Liz Truss’ former adviser has alleged the Prime Minister has previously pretended "minor members" of her family had died to avoid media appearances, incuding BBC's Question Time.

Kirsty Buchanan, who worked for the Prime Minister as a special adviser when she was justice secretary, said she would “kill off” minor members of her family in order to get out of her appearance on the show.

The excuses included the deaths of “aunts and cousins and things”, Ms Buchanan said.

When Ms Truss ran out of reasons to appear on Question Time, she said she would go as long as one person wasn’t appearing with her, who it turned out was booked on the same show upon her arrival.

 

Speaking on the Whitehall Sources podcast, Ms Buchanan said: ““Liz Truss, when I worked for her, she obviously didn’t like the media, so we used to spend quite a lot of time making up excuses and, you know, killing off minor members of her family so that she didn’t have to go on Question Time.

“We ran out of excuses to go on Question Time, so eventually we had to do it.

“Only minor people like aunts and cousins and things, I’m not talking about, you know, major members of the family

“Anyway, so we ended up on Question Time and she said to me, I don’t care who’s on the panel as long as it’s not X, and I’m not going to tell you who X is.

“And we turn up at the Green Room and there is the one person, the one person she didn’t weant to go on a panel with, and she looked at me and if looks could kill…

“I don’t know if they did it on purpose because he’s a long time kind of baiter of hers.”

Ms Truss appeared on Question Time nine times between 2012 and 2019.