secretary summoned the Chinese ambassador. In England, the number testing positive for Covid rose to one in 35 by 3 October and in Scotland fell to one in 50, according to the ONS. An Avian Influenza Prevention Zone was declared over England, Scotland and Wales; in some areas poultry must be kept indoors.

Abroad

Russian air strikes and shelling destroyed power stations in Kyiv and other cities; President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine said that in eight days, 30 per cent of its power stations had been destroyed. Power cuts also affected the water supply. In a day of attacks on cities all over Ukraine, Russia was said to have used Shahed-136 unmanned aerial vehicles – long-range drones made by Iran. General Sergei Surovikin, the commander of Russian forces in Ukraine, said that people would be evacuated from the occupied city of Kherson. Russia exchanged 108 Ukrainian women held as prisoners of war for 110 Russian captives held by Ukraine. In the southern Russian town of Yeysk, a Russian fighter-bomber crashed into a block of flats, setting it on fire and killing at least 13 people.

China’s 20th Party Congress met to approve the continuation of Xi Jinping in power. EDF, the French electrical operator, negotiated to end strikes at ten French nuclear power stations. Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany ordered that its last three nuclear power stations, due to close this year, should keep operating until April.

Protests continued in Iran and were met by violence and arrests by the security forces. Ethiopia said it had seized Shire, pop. 100,000, from Tigrayan forces in the civil war. The UN said 5.4 million people, three-quarters of Tigray’s population, were relying on food aid. Drought in Somalia left many children affected by malnourishment. Seven million Venezuelans, out of a population of 30 million, had left the country since 2015, according to the UN, with 545,200 going to the United States and 438,400 to Spain. Kanye West, who now calls himself Ye, agreed to buy the social-media platform Parler.