Why Tory rows are back on display

Not even a week on from the last blast of noisy public rowing in the Conservative Party - here they go again.

Sir Simon Clarke, a former cabinet minister, has become the second Tory MP to publicly call for Rishi Sunak to go. Dame Andrea Jenkyns was the first, late last year.

So what does this intervention mean?

If I had drawn up a list a week ago of those most likely to publicly call for the prime minister to pack it in, Sir Simon would have been pretty near, if not at the top.

He has been publicly critical for some time. He was one of the 11 rebels in the crunch Rwanda vote last week. He backed Mr Sunak's leadership rival Liz Truss early on and served in her cabinet.

Nonetheless, it is still quite a moment when an MP goes public like this - and is critical in the strongest possible terms.

It is quite a moment because they know what their remarks will provoke - another almighty row.

Sir Simon has said as much, as he shared a link to his article in the Daily Telegraph.

"I know I will be attacked for saying this. Perhaps even accused of positioning myself or on behalf of another - emphatically neither of which I am doing. I am speaking out because the stakes for our country and my party are too high to stay silent."

Sure enough, being strongly criticised by fellow Conservatives is precisely what is now happening.

Sir Simon's article picks up on the conclusions of a poll published by the Telegraph which suggests while Mr Sunak would be heavily defeated in a general election by Sir Keir Starmer, a Conservative leader willing to be tougher on immigration and focused on tax cuts could beat Labour.

The poll was commissioned, the Telegraph said, by a group called the Conservative Britain Alliance. The Tory peer Lord Frost, another noted critic of Rishi Sunak, worked on it too.

The public backlash was instant: two knights and a dame, all three former cabinet ministers, going for Sir Simon: Sir David Davis, Sir Liam Fox and Dame Priti Patel variously calling his actions "silly," "self indulgent," "facile" and "divisive."

A senior Conservative spokesman added "this is a self-indulgent attempt to undermine the government at a critical moment for the country. He may claim to be helping the party but the only person he is doing any favours for is Sir Keir Starmer".

But let's be clear: Sir Simon is not the only Conservative MP who reads the current situation for the Tories as he does.

As one ally put it: "This is about one brave MP speaking the truth. What everyone knows but won't say out loud. Rishi is killing the party's chance of a respectable election result. Others will take their time to think about the arguments and party's options."

The big question now is this: do any others, who share his views privately, go public in a steady drip-drip designed to undermine Rishi Sunak and so sap his authority, his credibility? Or does it fizzle out?

If you have a penchant for - a relatively recent - historical comparison, rewind 14 years.

Two former Labour cabinet ministers, Patricia Hewitt and Geoff Hoon, called on Gordon Brown to go, but the whole thing petered out.

It didn't end well for Gordon Brown some months later at the general election, but the attempt to topple him didn't end well either.

Liz Truss and Boris Johnson, though, would say you don't need a decade-and-a-half of political memory to recall moments more recent when momentum did build, for the latter quickly, for the former much more slowly, which in the end did do for them.

One senior Conservative figure remarked to me the other day while it looks like the imminent election will spell doom for Rishi Sunak, its very imminence is his best friend in protecting his job between now and then.

It was, this figure thought, too late for the party to change leader yet again and for any replacement to make any mark other than making the party look ridiculous.

Well, let's see where this goes.

One last thing. I wrote here last week the Conservative election strategist Issac Levido had pleaded with MPs "divided parties fail. It is time to get serious".

The divisions were never going to go away. But, they are back on public display yet again - and for a simple reason. Conservative MPs are worried they are going to lose and, quite possibly, lose big time.

So they are stewing.

Don't make it worse, say some. It can't get any worse, fear others - Sir Simon Clarke among them. That is what we are now seeing play out, privately - and in public.