LONDON: On Saturday, a senior Cabinet member who was supporting Rishi Sunak in the U.K. prime ministerial race became the first prominent person to support Foreign Secretary Liz Truss's rival team.

According to Sir Robert Buckland, who made this statement in The Daily Telegraph, Truss is now the "perfect person to drive the country ahead" and her policies offer the best chance for the U.K. to realise its potential as a "high-growth, high-productivity economy."

The Minister claimed that he had first supported Rishi Sunak because he believed the former Chancellor was "embodying what we needed" during the preliminary parliamentary rounds in which Conservative Party MPs selected the final two candidates.

As the election process has progressed, Buckland wrote, "I have given great consideration to the subjects that move me and what I want to see the next Prime Minister doing." It's difficult to change your mind on something this important, but I've decided Liz Truss is the best candidate to lead the nation, he added.

Surveys that have Ms. Truss clearly ahead of her British Indian rival in the contest to succeed Boris Johnson as leader and prime minister of the Conservative Party have led to the defection. Members of Parliament frequently choose their supporters in these leadership elections with an eye toward a ministerial position in the incoming leader's Cabinet.

"I know both candidates well and have collaborated with them in administration and in Cabinet," stated Buckland. I initially considered concepts and guiding principles, then I considered people.

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