Fresh pressure on Rishi Sunak as Liz Truss joins Boris Johnson in calling for fighter jets to be sent to Ukraine in first Commons speech since quitting as PM – as both ex-premiers hit out at China over Taiwan and arming Russia

• Liz Truss piles pressure on Rishi Sunak by calling for fighter jets for Ukraine
• She joins fellow ex-PM Boris Johnson in demanding UK boosts Kyiv’s air power 

Liz Truss tonight piled further pressure on Rishi Sunak as she joined fellow former prime minister Boris Johnson in calling for fighter jets to be sent to Ukraine.

In her first speech in the House of Commons since quitting as PM, Ms Truss said Britain and other allies ‘need to do all we can to make sure Ukraine wins this war as soon as possible’.

She warned that ‘every extra day’ without a Ukrainian victory meant ‘lives lost, women violated, towns destroyed’.

‘We need to do all we can as fast as we can – my view is that does include fighter jets,’ Ms Truss told MPs this evening.

She spoke in the Commons shortly after Mr Johnson had reiterated his own demand for Ukraine to be supplied with greater air power.

The former premiers, who sat near each other on the Tory back benches, also both used tonight’s debate on Ukraine to hit out at China.

Ms Truss warned about the threat posed by Beijing to Taiwan, while Mr Johnson told MPs it was ‘becoming ever clearer that China is preparing to arm the Russians’ in Ukraine.

In her first speech in the House of Commons since quitting as PM, Liz Truss said Britain and other allies ‘need to do all we can to make sure Ukraine wins this war as soon as possible’

Fellow ex-PM Boris Johnson called on Western nations to ‘cut to the chase and give them the planes too’

Ms Truss and Mr Johnson, who sat near each other on the Tory back benches, also both used tonight’s debate on Ukraine to hit out at China

Mr Sunak has offered to train Ukrainian pilots in Britain but has not committed to directly supplying Kyiv with RAF Typhoons or F-35s. 

Defence Secretary Ben Wallace has been tasked with investigating what jets the UK could potentially give to Ukraine.

But there are concerns in Whitehall about the sophisticated nature of British jets and the long time it might take to train Ukrainian pilots to successfully operate them.

It has been suggested that jets owned by other allies might be more suitable in helping Ukraine to push back Vladimir Putin’s invasion.

At the weekend, Mr Sunak said Britain stood ready ‘to help any country provide planes that Ukraine can use today’.

‘But we must also train Ukrainian pilots to use the most advanced jets,’ he added.

In the Commons tonight, Mr Johnson called on Western nations to ‘cut to the chase and give them the planes too’.

‘If the House was in any doubt about the urgency of increasing our supply of equipment to the Ukrainians it is becoming ever clearer that China is preparing to arm the Russians,’ he said.

‘With the right kit, including more long-range artillery they can punch through the land bridge, cut off Crimea and deal a knock-out blow to Putin’s plans, and they should not stop there.’

Mr Johnson called on the West to ‘end our obfuscation about what we think of as a Ukrainian victory and what we think of as Ukraine’. 

He stressed that Ukraine’s forces should be helped to restore their country to its borders when it became independent in 1991, not the borders of February 24 last year when Mr Putin began his full-scale invasion effort.

In 2014, the Russian President annexed the Crimea peninsula and also oversaw Russian-backed rebels seize control of parts of eastern Ukraine.

Mr Johnson urged the Government to designate Russia as ‘a state sponsor of terrorism’, alongside Cuba, North Korea and Syria, as well as proscribe the ‘bloodthirsty’ Wagner Group – which is supplying troops to Mr Putin’s invasion force – as a foreign terror group.

The former premiers are pictured looking on as Foreign Secretary James Cleverly opened tonight’s Commons debate on Ukraine

In her own speech following Mr Johnson, Ms Truss recalled what it was like being in Government after Russia invaded Ukraine last year.

She said: ‘We, together with our allies, not just in the G7 but around the world, everywhere from Australia, to Singapore, to Switzerland, we put on the toughest sanctions and we pushed back the Russian economy by decades.

‘We also supplied weapons to Ukraine, and many around this chamber have commented that maybe we should have supplied weapons earlier.

‘But I can tell you from working inside the Government, that we did all we could as quickly as we could to persuade allies.

‘And we have built up now an alliance of countries supplying those weapons. 

‘I can’t wait to see the tanks, and I can’t wait to see the fighter jets in Ukraine to help those brave Ukrainians.’

Ms Truss also urged MPs to learn the lesson of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine when considering the threat posed to Taiwan by China.

‘Let’s be clear with China exactly what would happen if there was an escalation with respect to Taiwan,’ she said.

‘Let’s be clear about that now. And let’s also make sure that Taiwan is able to defend itself.

‘Let’s not leave another free democracy undefended for an authoritarian regime to invade.’

At the beginning of tonight’s debate in the Commons, Foreign Secretary James Cleverly insisted Britain would provide ‘more advanced capabilities across land, across sea, and across air’ to Ukraine.

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