This week has seen a dramatic development that has taken the Westminster Village by surprise: Britain suddenly has an identifiable successor to Boris Johnson.
Liz Truss is going to become our third female prime minister at the start of September. What was expected by many to be a tight race between her and Rishi Sunak, which could sway one way and then the other before being settled by a knife-edge vote among grassroots Tories, has turned into a one-sided competition.
On every conceivable metric, Truss has steamrollered Sunak since they were confirmed as the final two in the race just ten days or so ago – polling of the membership, performances in televised debates and hustings, the orderly laying-out of a consistent agenda, senior endorsements, bookies’ odds and lately even ratings among the public at large.
With ballot papers about to land on the doormats of around 200,000 Conservative members and experience telling us most will be returned within a week, there is simply no time for Sunak to turn the tide towards Truss around, even should he hit a campaigning purple patch immediately.
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