Conference throat of no-confidence

POLITICS is a cruel business, as Theresa May found out in spectacular style yesterday.

The beleaguered Prime Minister needed a barnstorming conference speech to have any chance of reasserting her authority over the warring Conservative Party.

Instead, she coughed and spluttered through a nightmarish address that literally saw her given a P45 by a prankster in the audience.

In an astonishing security breach, the comedian Simon Brodkin managed to approach the lectern and hand her the document without being tackled.

But even without that stunt, this would still have been one of the most disastrous conference speeches in living memory.

May stopped time and again to drink from her glass of water as she struggled with a sore throat.

Cringing Tory delegates repeatedly burst into lengthy applause to allow her time to rest her voice and Chancellor Philip Hammond even handed her a throat sweet.

At times, it looked as if the words might stop coming altogether.

To cap it off, towards the end of the tortuous hour-long speech, letters began to fall from the slogan emblazoned on the wall behind her onstage.

The whole event was such a shambles it was almost tempting to feel sorry for her. That would be a mistake. This is the PM who is pushing through a damaging hard Brexit and continuing the Tories’ brutal assault on welfare. She could well be the most accident-prone PM in history but she deserves no sympathy.

Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson tried to portray the episode as symbolic of May’s strength under adversity.

It just underlined she is a completely unsuited to the role of prime minister and should really be put out of her misery.