Premier Emeritus Truss is herself tweeting about the trip and her speech to the Prospect Foundation in Taipei has been published on her website.
Ms Truss is not the first ex-Prime Minister to visit Taiwan. Margaret Thatcher visited in 1992 and again in 1996.
On the latter visit, she made a speech on the 'Challenges of the 21st century', and she referenced the country in a number of her other post-prime ministerial speeches.
Lady Thatcher wrote of her first visit, in 1992, in Statecraft. Whatever else may be said of that book, it contains fascinating insights into some of Premier Emeritus Thatcher's post-Downing Street travels. The description of her trip to Taiwan proves the point. While she was relaxing in the enormous whirlpool bath in her hotel suite, there was an earthquake. The room swayed - and each tremor resulted in soapy water slopping over the sides of the bath. Lady Thatcher stayed in it until the earthquake stopped. She went on, 'Neither I, nor the hotel, nor, as far as I know, the rest of Taipei was the worse for it.' Well, to paraphrase Lord Carrington about the bus, surely the earthquake wouldn't dare?
Anyway, about her 1992 trip there is also a fascinating note on the Margaret Thatcher Foundation website. It details exchanges between Alex Allan, the then Prime Minister's Principal Private Secretary, and Stephen Wall, John Major's Private Secretary.
Rather as Ms Truss' visit has excited criticism from China, it being described as a 'dangerous political stunt' by the Chinese Embassy in London, so Lady Thatcher's resulted in what Sir Julian Seymour called a 'rather ritual protest' being delivered by a First Secretary, with the Chinese Ambassador being due to see Lady Thatcher herself. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall.
The note also reveals that an official from the Foreign Office had telephoned Sir Julian and, in a 'rather peremptory request', had asked for the trip to be cancelled. Mr Allan notes that Sir Julian 'had not been much impressed' and ends the report about it with an exclamation mark!
On the latter visit, she made a speech on the 'Challenges of the 21st century', and she referenced the country in a number of her other post-prime ministerial speeches.
Lady Thatcher wrote of her first visit, in 1992, in Statecraft. Whatever else may be said of that book, it contains fascinating insights into some of Premier Emeritus Thatcher's post-Downing Street travels. The description of her trip to Taiwan proves the point. While she was relaxing in the enormous whirlpool bath in her hotel suite, there was an earthquake. The room swayed - and each tremor resulted in soapy water slopping over the sides of the bath. Lady Thatcher stayed in it until the earthquake stopped. She went on, 'Neither I, nor the hotel, nor, as far as I know, the rest of Taipei was the worse for it.' Well, to paraphrase Lord Carrington about the bus, surely the earthquake wouldn't dare?
Anyway, about her 1992 trip there is also a fascinating note on the Margaret Thatcher Foundation website. It details exchanges between Alex Allan, the then Prime Minister's Principal Private Secretary, and Stephen Wall, John Major's Private Secretary.
Rather as Ms Truss' visit has excited criticism from China, it being described as a 'dangerous political stunt' by the Chinese Embassy in London, so Lady Thatcher's resulted in what Sir Julian Seymour called a 'rather ritual protest' being delivered by a First Secretary, with the Chinese Ambassador being due to see Lady Thatcher herself. Oh, to have been a fly on the wall.
The note also reveals that an official from the Foreign Office had telephoned Sir Julian and, in a 'rather peremptory request', had asked for the trip to be cancelled. Mr Allan notes that Sir Julian 'had not been much impressed' and ends the report about it with an exclamation mark!
Lady Thatcher's speech to Citibank, delivered on 31 August, is also on her website, as is the speech she delivered in South Korea on 'The Principles of Thatcherism' on 3 September, an exact copy of which she had delivered to the United Daily News Group in Taiwan on 1 September.
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