Truss is in a stronger position than Thatcher – for now

People used to understand that they were ageing when they noticed police officers in their neighbourhood looking unfeasibly young. Given that nobody ever sees a police officer on foot patrol these days, a new benchmark for startling youthfulness needs to be identified. After Liz Truss unveiled her top ministerial team yesterday perhaps ex-cabinet members could serve the purpose.

Because Dominic Raab (48), George Eustice (50), Grant Shapps (53) and Priti Patel (50) have just joined the bulging ranks of former cabinet ministers to have moved from young thrusters to backbench elders with, in one or two cases, no discernible period of achievement in between.

At least nobody can say that the line-up chosen by Truss is ‘male, pale and stale’. In fact, she is the only surviving member of David Cameron’s cabinet of just six years ago.

Truss must have heard advice from assorted pundits and Tory grandees that she should assemble a top team of all the talents, representing every wing of the parliamentary party and including high-profile supporters of her rival Rishi Sunak and one or two greybeards from former regimes: heard it and then completely ignored it.

Instead, she chose to reward her own supporters with a clean sweep of plum roles and cast out those who had crossed her, either in the leadership contest or at any point before it.