A Boris Johnson comeback is ridiculous – but not impossible

It would obviously be ridiculous for the Conservatives to dump Liz Truss after just a few weeks and seek to re-install Boris Johnson as prime minister. To do such a thing would be akin to what the producers of the 1980s TV series Dallas did after realising they had made a horrendous mistake by killing off Bobby Ewing: writing a script for the next series in which the assassination was depicted as a dream had by his wife Pam.

The Tories would be asking the British electorate, in effect, to observe Boris walking out of the shower, into his luxuriantly wallpapered boudoir and telling a dumbstruck Carrie: ‘I’ve got to go and talk to Rishi about the economy. I say, are you OK? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.’

Totally ridiculous, credibility-shredding, shark-jumping stuff. And yet, suddenly not necessarily a worse option than sticking with Truss.

Despite the new premier’s perfectly serviceable conference speech, the catastrophic political damage brought about by the mini-Budget appears to be lasting.