Like him or not, Sunak is still the best option for the Tory party

Editorial: Simon Clarke launched a scathing attack on the prime minister – without considering what the future would look like for the Conservatives without him

(Dave Brown)

At first sight, it is difficult to know quite what the obscure former cabinet minister Sir Simon Clarke thought he would achieve by calling for the prime minister to be replaced by someone else (as yet unspecified – an important detail if installing a new premier is being contemplated).

Presumably, he doesn’t have in mind such idiosyncratic personalities as, say, the rebarbative Lee Anderson, the eccentric Sir Desmond Swayne, or the lavishly coiffed Sir Michael Fabricant.

A little less fancifully, Sir Simon has long been recognised as Liz Truss’s vicar on Earth, yet his mentor herself has let it be known, presumably sincerely, that she doesn’t support his intervention. Even she might think it’s a little too early for a return to No 10.