TMay doesn’t need reminding. Within a month of making his CON 2003 conference speech IDS was ousted.
And he hadn’t lost an election
According to the Indy 15 CON MPs have sent no confidence letter to the the Chair of the 1922 committee. This is part of the party’s formal process for ousting a leader. If 48 such letters are received then there would have to be a confidence vote amongst the parliamentary party.
All this is reminiscent of what happened to Iain Duncan Smith in October 2003. Sufficient letters went in and there was a vote which saw the end of his leadership and the election, without having to face a contest, of Michael Howard.
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What looks decidedly challenging for the prime minister is the Conservative conference in the first week in October. This ends with the leader’s speech and what could be crucial for her future is how well that is received
IDS’s speech, as in the clip above, was very well received by the conference with more than a dozen standing ovations and applause that lasted for a staggering eight minutes afterwards – which is something of a record.
That was no guide, however, to what was going to happen. His fate was sealed.
She is at her best when she is talking TO an audience and far worse when she is having to interact as we saw during the general election campaign.
Based on the Duncan Smith experience in 2003 we should not take too much notice of the number or length of standing ovations. At the end of that speech the audience applauded the leader for more than eight minutes which I believe was a record that has never been exceeded.
This did not prevent the letters going in and the formal challenge and ultimate end of his leadership.
I tend to agree with Nick Palmer’s post before the weekend that TMay will probably survive but this is far from certain.