Prime Minister Liz Truss has resigned after less than six weeks in the job, and amid chaos in the economy.

KentOnline reporter Alex Jee met the ill-fated future PM during her leadership campaign, little knowing she would become the shortest-serving premier in British history. Here is what happened....

One sunny afternoon in Sevenoaks, I found myself in a sun-lit garden, waiting for the arrival of a political hopeful.

Liz Truss was gracing Kent with her presence on a whirlwind tour to drum up support ahead of the leadership hustings against Rishi Sunak.

Many of the 30 or 40 people in the garden – most of them Conservative party members – were speaking about how the incoming politician was destined to go down in history.

And how right they were.

After around an hour of awkward chatting – I was very much undercover as a reporter, after attempts to get press passes fell extremely flat – an excited man ran into the garden.

"There was an awkward silence... I caught one lady muttering 'really?' under her breath"

Red in the face and practically vibrating with excitement, had previously spoken to me about the need to "keep the wrong people – the reporters – out".

"She's almost here, everyone!" he declared, gathering everyone at the foot of the garden.

"What I was thinking, is that we could all line up and form sort of a guard of honour, applaud her in," he suggested.

There was an awkward silence, and a few chuckles. I caught one lady muttering "really?" under her breath.

What Ms Truss found instead was an awkward semi-circle of keen supporters – and one journalist hoping to get a question in before being ousted. But more on that in a moment.

While she was taken around to shake hands and pose for photos, there was little gravitas or sense of occasion, just the feeling that this was somebody out to try and make a good impression.

She posed with me for a photograph – and here, a quick shout out to the KentOnline commenter who said we looked alike – but was whisked away very quickly afterwards.

She made a brief speech, describing Kent as "the best – of course – of the Home Counties", before launching through a checklist of issues she wanted to address, which were well received, albeit unsurprising.

Eventually, it came to the questions. When I identified myself as a reporter, I was pleased to not find myself frogmarched out – although I did notice a posture change from the future PM. It was less friendly, more obfuscating.

I pushed her on what she would do to address the issues in Dover that had been seen over the preceding days, as well as the chaos that is constantly inflicted on the M20 by Operation Brock.

Her response was fairly uninspiring, answering roughly half the question and swerving Operation Brock entirely.

"I actually have a phone call due with the French foreign minister to resolve the border issues because the French are not putting enough resources into it," she said, looking around and geeing up her supporters to try and support her answer.

"We need to get that sorted straight away – she was due to call me last night, I'm afraid she didn't, so I am on her tail at the moment."

Shortly afterwards, she left to continue her whirlwind tour of the county, before – ironically – being forced to cancel her final stop in Folkestone due to the carnage in Dover.

I was left fairly non-plussed. She seemed like an OK person, as a person, but... unimpressive.

I certainly had no idea that she would leave quite the mark on history that she has.