LIZ Truss has doubled down on her claim that Nicola Sturgeon is an “attention seeker” in front of a crowd of Tory faithfuls.
The prospective prime minister, who is likely to be announced as the winner of the extended Tory leadership contest on Monday, stood by her previous comments during an appearance at Wembley Arena.
The venue was hosting the final in a string of 12 hustings which saw Truss argue and re-argue the same arguments with her rival for the keys to No 10, former chancellor Rishi Sunak.
LBC radio host Nick Ferrari was quizzing Truss when he brought up her comments about other leaders.
“You mentioned world leaders, and you’ve mentioned some other well-known political figures,” Ferrari started.
“Nicola Sturgeon is an ‘attention seeker’, Mark Drakeford is the ‘low energy version of Jeremy Corbyn’, this is Liz Truss’s words.”
The statements brought laughter and applause from the audience of Conservative party members.
Truss responded over the ongoing questioning: “I still agree with myself by the way.”
The top Tory – still filling the roles of Foreign Secretary and Minister for Women and Equalities despite her focus on the leadership race – was further quoted as saying the “jury’s out” on whether French president Emmanuel Macron is a “friend or foe”.
Ferrari asked: “Is Donald Trump friend or foe?”
Truss refused to answer, saying that she is “not going to comment on future potential presidential runners”. She also claimed that she had not commented on Macron – despite accepting that she had said the jury was “out”.
The Tory leadership hopeful’s comments about the Scottish First Minister – made at the second leadership hustings in Exeter on August 1 – led to widespread outrage north of the Border.
Truss said: “I think the best thing to do with Nicola Sturgeon is ignore her. She’s an attention seeker, that’s what she is.”
Tory members cheered the comment, while the party’s MSPs went into damage control. Scottish Conservative chief whip Stephen Kerr claimed Truss had only meant to “ignore” Sturgeon on issues of independence, a line later touted by the Foreign Secretary’s campaign team.
Responding to Truss’s “attention seeker” jibe at an appearance with Iain Dale at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Sturgeon said the Tory MP had only been interested in getting into Vogue magazine when they met at COP26.
Speaking about when she met Truss, Sturgeon told a crowd: “I remember it quite well actually. I had just done, and this is going to sound really up myself but I don’t mean to … I’d just been interviewed by Vogue, as you do, and that was the main thing she wanted to talk to me about.
“She wanted to know how she could get into Vogue – and she calls me an attention seeker!”
The hustings at Wembley also saw Sunak questioned by a party member on how he would "suppress" Sturgeon and the SNP.
