Can she go on riding the storm?

Several papers are leading with the immigration row this morning and the story does not seem to be going away.

After her commons statement yesterday the home secretary and most senior women in Cameron’s government, Theresa May, will be back at Westminster in a few hours facing questions from the home affairs select committee.

To me the most significant element of yesterday was the way that David Cameron sat by her as she faced an onslaught of questions. The PM seems to have decided that losing one Tory cabinet minister in the past month (Fox) is enough and he’ll go on backing May.

What makes this so politically difficult is that immigration is such a sensitive area – particularly with Conservative voters. In October seven times as many of them told MORI that this was a key issue compared with Europe.

It’s also an area where the Tories have traditionally been seen to be much stronger than Labour

Ladbrokes have brought the Theresa May next cabinet exit price in from 16/1 to 7/1. Other bookies have her at 8/1.

In all of the cabinet exit speculation the record shows that the vast majority of vulnerable ministers survive. Unless something more damaging comes up my sense is that she’ll see it out.

@MikeSmithsonPB