Who will Liz Truss forgive?

Liz Truss has always been more popular with Tory party members than with Tory politicians. The moment of greatest peril for her in the Conservative leadership race was when MPs were whittling down the final two candidates.

After being knocked out in the second round, Suella Braverman urged her Brexiteer backers to get behind the Foreign Secretary. Many refused to do so and instead supported Kemi Badenoch, which meant that Truss’s vote count only went up by seven MPs. The momentum could have moved to Badenoch, then behind by just 13. ‘It was the most stressful point of the contest,’ recalls a supporter of the Foreign Secretary.

Eventually Truss made it to the final two and united the right of the party behind her. She now looks on course to enter No. 10 in just under two weeks’ time. A government-in–waiting is being assembled at Chevening, her grace-and-favour home, where aides duck in and out for meetings. Access to the prime minister-to-be is limited as plans are finalised and staffing decisions made.

But to have any hope of making it past the spring, Truss needs to win over sceptical MPs. Of all the problems facing the next prime minister – from economic Armageddon to the NHS – one that should not be under-estimated is managing an unruly parliamentary party in which even now just over a third of MPs back Truss.

Recent events have demonstrated that Tory MPs are a rebellious bunch. Boris Johnson won a very personal mandate and commanded a majority of 80, but was thrown out after less than three years. Many of the 2019 intake care little for parliamentary convention; instead, they prioritise their own brand of politics. Meanwhile, the more senior ranks are filled with former ministers who believe their careers are all but over. Michael Gove has admitted this, and Dominic Raab is likely to be next.