Kwarteng’s sacking is a warning to his successor

Kwasi Kwarteng’s sacking is brutal – and he was sacked as his letter makes clear. He was a chancellor who wanted to say yes to the Prime Minister, he deliberately did not try and build a power base for himself. But he has now been removed without ceremony, sacked even before he had returned to Downing Street. He will feel bruised, and understandably so.

Whoever succeeds Kwarteng is going to take a very different approach. They are going to demand control over economic policy and they are going to install their own people in the Treasury and try and build up their own position. They will be acutely aware that if Truss can jettison her closest ideological ally, and one of her best friends, then they will need to take steps to secure their own position.