london uk conservative liz truss the favourite to become prime minister next month suggested britons lacked skill and application and needed to work harder in a leaked audio recording released tuesdayin the twominute audio clip which dates from her time as a senior minister in the finance ministry between 2017 and 2019 truss said workers mindset and attitude were partly to blame for the uks relatively poor productivityits working culture basically she said in the recording obtained by the guardian newspaper adding british workers needed more graftif you go to china its quite different i can assure youtheres a fundamental issue of british working culture i dont think people are that keen to changethe embarrassing leak comes as truss emphatically leads rival rishi sunak in numerous polls in the race to become prime minister when boris johnson stands down early next monththe partys roughly 200000strong membership have already starting voting for their next leader who then becomes prime ministerthe result of the summerlong contest will be announced on september 5 with the new leader set to take charge the following daythe two leadership contenders who have waged a bitter battle over recent weeks featuring frequent hostile briefings and counterbriefings by their camps participated in a hustings event in scotland on tuesday eveningthe incendiary remarks by truss echo controversial arguments made in a 2012 book she coauthored britannia unchained in which british workers were described as among the worst idlers in the worldasked about it at a leadership debate last month truss distanced herself from the contentious assessment claiming coauthor and sunak supporter dominic raab who is currently justice minister had penned itraab has subsequently said the writers of the book which also included several other senior conservative ministers had agreed collective responsibility over its contentsin the leaked audio truss who backed remaining in the european union during the divisive 2016 referendum before subsequently becoming a brexit supporter also appeared to suggest the bloc and migration are unfairly criticisedwe say its all europe thats causing all these problems its all its migrants thats causing problemsbut actually what needs to happen is you know a bit more graft she said with a laugh before adding its not a popular messagea truss campaign source branded the leaked comments halfadecadeold and lacking context while acknowledging that britain does need to boost productivityas prime minister liz will deliver an economy that is high wage high growth and low tax the source addedmeanwhile at the outset of the hustings event in the scottish city perth both candidates reiterated their opposition to another referendum on scottish independence after scots voted narrowly in 2014 to stay in the ukfirst minister nicola sturgeons snp argues that brexit has transformed the constitutional debate and wants to hold a second plebiscite in october 2023sunak said he couldnt imagine the circumstances in which he would grant another referendumthe supreme court in london plans to hold hearings on october 1112 this year on whether that would be legal without approval from