Laughter fills the pauses as blank Liz Truss is let out to play leader | John Crace

The ghouls gathered, not wanting to miss the action, but it could have been so much worse

It was excruciating. Of course it was. It was never going to be otherwise. Liz Truss is finished. Her MPs know it. The country knows it. We're all just filling in time waiting for a definite sell-by date. Waiting for the Tory party to do the humane thing.

So much for compassionate conservatism. Right now the kindest thing anyone could do is switch off Librium Liz's life support. Instead they let her stagger on, humiliating herself more by the day. And all because no one can yet work out how to replace her. Or with whom.