Liz Truss: A quick guide to the UK's shortest-serving PM

Liz Truss has lost her seat in Parliament in the general election, nearly two years after she resigned as the UK's shortest serving prime minister. Here's what you need to know about her if you don't regularly follow politics.

She was the shortest-serving UK prime minister

Liz Truss replaced Boris Johnson as leader and became PM on 6 September then resigned 45 days later. The previous record was set at 119 days by George Canning who died in office in 1827.

Her 'mini-budget' caused huge economic problems

With her support, finance minster Kwasi Kwarteng unveiled £45bn of tax cuts in her third week as PM.

But the plans were widely blamed for reducing the value of the pound and panicked financial markets. Almost all of it has now been reversed - and Kwarteng was sacked as chancellor.

Some of her own MPs started openly criticising her

Dozens of Tories called on her to step down and her Home Secretary Suella Braverman resigned. She had to hire former rivals Grant Shapps and Jeremy Hunt to plug the gaps in her top team.

She went back on what she promised to do

She had pledged to cut taxes and boost the economy but in her resignation speech outside Downing Street, she said: "I recognise that I cannot deliver the mandate on which I was elected by the Conservative Party."

She won a leadership campaign to become PM, not a general election

Only Conservative MPs and party members got to vote to make her leader. After two months of voting between two Tory heavyweights she beat the former Chancellor Rishi Sunak in the final round. He became PM after she resigned then she lost her seat in the 2024 general election.

We don't know what she is going to do next

She lost the race to be MP for South West Norfolk in 2024. She held the seat from 2010, and won by more than 26,000 votes in 2019.

Before politics she worked for Shell and Cable & Wireless. She is married and has two daughters.