This is Spectator Radio and you're listening to Women with Balls, presented by Katie Balls.

Hello and welcome to Women with Balls, where I, Katie Balls, speak to women at the top of their

respective games about their passions, the battles and what makes them tick. Today I'm joined by Liz Truss,

Chief Secretary to the Treasury. Liz has so far had an illustrious cabinet career, which has seen a hold of a variety of briefs

from Deferra to Justice, and now to the Treasury, where she has quickly established her

status as one of the most important beam counters in the country.

Liz has warned her cabinet colleagues that is not macho to demand more money, has said destiny's child

had it right when they celebrated all the honey's making money, and has also argued that

millennials are not as left wing as they are often portrayed. And that's before we even get to

Instagram, which we will. Now this, before we go any further, I thought it would be good to work

at how you got to where you are for For us, who wants some desk inspiration.

So growing up, you grew up in Leeds where you describe your parents as being to the left of labour.

That's right, yeah.

My mum was actually a member of the CND.

So my first political experience was being taken on a CND march, talking about nuclear bombs, which I didn't really understand

at the time. I think I was age seven or eight. But my mum's always been a bit of an activist.

She was concerned about the world and wanted to get involved. So I guess that's why I first got

interested in politics. But after a while, I turned away from the left wing I was quite inspired by

what was going on in politics in the 1980s you know mrs thatcher was having a major impact and I found that

really fascinating and on your journey to the conservative party it's safe to say that you perhaps stopped

somewhere along the way.

If you look at your Oxford University days, you were the president of the Liberal Democrats, weren't you?

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