Former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern has said that British Prime Minister Liz Truss will not recover from the unpopular decisions made early in her premiership.

However, Mr Ahern believes things are looking up for Northern Ireland.

Speaking on The Anton Savage Show, he said they are close to achieving a deal on the Northern Ireland protocol.

"We'd love to tell your listeners that everything is hunky dory - it's not."

"Really what's happened is now is they have working documents and they've just began the process of looking at where we go from here", he explained.

The protocol

"It was going to go that people had been associated very much with the [European Research Group], that they were going to say 'well, listen, this is our position and we're doing nothing'", Mr Ahern said.

"The UK would have continued on the argument for political purposes with the EU."

"I know some people on our side of it did have that fear and still have that fear."

He believes that Liz Truss and her team have a positive attitude towards finding a compromise to the Northern Ireland protocol.

Boris Johnson

According to Ahern, Liz Truss's government has a "totally different attitude" to that of Boris Johnson when he was Prime Minister.

"He negotiated the withdrawal agreement, the protocol was part of the withdrawal agreement, which Boris conveniently wanted to forget all the time."

"The British government, the change in leadership, even though they came from the ERG side, have taken a different view, and that is heartening."

"It's not going to make these negotiations , but when you remove the hostility and the animosity and the enmity out of all these, it removes a lot of the tension."

"Hopefully that will continue in a positive fashion over the next number of weeks."

Liz Truss

On whether Truss can survive a full term, Mr Ahern said: "I think she will recover. Will she recover totally? Unfortunately, two years is a short time and the €45 billion will be thrown back at her all the time."

"It was a daft way of starting, but hopefully up and running now."

Tax, energy and health were three of Truss's major focuses while on the campaign trail.

"The most amazing thing is that she went around the country and she beat her opponent to a pulp by saying she was going to cut taxes."

Mr Ahern described Truss's decision to give a €45 billion tax cut without consulting her cabinet as "extraordinary".

He believes that the Labour Party "have a very good chance" of winning the next general election which will likely be held within the next two year.

"I do not believe that the Tory Party will turn around and change leader again."

"There is a good betting chance [Truss] will be there for the two years", he said.