Why Liz Truss had to go

The Liz Truss survival plan was, in the end, unworkable. She not only hired her enemies – Grant Shapps and Jeremy Hunt – but let them govern: tearing up her policies, while she held on in No. 10. She thought the Tory right had no candidate to replace her with and the Tory left would be happy because there had been a Cameroon restoration. So yes, it was a humiliation – but one that was supposed to keep her in post.

Could it last? Earlier this week I spoke to several MPs who could see Truss surviving in this way, as Theresa May did after the 2017 election. Staggering on, zombie-like, politically undead, waiting for her party to agree on who to succeed her. Given how divided they are, that could be a very long wait.

But yesterday was a shambles: some of the most disgraceful scenes ever seen in parliament. They made her carrying on unviable. Earlier in the day, she sacked her Home Secretary for sending an email from the wrong account. That was never a credible story: the two fought over immigration and Suella Braverman had the manifesto on her side. Truss had not, in the end, assembled a coalition around her policies. It was a political cage fight – which risked becoming a real fight in the voting lobbies. MPs were being threatened with the sack unless they voted against their manifesto on fracking. It was bedlam. No. 10 had no authority, given that Truss was a prisoner of Hunt. So in the end it came down to this: if Truss has renounced Trussism, what was left?

There was no answer, and there was a risk that every day would bring deeper humiliation. The wheels fell off yesterday, and Truss had to accept that her game was over. 

No, the Tories aren’t ready to work out what would come next. But this week’s appalling scenes showed that they no longer have this luxury.