Ditching PM would make Tories look like a maniacal cult

WE DIDN'T need the local election results to tell us that the Conservatives are in deep trouble and their chance of winning the next election is vanishingly small.

- Ross Clark

WE DIDN'T need the local election results to tell us that the Conservatives are in deep trouble and their chance of winning the next election is vanishingly small. Nevertheless, there is plenty of evidence that Tory plotters have been waiting for this weekend to try to depose the Prime Minister.

This, they believe, is their last-gasp opportunity to try to change voters' minds.

A new leader with a new set of policies aimed at aggrieved voters, goes their thinking, might be just what it takes to deprive Labour of victory.

But they are deluding themselves. The idea the Conservative party could win votes by swapping leaders would have some force if the same Prime Minister had been in post for the past decade.

Sunak, however, has been in Downing Street for just over 18 months. His predecessor lasted 49 days and the previous two, only three years each.

Ditching yet another premier prematurely wouldn't impress anyone outside the party, instead making the Tories look like a maniacal, regicidal cult.

Calls for an immediate general election would drown out any good ideas that candidates might have it is extraordinary that some Conservatives have not realised this.