Under fierce fire from journalists, Ms Truss refused to apologise for ‚trashing‘ the Tories‘ reputation – before abruptly walking out after eight minutes and just four question.

Downing Street will now be waiting anxiously to see if the PM has done enough to cling on, but the early response was not promising, with one former Cabinet minister telling MailOnline the PM had been ‚robotic‘ and made the situation far worse.