Supposed to handle day-to-day business, the Tory prime minister honeymooned in Slovenia last week as the central bank warned inflation would top 13% in the fall, plunging the UK into recession longest since the 2008 financial crisis.
Finance Minister Nadhim Zahawi was also away from London.
“By convention, it is not for this Prime Minister to make major budgetary changes during this (interim) period. It will be for the future Prime Minister” to take care of that, a spokesperson told Downing Street. .
Boris Johnson resigned in early July after months of scandals.
Members of the Conservative Party vote in August to appoint his successor, who will be known on September 5.
As the recession threatens, Boris Johnson is absent subscribers.
Since the announcement of his resignation, he has already been criticized for having missed crisis meetings devoted to the historic heat wave that hit the United Kingdom or for not having received the English footballers after their victory at the Euro.
On the other hand, he celebrated his marriage with Carrie Johnson and left last week on vacation in Slovenia, where he claimed on local television to have had a "wonderful" stay.
"We had a wonderful honeymoon. We climbed all the mountains available, dived in lakes, rode bikes," he said.
According to former Labor Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the political crisis is leaving a "vacuum" in the country at the worst time.
"There needs to be someone at the wheel. And it's not fair that they (the ruling Conservatives) are sleeping at the wheel - there's no one at the wheel right now," he said. he lambasted on the ITV channel.
"There is a void that must be filled immediately if we want to protect people" in the face of the crisis, added the former Prime Minister.
"If we wait for the new Prime Minister, it will be too late", he warned, calling on Boris Johnson and the two candidates to succeed him - Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak - to agree on emergency budgetary measures .
© 2022 AFP